MTO: Bibb students signing bricks for greenway

This year's group of students in Bibb County schools will leave the most lasting impression ever on the city of Macon.

Throughout April, every student in Bibb County will be given a brick on which to write his or her name. The bricks, which were donated by Cherokee Brick and Tile, will then be fired and used to build the Gateway Park, one of the entrances to the Ocmulgee Heritage Greenway.

Robert Hartzog, manger of the engineering department at Cherokee, has been traveling to all Bibb public schools to distribute the bricks. By the end of the month, he will have given out about 30,400 bricks to students, faculty and staff in the system. In the fall, he'll take another 7,000 bricks to all the private schools in the county.

"This was a chance for us to do something nice for the children and the community," Hartzog said. "It should be real fun for the kids to go down to the park and find their bricks."

Gateway Park will be located at the corner of Riverside Drive and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, the former site of the Washburn building, which was torn down last year. Grading on the site is set to begin in June. The park should be complete by spring 2000. Construction is also set to begin later this summer on the Water Works Park on Pierce Avenue.

"We're very excited that we'll have construction going on simultaneously," said Andrea Williford, greenway trail coordinator. "We thought we would have to wait to start at the waterworks, but we've raised enough money that we can get started as soon as the water authority is out of there."

The first two phases of the project, which include the Gateway and Water Works parks, will cost about $8.5 million. Williford said $3.6 already has been raised for the project. In March, NewTown Macon identified the greenway as one of its eight major initiatives and also is raising money for the project.

Williford said the next major fund-raising effort will be to find sponsors for the bricks. Although Cherokee has given the bricks away, the greenway project is trying to get parents, PTOs and private groups to donate $10 per brick toward the greenway.

"We want to give parents an opportunity to donate the money first," she said. "Then we'll talk to the PTOs and private donors. Cherokee Brick has given us the bricks, but we still need to pay for the construction of the park."

Once the park is completed, the bricks will be grouped by school and the greenway will have a list so people can find their bricks. The 37,000 bricks will cover more than 6,000 square feet and may be more than the park needs. If there are too many, others will be used near a foot bridge that will link Central City Park to the Ocmulgee National Monument.

The idea of selling bricks in a park to pay for its construction is not a new one, but, generally, bricks are simply stamped with the sponsor's name. Williford said this was the largest project that involved people signing bricks in their own writing.

"This is something that's really unique for these kids," Williford said. "They get a chance to be part of Macon forever through these bricks."