The city of Akron is one step closer to establishing new uses for the decommissioned, 1-mile section of the 4-mile Akron Innerbelt.
Akron City Council unanimously voted 13-0 this week to authorize the city to apply for a $10 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation, called the Reconnecting Communities Pilot (RCP) Program Capital Construction Grant.
If the city receives the funding, it would go toward reutilizing the area on and around the unused roadway, with the aim of recognizing the needs of the majority-Black communities and individuals and their descendents who were harmed by the Innerbelt's construction, said Esther Thomas, Akron's director of diversity, equity and inclusion.
City spokeswoman Stephanie Marsh said via email that the city plans to use the grant to apply for a 2026 project. That will allow the city more time to raise $10 million in matching funds, as it is required to both spend the $10 million grant and raise the match within five years, she said.
The city has not yet secured any matching funds for this specific grant, Marsh said.
City of Akron Planning Director Kyle Julien said the application “helps with our effort to secure other funds from public and private sources for the local match.”
The legislation passed on Monday follows the U.S. Department of Transportation moving up its application deadline to Sept. 30, Julien said.
The Innerbelt, built in the 20th century, has not seen the levels of traffic that planners expected prior to its construction — about 120,000 vehicles daily, Thomas said. Less than a fifth of that amount, around 22,000 vehicles, travel on the freeway daily, she said.
The Innerbelt decimated the entire African American business districts of South Howard Street and Wooster Avenue and destroyed more than 700 homes, she said.
“The RCP Program provides an opportunity to repair the urban fabric, to reconnect the areas separated by the Innerbelt and to create value out of this path of destruction,” Thomas said. “It also provides an opportunity to create value, precisely for those communities that experienced direct destruction and displacement.”
Akron Mayor Shammas Malik provided more details for the project in a prepared statement on Tuesday.
“Our goal is to present a grant application that provides a viable plan for east/west connectivity including improvements to Vernon Odom Boulevard to support the neighborhood most harmed by the Innerbelt development," Malik said. "This application is for a series of baseline infrastructure improvements flexible enough to allow our team to further engage our residents on a vision that fits their wants and needs for a revitalized Innerbelt corridor.”
Additionally, the measure passed by City Council on Monday states that a goal is “reconnecting the West Hill and Sherbondy Hill neighborhoods to Downtown jobs, hospitals, retail, and recreational amenities using Complete Streets elements such as bike lanes, improved pedestrian facilities, traffic calming measures, and additional street trees.”
Akron received separate grant for Innerbelt planning in 2023
The city received a $960,000 RCP planning grant in 2023. There is a $240,000 local match using city funds for that grant, Marsh said.
In August, the city selected a lead planning firm, Sasaki , whose past projects include the Chicago Riverwalk, Cleveland’s Healthline BRT and Cleveland's Nord Family Greenway.
Marsh said the planning funding "covers the scope of the work and compensation" for Sasaki, engineering consultant WSP and other team members.
Those other team members are ThirdSpace Action Lab, Ideas and Action, City Architecture and Vista Site Selection, according to an August press release from the city announcing the selection of Sasaki as the lead planning firm.
Patrick Williams covers growth and development for the Akron Beacon Journal. He can be reached by email at pwilliams@gannett.com or on X, formerly known as Twitter, @pwilliamsOH.
This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Akron to seek $10 million in federal funding to revitalize Innerbelt corridor
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