Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

City seeks grant funds for trail to connect area parks

 

The city of Brewton is currently working on securing grant funds to help create a trail that connects area parks from E.O. Wilson to the YMCA.

Steve Layton, public lands manager of the city of Brewton, said there are a lot of components that have to be met for the trail.

“Part of that is going to be trying to get corridor of land from downtown to the YMCA,” he said. “We will be working on other things including connecting the parks with bridges.”

Layton said this project has been a vision of the city’s for sometime.

“It’s going to take awhile to do this,” he said. “But we want to connect the downtown area to the northern parts of the city without having to cross any blacktop.”

Layton said the trail would be multipurpose and could be used for hiking, biking and horseback riding. However, there will also be a nature component on the YMCA end as well as the E.O. Wilson side.

Layton said they will soon work on improvements to the bridge that connects Jennings Park and O’Bannon Park, which is heavily used.

“We are also looking at a bridge that would connect E.O. Wilson and Jennings Park,” he said.

Layton said the city’s construction of an arena at O’Bannon has created a niche for a different group of folks.

Layton anticipates the project will take longer than a year to complete.