Connecting Communities: The Mountain to Sea Trail Project in Oak Ridge

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Music.
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Welcome to the Engineering and Public Works Roadshow, a joint effort from the
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American Council of Engineering Companies, the American Public Works Association,
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the American Society of Civil Engineers.
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And we're coming to you today from Winston-Salem, North Carolina,
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where we are actually at the first ever Great Trail State Conference,
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celebrating the Great Trail State of North Carolina.
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And we're talking about today one ambitious project and one project and a larger
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ambitious project, and that is the Mountain to Sea Trail Connector in Oak Ridge, North Carolina.
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And I am joined today by Mike Slusher with Davis Martin Powell,
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and also with Bill Bruce with the City of Oak Ridge. Thank you for taking some time.
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Thank you. Really appreciate it. So let's talk a little bit about this project
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here because it's a very interesting one. I mean, what it means,
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of course, to the city of Oak Ridge.
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But Bill, I guess you want to start, like, what was the project inception?
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And then from the engineering perspective, how did the firm get engaged?
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Sure. Town of Oak Ridge is right about in the middle of the state.
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And we're along the corridor of the statewide mountains to sea trail.
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Our town council embraced the idea of bringing the trail through the town of
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Oak Ridge, not only as an amenity for the citizens of our town,
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but also as a way to bring people to Oak Ridge and showcase the town, what we have to offer,
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help the merchants of the town, tourism and so forth.
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So we had two great natural surface off-road trails, one in an open space preserve
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called the Cascades, another along the headwaters of the Hall River,
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which we call the Headwaters Trail.
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Problem was connecting those two real gems of our trail system.
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So there was about, I want to say about two thirds of a mile section of rural
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roadway, high traffic area, but rural.
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So we're talking ribbon pavement. There's no curb. So folks are walking and
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trying to get between those two areas.
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They're walking on, on pretty much on the pavement.
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Yeah. And that's, that's not good. I mean, that's a, yeah, it's a public safety issue,
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but it's a something we've heard a lot about in a lot of different projects,
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how you could have a small area have an outsized impact on really the,
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the, you know, the trails, you have two disconnected trails.
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That might be a small area that you got to connect, but doing that, it just is, is huge.
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That that's right and we struggled we looked for off-road
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connections but it was a fairly well developed area and we knew that
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we had to come down the roadway yeah the problem was we
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didn't want a typical sidewalk uh-huh this was a rural area we wanted it to
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be consistent with the feel you had when you were on those natural surface trails
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so when we hired davis martin powell to help us sort of concept what type of
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surface and what type of facility would best match that environment.
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They brought a great idea to the table, which the town just ran with.
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And maybe I'll let Mike talk about it. What was your approach?
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Sure. We had previously designed a large sidewalk for the town,
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more in the center of town at their larger park.
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So I think that's one reason they selected our firm for this.
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It was the success of that project.
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But we had to sort of scale our designers back from, you know,
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looking at this, like a big sidewalk where you come in and grade and move utilities
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and do a lot of work to something as they envisioned, just a simple walking trail through a rural.
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Lightly developed area.
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So we took the approach of, hey, we can move the trail around obstacles rather
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than going through them or moving obstacles.
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And, you know, our challenges, like every construction project was lots of underground
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utilities, power poles, and then we had to work with the homeowners along the rail.
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Yeah. I mean, the stakeholder engagement part of working with the homeowners,
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I mean, how was that to work with and kind of, I guess, what was their reception to it?
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Because it was the possibility of bringing more traffic into the area,
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of course, but doing it in a specific way. That was a challenge.
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And we were at a point where we were really building our trails program.
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So we wanted to be good neighbors. Yeah. We wanted to accommodate concerns as often as we could.
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And so, you know, we'd have homeowners say, hey, this is a line of trees that
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my granddad planted. Yeah. Can we scale the project back in that area?
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And in those areas, we narrowed the pathway.
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Or there might've been other areas where a landowner was skeptical about public
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access in front of their property.
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And we did our best to sort of avoid this kind of impact. So it was a very intensive
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public outreach period because we wanted to maintain that public confidence and be good.
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It's a little challenge because, as he mentioned, it was written in pavement
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with very little shoulder beside an open side ditch. Yeah.
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So we were in the yards in most of these places or what people consider the yards.
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We wanted to avoid all the masquerading and retaining walls.
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I could imagine if you're a landowner and it has been touched,
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you're in a fairly rural area,
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and then you hear projects coming in, And the first thing you think about are
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major excavations or alterations to the landscape and being able to avoid that through, you know,
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really looking at the problem and trying to solve it with input.
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I mean, that, you know, it's, it's got a, it's successful, right?
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It comes down to, you make all the parties as happy as humanly possible, right? Yeah.
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So we were fortunate. We got a good contractor who understood the town's goals
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and was willing to work with the landowners.
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And they found out it was a lot different than a typical sidewalk because they
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had to do a lot of work digging by hand, carrying materials in by hand.
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We used pavers to create a mortar and then some pea gravel to fit in with the
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natural environment for the walking service.
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So it took them a little longer, but they stuck with it and did a good job and
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respected the homeowners.
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And then at the end of the day, you're left with something which is going to
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stand the test of time, but actually fits into the natural environment.
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That's right. And it's a consistent user experience. So you come out of the
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nature preserve and you're on a roadway and you might expect to get on a sidewalk
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or a pavement type of surface.
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And here you are, you're still on a natural surface that's easy for the town
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to maintain, but kind of maintains that sense of, of being in the,
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being in the woods and going with the contour and being next to the trees and so forth.
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And now with this connector, you're going to be able to have Oak
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Ridge part of that larger trail that mountain
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to trail project which you mentioned is you know a long term project
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but it's going to be about 1200 miles worth of trail taking
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you pretty much from the mountains to the ocean which
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is essentially i mean that's that's that's huge that's right
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and it's an incremental approach and every connection like this that
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we get this adds a little bit more to the mileage of the
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off-road section of that trail it's it's just another example i
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think you know largely what we talk about is just these small
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projects that have just a significant impact and it does
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i mean to your point earlier you know without these investments without the
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engineering that goes into it and the and and the desire to do this you really
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it really unlocks a lot of that possible economic activity investment and a
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lot of people coming in and and and it can change a community.
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That's true. And we really took the tack very early.
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One of the great pieces of advice that the Statewide Trail Association gave
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us was, you may be planning for the Mountains to Sea Trail, the statewide trail,
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but build those trails for your community.
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So with the help of Davis Martin Powell and being sensitive to the design and
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working with the neighbors, we know that most people on that trail are the people that live along.
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And so they need to be the ones that are the good stewards and can take advantage of it. Yeah.
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Fantastic. Well, it's a great project and I really appreciate you taking the
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time to tell us a little bit more about it. And it's just another example.
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I'm really impressed by what the state's doing in general, just investing in these trails.
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It really does change the quality
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of life for people here, and it makes a really attractive place to be.
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So, Mike and Bill, thank you again. Thank you. Thank you.
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And again, this has been the Engineering and Public Works Roadshow coming to
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you from Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
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We'll see you next time. Bye-bye.
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Music.