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OverviewThe East Coast Greenway is a vast public works project that is creating a transportation infrastructurefor cyclists and pedestrians along the Eastern Seabord. It is akin to the National Highway System. Estimated build-out for the spine route is $3-4 billion with alternate routes costing another $2 billion. But, while federal funds are the major source for building Greenway segments, the federal government does not play a lead role. The East Coast Greenway Alliance (ECGA) is the driving not-for-profit force behind the Greenway. Making the Greenway is an enormous partnership undertaking. The ECGA provides the leadership and coordination to ensure continuity and a consistent product, based on Alliance routing criteria. This is both a top-down and a bottom-up trail building process. It depends for its success on direction by the Alliance, federal financial support, and the involvement of hundreds of state and local government agencies, trail advocates, and other non-profit organizations. While huge in scope and scale, creation of the Greenway is happening incrementally, one segment at a time. It will take decades to achieve the ECGA goal of a mostly off-road Greenway. Currently, and for many years to come, portions of the route temporarily follow roads that link the completed trail sections together and enable public use. We consider the on-road sections of the trail interim and continue to work to move them onto traffic-free right-of-way since our vision is for the ECG to be entirely off-road and traffic-free. We approach our work with both determination and patience, knowing that the Appalachian Trail was largely on road for many decades and is achieving a fully secured off-road right-of-way only after 80 years of diligence. We acknowledge the long-term nature of this trail-making project. The East Coast Greenway Alliance is committed to working to achieve a 95% traffic-free route by 2030, if not sooner. Establishing the GreenwaySpearheading this project is the East Coast Greenway Alliance , a non-profit headquartered in Rhode Island that champions the ECG vision and provides overall coordination. The Alliance staff, Board of Trustees, Trail Council, and state committees each play a critical role in advancing the ECG vision. Creating and Advocating for the VisionThe Alliance works to ensure continuity and a consistent quality of route by establishing a clear vision and orchestrating an advocacy effort to build the support for this vision. Our state committees provide the advocacy at the state and local levels with the Alliance board and staff supporting their efforts. The Alliance also builds support from federal agencies and national partner organizations, and coordinates a broad communications effort to increase awareness of the ECG vision. Where no local trail projects are underway, the Alliance assumes responsibility for establishing new trail projects. The Four ECG RegionsThe ECG is broken into four regions for planning and operational purposes:
New England: Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut Mid-Atlantic: New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Washington, DC South Atlantic: Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina Southeast: Georgia, Florida Defining the Route and Establishing TrailThe Alliance board is the body charged with establishing the Greenway through a formal designation process. The board first approves the route corridor, which experiences some changes from time to time through a "designation" process and then the inclusion of specific completed trail as part of the ECG trail system. New trails are nominated by ECGA state committees, field checked by volunteers or staff against established criteria, brought to our Trail Council for review, and finally approved by the Alliance Board of Trustees . The Alliance also plays a proactive role in defining new off-road route. While many sections of the Greenway are initiated as local trails, there are many portions of the route that will depend on the Alliance to determine a way to them bring off-road. 30% of the corridor still remains to be defined, and it will be up to the Alliance to make that happen. Building the GreenwayBecause this trail is a hard-surface facility, it does not lend itself to the kind of hands-on trail making by volunteers on back-country, soft-surface trails. There is some opportunity for that during the initial stages of cleaning up a given corridor, such as an abandoned rail line. Generally, we depend on professional design and construction to build our hard-surface route, which is done by local or state organizations. The Alliance does not build trail. A great deal of the proposed route is already in public ownership, so only limited acquisition of right-of-way is needed, but that will undoubtedly be expensive and, in some cases, challenging. 
Trail construction is usually organized by local or state agencies or volunteers. Here, a boardwalk and road connections are being built on the White Oak Creek Greenway in Cary, NC. The funds to acquire, plan, and build the Greenway come chiefly from federal transportation monies that flow to the states and localities, usually via Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) for dispersal through both earmarks and programs like Enhancements, Recreational Trails, and Congestion Mitigation. Matching funds come from state and local governments and in-kind sources. We estimate the full cost of our spine route at $3 billion or more, based on a cost of $1 million per mile, including the more costly infrastructure of bridges and tunnels. The alternate routes will cost another $2 billion. While complete records on the funding already allocated to and/or spent on the Greenway have not been compiled, we are confident that it totals over $1 billion and probably substantially more. Promoting Use of the GreenwayWhile still heavily involved in trail development, the Alliance’s role is beginning to shift into marketing the Greenway for use. Initially, we have focused on making cue sheets, user maps and guides, and posting trail markers and informational kiosks along the route. We will also package travel itineraries for the model sections where much trail is complete, like our New York City Weekend Trip Planner. This will encourage families and others to get out and experience the Greenway on day or weekend trips or longer excursions. Eventually, the Alliance will promote use of the ECG and the network of linking routes as a vast travel network, via both our web and printed materials, but also using interactive kiosks planted along the route, cell phones, and other emerging technologies. Stewarding the GreenwayThe Alliance does not own any portion of the Greenway and will not directly maintain or manage it. The trails that constitute the Greenway are owned and managed by local public bodies: state, county, and municipal agencies. The Alliance plays a role in ensuring that the condition of this route is maintained. We monitor trail conditions to ensure long-distance users of consistency in fundamental trail quality. We will work to support the budget requests by local trail-managing agencies to ensure adequate maintenance levels. A longer-range goal is to secure the resources to establish a trail endowment. We could then make grants to local trails to provide the revenues needed to deal with emergencies or to embellish the trail with amenities, including public art. Important Role of our State CommitteesThe Alliance works through our 16 state committees who coordinate route selection and undertake our advocacy efforts to move the agenda ahead within each state. They bring hundreds of volunteers into the process of trail making. By building support from both citizens and public agencies at the local and state levels, they provide the legitimacy for this project. Essential Role of Local Trail InitiativesWere it not for the civic energy behind scores of local trail projects, assembling the Greenway would a much more speculative goal. Virtually every community along our route is involved in developing bikepaths and multi-user trails, some of which will serve as sections of our route. Examples are the Eastern Trail Alliance in Maine, the Farmington Canal Rail to Trail Association and the Merritt Parkway Trail Alliance in Connecticut, and Triangle Rails-to-Trails Conservancy in North Carolina. This trail movement involves thousands of additional volunteers indirectly in the making of the Greenway. In many cases, the local trail advocacy organizations evolve into friends of the trail groups and continue working for the maintenance of these local trails. An excellent example is the Friends of Anne Arundel County Trails in Maryland. Role of Local, County, and State GovernmentsThe Greenway is being built and will be owned and managed by public agencies, chiefly municipal and county governments, but also by state and to a very limited extent by federal agencies. Their commitment to these local trails is evidence of the value of trails for their communities and to their economies. 
Meeting and summits, such as this ECG summit in North Carolina, bring advocates and government officials together with ECGA staff to plan the Greenway. Photo: Matt Hayes. Role of Federal GovernmentIn 1989, the ECG was designated a National Millennium Trail, a program administered by USDOT. However, it is not part of the National Trail System administered by the Department of Interior under the National Trails Act passed by Congress in 1968. The Alliance aspires to be included within the National Trail System at some point, but is currently focusing its resources on getting the trail built. To that end, federal transportation dollars funneled through state and local governments are paying for much of the cost of building the Greenway. In addition, the Greenway has received substantial support from the National Park Service through its Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance Program, mainly in the form of technical assistance for local trail projects but also through limited but important direct financial support to the Alliance. Other PartnersThe Alliance works closely with scores of other organizations who have a stake in the Greenway's realization. Some of our key partners are:
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