Fredericksburg-area transportation officials are asking the state for money to put a pedestrian/bike path on the Falmouth Bridge.
The Fredericksburg Area Metropolitan Planning Organization’s policy committee, which is made up of local elected officials and transportation personnel, voted unanimously Monday night to send a letter to Gov. Glenn Youngkin, asking that a 10-foot-wide, shared-use path be included in a planned renovation of the bridge spanning the Rappahannock River.
The Virginia Department of Transportation is working on the design of a $86.2 million rehabilitation of the bridge on U.S. Route 1. It’s unclear how much it would cost to add a shared-use path to that project, though, because important details about the renovation are still to be decided. Construction is expected to begin between July 2028 and June 2029, and a completion date hasn’t been set.
FAMPO policy committee First Vice Chair Will Mackintosh told his colleagues Monday that Fredericksburg and Stafford County officials have been discussing the upcoming Falmouth Bridge work and the importance of a pedestrian/bike path being included.
“And we just wanted to make sure that it’s on record that it is the preference of the localities,” said Mackintosh, an at-large Fredericksburg city councilman.
The time for putting a shared path on the bridge would be when work is going on there anyway, policy committee Chair Lori Hayes said.
“Well, it’s pretty common sense, I mean, if you’re doing the work now, let’s just do it the right way for the future,” said Hayes, a Spotsylvania County supervisor.
The letter to Youngkin will be accompanied by supporting documents about local pedestrian/bike path efforts. Officials with the policy committee, VDOT, Fredericksburg and Stafford have been working since 2010 on the issue of having a shared trail in the vicinity of the Falmouth Bridge.
Copies of the shared-path letter will be sent to Virginia Secretary of Transportation W. Sheppard Miller III and the Fredericksburg area’s delegation to the General Assembly. The FAMPO committee is also asking delegation members to send their own letters supporting the project to Youngkin and Miller. In July, Fredericksburg’s Economic Development Authority took a similar course of action.
Aside from the planned renovation of the bridge, VDOT recently posted a vehicle weight limit and closed one of its lanes to make emergency repairs to the structure. The northbound lane closure is expected to remain in place for at least several months.
The Falmouth Bridge carries about 38,000 vehicles a day between Fredericksburg and Stafford. It opened in 1943.
