Huntsville has approved a $910,375 contract to design the next stretch of the North Huntsville Greenway, a roughly 4,500-foot segment that will eventually link the city's transit center to trails already woven through the Pinhook Creek corridor. The city council's approval sets engineering work in motion for what's known as Segment C, running between Holmes Avenue and Pratt Avenue.
The Huntsville City Council approved the contract with Barge Design Solutions Inc. for engineering services on the segment, according to AL.com. The stretch runs parallel to Pinhook Creek and is designed to connect the transit center to the current Pedestrian Access and Redevelopment Corridor greenways near the creek, as reported by WHNT.
The scope of work goes beyond basic design. The contract covers surveying, permitting and design of two precast pedestrian bridges — one crossing Dallas Branch, the other spanning Pinhook Creek — plus a gateway trailhead, per the same station's report. City officials expect that design and permitting work to wrap up within two years, though the timeline covers only the contract itself and doesn't set a date for when the segment would open to walkers and cyclists.
Permitting Crosses Multiple Jurisdictions
Getting shovels in the ground will require sign-off from more than just the city. Kathy Martin, Huntsville's senior director of engineering, said permitting for the segment will involve the Alabama Department of Transportation, Norfolk Railroad and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers — a trio of agencies whose review timelines aren't spelled out in what's been made public so far.
That layered approval process reflects how much territory the North Huntsville Greenway is meant to cover. The broader project is intended to connect downtown Huntsville to Alabama A&M University, with the stated goal of spurring recreation, redevelopment and reinvestment in the neighborhoods the path passes through, WHNT reports.
A Multi-Phase Push With a Price Tag Attached
Segment C is just one piece of a larger buildout. The first phase, connecting Holmes Avenue to Pratt Avenue, is estimated to cost up to $13 million, according to WAFF. The city is pursuing a federal grant to help cover that cost and plans to use money already set aside through the downtown tax increment financing district as a local match, the station notes.
Two additional phases are planned beyond that first stretch, extending the route from Pratt Avenue to Oakwood and then from Oakwood to Sparkman, per WAFF's reporting. The long-term vision ties it all together into one continuous route, with the eventual goal of connecting Alabama A&M, downtown Huntsville and Ditto Landing.
Part of a Broader Trail-Building Streak
The Segment C contract lands amid a steady run of greenway spending across the city. Last August, the council approved three contracts totaling $3.8 million for greenway trails and a railroad bridge replacement, AL.com reported at the time, including a $1.8 million deal with the Rogers Group to build a 1.5-mile, 12-foot-wide multiuse path near Alabama A&M. That same round of approvals included a $321,000 contract with CSR Engineering for design work on replacing the Peter Fagan Railroad Bridge over Pinhook Creek.
More recently, in February, the council approved a 2.4-mile path near Bailey Cove and Four Mile Post roads and a 1.6-mile second phase of the Miller Branch Greenway, with the Bailey Cove project drawing roughly $800,000 in federal Transportation Alternatives Program funding toward its roughly $1.8 million cost, according to the outlet's coverage. Huntsville's push toward a far larger trail network has been underway for years: the city's Greenway Master Plan was first adopted in 2006 and updated in 2017, according to The Redstone Rocket, which notes the city is now prioritizing projects that can be built quickly and cost-effectively, sometimes using gravel paths as interim solutions before paving.
Just how big that network already is depends on which source you ask. AL.com reported in February that Huntsville had approximately 130 miles of greenways, bikeways and trails, while the Huntsville Business Journal has put the figure at more than 73 miles with a long-term goal of 300 miles, and the City of Huntsville's own trails page references a revised system of 312 miles of interconnected trails. The discrepancies aren't reconciled in available reporting, but the direction is the same across every account: more trail mileage is coming, and Segment C is the latest piece of that expansion to get a green light.
