ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, March 28, 1996 TAG: 9603280037
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-9 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: ROBERT FREIS STAFF WRITER
For a footpath designed to follow an old railroad track, it's been a long and winding road for the Huckleberry Trail.
Six years after the idea for the recreational trail originated, construction will begin next week on the project's first phase.
Mounds of paperwork and a gantlet of regulatory hurdles delayed the beginning of work.
By fall, however, bikers and walkers should be able to use about three new miles of the trail between Blacksburg and the intersection of Merrimac and Hightop roads.
To celebrate, project organizers plan a groundbreaking ceremony for 3 p.m. April 4 on the trail at its present terminus near Country Club Drive.
Last month the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors approved a $366,576 contract for L.H. Sawyer Paving Co. of Salem to begin work. They'll be grading and paving the trail's course, 8 to 10 feet wide with 2-foot compacted dirt shoulders. The route generally follows an old railroad spur that connected Blacksburg to Cambria.
Bids haven't been advertised for phase two, which will extend the Huckleberry Trail from Merrimac to the New River Valley Mall. Cost increases, land acquisition and bridge design delayed progress in that section and may delay its completion for another year.
Eventually the trail will run about six miles between the mall and the Blacksburg branch library. Later it may be extended to Christiansburg's new recreation center and beyond.
Over the past two years about $700,000 in federal grant money has been allocated to help build the trail, but governmental red tape blocked access to spending it until recent months. Project-supporting funds have also been raised from local industries, private donations and local governments.
Now, finally, organizers say that citizens will be seeing visible progress as construction begins. They've invited local government officials to don hard hats and wield golden shovels at the groundbreaking.
LENGTH: Short : 43 linesby CNB