Urban Rail Trail Gateways & Road Crossings

I was in New Haven today & took some photos of the Farmington Canal Rail-Trail crossings. They're spending a little more money on their greenway than Shelton is - it's nice to have Yale for a neighbor.

Here's a typical road crossing. The rail trail is bounded by fence and pillars to keep cars out.

The pipe bollards are removable and have locks. This keeps vehicles out but allows for maintenance access by the City. When the bollards are removed the plates spring back flush with grade to cover the sleeves. These look nice and sturdy.

There's a variety of traffic warnings to prevent trail users from getting hurt in traffic, along with traffic signs on the street alerting motorists. The path is paved with crushed stone along the side for joggers. This system didn't seem to be used as much in Shelton so we went with an all gravel surface for a more rural RecPath.

Here's a closer view of a typical road crossing in New Haven. The stone pillars look like Cleopatra should be carried past them on a litter, but they sort of go on an urban trail like New Haven's. I guess they are supposed to look like the walls around the Grove St. Cemetery.

This is the Canal Trail passing the new Science Park development near their parking garage. Pedestrian and bicyclist users were integrated into the overall car, bus and truck transportation improvements.

This entry uses another type of Trafficguard bollard that is locked at the top and folds down flat. Maintenance vehicles drive over the top of the bollards.

Here's a close-up of the fold down type of bollard.

The trail right of way contain underground fiber optic utilities, as well as portions of the Yale University emergency blue phones. Rail-Trail projects can also double as utility corridors.

It was pretty darn chilly this morning with the wind, and there were still people biking and walking on the Canal Trail. I bet that it gets a lot of traffic on a nice spring day. It's community assets like this that make New Haven one of Connecticut's most attractive citys.