Construction is finally ramping up on Georgia Tech’s campus to bring a dedicated north-south bike path to the western side of Midtown.

While work began in April, a recent drive down the road revealed preparations for lane closures in the coming days. So things are about to get real. And plans call for the project to wrap by very early next year.

Georgia Tech will put Tech Parkway on a road diet, reducing the divided parkway into a single two-lane street, while converting the other traffic lanes into a dedicated bike trail and wide pedestrian sidewalk.

The project is being completed in collaboration with the PATH Foundation, which will be providing 50 percent of funding. It's another piece in the ongoing web of bike paths slowly crisscrossing Atlanta.

While the bike path will run through Georgia Tech’s 400-acre campus, it's not exclusively an amenity for bipedal brainiacs; it'll provide access from Midtown to downtown for all Atlantans on bikes and on foot.

But it's not limited exclusively to Tech’s campus, either. Plans indicate the trail will continue in some fashion southward on Luckie Street, carrying users all the way downtown to Centennial Olympic Park.

The southern end of what is now Tech Parkway comprises what was originally Hemphill Avenue, which once stretched from its present terminus at 10th Street, through what is now Tech’s campus, to North Avenue.