Cardinal News: Then & Now takes a look back at the stories we brought you over the last 12 months. Through the end of the year, we’re sharing updates on some of the people and issues that made news in 2025. This installment: expansion of the Roanoke River Greenway.
Almost exactly two years after its construction began, a new 0.6-mile section of the West Roanoke River Greenway was introduced last month by Roanoke County and the city of Salem. It’s just one of multiple projects the county completed in 2025, adding a total of 2.95 miles to the greenway system this year.
At a ribbon-cutting event held at the new trailhead parking lot in early November, Roanoke County Administrator Richard Caywood said this project on the west end of the greenway was one of the first things he worked on when he moved to the area in 2004, though he was working for the Virginia Department of Transportation at the time.
“When Liz Belcher introduced the project, the staff was doubtful that it would ever happen,” he said. Belcher, whom Caywood referred to as the “mother of the greenway,” is a former greenway coordinator for the Roanoke Valley Greenway Commission, with a vision for a greenway system that would extend from Montgomery County to Franklin County. The initial greenway plan was written in 1995 with significant influence from Belcher.
The greenway plan was inspired by sewer line replacements that needed to happen anyway, she said — “People said, ‘Let’s do a greenway at the same time.’”
Since those original plans, more than 40 miles of greenway trails have been built across the region, including the 15-plus miles that make up the Roanoke River Greenway. It’s been a collaboration among multiple jurisdictions in the region, including Roanoke, Roanoke County, Salem, the town of Vinton and Botetourt County.
“I think our region in particular loves greenways,” Belcher said after the event. “They just love greenways. That’s how it is.”
2 years of construction and roadblocks
The new stretch of the West Roanoke River Greenway, or Phase 1, connects the West Riverside Drive trailhead to Kingsmill Drive in Salem. The county is applying for funding for Phase 2, a challenging project that would connect the newly opened trail out to the county’s Green Hill Park.
The new 10-foot-wide paved greenway runs next to the river at the trailhead and dips below the road level, along a retaining wall above the riverside, as you travel east on the trail.
Phase 1 cost about $12.6 million and was financed through a combination of federal and state funds from the Highway Safety Improvement Program, Open Container, Regional Surface Transportation Program and Smart Scale Program funds.
Since November 2023, when construction of Phase 1 began, planners faced significant and costly roadblocks to finishing the project.
Megan Cronise, assistant director of planning for Roanoke County, said that two major flooding events occurred during construction: the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, which she said eroded some of the riverbank, and the Valentine’s Day flood, which flooded the work zone.
In the aftermath of the pandemic, the localities that work together on the greenways are seeing “incredible escalating costs” of materials, Martha Hooker, the Catawba District representative on the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors, said during the ribbon-cutting.
This was when the West Roanoke River Greenway project was split into two phases.
The challenges of connecting to Green Hill Park
For years, the Roanoke Valley Greenway Commission, the advisory board that coordinates planning among the five member jurisdictions, has grappled with how to connect the West Roanoke River Greenway to the existing greenway in Green Hill Park.
Former greenway coordinator Frank Maguire said last year that extending to Green Hill Park is important because the park is a major draw for walkers and bikers, with parking, restrooms and shelters at its trailhead. Cronise said this section will likely be about 0.6 miles long.
This time last year, the commission was mulling over two options. The first was to build two bridges across the Roanoke River and a separate below-grade crossing under Diuguids Lane. Maguire estimated this would cost $10 million.
The second option would allow the greenway to remain on the same side of the river, at half the price, but would require homeowners on West Riverside Drive to agree to the trail being built on the edge of their property abutting the river, Maguire said.
Lindsay Webb, who at the time was the county’s parks, planning and development manager, said last year that 20 parcels of land could be affected.
In April and May of 2024, the county surveyed public opinion on greenway expansion and the options for Phase 2. Survey respondents were mostly excited about greenway improvements and extensions, and many encouraged negotiations with homeowners.
Cronise said in April of this year, the county had a follow-up meeting with “more great feedback” from residents. The county decided to move forward with the option that would continue the greenway on one side of the river on the homeowners’ property.
The county anticipates some potential right-of-way impacts and will work through that if it receives funding for design, Cronise said. At this moment, there is no money set aside for that project.
“We are optimistic that our grant application to begin Phase 2 will be funded by the Roanoke Valley Transportation Planning Organization next spring,” Hooker said at the ribbon-cutting event.
New construction will connect to Explore Park
This time last year, multiple construction zones were active on the east end of the Roanoke River Greenway. Two of those projects are completed, Cronise said: a small section running under the Blue Ridge Parkway, and another that connects out toward Roanoke County’s Explore Park, across from a closed landfill.
Work continues on the last stretch that will connect to Explore Park. Cronise said workers are preparing to pave the section closest to the park.
She said a ribbon-cutting will be held in the spring, and by then, planners can “celebrate 3.95 miles of continuous greenway,” Cronise said, from Rutrough Point at Explore Park to west of the Blue Ridge Parkway.