Peabody's new bike path now has a name

By Stacie N. Galang
Staff Writer

June 24, 2009 12:10 am

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PEABODY — Residents can now call the city's 4.6-mile bikeway the Peabody Independence Greenway.

The name is the winning entry of Higgins Middle School eighth-grader Caitlin Truesdale in the contest to name the new bike path.

"It's a name that is able to portray all aspects of the trail, instead of signifying one," Caitlin wrote in her accompanying essay.

Caitlin cited two historical figures she felt supported her theme of independence: Peabody's own Revolutionary War hero Capt. Samuel Flint and Hannah Phelps Phelps Hill, an independent Quaker woman of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Jean Delios, director of the city's Community Development and Planning Department, said the selection committee received 500 entries and narrowed the pool to six, one from each student cluster.

"Everybody really did a good job," she said. "This one just felt like it was Peabody."

Caitlin received a $100 gift card to the Northshore Mall, and the remaining five finalists each received $25 gift cards, Delios said.

Mayor Michael Bonfanti gave out the awards Thursday. Delios said the mayor wanted to include young people in the naming as a learning opportunity.

"It was the mayor's idea to do it this way," Delios said.

Construction of the 10-foot-wide path, which runs from the Middleton line to Lahey Clinic, began last winter and should be completed by the fall.