SALISBURY — The Salisbury City Council voted on Tuesday to spend $55,000 on sidewalk renovations around the Rail Walk Arts District, a project that will be performed alongside pedestrian improvements to the area, especially in the alleyway.

The project was presented by Downtown Development Director Sada Troutman, who worked with the Rowan County Tourism Development Authority on the plans. She said that the sidewalk project will consist of Depot and Kerr streets and will renovate them to match the brick sidewalks already installed on Lee Street.

“Their vision is to improve access and the impact of the farmers’ market, to improve access and the impact of the depot and improve access and the impact of the arts district,” said Troutman.

The $55,000 that was requested from the city represents half of the cost of the project, with the TDA covering the other $57,000. Troutman said the TDA put out a request for bids, with the lowest having the approximately $112,000 price tag. She said that she asked city Transportation Director Wendy Brindle what the cost would be if Salisbury undertook the project themselves, with the city receiving estimates of $65,000 just for the Kerr Street section.

The funding is coming from the city’s general fund savings, which City Manager Jim Greene Jr. said was specifically utilizing money that was budgeted for salaries but went unspent.

“We project that we will have some salary savings at year end and so in conversations with the finance director (Wade Furches), he felt that the savings would cover this $55,000 request,” said Greene.

The TDA is also paying for the improvements to the alley running from the Salisbury-Rowan Farmers’ Market to the Historic Salisbury Train Depot.

“What’s currently there is not exceptionally pedestrian friendly or safe, but they’ll be doing projects to include lighting, different (pedestrian) amenities, safety elements and making it much more accessible,” said Troutman.

The TDA is utilizing a $750,000 loan from the Rowan County government to pay for their portion of the project. The loan was unanimously approved by the Rowan County Board of Commissioners during a meeting in May and came with an agreement that the funding be repaid in full by the end of the 2029-2030 fiscal year.

“You can see, in some of these images, a significant improvement in public safety by lighting. Festive lighting and additional street lights throughout the area. This has not been a quote-unquote ‘problem area,’ but with the desire to increase the amount of public traffic we think the safety aspects are also an important part of this project,” said TDA CEO James Meacham during the May meeting.

The railwalk project comes on the heels of the Railway Pavilion project, which turned a storage structure on East Kerr Street into an outdoor event space and the home of the farmers’ market. The commissioners fronted the money for that project as a loan to the TDA as well, and Meacham said that subsequent increases in occupancy tax revenue meant that the organization paid off the loan before the agreement’s end date.