PELHAM

Pelham 'highline' park gets go-ahead

Dan Reiner
Rockland/Westchester Journal News

PELHAM - A park inspired by Manhattan's High Line is set to break ground after the Village Board of Trustees recently gave the project the green light.

The collaboration between the village and 17-year-old Eagle Scout candidate Mike Ruggiero is set to break ground in July on a 700-foot parcel of land that leads across the historic New York, Westchester and Boston Railway bridge.

The New York, Westchester and Boston Railway sign near the Highbrook Avenue Bridge in Pelham.

Ruggiero, whose project must be free-of-charge to the village, will rely on donations and grants to fund his idea to create a rails-to-trails path from Pell Place to Young Avenue Field.

EARLIER: Trail, gardens eyed for Pelham bridge

“One of the challenges with public land is always maintenance and how we’re going to keep the property maintained and enhance it over time," said former Deputy Mayor Susan Mutti at the June 20 Village Board meeting. "I think that Mike’s choice of this project is going to help us open up this pipeline of work so we’re going to be able to maintain this property and add layers onto it.”

The Highbrook Avenue Bridge in Pelham was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and may now be turned into a walking trail and garden.

Grading will be completed at the site east of the bridge in late July by New Rochelle-based Superior Excavation. Ruggiero and volunteers will then work to complete the first phase in August and September.

Ruggiero, a Pelham resident and member of New Rochelle's Troop 11, proposed two wooden benches, four historical signs with information about the defunct railway system and trail beautification materials.

The path above the Highbrook Avenue Bridge in Pelham where the NYW&B Railway once ran. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and may now be turned into a walking trail and garden.

Mutti has said the bridge could host flower beds or a community garden alongside the trail in the future.

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