The BRX is booming
The BRX is booming
Big River Crossing data reveals increased visitor traffic
news@theeveningtimes.com
Big River Crossing, the nation’s longest pedestrianbike bridge across the Mississippi River, has announced 385,875 total visitors since its October 2016 launch, with 57,060 visitors between April and June 2018 alone.
To date, the bridge has welcomed hundreds of thousands of visitors from all over the world and has been featured for its architectural excellence and innovative Philips Lighting installation in over 200 publications in local, regional, national and international markets including the Chicago Tribune, National Geographic Traveller and Huffington Post. A surprising percentage of hikers and cyclists start the crossing in West Memphis.
Philips Lighting’s installation — coined “Mighty Lights” in anticipation for the Hernando DeSoto additive installation — covers the entirety of Big River Crossing with over 100,000 LED lights to provide stateof- the-art light shows.
Since the bridge’s 2016 launch, BRX commemorated over 85 holidays, causes and events with dynamic and unique displays from St. Patrick’s Day and Fourth of July to Memphis Grizzlies NBA victories.
The BRX has received 15,000 Facebook Check-Ins and over 8,000 Facebook likes. The hashtag #BigRiverCrossing has been used over 3,700 times on Instagram.
The bridge’s third-quarter traffic data shows there have been 57,060 visitors between April and June 2018 alone, 45,595 of whom have been pedestri- ans and 11,465 cyclists.
The majority of visitors have entered from the Memphis side.
The Arkansas gate still awaited Interstate Highway signage and is situated in a rural setting across from urban Memphis but 26 percent of the bridge visitors entered from West Memphis. West Memphis Planning and Development Director Paul Luker was very pleased with the number of bridge visitors entering from the West Memphis landing as reported during the spring quarter and indicated summer visits appeared strong as well.
“Anytime you come down here, and we have a lot of heat right now, you see people using the Big River Trail and the Big River Crossing,” said Luker.
West Memphis spent two million dollars of public and private funds developing the six mile BRT loop along the river edge from the Harahan Bridge landing to Dacus Lake north of the Hernando DeSoto Bridge connecting to Dacus Lake Road.
Between October 22, 2016 and June 30, 2018, 83 percent of counted visitors are pedestrians, collectively walking 675,281 miles, 27 percent of visitors represent cyclists, who biked a combined 114,798 miles. In total, approximately 69 million calories have been burned by Big River Crossing visitors. Additionally, the introduction of Explore Bike Share, a nonprofit bike rental system launched in May throughout the city of Memphis and into West Memphis, has made Big River Crossing more accessible than ever before. Visitors continue to utilize rest stops on either sides of the bridge including Loflin Yard in Downtown Memphis, Big John’s Shake Shack in Marion, and Pancho’s in West Memphis.
Big River Crossing will celebrate its second anniversary on Oct. 22, 2018.
Soon after on Oct. 27, the Mighty Lights reveals during a coordinated concert between Big River Crossing and Hernando DeSoto bridges during RiverArts-Fest. Additionally, the second- annual Big River Crossing Half Marathon & 5K will take place on November 3. Interested registrants may learn more and sign up at bigrivercrossing. racesonline.com.
The BRX spans nearly approximately 1-mile, is the country’s longest active bike-pedestrian rail bridge and the longest public pedestrian bridge across the Mississippi River. It serves as the centerpiece of Main Street to Main Street, a 10mile multi-modal corridor between Memphis and West Memphis. The bridge is open daily to the public from 6 a.m. until 10 p.m.
For more information, visit bigrivercrossing.com.
By the Evening Times News Staff
