The Anne Springs Close Greenway continues to grow, this time into Rock Hill
The Anne Springs Close Greenway will grow by almost 170 acres, but those acres won’t be in Fort Mill.
Parent company Leroy Springs & Company received 167 acres from Sandra Hagler White and her husband Spratt. The property is in the Bethesda community in southwest Rock Hill, south of McConnells Highway between Williamson and Faires roads.
The site has a horse barn, miles of trail, two ponds and a cabin. Eventually the Greenway intends to use the site for programs like group camping, private events, scouting and other outdoor activities like those now at the Greenway in Fort Mill. The Rock Hill site will be for Greenway programming, not public use.
The White family placed the property in a conservation easement in 2016 with Nation Ford Land Trust, the same nonprofit that holds the conservation for the 2,100-acre nature preserve in Fort Mill.
“The Greenway is honored that the Whites have chosen our organization as beneficiary of this historic landholding,” Leroy Springs CEO John Gordon said. “We look forward to working it into the myriad of programming opportunities that staff will utilize in order to help draw more people to the outdoors.”
Sandra Hagler White inherited 52 acres in 1989 from her father Walter Hagler, who bought it in 1964. The Whites added property since, including some that generations back belonged to Sandra’s mother’s family, the McElhaneys.
“We love this land,” said Spratt White. “Preserving it was important to us and we are delighted now to have this arrangement with the Greenway. We hope other owners will join us in the effort to preserve land for the future.”
The announcement comes a little more than a month after the death of Greenway founder and namesake Anne Springs Close. She opened the Fort Mill site in 1995 that now provides horse, hiking and bike trails along with camping, fishing, a dog park, amphitheater and other outdoor activities.
The new land isn’t the first time the Greenway in Fort Mill inspired conservation across the river. The group that is master planning a 1,900-acre Catawba River front property stated the Fort Mill nature preserve is a model for setup and sustainability. York County owns that land, which will become a public park for now known as Riverbend Park.
This story was originally published October 4, 2021 at 6:00 AM.
