Hellbender Trail intended to link communities

Posted on by Mark Barrett

About 150 miles of trails and greenway paths would connect in Buncombe and nearby counties as part of the plan for the Hellbender Trail.

The plan envisions stitching together existing greenways and trails in Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson, Madison and Transylvania counties and others that local governments already plan. The French Broad River Metropolitan Planning Organization and Land of Sky Rural Planning Organization, two groups of local government officials that help decide which transportation projects in the region get funded, approved the plan in 2000.

The trail is named after a rare salamander found in mountain streams. Having the plan on the books will generate momentum to build more greenways and make it more likely that trails and greenways will connect with one another as local governments build them out to city, town or county lines, says French Broad MPO Director Tristan Winkler.

The network got a huge boost this summer with announcements that the federal government had awarded $45.9 million to help build the 19.4-mile Ecusta Trail on a disused rail line between Hendersonville and Brevard.

The French Broad MPO has awarded $70.4 million in federal money for bicycle and pedestrian projects — including bike lanes and sidewalks as well as greenways — to be spent over the next five years in the four counties the MPO serves. Some of the projects will expand the Hellbender, and some will not.

About 15 miles of Hellbender greenway and trail already exist, and another 34 miles are funded, Winkler says. “We’re about down to the last 100 miles” of the Hellbender to be funded, he jokingly told a recent forum on the trail.

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