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After nearly six years of negotiations, Great Rivers Greenway signed paperwork to have Union Pacific Railroad officially “abandon” a small portion of their land so we could purchase it and transform it into a greenway for you!
Since 2018, we have been actively working with the City of Olivette to extend the Centennial Greenway from Olive Blvd. (near I-170), 2.5 miles west through Olivette to Warson Park so you can connect to the neighborhoods, parks, business districts and other greenways in the area.
As part of the initial planning process, the Olivette community identified the preferred route for the greenway. Part of this route included a 0.75-mile section of a dormant railroad track that has not been used since the 1960s.
Using a railroad that hasn’t been active for 60 years sounds simple, but Senior Project Manager Angelica Gutierrez had to take this matter all the way to Washington DC to ask the Surface Transportation Board to officially “abandon” the railroad before they could sell it. (The Surface Transportation Board is an independent federal agency that is charged with the economic regulation of various modes of surface transportation, primarily freight rail.)
On November 1, 2024, after nearly six years of negotiations, we signed the paperwork to purchase the land; we cannot wait to bring this to life!
To keep the rest of the greenway expansion moving forward, the project was broken down into four sections. This includes the completed improvements to the intersection at Olive and I-170, the completed greenway in Warson Park, and the soon-to-be-completed-in-early 2025 section from Warson Park through Indian Meadows Park to Dielman Rd.
We are thrilled to now be able to build this section of the greenway that the community has asked for! The next step will be working with our partners and residents in Olivette to design the final section along the former railroad route (starts at Olive, between the CVS and Chevy’s Fresh Mex and heads north/northwest, on the east side of Dielman Industrial to Dielman Rd.) over the next couple years. Stay tuned for updates on this project!