The Northern Virginia Transportation Authority (NVTA) on July 9 approved $45 million for the Route 234 Trail at Innovation Park. The project will construct a 10-foot asphalt shared use path on Route 234 (Prince William Parkway) between Route 28 and Sudley Manor Drive and a pedestrian bridge (circled above) crossing over Route 234.
The pedestrian bridge over Prince William Parkway at Discovery Boulevard was proposed six years ago in the Innovation Park Small Area Plan (see p.96). The trail will be a partial retrofit – Prince William Parkway was built in the 1990’s from Brentsville/Dumfries Road to I-66 without a parallel shared use path.
The 2021 rezoning for Innovation Town Center (where houses are now under construction) included a proffered trail (see p.18) on the north side of the parkway from University Boulevard to Wellington Road. The county may eventually decide to locate the trail on the south side of the parkway between Route 28 up to the new pedestrian bridge, then utilize the proffered trail on the north side to reach Wellington Road.
There is also the possibility that the new Shared Use Path funded by NVTA will be located completely on the north side. Discovery Boulevard could be modified between University Boulevard-Route 28 to provide a trail, perhaps through a road diet reducing some of the existing 4-lane highway to a 2-lane road.
No new trail will be constructed adjacent to the parkway between University Boulevard-Wellington Road. Instead, a Shared Use Path is planned along Hornbaker Road.
The $45 million in new NVTA funding was added to the last years of the six-year funding cycle. Anticipated completion date of the Route 234 Trail at Innovation Park is March 31, 2035.
An additional $30.3 million was approved for the Manassas VRE Rail With Trail project. That three-mile trail will link the Virginia Railway Express (VRE) station in Manassas with the VRE station in Manassas Park, and extend across Bull Run (with a new bike/pedestrian bridge) to the Bull Run-Occoquan Trail in Fairfax County.
The connection across Bull Run is Phase 1 of a proposed $110 million project. As proposed in the feasibility study, Phase 2 would extend the bike/pedestrian trail parallel to the VRE tracks to the VRE/Amtrack station in Alexandria at Landmark. In some spots, the trail will be adjacent to the railroad tracks.
Between FY2014-2031, NVTA has allocated almost $4.5 billion for 153 projects.. NVTA notes the
latest (FY2026-2031) funding round includes the “Highest amount and percentage of bike and
pedestrian projects (9 projects, 43% of total) and funding ($165 million, 21% of total) ever in one funding cycle.” Prince William County and the cities of Manassas and Manassas Park submitted six projects for this funding cycle.