The town of Porter will contribute a 1.04-mile link to the Marquette Greenway Trail this year from the Burns Harbor border at Babcock Road to Howe Road.
The Redevelopment Commission took action Tuesday, awarding the contract to Milestone Contractors for $1,668,400, the lowest of three bidders. The bid came in close to the predicted estimate.
Construction is expected to start this spring with a completion date around September, said Michael Barry, the town’s director of development/building commissioner.
The Marquette Greenway Trail, when it’s completed, will stretch 56 miles from Calumet Park in Chicago to New Buffalo, Michigan. Communities between the two destination points are building their portions of the trail.
In 2024, Porter County government paved a 1.4-mile section of what had been the unpaved Calumet Trail, now part of the Marquette Greenway, from N. Mineral Spring Road to the South Shore’s Dune Park Station.
Burns Harbor is planning to soon build a 0.8-mile link for its portion of the Marquette Greenway to the border of Porter at Babcock Road.
Porter received a $2,077,016 grant from the state government’s Next Level Trails Program in December 2023 for the trail, which will traverse the Mnoke Prairie.
Barry said Porter will provide a $520,000 match toward the project.
When completed, the new portion of the trail will also intersect with the Porter Brickyard Trail, which provides a way to access the Prairie Duneland Trail in Chesterton.
In other business, the Redevelopment Commission and Town Council approved for the town to participate in an application for the Brownfields Coalition Grant.
Barry explained that the Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission is coordinating the grant application for federal dollars, likely from the Environmental Protection Agency, to clean up polluted land.
The town’s Redevelopment Commission owns a now heavily wooded 33 acres off of Beam Street that years ago was the site of a brickyard facility. The contamination of the soil needs to be addressed before the land can be reused.
The Duneland School Corporation in 2021 had considered the brickyard as a potential site for Yost Elementary School, but decided instead to build a new school building at its present location.
Additionally, Clerk-Treasurer Corinne Peffers said that the town of Porter will begin the sale of its Porter Beach parking permits on March 16.
Applications for the parking permit will be accessed from the town’s website. The applicant must supply a copy of their driver’s license and car registration, which must match and show they live in the town of Porter. Applications can only be submitted through the mail.
Sale of the passes will be limited to town residents for two weeks until others are allowed to apply. The cost for Porter residents is $50 and $25 for seniors. Indiana residents would pay $80 and out-of-state residents $115.
The popular parking pass — which provides parking next to the beach — sells out every year. The town will sell 800 passes this year, the same number as last year.
In other business, Porter Fire Chief Jay Craig Jr. said that his volunteer fire department again set a record for the number of calls with 983 last year.
Craig said it really helped that the town provided him with part-time paid firefighters for the summer months, because his department fielded more than 100 calls for June, July and August.
Jim Woods is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
