Lilly Endowment awards $25M for pedestrian, bicycle trails

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A local foundation announced a historic investment in Marion County’s trails and greenways.

Lilly Endowment awarded a $25 million grant to Central Indiana Community Foundation. The funds will go to the connected communities initiative.

You can see where the money will be used and the grant will expand and enhance pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure in the county, including building more than 7-miles of new greenways and 4-miles of on street protected bicycle infrastructure.

A full list of projects are below:

Construction projects supported by the grant include:

• B&O Trail (5 miles of new trail to complete a 16.65-mile corridor – Near Westside)
• Grassy Creek Trail (1.75 miles of new trail – Far Eastside)
• $5.25 million towards the completion of northeast leg of Fall Creek Trail, Nickel Plate Trail, and Eagle Creek Trail
• Andrew J. Brown Ave (1.5 miles of protected bike lane from 16th to 30th streets)
• 30th Street (1.5 miles of off-street trail from Dr. Andrew J. Brown Avenue to Boulevard Place)
• 38th Street (Traffic-calming interventions between Cold Spring Road and Meridian Street)
• Olney Street (1 miles of improved access from Pogue’s Run Trail to IPS School 51)
• 10th Street (Sidewalk improvements on the northside of 10th Street along edge of IUPUI campus)
• Urban Wilderness Trail (.5 mile of new trail to connect two existing cross-country trails – Downtown/IUPUI)

Planning and design of pedestrian and bicycle improvement projects include:

• Broad Ripple Avenue (Primrose Avenue at Broad Ripple Park to Keystone Avenue)
• 16th Street (Main Street of Speedway to Roosevelt Avenue and I-70)
• 30th Street (Moller Road north of Speedway to Boulevard Place)
• 38th Street (Cold Springs Road to the Monon Trail)

Programming Partnerships include:

• Greenways Full Circle Plan Update (Funding for new Greenways Plan)
• Wayfinding (Funding to make it easier for people to find and use trails and greenways, with an emphasis on new access points)
• Marion County Bike Map (Upon completion of projects a user-friendly map of the system and connection to multimodal options)
• Groundwork Indy (Trail-based land stewardship training for youth)
• Freewheelin’ Community Bikes (Bicycle repair programs for youth)
• Bike Indianapolis (Bicycle safety training)
• Indiana Pacers Bikeshare (New stations and subsidized bikeshare passes)
• Greenways Partnership (Programming partnerships for trail activation)