Alllan Appel Photo
When you celebrate a grand opening of a store or building, it’s customary to cut a symbolic ribbon.
But when you celebrate the opening of an equally important asset, a riverine trail that links long-separated parts of the city?
Well, you cut a symbolic strand of Japanese knotweed, of course.
Looking north up the river with trail on right.
Dozens of volunteers have cleared yards and yards of that invasive species in the initial stages of the creation of the Mill River Trail.
Mayor Toni Harp, City Plan Director Aicha Woods, Ward 9 Alder Charles Decker, and super-volunteer J.R. Logan from Mill River Trail Advocates, who initiated the effort back in 2014, showed up at that cleared portion of the trail Wednesday morning.
Their mission: formally to celebrate the opening of the first phase of the trail — a stone dust or cinder surface suitable for walkers or bicyclists that snakes dreamily along the east side of the river from the Chapel Street Bridge right up to the train overpass 25 yards from Humphrey Street.
Paddlers and swans and a aggressive groups of turkey vultures and ospreys feasting on the schooling bunker in the narrowing bends in the river were all also on hand. In their way they were also making the precise same points as the humans in their remarks:
“It’s about connecting people, neighborhoods, and habitats,” said City Plan Director Aicha Woods, who invoked the natural history of the area and its initial uses by the indigenous native peoples like the Quinnipiacs.
“The trail will also serve as a spine to District and to an emerging industrial area on River Street,” Woods added, citing the new innovation tech complex that hugs the trail.
To make that happen, two more planned legs of the trail need to be added: a stretch from Chapel Street at the bridge down to Criscuolo Park and the brief continuation of Phase One along the margin of the train embankment to Humphrey Street and across to District.
J.R. Logan arrives at the knotweed cutting on his bicycle.
The former is being developed through a recently received grant from the Connecticut Fund For The Environment/Save The Sound.. And the stretch up to Humphrey Street will be handled by City Plan in 2019 with construction scheduled for 2020.
The city’s engineering department plans to execute the final connecting link from District to the Ralph Walker Skating Rink and East Rock Park toward the end of this year, Woods added.
“For a long time, the only access to the Mill River was in East Rock and the river bank was inaccessible to Fair Haveners,” said Mayor Harp.
She hailed the park as part of a “larger vision” of greenways and trails and bike paths throughout the city.
City and nonprofit economic development officials also pointed out — as the cormorants beat their wings along the water — that the new access to the Mill River is not strictly about birds or fishing or kayaking or water views.
Alder Charles Decker and Radiall’s Bill Neale, with paddlers nearby.
Michael Harris of the Elm City Innovation Collaborative (ECIC) called the opening of this phase of the trail “one piece of stitching Criscuolo Park to the skating rink and to turn inaccessible and fenced spaces into connected and innovative spaces.”
He said that in the early days of the volunteer effort to clear the river bank, he and J.R. Logan paddled from the area near the skating rink down to the food trucks at Long Wharf. He said that they counted abut 35 people fishing or otherwise using the river.
“There really is a community that engages with the river but they have had to climb over branches and brambles,” Harris said. That’s why this is important.”
Radiall Leaving Town But Still Loves New Haven!
Looking south on Mill Street to Criscuolo Park and the confluence of the Mill River, proposed end point of the trail.
The trail runs between the margins of the river and Grand Paint and Radiall, a retail store and a manufacturer, and several large unused lots that belong to Radiall. All that unutilized space is also important, Harris added.
He said ECIC is focusing on the Mill River District to see how investing in public assets, such as the Mill River Trail, contributes to bringing and keeping jobs.
As it turns out, Radiall will soon be relocating to Wallingford, said Bill Neale, the operations manager of that French-owned company. Neale was instrumental in keeping the river bank that abuts the company’s property from turning into a jungle, especially in the early years of the volunteer effort. He was on hand as well to help celebrate the partnership of the city, nonprofit grant makers, private businesses such as his, and the energy and sweat equity of volunteers that have come to fruition.
As the mayor arrived to make remarks, Neale was at pains to tell Harp that Radiall’s departure “is not because of New Haven.” He said he worked well with city economic development officials to find a suitable new manufacturing space, but nothing appropriate was available. Personally, Neale added, “My heart is in New Haven.”
Neale said the company is poised to sell the property to another manufactuer he was not at liberty to identify. “I think New Haven’s going to be happy with who’s coming,” he added.