The Spanish Moss Trail is going underground in Beaufort. Here’s why
John Praylow stopped his bicycle at the construction site and dabbed sweat from his forehead with a blue cloth.
Praylow rides the Spanish Moss Trail multiple times each day.
"It's the fastest way to get around when you don't have a vehicle," he said Thursday afternoon.
He knew the trail detour at Trask Parkway and Parris Island Gateway was related to the hotel construction but didn't know the trail is going underground.
The ongoing hotel project on a busy stretch of Beaufort highway is also transforming a section of the popular biking and walking path. As part off the work, the county required developers to build a tunnel for the trail to cross beneath the planned hotel entrance.
The decision last year to build the tunnel was controversial, with some trail supporters opposing the configuration favored by Beaufort County engineers and planning officials. Both sides offered the same argument — safety.
The tunnel will keep bicyclists, runners and walkers from potential collisions with cars entering the new parking lot.
On the other hand, those who frequent the trail aren't keen to the idea of being directed underground.
County officials felt the tunnel was necessary — at the developers' expense — to eliminate the possibility of cars hitting someone crossing the entryway. Vehicles traveling more than 40 mph would have little time to react if they turned right to enter the hotel as someone is crossing on the trail, interim county administrator Josh Gruber said.
The tunnel will be lighted and trail users will be able to see from one side through the other, he said. There has been talk of eventually installing emergency callboxes along the trail.
"We don't want it to in any way discourage people from using the trail," Gruber said. "...There shouldn't be any issues with the tunnel itself that will give people pause in using it."
That might not be possible, said Nick Gregoire, who rents bicycles to trail users from his Pluff Mudd Coffee Shop in Port Royal. He said he can't imagine a mother being willing to push a child in a stroller through the tunnel, even in the middle of the day.
County officials say the trail is safe, with a Sheriff's Office spokesman saying Thursday he couldn't recall any recent incidents reported. An 86-year-old man was robbed of his wallet while working in a flowerbed at a Beaufort trailhead in 2015 but said at the time the incident shouldn't discourage people from using the trail.
"There's no unique public safety concern about the trail," Sheriff's Office Capt. Bob Bromage said. "People are encouraged to use it. It's there for the recreation."
Moss said he suggested alternatives to the tunnel, including stop signs on the trail, "rumble strips" to alert bicycles of the upcoming intersection and triggered lights.
The Spanish Moss Trail is a 12-foot concrete path running from Port Royal, through Beaufort and Burton and into Seabrook. Plans for final segments will take the trail from the Battery Creek waterfront in Port Royal's Old Village to the Whale Branch River.
The project has been pitched in part for the potential for redevelopment efforts to follow the trail's construction.
Developers of two new hotels and other commercial development planned at the site with the new tunnel said the increased popularity of the trail is part of the reason the property was desirable. The trail runs between the hotel development and Trask Parkway.
For now, the route is closed just before the tunnel construction and directs users through the dirt lot near the hotel construction and out the other side as it continues toward Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort.
A group of bicyclists waited for the light to change at Parris Island Gateway and Trask Parkway after navigating a detour through the dirt adjacent to the construction site Thursday morning. One of the riders described the configuration as a mess before pedaling away..
A man who emerged from the detour pedaling toward Beaufort with plastic grocery bags over each handlebar thought the project was related to drainage and would be restored to its original form.
Praylow rides the trail to take his wife to work early in the morning and to meet her when she gets off work in the afternoon. The trip from his home off of Shanklin Road to his wife's job on Robert Smalls Parkway takes about 30 minutes.
He said he hasn't had issues with safety on the trail and said he doesn't feel the tunnel will be a concern.
"It'd be fun and entertaining," he said. "But it wouldn't make no difference."
This story was originally published April 26, 2018 at 4:16 PM with the headline "The Spanish Moss Trail is going underground in Beaufort. Here’s why."