Ellington

Plans are moving forward with the Moccasin Bend Gateway Project that will connect Stringer’s Ridge and Moccasin Bend through a series of landscaped multi-use roadways, bike and pedestrian paths.

“We are currently working with TDOT to incorporate some of the project’s design elements into the U.S. Highway 27 improvement project they are getting ready to begin,” said Chattanooga-Hamilton County Regional Planning Agency Executive Director John Bridger.

According to him, the U.S. Highway 27 interchange at Manufacturers Road will be the future site of Manufacturers Park, a green space in the overall gateway project. Some components that will be completed in the improvement project by TDOT will also be necessary in the gateway project, which is why the planning agency is partnering with them at this stage, Bridger said.

For instance, necessary grading for the improvement project can be done in a manner that is conducive to eventually creating Manufacturers Park, he said.

“We have a really short window of opportunity with them, because they are getting ready to begin,” said Bridger.

In addition to the work with TDOT, Bridger said the planning agency is waiting to receive a final draft of the Moccasin Bend Gateway Project master plan created by the architectural, landscape and planning firm Jones and Jones out of Seattle, Wash. Once received, that plan will likely go before the Planning Commission in February and Chattanooga City Council in March, he said.

The Chattanooga City Council recently voted in favor of Mayor Ron Littlefield applying for a grant that could designate $2.5 million to build the Moccasin Bend National Archaeological District Visitor and Interpretative Center as part of the larger Moccasin Bend Gateway Project.

Though transportation, whether by foot, bike, water or car, will be the main focus of the project, an educational component is also part of the plan, said Chattanooga City Council District 1 representative Deborah Scott, who made a motion for approval of the grant.

“There is an attempt with this project to come up with the vision for how to tell the story of Chattanooga from a manufacturer’s or historical point of view in an interesting and artistic way,” she said.

As destinations for locals and tourists, the sites have a physical proximity but there is currently no real infrastructure in place to connect the two. The plan will connect them physically but is also an attempt to connect them through a narrative history of the Chattanooga area, said Scott.

“It’s not easy to get from north of the river to Moccasin Bend,” she said. “[The project] will enable you to get there without taking your life in your hands.”

That connection will take shape via “green streets” with bike lanes, pedestrian paths and waterways. The plan also incorporates the use of indigenous plants and trees to help give the new routes a local feel, said Scott.

For more information click the Moccasin Bend Gateway Project link at www.chcrpa.org.