Jarah Jacquay was standing in Bay Bluffs Park off Scenic Highway on a warm spring morning as he talked about an ambitious public greenway project in Pensacola that is picking up support locally and statewide. It’s called the Bluffline, a project that’s been talked about for years.
“The Bluffline is a 10-mile, multi-use path stretching from Scenic Heights in East Pensacola, through downtown Pensacola, to the Jackson Lakes/Warrington area of West Pensacola," said Jacquay.
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Jarah Jacquay is the president of Bluffline Inc., a nonprofit started last year by a small group of community advocates. He sees the Bluffline as a unifying concept tying together several city and county projects already in varying stages of development.
“Starting from the east, we have the Scenic Highway multi-use path that FDOT is in the planning phases (of), we’ve already done a feasibility study," said Jacquay, pointing down the hill towards Pensacola Bay.
“Once we hop over into East Hill, the city has been working on awaterfront framework planthat would take us from the Pensacola Bay Bridge, along Main Street, past the ECUA property and Bruce Beach,” said Jacquay.
That’s where the city’s current planning terminates. Bluffline Inc. wants to continue the project along the Jackson Street corridor, where Escambia County and the city of Pensacola are jointly working on the Reimagine Jackson Street project.
“That’s really the project that’s in the earliest phase of development," said Jacquay. “They just started soliciting public input and seeing what neighborhood residents want and need in that area. But what I’m trying to emphasize is that the Bluffline is an effort to knit together several projects that are already in development and in different stages of the planning process.”
The idea for the Bluffline is not unique to Pensacola. There are similar projects in urban and rural areas across the country, including some in our immediate area.
“We have some fantastic multi-use trails at Blackwater State Park, the Blackwater Heritage Trail in Milton," said Jacquay. “Over in Baldwin County you have the Gulf State Park trail system. But we are more modeling this project on the Beltline Project in Atlanta, the Underline Project in Miami, the High Line Project in New York to a certain extent. Because those trails go through urban areas and they’ve been strategic from the very beginning in making sure that the public achieves a return on investment that’s not just quality of life — although that’s hugely important — but that there’s an economic impact to the broader community (and) that there are positive environmental impacts. So we are trying to take a page out of their playbooks.”
The Bluffline project is still just a concept, but one that Jacquay and his group is looking to guide along for as long as it takes.
“The biggest success stories have had strong advocacy groups and public sector engagement over a many year process to keep moving things forward," said Jacquay. He envisions Bluffline Inc. acting as a project manager of sorts, and to make sure that all the various public sector stakeholders involved continue to communicate with one another. “We are still very early on in building our capacity in that regard, but we’ve been blessed to have some very, very talented people step up to the plate and volunteer their services.”
Some of those volunteers are skilled urban planners and transportation engineers who have worked on similar projects across the country and want to see this one succeed. Bluffline Inc. is currently building a team to do the legwork necessary to coordinate with the various governmental agencies involved in make this project happen.
“Our two biggest goals right now — one would be to support the city’s efforts on Main Street, to make sure that the facilities that are built are safe and comfortable for cyclists and pedestrians from (ages) 8 to 80," said Jacquay. “Because that’s the crucial middle portion of the trail. That’s the part that’s been funded, fully designed already, and that will be built most likely in the next year or two. So it’s crucial that we get that right.”
“The second goal right now would be to move the Scenic Highway portion of the trail on to the next phase," he added. "We received really wonderful news in April that this section of the trail, after honestly decades of work, has been finally added to the Florida Greenways and Trail Map. What that means is that the state recognizes this as an important corridor to allocate resources to.”
The current proposed route of the Bluffline begins at Chimney Park, in Scenic Heights, travels southwest along the Scenic Bay Bluffs corridor and then merges downtown with the Pensacola Waterfront Framework Plan before continuing west through Brownsville and, finally, terminating at Jackson Lakes.
