The Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC) recently announced a new round of funding for trails in the Philadelphia region.

Notably, DVRPC approved funding for Upper Darby Township to design two bridges over the Darby Creek. One of the bridges will cross the creek at a lovely spot where the image above was taken.

We’ve gushed in the past about how great the Darby Creek Trail is, and what a great potential it has for connecting lower-income communities to recreation and transportation. This is why we met with Mayor Micozzie and senior staff from Upper Darby Township to encourage them to apply for Regional Trails Program funding. We applaud Upper Darby Township for not only meeting with us, but for making significant changes in the trail alignment to maintain a fully accessible trail. These changes necessitated two creek crossings (at considerable additional cost), but also allowed for making better connections to the Township’s open spaces on each side of the creek. 

There were several other notable awardees, including:

• Cobbs Creek Connector in Philadelphia, the second highest scoring Circuit trail in terms of community impact
• Parkside Cynwyd Trail in Philadelphia, which will connect to the Cynwyd Trail extension across City Line
• Tookany Creek Trail in Cheltenham
• Road crossing improvements to the Chester Valley Trail
• Two projects on the Lawrence Hopewell Trail in Mercer County, NJ

As ever we are grateful to the William Penn Foundation for supporting the Regional Trails Program. For a complete list of awardees, click here.