The Missing Link project–which would create a bike path to connect the Neponset Greenway and the Boston HarborWalk along the Dorchester coast–was chosen this week as a field project for 2011 by the Tufts Urban + Environmental Policy + Planning school.

The 3-month effort involving a half-dozen graduate students will look at the area between the corner of Morrissey Blvd./Mt. Vernon St. all the way to the former land of the Schafer paper company in Port Norfolk, and propose a way to connect the Neponset Greenway there to the HarborWalk near Carson’s Beach.

Having the proposal from Tufts could save the state some money on the cost of bringing the project up to 25% design–and go toward a matching requirement for receiving certain kinds of state funding.

The Boston Cyclists Union, DotBike, the Dorchester Environmental Health Coalition, and the Department of Conservation and Recreation have been working together this summer to re-start the project, but this time special thanks go out to the DCR’s Cathy Garnett, project manager for the Missing Link, for identifying this opportunity and writing the proposal for it.