City gets grant for accessible trail in Moss Rock Preserve

The city of Hoover has secured a $110,000 grant from the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs to help make the Moss Rock Preserve nature park more accessible to people with mobility issues.

The grant from ADECA’s recreational trails program will help the city build a trail and overlook area that would give everyone access to the popular boulder field in the nature park.

Currently, it’s difficult for people in wheelchairs or with walkers as well as parents with strollers to get to the boulder fields and up on the boulders.

The plan is to build a new parking lot that includes 50 to 60 regular parking spaces and five or six handicapped-accessible spaces several hundred feet south of the boulder field and use natural materials to build a firm and stable trail that’s about 600 feet long.

The trail would lead to a 12-by-12-foot observation platform that would sit above one of the boulders and give people the same viewpoint they would get if they were to climb one of the boulders in the field, said Dee Nance, the community services officer for the city of Hoover.

The observation platform would be built out of a Trex composite deck material and be designed to fit into the natural setting, Nance said.

The total cost of the project is estimated to be $193,750, with the state providing $110,000, the Hoover Parks and Recreation Foundation providing $7,500 and the city of Hoover providing $41,500 in cash and $34,750 in

in-kind work by city staff, said Mindy Wyatt, a strategic analyst for the city’s Office of Economic and Community Development.

When the city first submitted its grant application, the design of the project was different, and it was expected to cost $284,000, with $200,000 coming from the state.

ADECA officials liked the concept of the project but said only $110,000 was available, so the city redesigned the project to reduce the cost, Wyatt said.

The entrance to the parking area was originally going to come from the area where the previous parking lot was located — just to the east. But now a shorter entrance road will be built coming directly off Preserve Parkway, Wyatt said. It will be 400 feet shorter, and the modifications to the road will save about $65,000, she said.

The parking lot should have roughly the same number of parking spaces as originally planned, and people will have access to views they have not been able to see before, Wyatt said.

The redesign also included the removal of a gate and specialized trail signs, Wyatt said. The city can revisit the sign issue at a later date.

“Our priority was to create a trail experience and access to the boulder field that can be enjoyed by all,” Wyatt said.

While the timetable for the project is not firm, city officials plan to start work on it by June, but hopefully sooner, Wyatt said. The grant money has to be spent by May 31, 2023.

Wyatt thanked Councilman Casey Middlebrooks, whom she said spearheaded the idea for the project. “We are very appreciative for his vision,” she said.

Middlebrooks said it’s really simple to supply a vision, but the hard work is bringing the vision to reality. The staff in the city’s Office of Economic and Community Development and City Forester Colin Conner deserve all the praise for making this project viable, he said.

Conner has said the city may in the future seek a second grant to improve trail accessibility from the Moss Rock Preserve gravel parking area off Sulphur Springs Road.