AFTER BEFORE
Monon Greenway Celeb rat i n g T w o D e c a d es of th e
Writer // Janelle Morrison • Photography // Courtesy of Ron Carter and City of Carmel
Imagine for a moment … what if the Monon Trail had not been redeveloped and was left as an unsightly “linear junkyard” as it was prior to becoming a major outdoor attraction for Marion and Hamilton Counties?
T
oday, the Monon Trail is an asphalt trail that stretches from the town of Westfield south to downtown Indianapolis. The Monon Greenway runs 5 miles from 146th Street to 96th Street. As many trail users celebrate two decades of utilizing the trail for recreation and transportation purposes, we thought it prudent to look back at the people and organizations who assisted in making the Monon Trail and Monon Greenway (Carmel’s portion) a reality and worked through a myriad of obstacles so that current and future generations can enjoy it. PRE-REDEVELOPMENT OF THE MONON TRAIL The CSX (formerly Monon) Railroad line connected Chicago and Indianapolis for more than 100 years. According to attorney Alan Townsend at Bose McKinney, who represented the City of
Carmel during the land acquisitions for the Monon Trail project, CSX had either purchased outright parcels from landowners—mostly farmers at that time—or had written documents that were written as easements that gave the railroad company the right to use the land so as long as it was operating its railways. In later years, discerning who actually owned these parcels—246 in total—proved to be a convoluted task, to say the least. After the decline of railroad travel and the sale of the company in 1987, the portion of the line between Indianapolis and Delphi was abandoned. As municipalities in both counties began looking at purchasing properties along the Monon Railroad line, some property owners supported its redevelopment and some remonstrated in fierce opposition. Carmel resident Paxton Waters and his wife, Rosemary, purchased their residence
CARMEL MONTHLY
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that adjoins the trail 31 years ago. Prior to its redevelopment, he recalled what the railroad line looked like. “Thirty-one years ago, it was a serious junkyard,” Waters shared. “We bought our house at a discount because of the abandoned trail in the backyard. There were refrigerators and all kinds of big trash. People were shooting off guns back there, and in the wintertime it was a snowmobile course.” Waters added, “I was totally for [the redevelopment] of the trail just to get rid of the trash. When I heard that the city was trying to buy up some of the properties along the trail, I was all for it. The trail was such a negative at the time and anything would be better than what it was.” The Waters sold approximately 400 feet of their property to the city of Carmel for what he said was a “fair deal.” Fast forward to present time, Waters—who enjoys regular walks out on the trail—said he can’t even get out of his gate access to the trail from his backyard without people stopping to ask if he’d be interested in selling his house. “What was a junkyard became a walking trail, and now it’s the biggest linear
NOVEMBER 2021
2021-11-23 11:25 PM
