Bridge to link 60 miles of MST in Triangle by year’s end

8.30.2011

Good news for the Mountains-to-Sea Trail in the Triangle: A crucial bridge that will link two long stretches of statewide trail looks like it will be done by year’s end. It’s completion means the MST will run 60 continuous miles through the Triangle, the trail’s longest continuous stretch outside the mountains.

As recently as last month, Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail Executive Director was hopeful-but doubtful that the bridge over Little Lick Creek in Durham County would be finished this year. But bids on the bridge were recently opened and the group has enough money in its coffers to cover the bid, submitted by Smith-Rowe of Mount Airy. Terms of the agreement call for construction to be finished by Dec. 30 of this year.

The bridge replaces an old bridge over Little Lick Creek from the area's pre-Falls Lake days, a bridge that, lore has it, was torched years ago by a fisherman. It joins sections 14 and 15 of the Falls Lake portion of the MST, and will create a continuous trail of 60 miles, running from the Falls Lake dam at Falls of Neuse Road in Raleigh northwest to Penny’s Bend just off Old Oxford Road in Durham.

Check out the MST's route along Falls Lake here.