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wider thanks to a $300,000 refurbishing, said George Washington Memorial
Parkway Superintendent Audrey Calhoun.
Grass had grown over the asphalt, Calhoun said, squeezing the nine-foot-wide
trail down to five feet of pavement in many places.
Workers scaled back the grass, repaved the surface and re-seeded at the
edges.
Three more infusions of $300,000 are expected, Calhoun said, and the aim is
to continue upgrading the 25-year-old trail, moving next to the Mount Vernon
end.
"We'll go as far as the money goes," she said.
Alexandria, Arlington and Fairfax all plan to create new trails.
Alexandria and Arlington are awaiting word on federal funds, which the
localities would have to supplement.
Alexandria would use its $648,000 in federal funds to start building a 4
1/2-mile path parallel to Eisenhower Avenue. The path would run from Van
Dorn Street to Payne Avenue, said Bruce Dwyer, a Parks and Recreation
commissioner who chairs the city's Bicycle Study Committee.
If the grant comes through this summer, Dwyer said, the central two miles of
the trail would be ready in two or three years. The end sections could not
be completed until the city received permission from various developers who
own pieces of land near the roadway.
If Arlington County gets its $140,000 from Uncle Sam, it will add a small
connector to its already extensive trails. A rough dirt path near the
Pentagon would be paved, creating a 3,500-foot-long asphalt trail from the
Pentagon's north parking area to Memorial Drive, near the Arlington National
Cemetery Metrorail station.
The purpose of the short segment, according to James Hamre, Arlington's
transit program coordinator, is to provide "a connector between where people
are, in other words along Columbia Pike, and where they want to be--the
Mount Vernon bike trail."
If Fairfax County Supervisor Gerald E. Connolly (D-Providence) gets his way,
cyclists or hikers will be able to go 31 miles, from Lorton to Great Falls,
on the Fairfax Cross-County Trail.
The great majority of the trail is in place, Connolly said, but there are
gaps that total nearly five miles along it, and what exists is poorly
marked.
Connolly is asking his colleagues to support the project, which comes with a
price tag of $1 million to $2 million, he said.
"This is such an achievable goal," he said. "It's a great opportunity not
only to preserve but to champion open space in the county."
The trail would cross every one of the county's nine magisterial districts,
a helpful fact politically speaking, Connolly said, and would connect to the
W&OD Trail, the Fairfax City trails and the Occoquan Trail.
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