WHEELING - The city's Heritage Trail is expanding.

On Tuesday, Wheeling leaders accepted two state grants totaling nearly $475,000 that will allow the trail to grow from its current 13 miles to more than 15. The new trail sections will be located in South Wheeling and near Wheeling Creek in the East/Center Wheeling area to Tunnel Green.

Robert "Scat" Scatterday, manager/project engineer for the Wheeling Rails to Trails system, has spent the past few years working on a plan to expand the city's trail system. He said Tuesday's announcement in Charleston marks the first step of that plan coming to fruition.

"Years ago, when I started thinking about the bike trail and what it could become, I was shooting for pie in the sky," he said in reference to the plan he and Wheeling Jesuit University professor Ben Stout generated. "Now, basically we're being told there's actually going to be dirt flying to expand the trail. Asphalt will be going down and bikes and walkers will be traveling through new areas. This is actually going to be a reality. ... We are actually going to have this in our city."

Scatterday, along with Wheeling City Manager Robert Herron and city spokeswoman Joelle Connors Ennis, accepted the award from Gov. Joe Manchin during a ceremony at the Cultural Center in Charleston.

The South Wheeling trail expansion will be funded through a $96,000 Safe Routes to School grant that will benefit students at Wheeling Middle and Ritchie Elementary schools. The project will provide shared-use bicycle path construction, sidewalk repairs and pedestrian crosswalks to encourage children to walk or bicycle to and from school.

The East/Center Wheeling trail expansion will be funded through a $376,425 Transportation Enhancement Grant that will provide a new, 1.4-mile connection between the Ohio River Trail and Tunnel Green, with the new trail section running on abandoned railroad tracks above Wheeling Creek.

The trail expansion in East/Center Wheeling also will provide new transportation routes for students attending classes at West Virginia Northern Community College and also students at Wheeling Jesuit University who want to access downtown businesses, city leaders said.

"We are honored to receive these two awards," Herron said. "This is a tremendous project and we look forward to getting started. Both of these projects add to our already outstanding trail system. Our trails are not only enjoyed by our citizens, but serve as a tourist attraction. Trail expansion improves quality of life of the city and enhances economic development efforts."

Both projects are expected to begin next year.