Adults on bicycles. Seniors in motorized wheelchairs. Teens and adults on foot, trying to get to work or to a store.
All of them travel State Road 46 between downtown Nashville and Hawthorne Drive, alongside vehicles that often exceed the posted 40 mph speed limit.
A group of residents is drawing attention to the dangers along this stretch of road for people who can’t drive it.
Near dusk Thursday, Feb. 15, they’re planning to meet at the Pine Room Tavern and walk along the shoulder of the highway into town, then voice their concerns at the Nashville Town Council meeting at 6:30 p.m.
The Nashville Police Department will escort them. Walkers are asked to bring a flashlight as well.
Christina Grimes is fully aware of the dangers of walking along a highway shoulder. On Sept. 4, 2017, she and her boyfriend, James “David” Sturgeon, 28, were walking on State Road 46 East toward Hawthorne Drive after finishing dinner at Out of the Ordinary downtown.
As the couple crossed from the north side to the south side of State Road 46, just west of the Hawthorne Drive intersection near McDonald’s, Sturgeon was struck by an eastbound Volkswagen Jetta.
Grimes told police that he pushed her out of the way of the car. He died at Columbus Regional Hospital that evening. The driver stayed at the scene and no one has been charged; the incident still is under investigation.
Grimes thinks Sturgeon’s death might have been prevented if the highway had better lighting, an actual sidewalk along it and a marked crosswalk with signals.
She cannot drive because she has epilepsy, and Sturgeon didn’t have a license either, she said. They walked pretty much everywhere, from their home on hilly Bear Wallow Road to work in Nashville. “We did what we had to do to maintain jobs,” she said.
Grimes now works at McDonald’s. She estimates at least 15 of her coworkers also walk to work, including high school students.
“The thought has run through my head that if it was one of the high school kids that had gotten hit, something would have been done already, or a tourist,” she said.
“Other than myself and the other people that are with Brown County Paths for People, I don’t think there’s been much outcry for change to happen, and I think that needs to change.”
Anna Hofstetter and Annie Hawk are the other organizers of Brown County Paths for People. The group has started a Facebook page and has been posting notices around the county about the Feb. 15 walk.
They’ve also reached out to other people who might join them in calling for increased safety measures, such as Brown County Schools, and to people and agencies who could make a change, including the Indiana Department of Transportation and the town of Nashville.
McDonald’s co-owner Mike Stieglitz says he’s fully supportive of the idea of a sidewalk. He said he’s always been worried about high school students walking to his restaurant and crossing the highway — not only employees but also customers.
With the Maple Leaf Performing Arts Center planned for the Hawthorne Drive area, Paths for People members believe there will be even more of a need for a visible, safe route from downtown to that area.
“There’s no downside to it,” Hofstetter said. “It’s about public safety first and foremost, and especially for the kids. And it’s going to help with the tourism aspect and getting people over to those businesses and hotels.”
“Amen. I want one, too,” said Nashville Town Council President “Buzz” King about the sidewalk project. He said he’s seen a need for 10 or 12 years. “We need a (pedestrian) overpass from the Brown County Inn area to Speedway as well. I don’t know how many times we’ve approached the state to do that.”
Hawk exchanged emails with an INDOT customer service representative last fall, and INDOT told her that it was “willing to cooperate with Nashville/Brown County if a project is funded.” Hawk had suggested putting crosswalks at two places across 46: between the Brown County Inn and Speedway, and at the light at Hawthorne Drive.
INDOT representative Alisa Sweazy wrote that if the local jurisdiction installs the curb ramps and sidewalks, INDOT would be willing to provide the crosswalks, push buttons for pedestrians and pedestrian signals.
King said the town doesn’t have any money right now to fund such a large project. He guesses it could cost in the neighborhood of $200,000. But the town’s grant administrator might be able to find some, and it might be a project that’s eligible for Community Crossings road grant money from the state, he said.
“I want street lights above 46, from the hotel by McDonald’s to the Speedway corner, too, both sides of the road,” King said.
There is no road lighting at all between the Brown County Inn and the Hawthorne Drive traffic light, Nashville Police Chief Ben Seastrom said. At least one of the highway lights near Speedway hasn’t been working for quite some time and Duke hasn’t come out to fix it, he said.
Seastrom has mixed feelings about adding a sidewalk and crossings on 46. On State Road 135/Van Buren street going through Nashville, where the speed limit is half what it is on 46, Seastrom can remember several instances over the past couple decades when pedestrians were hit either while crossing the street or while walking on a sidewalk, and two deaths.
“I get what they’re saying,” he said about the Paths for People group.
About a sidewalk on 46, “it wouldn’t hurt to have one, but I couldn’t say if it would be used every single day,” he said. Getting it done probably would involve lowering the speed limit in that stretch of highway and changing the traffic pattern somewhat, he said.
King said the town petitioned the state for a crosswalk between Speedway and the Brown County Inn, but so far it’s been denied because of problems with the yield/merge lane turning onto 46 from the Bloomington area.
There is a pedestrian path that leads from downtown Nashville to the McDonald’s area: the Salt Creek Trail. It starts at the CVS, follows the creek through the woods behind the Brown County Inn and ends at the Brown County YMCA, near the end of Hawthorne Drive.
In the spring, Hawthorne Drive will be widened to three lanes and a sidewalk will be built along at least one side of that road, King said. The Indiana Department of Transportation funded that project for the town through the Community Crossings grant program.
Since the Salt Creek Trail opened in 2013, Seastrom said he hasn’t seen as many people walking along the shoulder of 46.
Technically, the unlit trail is closed after dark, but officers don’t ticket people on it, and they don’t patrol the trail and kick people off it unless they’re up to no good, Seastrom said.
Grimes and Hawk said the trail is great for recreation, but it isn’t the shortest way to get between two points, so they don’t believe many people use it to get to work. Hofstetter said the sidewalks in town leading to the trailhead at CVS also need to be improved because it isn’t clear in some places that a sidewalk exists, and that causes conflicts between walkers and drivers.
There are also plans to build a section of the trail under State Road 46, connecting the Brown County Schools campus with the Hawthorne Drive area. However, there’s no funding yet to build it, and the committee in charge of the trail hasn’t met since the Brown County Commissioners pledged to reorganize it last fall.
Seastrom said he’s interested in the trail-under-46 idea. That way, pedestrians wouldn’t compete at all with the vehicle traffic. But it’s unclear how accessible that path from the schools campus would be to the general public, and when it would get built.
King said a pedestrian overpass could serve the same purpose, and it could double as a place to hang a “welcome to Nashville” sign to encourage drivers to turn toward town.
Paths for People members say something needs to happen soon.
Grimes has collected more than 100 signatures on a petition. “Everyone I’ve talked to was like, ‘Oh yeah, of course.’ Nobody’s been like, ‘Oh, that’s a terrible idea,’” she said.
“This can’t wait five years,” Hawk said. “Safety has to be up there as the No. 1 priority.”
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WHAT: Brown County Citizens Paths for People information session and walk, to advocate for better pedestrian and cyclist infrastructure in Nashville
WHEN: 5 p.m. information session, 6 p.m. police-escorted walk to Town Hall, 6:30 p.m. Nashville Town Council meeting
WHERE: Starts at the Pine Room Tavern on Chestnut Street at 5. Walkers will travel Hawthorne Drive and State Road 46 through downtown Nashville to Town Hall on Commercial Street. Organizers are working on a way to get walkers shuttled back to their cars at the Pine Room after the meeting. Bring a flashlight.
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