(WASHINGTON, DC) – District residents and visitors to the centennial National Cherry Blossom Festival have something else to celebrate this year – improved walking and biking between festivities at the Tidal Basin and the neighborhoods, restaurants and marina in the Southwest Waterfront via a new Maine Avenue section of the Anacostia Riverwalk Trail.

The one-third-mile long section offers a new 14-foot wide multi-use paved trail along the south side of Maine Avenue, SW between the 14th Street Bridge and just east of 12th Street, SW in front of the Washington Fish Market.

Constructed between July 2011 and mid-March 2012, the new trail replaces a previously existing four-foot wide sidewalk and includes enhanced lighting, landscaping and ornamental fencing along the Washington Marina. Work also included resurfacing and reducing the width of the adjacent roadway and installing new storm water management elements, curbs and gutters.

The District Department of Transportation and Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development partnered in funding the $2 million project using Payment In Lieu of Taxes, or PILOT, funds.

The Anacostia Riverwalk Trail is a key component of the District’s progress toward creating a world-class waterfront via the Anacostia Waterfront Initiative (AWI). To date, 13 of the ultimate 20 miles of planned trail are open for use. Once complete the trail will allow seamless pedestrian and bicycle travel between the Tidal Basin and Bladensburg Marina Park in Maryland.

For more information about the trail or AWI, visit www.AnacostiaWaterfront.org . More photos of the new trail section are available on DDOT’s Flickr Photostream .