A new section of road is creating a direct route from what’s known as Nashville’s “black main street “to the retail, restaurants and wealth of West End Avenue.
At Tuesday’s opening of the 28th Avenue Connector, the Pearl Cohn High School Marching Band played, black and white ministers prayed, and city officials talked of an easier path to walk, drive or ride the bus between historically black North Nashville hospitals, universities and businesses and their counterparts just a few miles away.
“This would be a good time now to have not just a symbol.”
Pastor Enoch Fuzz was clearly happy to see the long-awaited project come to fruition, but says it’s just a first step.
From this intersection, the connector takes a curving path between empty lots, over the railroad, to join with 31st Avenue and Centennial Park at the base of the hill seen in the distance. Credit Nina Cardona/WPLN
“We’ve connected these two communities with a bridge, now lets keep working at connecting the hearts and the cultures of Nashvilians so we can really be what I always dreamed Nashville ought to be.”
The connector joins 28th Avenue at a stretch of Charlotte Pike that has been marked by empty industrial properties. Plans are in place to build an 18 acre mixed-use development at that intersection, with offices catering to the health care sector.
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