INDIANAPOLIS — Bicyclists and pedestrians will soon start to see improvements on the Monon Trail as construction gets underway to widen the path from 10th to 96th streets.
The Department of Public Works is widening the popular, 10-mile stretch by up to 4 feet, as well as resurfacing and updating its signage.
Design on this project began five years ago.
DPW is in the first of two projects, with construction happening in segments up to 56th Street. The second project, which is not under contract yet, will move north from 56th to 96th streets.
Some homeowners with properties next to the Monon are voicing concerns that part of the expansion is on their property.
"We're not building anything on anybody's private property. It will all be built in the public right-of-way," DPW spokesperson Ben Easley said. "I would say a lot of times, those lines were a little bit less than understood in the past, and so that's what we've been doing in the past year or so, showing what those actual delineations are so that when we go to build our project, it's entirely in the right-of-way."
According to Easley, the trail is a former rail-line and in the public right-of-way. As the rail-line moved out, many built connections into the trail or did landscaping. DPW had to figure out if it was on the public right-of-way or private, purchasing land on either side to allow for enough space to widen.
Crews will first put down what looks like gravel before laying down asphalt. DPW is asking that users stay off the Monon until the asphalt is put down.
DPW expects to finish this first project up to 56th Street by the end of 2022.
What other people are reading:
- Hoosiers trying to cope as inflation persists
- 3 days, 3 dead in central Indiana, allegedly at the hands of their current or former partners
- Every patient in small cancer study achieves complete remission
- 'Make their loss of life matter' | Matthew McConaughey makes passionate plea for gun law changes
- Scams on the rise amid growing popularity of cryptocurrency
- 3-year-old boy found alive and well after 3 days in Montana woods
- Take a look at the new, 2-story Taco Bell Defy
- Facing huge inventory, Target cuts vendor orders, prices