Greenway seen as link between downtown, West Side

A NEW PATH: A rendering of ideas to improve the lower Woonasquatucket River (near Bath Street), including restored native vegetation, bankside walkway, “floating island” of aquatic water-cleansing plants and serpentine dock. / COURTESY BIRCHWOOD DESIGN GROUP
A NEW PATH: A rendering of ideas to improve the lower Woonasquatucket River (near Bath Street), including restored native vegetation, bankside walkway, “floating island” of aquatic water-cleansing plants and serpentine dock. / COURTESY BIRCHWOOD DESIGN GROUP

More than 20 years after the Fred Lippitt Woonasquatucket River Greenway project in Providence was launched, the river and its surroundings can still look a little unloved.
But progress to restore the waterway, expand the Greenway and turn it into a well-used link between downtown and the West Side is picking up pace again in concert with the city’s recent efforts to become more bicycle- and pedestrian-friendly.
This fall the state transportation department is completing two construction projects that will expand connections to the existing off-road walking and cycling trail that runs northwest of Olneyville Square.
It’s part of a larger goal of making a dedicated, nearly six-mile bicycle and pedestrian route from downtown to the Johnston line, which along with the city’s ongoing zoning rewrite and a plan to create a bicycle-sharing system, is intended to make it less automobile-reliant.
Supporters hope that the Greenway will also stimulate investment in Olneyville and surrounding West Side neighborhoods, which are still adjusting to the decline of once-defining heavy industry.
“One focus is strengthening the connection between downtown Providence, Eagle Square and Olneyville,” said Lisa Aurecchia, program director of the Woonasquatucket River Watershed Council, which has led the Greenway effort for years. “Clearly if we are creating view corridors and a shared walking path for these mill buildings, where right now people don’t have open space, it will add capital value.”
The Greenway projects come after the city has done a series of beautification projects in Olneyville Square, such as hanging flower baskets, and putting up new streetlights and banners. The Square One committee of local businesses and organizations has also started trying to market the area.
And next spring the Olneyville Housing Corp. hopes to begin work on the $30 million redevelopment of the 120,000-square foot Paragon Mill into commercial space for local small businesses. One of the last large mill buildings still standing in Olneyville that hasn’t been renovated already, the Paragon hangs right over the Woonasquatucket at Delaine Street near one of the new bicycle path sections.
That new section will include an off-street trail starting at Donigion Park on Valley Street and, after crossing through the park, follows the river behind Rising Sun Mills to Sonoma Court.
The most-prominent feature of the trail is a new bridge installed at the end of September that crosses the river at the site of a fish ladder built by the Watershed Council in 2005.
The work is being done under a $1.3 million contract with Lucena Brothers Inc. of Woonsocket and is expected to be completed by the end the year, according to R.I. Department of Transportation spokeswoman Rose Amoros.
The second new section connects the Hartford neighborhood west of Olneyville with the existing Greenway path and Button Hole Golf Course.
The new spur will start in Merino Park and move west across the park and a former brownfield site to Glenbridge Avenue, where it will cross Route 6 and then run along the golf course until meeting the existing path.
Work on that section is being done by Cardi Corp. under a $1.6 million contract.
The existing Greenway itself just reopened this summer after being closed for the Narragansett Bay Commission’s combined-sewer-overflow project.
Even with the two new bike-path extensions, pedestrians and cyclists in downtown Providence still have to navigate a winding course of traffic-filled on-street routes to get to Olneyville and the off-road Greenway.
Using federal Community Development Block Grant money, the Watershed Council is planning to solicit bids for new signs and markers directing people to the bike path.
After that, the next step will be the larger task of setting up a dedicated pedestrian and bicycle path between the mall and Eagle Square.
Not everyone agrees exactly where that path should go. Right now the official bike path follows the river (Promenade Street to Kinsley Avenue,) but commuting cyclists often take Harris Avenue because it’s more direct and goes underneath Dean Street, a busy four-lane highway.
But the Watershed Council, as you would expect, wants to focus on the river.
To get things going, Birchwood Design Group, landscape architects whose offices are on Dike Street in Olneyville, have been working on new designs for the bikeway that include an “all-of-the-above” strategy.
Birchwood’s plan includes narrowing the automobile right-of-way along the current Greenway route on Promenade Street, Providence Place and Kinsley Avenue to allow bike and pedestrian paths.
Then where the current path now follows the south bank of the river, the Birchwood design would also complete the partially built path on the north bank of the river at the American Locomotive Works building.
That path was supposed to go all the way from Acorn Street to Eagle Street, but only a mostly hidden section behind ALCO was finished before financial trouble for developer Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse cut it short.
And finally, Birchwood would add an official bike lane to Harris Avenue, so commuters and cyclists on longer journeys could use the more-direct route, while pedestrians and more leisurely cyclists could enjoy the river.
“It really feels like a highway system instead of a pedestrian corridor now and I think the river needs to be opened up to allowing people to interact with it,” said Arthur Eddy, co-founder of Olneyville landscape architects Birchwood Design Group. “The right of way is really wide on Kinsley and Providence Place and we really felt like that could be slimmed down for a much more multiuse path, while putting in a dedicated bike lane on Harris for commuters.”
Aurecchia said the Watershed Council is now working with the state on getting federal transportation dollars to put these plans into place. •

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