Credit: Google Maps
Bristol Borough received $343,782 in county open space funds Wednesday to reconstruct the Maple Beach Road bridge.
The $343,782 grant approved by the Bucks County Commissioners will cover 46 percent of the roughly $700,000 project that would reconstruct the crumbling bridge and repurpose it for pedestrians, according to David Johnson, who works for the Bucks County Planning Commission. He added that Bristol Borough would be responsible for the rest of the project’s funding.
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Johnson said the bridge is currently in disrepair has been closed to vehicles for years.
Future plans would be to extend pedestrian access and possibly add a small kayak boat launch that would connect to the Delaware River, Johnson said.
Borough Manager Jim Dillon told LevittownNow.com that Council will be pursuing additional funding for the project. Council President Ralph DiGuiseppe added that no borough funds would be spent on the construction of the improvements to the area.
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A plaque on the bridge states it was constructed over Otter Creek in 1915. At one time, it was a connection between Bristol Borough and the Maple Beach section of Bristol Township. The neighborhood only includes a few homes after the former Rohm and Haas company began purchasing the neighborhood for their campus in the first part of the 20th century.
Doylestown-based Heritage Conservancy owns the area around the Maple Point Road bridge. They also own the nearby Bristol Marsh Nature Area, which is one of only a handful of freshwater tidal marshes along the Delaware River.
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County officials said the goal is to tie trails in Bensalem to ones in Bristol and the 60-mile-long Delaware Canal State Park trail that stretches from the Waterfront Park in the borough to Easton, Northampton County. The work is part of the East Coast Greenway project, which aims to complete a trail network that runs from Maine to Florida.
The Commissioners also approved $366,200 in open space funds to construct walking trails in Central Park near the Bensalem Municipal Complex and a portion of trail along Street Road. The work is part of the East Coast Greenway project.
In Morrisville, the borough will use $24,000 of open space funds to make improvements to the Riverfront Preserve Property.
