Greenway, this way

Carrboro is right to propose paving parts of the Bolin Creek trail to construct a greenway.

Greenways can be used as environmentally friendly transportation alternatives and can connect parts of town that are hard to reach by bike.

Carrboro has been trying to create a greenway system for some time and hired Greenways Inc., a greenway consulting firm, to draft construction plans. Its plans were released in December.

The plans presented by the firm, which included paving the trail running next to Bolin Creek, caused quite a commotion. Now, a petition with about 180 signatures is circulating in an attempt to block the proposed paving.

Those spearheading the petition claim that trees and macroinvertebrates (whatever those are) in the creek’s water will die if certain portions of the trail are paved. They claim that the water in Jordan Lake, one of our water sources, will become undrinkable.

But it’s not as if the town is planning on building a road through Bolin Creek. It’ll be a bike path. And there are already environmental disturbances there — a sewer line runs under portions of the trail.

The town invited the N.C. Division of Water Quality to inspect the proposed path area. And division officials told town staff that the location was preferable because sewer line maintenance already causes a disturbance in the area.

 It seems Greenways Inc. figured it would be best to put a greenway in an area that already needs to be accessed by heavy machinery rather than assaulting some untouched stream.

That doesn’t necessarily diminish the environmental concerns. But we trust the Carrboro town government will keep those concerns at the forefront of its planning.

The town is simply planning to pave over a path that’s heavily used but currently inadequate as a greenway. The town should move forward with its plans to pave the trail.