Marquette Greenway hits about 65% complete with $30M still to raise

PORTER COUNTY, Ind. — The Marquette Greenway is roughly 65% complete, with about 39 miles built by October, nine miles fully funded, and 12 miles only partly funded, Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission active transportation planner Mitch Barloga told the Post-Tribune in a Sept. 12 report by Doug Ross — leaving the multi-state lakeshore trail about $30 million short of a finished 60-mile route from Calumet Park, Illinois, to New Buffalo, Michigan.

Key facts

Ten miles are under construction and should finish by next spring “at this rate,” Barloga said. Burns Harbor and Porter are each building sections meant to meet near the Norfolk Southern bridge over the Little Calumet River, continue under the tracks toward Beam Street and Minoke Prairie, and reach a Howe Road trailhead serving the Little Calumet River Trail.

“There’s lots left,” Barloga said of the funding gap. The Post-Tribune flags the stretch from NIRPC’s Portage headquarters westward as the main challenge. The Portage Redevelopment Commission plans a new Burns Ditch bridge financed with a $15 million bond, but extending Burns Parkway to reach that bridge likely waits until the commission sells about 300 acres and secures a development plan — leaving Portage routing unresolved for now.

Barloga said one alternate would push the trail north on Ind. 249 toward Portage Lakefront Park and Riverwalk on existing national park access, though he described that option as still “in a state of limbo.” Crossing the RDC bridge would instead wind toward Stagecoach Road and the South Shore Line’s Portage/Ogden Dunes station before skirting Ogden Dunes to West Beach and the Douglas Center in Gary’s Miller area, where the trail currently ends on National Park Service land.

Further west, the Post-Tribune and Hoodline accounts say the federal RAISE grant includes a west Gary phase from Bridge Street to Cline Avenue — roughly $22 million to $23 million for three miles because of multiple bridges. Barloga expects that work to be split into smaller phases and hopes Gary can help with construction costs. Inside Indiana Dunes National Park, a 3.6-mile Douglas Center-to-Broadway segment still needs construction dollars even if engineering funding is closer at hand; overall, Barloga put about five miles on park trails and about three miles outside the park for the city to finish.

On the scenic eastern build, the route between Ind. 49 and Kemil Road is done, and planners are aiming to reach Broadway in Beverly Shores by the end of 2026, pulling riders off the Calumet Trail corridor under NIPSCO power lines onto a more stable path, Barloga told the Post-Tribune. Michigan’s end is nearly finished, with about a half-mile left, and a 2.9-mile Michigan City segment from Karwick to El Portal is fully funded under RAISE, he said.

The Times of Northwest Indiana’s March 14 package set the longer arc: former U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky’s Marquette Plan roots, NIRPC Executive Director Ty Warner comparing the corridor’s potential to Atlanta’s BeltLine and Cincinnati’s Crown Trail, and Indiana Dunes Tourism CEO Christine Livingston calling completion “transformative.” Barloga told the Times the full route was then estimated at about $116 million with $25 million to $30 million still to raise, and that Friends of the Marquette Greenway funding had been stood up with the Legacy Foundation.

Miles are opening in Porter, Burns Harbor, and Beverly Shores. Uninterrupted Chicago-to-New Buffalo riding still depends on river crossings, railroad bridges, park construction budgets, and that last $30 million.