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Bicycle and walking routes may soon improve in Hyattsville, thanks to an $110,000 state grant for the city to improve pedestrian and bicycle transit.

"We have two of the most-used Metro stations in the area; it would certainly behoove us [for] people to bike and walk there safely," said Jim Chandler, Hyattsville's community development manager.

There are some bike lanes already in Hyattsville — such as on Hamilton Street near Magruder Park, Chandler said — but they don't connect to other trails or bicycle routes such as the Anacostia Tributary Trails System.

Chandler said he expects that during the coming months, the city will chose two or three projects from a 2008 city master plan for bicycling and pedestrians that the grant would fund.

"We'll see how people like it," Chandler said. "Based on that, we would look to implement additional recommendations from the adopted plan."

The funds were award through the state's Community Legacy Program, which sponsors revitalization projects by local governments and community development organizations. The funds won't be available until July 1, and Chandler said he believes work will start on the projects in fall 2011 or spring 2012.

The Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan was written by a committee of residents and outlined several strategies for improving access throughout the city, including adding painted bike lanes on Adelphi Road, which would make Northwestern High School and the University Hills area easier to reach for pedestrians and cyclists, and on Ager Road, which would further connect apartment buildings and homes between Riggs Road and Queens Chapel Road to the West Hyattsville Metro station.

Pedestrian-oriented recommendations include establishing a designated pedestrian route from Adelphi Road to Magruder Park, which could involve widening some sidewalks.

Hyattsville resident Nathaniel Kelso, who chairs the committee that developed the master plan, said he thinks adding sidewalks along stretches of 38th Avenue could be an important place to start.

Sidewalks would benefit both pedestrians and cyclists by moving pedestrians off the road and so bicycles would not have to contend for space, Keslo said.

Resident and former Councilman Scott Wilson, who also served on the committee and said most of his transportation is done by bicycle, praised several suggestions on the master plan, particularly a proposal to connect Hyattsville to a trail the follows the old trolley car line that used to run from Washington, D.C., to Laurel.

Hyattsville resident Jason Riggs, who also served on the committee, said he was pleased the city would be moving forward with some of the recommendations.

"There's been a lot of good work done at the planning stage. ... I think the city's moving in the right direction," Riggs said.

dleaderman@gazette.net