A dedicated crossing over Wade Avenue was supposed to be ready before crowds arrived for the 2023 North Carolina State Fair. The piece is a pedestrian and bicycle bridge in West Raleigh, running parallel to Blue Ridge Road, inside a $5.5 million city project that also builds a 10-foot-wide path along that road.
By September 2025, the bridge and path were not expected to be completed and open until fall 2026, the News & Observer reported. Preliminary plans had reached the public in early 2020, with construction then set for summer 2022 so the path could make that fair.
What The Project Actually Builds
The bridge spans Wade Avenue and is meant to give cyclists and pedestrians safe passage along Blue Ridge Road near the N.C. Museum of Art. Friday’s News & Observer account calls the work the first pedestrian and cyclist accommodation on a busy five-lane stretch of road.
It is also supposed to connect sidewalks and greenway trails at the art museum with the Lenovo Center, the N.C. State Fairgrounds and Hillsborough Street. Those are the places a crossing has to serve if it is going to matter on a fair day, a concert night or an ordinary afternoon at the museum…