Statesboro City Council on Tuesday approved $3,250 as the final piece of $15,000 requested from public and private sources in Bulloch County toward development of a master plan for the proposed Georgia Hi-Lo Trail, a bicycling and pedestrian trail from Union Point, south of Athens, to Savannah.

Georgia Hi-Lo Trail Inc., a nonprofit corporation, seeks to create the approximately 211-mile trail using old railroad routes where possible and to connect the end at Union Point to a separate project called the Firefly Trail, planned to extend 39 miles from Union Point to Athens. Together these would form an approximately 250-mile route, separate from motor vehicle roads, from Athens in the piedmont region to Savannah on the coast.

A concept map of these trails appeared on screens in Statesboro’s council chambers while Mary Charles Howard, Georgia Hi-Lo Trail executive director, spoke Tuesday morning.  The expected cost of the Hi-Lo Trail master plan development is $120,000, with each of the eight counties along the route asked to pitch in $15,000 from public and private sources.

“I’m a landscape architect, so I’ve designed and engineered this pre-concept just to get it going,” Howard said after the meeting. “But now that we have, you know, a commitment from Statesboro for this master plan, we’re going to work with the PATH Foundation out of Atlanta, and they are the experts in trail planning, so they will tell us exactly how many miles it will take.”

The PATH Foundation, established in 1991, has led in creating more than 300 miles of paved trails in Georgia and South Carolina. The majority of these are within or begin in the Atlanta metro area. The longest is the 61.9-mile Silver Comet Trail, which follows a former passenger rail line west from Smyrna to connect to a trail in Alabama.

For the Georgia Hi-Lo Trail, proposed by its separate group, including Howard who is a Sandersville resident, even the 211-mile estimate is speculative at this point.

“Once they actually design where this trail will go, and talking to the cities, talking to each county, listening to where they want the trail to go, it could be shorter or longer,” she said.

The cost of the actual construction would also be determined by the planning and future decisions at the local level. For the $120,000 sought for planning, the organization reached out to 18 local governments along the route, including 10 cities as well as the eight counties.

The Bulloch County government, which has plans of its own – facing some challenges – for an extension of the existing 2.5-mile S&S Greenway trail eastward from Statesboro toward Brooklet, has not committed direct funding for the Hi-Lo Trail planning.

Morris Bank, DABC

Instead, the trail organization obtained a commitment of $7,500 from Morris Bank, which a city staff memo referred to as providing the “Bulloch County Board of Commissioners’ 50% share.” 

Additionally, Howard secured $1,625 from the Development Authority of Bulloch County and another $1,625 from the Statesboro Convention and Visitors Bureau. 

Another $1,000 for Statesboro and Bulloch’s share came from Georgia Power, which provided $8,000 to be spread evenly among the eight counties, Howard noted in a summary emailed later. 

So that left the $3,250 ask, which she directed to the city of Statesboro, to make up the full $15,000 for Bulloch County. Tuesday morning’s vote to approve, on a motion from District 5 Councilmember Shari Barr seconded by District 3 Councilmember Venus Mack, was 4-0, with District 4 Councilmember John Riggs absent. 

“All of us know that this is a good thing for Statesboro, with more opportunities,” Barr said. “I just loved it when I heard about it, because it’s an opportunity to connect where people can be part of it. … This will the Georgia Hi-Lo Trail, where you can go from up in Athens all the way to Savannah or any part thereof, and they’ll take advantage of where there already are trails.”

With Statesboro’s and Bulloch County’s shares effectively covered, Georgia Hi-Lo Trail has obtained commitments from 16 of the 18 local governments, and so has only Greene County and its county seat, Greensboro, left to appeal to, Howard said.

Planning timeline

“What we’re working on now is to get Greene County on board, before the end of this year, and the city of Greensboro, so that we can start the master plan in January,” she said. “It will be a six-month planning process, so we’ll sit down with each city and county, get their input, go back to the drawing boards and keep designing that way.”

For construction funding, federal, state and other sources are available, Howard said.

“There’s a lot of funding out there, and each county and city will go about it the way that they want to …,” she said. “We will deliver the plan, we will deliver a strategy, and then they will say, OK, this is how we want to go about it.”

The concept route includes publicly owned, railroad-owned and privately owned rights of way. In particular, the Georgia Hi-Lo Trail organizers know they will be in “conversations” with Norfolk Southern for some of the rail company’s inactive lines, she said.

Carolyn Altman, director of the Botanic Garden at Georgia Southern University and a member of the local group Southern Cyclists, rode her bike to City Hall to show support for the project.

“We’d just really love for cycling to be safe for everyone,” Altman said after the meeting. “We do have the S&S Greenway, which is nice, but it’s kind of short, and it would be really nice to have some connectivity. It would also be nice to be able to use it as transportation. There are so many students here, and they should be on bicycles instead of in their cars.”

Brooklet bound?

Altman and Howard were aware of the resistance Bulloch County officials encountered last year with the county’s plan to extend the Greenway into Brooklet through a residential neighborhood.  Residents voiced opposition – although a smaller number expressed support – at public meetings, and Brooklet City Council said “no” to the plan with a 4-1 voice vote in June 2021.

Of course, Hi-Lo Trail supporters want to make the S&S Greenway, which follows the path of the long-defunct Savannah & Statesboro Railway, a part of the longer trail, with the Brooklet extension being part of the original concept.

But Howard said Georgia Hi-Lo Trail has found enthusiastic support from Effingham County and the city of Guyton, which already has the Guyton Main Street Rail Trail. About 26 miles of the old railroad bed pass through Effingham County.

“If Brooklet does not want to be part of this, it’s a straight line, really, to the north end of Effingham County to connect up with the rail line, so it’s not an obstacle,” she said. “We would, of course, love to have Brooklet in. It’s beautiful community.”