RALEIGH – Just days after Hurricane Helene, a greenway improvement project in hard-hit Hendersonville earned first place honors in two categories as one of the best multimodal projects in this year’s N.C. Department of Transportation Mobi Awards.
Officials with Hendersonville took top honors for the project they nominated, Oklawaha Greenway Phase 3. The project earned first place in the contest’s Small Urban category for projects that serve North Carolina’s communities with between 10,001 and 50,000 residents. It also earned first place in the contest’s Most Voted Project category.
The city learned of the good news not long after Hendersonville was ravaged by Hurricane Helene. While the greenway was impacted, city officials worked hard to clear debris from the trail so it could be reopened Oct. 4.
The winners of this year's NCDOT Mobi Awards were selected several months before Helene.
“Western North Carolina sustained catastrophic flooding and a large number of fallen trees, but the project foot bridges remained intact, and the greenway resiliently weathered the storm,” said Hendersonville’s Public Services Director Brent Detwiler. “The City of Hendersonville Public Works team worked diligently to reopen this wonderful amenity to a community in deep need for outdoor recreation opportunities, relaxation, and a return to some semblance of normalcy.”
The NCDOT Mobi Awards, now in its fourth year, honors towns, cities and counties for multimodal projects that spurred economic development, improved public health and enhanced communities. First, second and third place winners were selected in six categories – Rural, Small Urban, Urban, Large Urban, Innovation and Most Voted Project.
Hendersonville’s project was one of 20 entered into this year’s competition.
Completed in July 2019, the Oklawaha Greenway Phase III project enhances the area’s active transportation system by expanding the Oklawaha Greenway an additional 1.5 miles and completing a city-wide network that connects four parks in Hendersonville.
The 10-foot-wide asphalt, multi-use path provides an inviting place for visitors to exercise in nature. The North Main Street sidewalk portion of the project creates a half-mile of sidewalk along a busy corridor where no walkway previously existed. A 70-foot pedestrian bridge provides safe passage over Mud Creek and gives the Oklawaha Village direct greenway access.
“The Oklawwaha Greenway is an asset for Hendersonville especially after the hurricane,” said NCDOT Deputy Secretary for Multimodal Transportation Julie White. “The investment the city made in the greenway provided a safer way for people to walk and provided connections to destinations. The city’s hard work to reopen the greenway is a reflection of the resilience of the citizens in Hendersonville and all the people who are working hard to help restore western North Carolina.”
Also in the Small Urban Category, the town of Cornelius’ Antiquity Greenway project claimed second place honors and the Ocracoke Express Passenger Ferry: Connecting Hatteras and Ocracoke Islands with Passenger Ferry and Tram Services, which was nominated by Hyde County, took third place.
Most Voted Project WinnersThe Oklawaha Greenway Phase 3 also took first place in the Most Voted Project category. All the entries were opened to an online public vote, with the winner being the project with the highest number of votes.
The public was able to vote using a website and social media. Each person could cast a ballot up to three times a day. Oklawaha Greenway Phase 3 was the top vote-getter with 3,266 votes.
Cary’s Reedy Creek Road Improvements took second place honors in the Most Voted Project category with 1,896 votes, and the passenger ferry project in Hyde County claimed third place honors with 199 votes in the MVP category.
This year’s Mobi Awards were hosted by NCDOT, the North Carolina Triangle Chapter of the Women Transportation Seminars, NC Go!, N.C. State University Institute for Transportation Research and Education, and ACEC: The American Council of Engineering Companies.
To see this year’s winning projects, including NCDOT-produced videos of the first place winners, visit the
Mobi Awards webpage. People can also see photos of the cleanup of the
Oklawaha Greenway on NCDOT’s Flickr account. and visit the
NCDOT Mobi Awards online booklet for more information on this year’s contest and its participants.