Health and Wellness on the Downtown Greenway

Sandra Boren: The Downtown Greenway provides some great opportunities for folks to get out in a safe environment for physical activity, whether that is running, walking or cycling.  We are delighted to be investing in that, and it is an opportunity for our entire community to get out and experience the great outdoors without having to go very far from home.

John McLendon: The Downtown Greenway, as a loop around downtown, will be a hub of the entire trails, greenways, and system of bike lanes and bike routes going out into Greensboro and to Guilford County.  Eventually, there will be connections planned with the Atlantic & Yadkin Greenway to the Bicentennial Greenway, which will run all the way over to High Point and the Piedmont Greenway, which is planned to connect to Winston-Salem.  So this Greenway is the hub, and it will be the hub of a network that will allow people to walk and ride their bikes all over the region safely.  We do have some places where there are good sidewalks and people can walk.  And there are bike lanes where we can ride on streets, but there are a lot of gaps where you just cannot safely connect to by riding your bicycle or walking without using the Greenway that is planned around downtown and the connectors reaching into the larger part of Greensboro.

Connie McLendon: We love to go on long rides on the weekends, but like John said, there are some areas that we go in that really are not very safe.

To one day be able to ride on a trail from here to Winston-Salem and back in a relatively safe spectrum is very exciting to me because it is a little bit scary to be out there some days.  To be on the trail and interacting with other people and the whole safety factor is just very exciting to me.

T. Dianne Bellamy-Small: Since this Greenway is connected to neighborhoods, it makes it a lot easier.  I do not have to go somewhere else to be involved with physical activity.  For some of these folks, they can just come out their back doors and walk over to the Greenway, then walk a half mile or a mile and then come back home.

Natalie Abbassi: Well, a healthy lifestyle and going green is very important to me.  So when I think of the Greenway, I think of this as a means to be more healthy, a means to exercise, and a means to get my body moving.  We could be less dependent on our cars.  We could be more social.  We could walk our dogs and get on our bikes.  It is just going to be better for the environment and better for our bodies and health.

Susan Schwartz: You will be able to live downtown if you want to, and walk or ride to your place of work, to all entertainment—and get exercise.  I think this is a very high quality of life for people, and as the world grows and we face different issues, we all know that you want to be in your car less, you want to eat better, you want to walk more, and you want to live near your work.  All of those features will be provided through the Greenway.