The news was good earlier this week at the Marquette Township Board meeting. A significant recreational project to construct a tunnel underneath U.S. 41 is now fully funded, officials announced at the meeting.

Township Planner Jason McCarthy was the bearer of the positive news, noting the Michigan Natural Resources Trust Fund Board amended its 2017 grant award from $225,000 to $300,000. In addition, a private party had chipped in with a large cash donation, he said, not mentioning the donor’s name.

“It’s pretty exciting,” McCarthy said. “I mean, we are still accepting donations, of course, but we are a few hundred dollars over our $495,000 required match for the $2.5 million project.”

The project, talked about in Marquette Township for many years, includes construction of a tunnel that will be 20 feet wide, 150 feet long and will be located just east of the Menard’s store.

A recent Mining Journal story on the matter noted the underpass will be built as part of a Michigan Department of Transportation project in 2019 to reconstruct the U.S. 41 corridor between Marquette County Road 492 and Brickyard Road, replacing the two signalized intersections at Brickyard Road and County Road 492, near Target and Walmart, with roundabouts.

It would connect the south Noquemanon Trail Network to the Little Presque Isle public trail system, and also would serve as a snowmobile crossing Dec. 1 to April 1, the Journal story stated.

All of the above, of course, will be good for area recreation. U.S. 41 is dangerous to cross just about any time of the day or night. This will eliminate that hazard.