Pinellas Trail Bridges In Palm Harbor Reopen To Public

PALM HARBOR, FL -- Enthusiasts of the Fred Marquis Pinellas Trail in Palm Harbor have reason to celebrate this weekend. After a successful final inspection, Pinellas County reopened the pedestrian bridges over Alternate U.S. 19 and Orange Street on Friday afternoon.

Walkers, runners, bicyclists and other users will no longer have to detour around the location.

The busy section northeast of Curlew Road and Alternate U.S. 19 had been closed since September 2017 for replacement of the bridges. The old trusses were demolished and removed, and new steel trusses with improved coatings were lifted into place. Concrete decks were poured in recent weeks. Although completion of the project had been rescheduled for the end of February, the contractor was able to finish early.

The Fred Marquis Pinellas Trail extends from downtown St. Petersburg to Tarpon Springs as a unique connector to the Pinellas communities. It serves as a haven in a busy, urbanized environment and has won numerous awards, including induction into the National Rails to Trails Hall of Fame.

Eventually, it will be part of the Pinellas Trail Loop, a 75-mile regional trail network that will circle the county and provide regional connections to Hillsborough and Pasco counties trail networks and link to the Florida Coast-to-Coast Connector Trail.

The Palm Harbor improvement project was funded through Penny for Pinellas, the county’s infrastructure sales tax.

For more information, click here.

Image via Pinellas County

(For more local news from Florida, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Patch. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app; download the free Patch Android app here.)