NATCHEZ, Miss. – The city’s plans for spending more than $24 million to furnish Natchez with new pathways, street lights, landscaping and other enhancements is expected to be fulfilled by 2030.
The preliminary planning, studies and designing by hired consultants are currently underway in conjunction with feedback sought from the public. Actual construction is scheduled to begin in 2027 for the “Transforming the Forks to Freedom Corridor” project.
Natchez received a $24.5 million federal grant in 2024 for the city to revitalize an area stretching from Devereux Drive and St. Catherine Street through downtown Natchez to the city’s scenic bluff overlooking the Mississippi River.
“This project will serve as a catalyst to further propel access to businesses while taking cultural tourism, city gateways and green spaces to the next level,” Mayor Dan Gibson said in an overview provided Thursday to the public gathered at the Natchez Convention Center.
Specific improvements being envisioned include new landscaping, bike trails, lighting, signage, and sidewalks in downtown Natchez and along the “Forks to Freedom Corridor,” according to plans presented Thursday.
Construction is expected to begin in 2027 after contractors are selected later this year, said Russ Bryan, a landscape architect with Neel-Shaffer, the engineering-planning firm hired by the mayor and Natchez aldermen to manage the city’s transformation project. Bryan noted the city is required to allocate all the federal funds for the project by 2030.
The city’s “Forks to Freedom Corridor” project includes the development of three sites commemorating Black history: the former Forks of the Road slave market, a plaza honoring the country’s first Black member of Congress and a memorial for Black Civil War Union soldiers.
Gibson said Thursday he hopes to seek construction bids soon to build the long-planned monument in tribute to Black soldiers on the green space at Broadway Street’s north end.
An outdoor event space and market place is also being envisioned at the planned Hiram Revels plaza near where St. Catherine Street intersects with Martin Luther King and Jefferson streets. Revels was a Black Natchez alderman who went on to briefly represent Mississippi in the U.S. Senate 1870-71.
The Forks slave market site in the St. Catherine Street-Devereux Drive area is owned by the National Park Service, which has plans for its further development as an historic site.
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