A $13 million project will provide a 10-foot-wide multi-modal trail along Lake Erie between Euclid Beach and East 151st Street, connecting the park to Cleveland's 17-mile lakefront bikeway.
Cuyahoga County, Cleveland Metroparks and the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District broke ground on the connector Monday afternoon.
The project will reconnect residents on the East Side to a lakefront where they鈥檝e historically lacked access, Cuyahoga County Executive Chris Ronayne said.
"We've made decisions over time, decades back when, to put everything from an airport to power plants to highways in the path of what would otherwise be access to the water," he said. "So we're really righting the wrongs of history."
Once completed, the Euclid Beach Connector will provide a 0.6-mile multi-modal trail connecting the park to others on Cleveland鈥檚 East Side, including Beulah Park, Villa Beach and Shore Acres.
The connector is a step in the county鈥檚 commitment to bringing 60 miles of new trails over the next five years, Ronayne said.
"When you think about what the county's doing with its lakefront access plan across all of its shoreline communities, Bay Village, Rocky River, Lakewood, Cleveland, Bratenahl, Euclid, across the communities, we're adding new miles of trail every year along the shoreline," Ronayne said.
A 2,400-foot bluff will be constructed as part of the project to prevent further erosion along the shoreline, and kayak ports, look-out points and other amenities will also be featured along the trail.
It's the first integrated lakefront public access and shoreline protection initiative in Cuyahoga County, according to its
The county will continue to look for other gaps along its trail systems in an effort to complete its Lakefront Access Plan, Ronayne said a thriving trail network will improve residents' quality of life.
"We've always said we're about healthy communities, and I think nothing really gets to health more than opportunities for people to walk, to bike, to roll, to stroll on places like our trails," he said. "To us, this really adds up to people's health and wellness. And I that's what's so exciting about this."
The trail connector is expected to be completed in November 2027.
