Mars Hill receives input from more than 530 residents on bike, pedestrian pathway project

MARS HILL - With the town of Mars Hill experiencing the most residential growth of any Madison County township, the town has taken efforts to ensure residents' safety, as it is currently working on a bike and pedestrian pathway project.

On Aug. 2, Land of Sky Regional Council hosted a pop-up meeting with the public during First Fridays in Mars Hill to gather feedback from local residents about the project.

According to Mars Hill Town Manager Nathan Bennett, roughly 65 residents dropped in at the booth operated by Land of Sky Aug. 2.

Residents reviewed the number of draft recommendations to offer their opinions on them.

The bike and pedestrian plan, of which French Broad River Metropolitan Planning Organization is also a partner, is being coordinated by the McAdams Group, a full-service civil engineering, land planning, landscape architecture, transportation and geomatics firm headquartered in Raleigh.

According to Bennett, there are roughly 15 draft recommendations being considered. Those recommendations include:

• Enhanced crosswalks.
• Potential bike corridors being added to existing facilities where existing right of way and shoulders would allow.
• Expanded sidewalk networks.
• Extending the Otis Duck Greenway.

Those four recommendations were the most popular brought by residents, according to Bennett.

"That's problaby the most popular thing that we've come out of this study with, is that desire to see the town's greenway enlarged, expanded, made with different various loops and tie-ins," Bennett said.

Other recommendations include:

• Sidewalk or side path along N.C. 213/Carl Eller Road toward Gabriels Creek.
• Sidewalk or side path along North Main Street.

"Side paths are cheaper to construct, and a little easier on what's required from property," Bennett said.

Additionally, another recommendation is to fill in any missing sidewalk infrastructure.

"You might come down one street that has a sidewalk and then it ends, and then it goes a long way before it picks back up again, like Mountain View Drive is notorious for that," Bennett said. "Most of that street has sidewalk until you get to Cemetery Drive, and then from Cemetery Drive down to Anderson Street at the medical center, there's no sidewalk.

"So, that's what we're looking to do, is fill in the gaps. A lot of our stuff will revolve around that aspect of the plan."

Of the 15 draft recommendation items, the team will revise the recommendations down to roughly six to seven that will get more detail, and will explore engineering work to be done, as well as financial resources that could be used for those repairs/additions.

According to the Mars Hill town manager, roughly all of the recommendations deal with pedestrian enhancements.

"Most of the bike enhancements are going to go on the existing roadways within existing shoulders," Bennett said.

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Bennett said he has been very pleased with the number of residents who have voiced their opinions, as a survey made available to residents for roughly two months resulted in more than 535 responses.

"There are a lot of comments and a lot of good data from those respondents in the survey — who's walking, who's driving, who works from home and where they're going when they walk and bike," Bennett said. "So there's good information out there."

Bennett anticipates the final document being formalized in December or January.

Johnny Casey has covered Madison County for The Citizen Times and The News-Record & Sentinel for three years. He earned a first-place award in beat news reporting in the 2023 North Carolina Press Association awards. He can be reached at 828-210-6074 or jcasey@citizentimes.com.May 24, 2024 .

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Mars Hill receives input from more than 530 residents on bike, pedestrian pathway project