County seeks input on greenways, blueways plan at Onondaga Lake Park

Residents who want safer places to walk, bike, paddle and reach the waterfront will get a direct say June 16 at the Onondaga Lake Park Visitors Center, where county planners will seek input on where Onondaga County’s next usable trail and water-access connections should go.

The effort is titled Naturally Connected Onondaga: Countywide Greenways + Blueways Plan, and county planning materials describe it as a strategic framework for an interconnected network of conservation greenways, mobility corridors, recreation greenways, agricultural corridors and blueways. The county says the work is meant to improve environmental resilience, community connectivity and overall quality of life while protecting open space and waterways that also support recreation.

Colliers Engineering & Design is helping lead the planning process. County materials say the project will include a countywide inventory of existing conditions, a vision and implementation strategy, priority projects with cost estimates and funding sources, and a municipal toolkit that local governments can use for implementation and maintenance. That makes the June 16 meeting more than a presentation: planners are looking for local knowledge that can help define which connections matter most and which projects should rise to the top.

The plan builds on Plan Onondaga, which identifies greenways and blueways as one of the county’s five major planning themes. The county’s StoryMap for that comprehensive plan launched June 16, 2022, and covers historical trends and outside forces shaping towns, villages and the City of Syracuse. County officials have tied the greenways and blueways effort to that broader vision of future growth and change.

Onondaga Lake Park is a natural place to hold the meeting because county planning materials already describe it as an existing greenway and a potential blueway. The park includes restored natural areas, the St. Joseph’s Health Amphitheater at Lakeview, boat launch facilities and the ongoing effort to complete the Loop the Lake trail. County parks materials say the park was envisioned in the 1920s by Joseph A. Griffin, who served as secretary of the Onondaga County Park and Regional Planning Board and chairman of the Boulevard-Parkway Committee in 1928.

The county has already started lining up money around the concept. Legislative planning documents from November 2024 referenced $375,000 for greenways and blueways plan development, scoping and engagement, along with a $1.1 million Greenways/Blueways Development Fund. In March 2025, County Executive J. Ryan McMahon, II announced a greenways and blueways grant program at the Onondaga County Planning Federation’s 36th annual Planning Symposium at the Marriott Syracuse Downtown.

The waterfront context has also shifted. In June 2025, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation said the Onondaga Lake Visitor Center had been transferred from Honeywell International, Inc. to the state and would become a public outreach facility. DEC said the center, which originally opened in 2012, would feature displays on the cleanup and restoration of Onondaga Lake, its tributaries and watershed and would operate seasonally from April through October. Together, those moves make the lakefront a central piece of a countywide plan that is now asking residents to help shape where the next connections belong.