{"id":35811,"date":"2025-11-16T14:25:21","date_gmt":"2025-11-16T14:25:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/35811\/"},"modified":"2025-11-16T14:25:21","modified_gmt":"2025-11-16T14:25:21","slug":"57m-riverside-drive-project-gets-allentown-planners-blessing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/35811\/","title":{"rendered":"$57M Riverside Drive project gets Allentown planners’ blessing"},"content":{"rendered":"

ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2014 A yearslong collaboration billed as the Lehigh Valley\u2019s \u201cmost significant public-private partnership\u201d has finally cleared Allentown\u2019s planning approval process.<\/p>\n

Planning commissioners on Tuesday unanimously approved a $57 million project to convert miles of former railroad tracks into roads and trails between Hamilton Street in Allentown and Race Street in Whitehall Township.<\/p>\n

The Riverside Drive Multimodal Revitalization Corridor is a joint undertaking with both municipalities, Lehigh Valley Planning Commission and the state Transportation Department.<\/p>\n

Leaders in local municipalities \u201cdecided that we were going to band together and work together to try to close this gap.”<\/p>\n

Becky Bradley, Lehigh Valley Planning Commission executive director<\/p>\n

The project started about 10 years ago, when officials identified a several-mile stretch that includes the Riverside Drive area as \u201cthe biggest gap\u201d in the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor trail system, LVPC Executive Director Becky Bradley told the commission Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Leaders in local municipalities \u201cdecided that we were going to band together and work together to try to close this gap,\u201d Bradley said.<\/p>\n

The project four years ago landed a $21.2 million grant from the U.S. Transportation Department, and developer Mark Jaindl agreed to donate the land for the Allentown part of the conversion, Bradley said.<\/p>\n

Officials are working to secure the remaining funding. <\/p>\n

The Lehigh Valley Transportation Study this summer awarded the project $1.8 million through its Carbon Reduction Program, which is funded by the Inflation Reduction Act.<\/p>\n

Phased project<\/p>\n

The project gained steam in May 2023, when residents weighed in during a meeting at Bucky Boyle Park<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Some of their suggestions, including a ban on tractor-trailers and traffic-calming measures, will be part of the final plan, Bradley said.<\/p>\n

Six speed tables are planned in Whitehall and also could be installed on Allentown\u2019s part of Riverside \u201cto prevent anybody from using it as a drag raceway during offhours,\u201d PennDOT Project Manager Christine Frey said.<\/p>\n

The Riverside Drive project is set to redevelop the old railroad bed in several phases.<\/p>\n

Construction is slated to begin in the spring of 2028 and finish by mid-2029.<\/p>\n

Project engineer Chris Stanford<\/p>\n

The first phase includes the \u201cHamilton Gateway,\u201d where Hamilton and Union streets meet, with the second phase to stretch from Linden Street north to Furnace Street.<\/p>\n

The project\u2019s final phase will extend the new road and trails north to Race Street in Whitehall.<\/p>\n

Officials will spend the next two years designing the project and securing permits, engineer Chris Stanford said Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Construction is slated to begin in spring 2028 and finish by mid-2029.<\/p>\n

All work must be done by September 2029, according to conditions of the $21.2 million federal grant.<\/p>\n

Whitehall planning officials are scheduled to consider the Riverside Drive project Aug. 20, with the full Lehigh Valley Planning Commission to review it Aug. 28.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2014 A yearslong collaboration billed as the Lehigh Valley\u2019s \u201cmost significant public-private partnership\u201d has finally cleared…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35812,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,22228,22230,121,120,2983,22229,22231,22232,22233],"class_list":{"0":"post-35811","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-allentown","8":"tag-allentown","9":"tag-allentown-57-million-project","10":"tag-allentown-gap-in-dl-trail","11":"tag-allentown-headlines","12":"tag-allentown-news","13":"tag-allentown-planning-commission","14":"tag-allentown-riverside-drive","15":"tag-biggest-gap-in-dl-trail","16":"tag-delaware-lehigh-national-heritage-corridor-trail","17":"tag-riverside-drive-multimodal-revitalization-corridor"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35811"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35811\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}