Outagamie County, Grand Chute and Appleton are working to reconstruct College Avenue between the Fox River Mall and downtown Appleton. Sept. 9, 2025. PC: Fox 11 Online
APPLETON, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — West College Avenue may soon get an overhaul between the Fox River Mall and downtown Appleton.
Heavy traffic, frontage roads, overpasses and underpasses — those are some barriers to growth on West College Avenue, according to Outagamie County. They created a plan with Appleton and Grand Chute to redevelop that stretch.
Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson said the goal is, “Bringing the traffic, visitors from that part of the county to downtown Appleton and [to] a number of points within Outagamie County.”
The new plan hopes to encourage more walking, biking and public transportation. Right now, it’s dominated by vehicle traffic, partly because it’s not conducive to those forms of transportation.
For example, College Avenue has no sidewalks when it meets up with Mall Drive.
“Our community has told us that we have some large needs for bicycling and pedestrians,” said Kevin Englebert, Outagamie County Land and Services director.
If you improve accessibility for drivers, bikers and walkers, growth will follow, according to the county.
Here’s one diagram:
Outagamie County, Grand Chute and Appleton are working to reconstruct College Avenue between the Fox River Mall and downtown Appleton. Sept. 9, 2025.
PC: Fox 11 Online
“This is a key economic corridor for our community right between the mall, downtown Appleton and the airport,” said Englebert. “So we do hope this spurs economic activity, whether that’s more business locating there, or more visitors, more residents along the corridor. This would be a great corridor to introduce more density too.”
The county approved the plan Tuesday. Appleton and Grand Chute will vote later this month. Then, they’ll meet with the Wisconsin Department of Transportation, since the agency would likely fund a majority of the project, being that it’s a state highway.
There’s no cost estimate yet. If it’s all approved, think 2027 and beyond for construction. So, we’re a ways away — but plans are taking shape.
Outagamie County recently re-did two miles of College Avenue between the airport and mall. That project cost $10 million — $2 million from the county and about $1 million each from Grand Chute and Greenville. Federal funding picked up the remainder of the tab.
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