The highway that displaced Wilmington residents and divided the city decades ago could be hidden from sight in the years ahead, covered with a 12-acre park.
Final plans were revealed last week to cap I-95 over six blocks, constructing an ambitious greenway that would reconnect neighborhoods torn apart in the 1960s when neighborhoods were leveled for the new interstate that cut the city in two.
Following a year of planning meetings, a Wilmington Area Planning Council working group revealed its final plan Thursday night. It’s likely to cost hundreds of millions of dollars and take years to complete.
Background:Plan to cap part of I-95 in Wilmington and turn it into greenspace is a hit, but who will pay?
What does the plan include?
The planned park covers six blocks, around 12 acres in total, bordered by Sixth Street and Delaware Avenue and between North Jackson Street and North Adams Street. The plan has three separate public spaces separated by Eighth Street and 10th Street. Seventh Street and Ninth Street overpasses would be permanently shut down.
The park would include the following features:
- Public green overlooking an amphitheater
- Festival lawn
- Dog park
- Space for pop-up markets for local vendors
- Play areas
- Knoll with views of the park and city
The planners said downtown would not lose any parking capacity from the project, and additional parking would be added for visitors.
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The group conducted a traffic impact analysis with the Delaware Department of Transportation, which concluded that the shutdown of Seventh and Ninth streets would not drastically change the traffic patterns of the area and that emergency service response time would not be impacted. Traffic light adjustments would need to be made to mitigate any potential problems.
The plan would reduce North Jackson Street and North Adams Street from two lanes to one lane.
What are the next steps?
The final report will be submitted to WILMAPCO’s public advisory committee in mid-December, opening up a 30-day period for further public comment.
In mid-January the report will be presented to WILMAPCO for review and endorsement, opening it up to state or federal funds.
President Joe Biden’s infrastructure bill, which passed earlier this year, allocated $1.2 billion for Delaware highway repair, $225 million to bridge repair and an additional $1 billion to reconnect communities divided by highways and other roads. While the group is confident that their project meets the standards necessary to obtain this grant money, they emphasized that the federal grant process is extremely competitive and nothing is certain at this point.
More:The end is near, for construction on I-95 in Wilmington, that is
Many questions remain, including the final cost and timeline.
The closest estimates provided Thursday evening were that similar projects conducted by the consulting firm HargreavesJones cost in the hundreds of millions of dollars and that the entire project would most likely take around five to six years to complete.
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Contact Molly McVety at mmcvety@delawareonline.com.
