Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, January 10, 1995 TAG: 9501120017
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: ROBERT FREIS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
This month, People Advocating the Huckleberry - PATH - will be seeking more money from local governments, private sources and grants for the proposed six-mile, multipurpose footpath between Blacksburg and the New River Valley Mall.
The trail project received a $453,000 grant in October 1993. Supporters predicted that amount and about $120,000 raised locally would be enough money to finish the trail in a year.
However, construction has been delayed by federal regulations that have forced trail redesigns to avoid environmentally sensitive areas and accommodate handicapped users.
Meanwhile, economic conditions changed. Contractors are busier and materials such as gravel and asphalt have become significantly more expensive.
"I'm sure there are a lot of people who think that should have gotten the job done," Lance Terpenny, chairman of PATH's engineering committee, said of the Huckleberry Trail's original fund cache. "But there was no way to realize what the regulations were."
Among the estimated increased costs cited by PATH are:
$118,000 in construction material and contract labor
$79,000 for three trail bridges, including a structure over active Norfolk Southern railroad tracks near Merrimac
$63,000 for a 40-foot underpass beneath a road on Virginia Tech agricultural land
$53,000 for trail alignments which would avoid wetlands or archeological sites and lessen grades to meet Americans with Disabilities Act standards.
"That's a whole lot of hoops to jump through," Terpenny said. With private instead of public funds, the Huckleberry Trail probably would be already completed, he added.
This month, PATH will file a grant request with the Virginia Department of Transportation, the same agency that approved the original grant in 1993.
Also, town councils in Christiansburg and Blacksburg and the Montgomery Board of Supervisors will be asked to contribute more money.
PATH plans to ask the state for about $248,000. As part of a local match totaling $62,000, funds will be sought from town councils in Christiansburg and Blacksburg, the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors, and private sources such as the Friends of the Huckleberry organization.
Last week, Christiansburg Town Council referred PATH's request for $7,500 in 1995 and again in 1996 to its Finance Committee.
If the grant comes through and local governments give the trail project additional money, Terpenny said construction may begin by September. "We hope we can hold to that."
PATH has yet to satisfy all the environmental requirements and reviews of the Huckleberry Trail, a bureaucratic delay that has held up access to the original $453,000 grant.
"It's making it awfully hard," Terpenny said.
A public hearing on PATH's grant request to the Virginia Department of Transportation will be held Jan. 23 at the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors' meeting.
by CNB