Slightly more than a year ago, the seed for the Glenlakes bike project was planted by David Volsoh’s wife when she complained to him, saying there was nowhere for her to ride her bike near Glenlakes.

According to Volsoh, after that conversation the seed was planted. Volsoh, a resident of Glenlakes for more than a decade, set out to see what could be done about acquiring some sort of bike path near the complex of four communities and almost 600 houses.

“We are sandwiched between County Road 12 and County Road 20. The police department has recommended against riding bikes on those roads, so I reached out to try to find a way to fix that,” said Volsoh.

As the project grew it became apparent that his wife was not the only resident of Glenlakes who would enjoy a bike path easily accessible from home.

According to Volsoh, the Glenlakes community is primarily made up of retirees.

“Increasingly,” said Volsoh, “retirees are trying to improve their health by exercising and one of the key ways the medical community is advising them to do that is by bicycle riding.”

Volsoh’s efforts to get the bike path built began by approaching Gulf Shores Mayor Robert Craft who owns a sod farm alongside County Road 20.

“I asked if he would be willing to donate 15 feet of his sod farm to the City of Foley. Robert is a big biking fan himself, so he graciously agreed to do that,” said Volsoh.

Getting the land for the project was the easy part of the project for Volsoh. Craft told him if the land was donated, Volsoh had to figure out a way to come up with the money to complete the project.

Volsoh spent much of his life in the building industry, so when the idea for a bike path was in its early stages he was able to roughly estimate the time and cost of such a project. His early figures totaled about $60,000, but in order to amass enough funding, he looked into pockets outside of the Glenlakes community.

Volsoh figured the bike path, if it was done correctly, could be a benefit not just to those living in the Glenlakes community, but also to the surrounding areas including Foley and Gulf Shores.

Because of the benefit to the larger community as well, Volsoh approached the City of Foley to see what could be done, if anything. He proposed that if Glenlakes could come up with half of the $60,000 estimated building cost, the City of Foley would put up the rest.

“According to the city, no one had ever come up with a cost-sharing idea like that before, so they agreed to it,” said Volsoh.

The rest of the money for the project came from families within the Glenlakes community.

“I got two families in the community who agreed to each put up $7,500 if the rest of the community came up with the other $15,000 that was needed to reach the subdivisions goal,” said Volsoh.

According to Volsoh, 100 families, in addition to the two large benefactors, contributed to the bike path project.

As soon as the community had raised its share of the money, Volsoh turned it over to the city in May of this year.

“Bingo, we had the beginning of our project,” said Volsoh.

Most of the work on the bike path was done by the city or local contractors to keep the costs as low as possible. Volsoh said the bike path is more than half a mile long and eight feet wide so bikes can pass each other easily on the path. The bike path was connected to a recently built sidewalk system in Foley.

Volsoh hopes the now-finished bike project, which extends beyond the Glenlakes property all the way to the Foley Beach Express, will be connected to other bike paths in the future. Connecting the bike paths, according to Volsoh, will allow bikers to safely ride through Baldwin County.

“We are hopeful that the cities of Orange Beach, Gulf Shores and Foley together will take advantage of the fact that they own the land of the Foley Beach Express and they will find a way to connect the beautiful bike paths in Gulf Shores and Orange Beach to the ones in Foley,” said Volsoh.

Volsoh also said he encountered some opposition when the project was first proposed. Some of the residents did not think they would use the bike path and did not support it financially.

“Most of them have now realized this is truly a community project that benefits the whole community,” said Volsoh.

The bike path will be dedicated today at 4 p.m. with the mayors of both Foley and Gulf Shores in attendance.