It was a pleasant surprise for the first cyclist who pedaled over the new Harbor Bridge shared-use path on July 11.
Jonathan Martin, a retired physician and cyclist from Corpus Christi, rode his bike over to where the path’s entrance ramp begins at Lake and Sam Rankin streets from Ocean Drive. Martin said he’d been looking forward to the day the walk and bike trail would open to the public.
“It’s good to see this opening finally,” he said. “It’s been a long time coming. I rode over the bridge two weeks ago, and my wife and I rode over to Portland and back after church.”
Just after 10 a.m., staff members of Flatiron/Dragados, the firm that built the new Harbor Bridge, welcomed the inaugural rider onto the bridge’s concrete ramp. Red, white and blue balloons placed at the trail’s entrance next to a blue trailhead map let people know they can access the path.
The shared-use path opened three days after the new Harbor Bridge’s three northbound lanes opened to the public. Its southbound lanes opened June 28.
The 10-foot wide shared-use path is partially open to the midway point — a distance of about 2.3 miles, said Lynn Allison, public information officer for Flatiron/Dragados.
The other half of the path will open in four to six weeks once construction workers complete the U.S. Highway 181 alignment to North Beach, bringing the total distance to about 4.4 miles, she said.
Hours for the path are temporarily restricted to 8 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., though the bridge will open 24/7 in about the same time span, she said.
Allison said she’s heard from many people who were excited about the opening of the path. She noted that she’d seen several students, curious about the area, walking around the neighborhood in the days leading up to the bridge’s opening.
“It’s going to be really exciting to see what’s happening in this area,” she said.
Developers have almost finished building a parking lot nearby on Lake Street near the intersection of Winnebago Street, Allison said.
The parking lot has 36 spaces, with another trailhead map placed nearby. Two trailhead maps will also be located next to the path’s entrance on the other side of the bridge in North Beach.
Allison said the path was designed with safety in mind. A 10-foot-wide buffer zone separates the path from the vehicle traffic lanes. As people walk or bike to the top of the bridge, they’ll see 55-inch-tall exterior fence placed atop the path that reaches up to 10 feet and arches inward at higher elevations to prevent people from climbing the bridge.
A concrete belvedere at the top of the bridge includes a seating area with benches to give people a view of the bayfront, along with two telescopes.
Allison noted the new bridge is safer than the old truss bridge, whose 2-foot walking lanes located on either side of the bridge no longer meet safety standards.
As the cyclist was returning from his route to the top of the bridge, the first pedestrian, David Walker, approached and started up the concrete ramp. Walker sat down and took photos at the top of the bridge before turning around and descending the ramp.
“If you’ve never walked over the old bridge, this one is much wider,” Walker said. “It’s windy at the top, and today isn’t even a windy day.”
MORE ON THE HARBOR BRIDGE
This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: Shared-use path on new Harbor Bridge partially opens
Reporting by Katie Nickas, Corpus Christi Caller Times / Corpus Christi Caller Times
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