Bike Walk RVA Fall Update: Fall-ing in Love with the Fall Line
By: Brantley Tyndall, Director of Bike Walk RVA
Ah, there’s a crispness in the air to enliven your biking and walking this autumn season, and we are excited to share Bike Walk RVA’s quarterly update on biking and walking developments in the Richmond region!
Fall Line Trailblazer
Back for the fourth year, Sports Backers’ Fall Line Trailblazer donation drive is live for the month of October! This is your opportunity to support the work we do to advocate for the Fall Line across seven localities. Donations at certain levels receive limited-edition gifts so you can sport your pride for the Fall Line! On October 19, we will be hosting three guided hikes in various sections of the future Fall Line, so register today to sign up and see what this transformational trail is all about!
Bryan Park
The Fall Line has broken ground in Bryan Park! This brings the count of localities with an active construction project to over half of the seven Fall Line localities, now including Richmond, Henrico, Hanover, and Ashland! The route through Bryan Park will connect the most important places in the park, including the new bathrooms, playground, ball fields, tennis courts, and shelters with a new ADA-accessible path where people need it the most.
You can see some more discussion of the Fall Line through Bryan Park in our October Friends of the Fall Line meeting recording below.
As a way to implement projects outlined in the Fall Line Vision Plan such as shade-bearing trees and landscaping to support beautification along the Fall Line as it is developed, we are looking for volunteers to help plant trees in Bryan Park on October 17 from 4 to 6 PM in conjunction with Richmond Tree Week!
Register to volunteer here, and show up ready to put some substantial trees in the ground. What fun!
Continual work on replacing the Mayo Bridge
VDOT hosted a Citizen Information Meeting in September to show the first draft concepts of the future replacement of the Mayo Bridge, a bridge in desperate need of modern, high quality dedicated biking and walking infrastructure. This once-in-a-lifetime bridge replacement will determine the look, feel, and access of the adjoining neighborhoods for the next 100 years, so we have to ensure we get it right for people biking and walking. There’s still a lot of work to do, but it’s clear the community came out to support protected bike lanes in this coverage by the Richmonder!
However, the survey is still open until October 11, so jump in there to support better protected bike lanes, traffic calming, and reduced travel lanes!
Bike Lanes!
The bike lane on Westover Hills Blvd is finally under construction! Here’s a nice pic from South Richmond News, and look at that perfectly parked car! Connecting bike lanes are also being added north of the Nickel bridge on Blanton Ave and Park Drive.
Richmond has published surveys related to new bike lanes on Franklin St., Hull St., Leigh St., Warwick Rd, and beyond. Check out the list of active projects at Richmond DPW’s bike/ped webpage.
Richmond Parks Survey
Richmond Parks Recreation and Community Facilities has launched a new master planning effort for city parks called Richmond Inspire. Take a look and respond to the community survey by November 5. Accessibility to parks is a big theme here, and there’s a lot we can contribute to biking and walking to and in parks across Richmond!