East Coast Greenway

I have been biking a lot on east coast Greenway biking trails lately. It’s a network of trails spread out across suburbs of Durham, Raleigh and Cary in the Triangle Research Area in North Carolina. It has off-road routes dedicated to bikers and pedestrians. You can feel immersed in the beautiful surroundings along creeks and rivers without the fear of the traffic.

Some interesting facts about the Greenway:

• The idea of a greenway linking existing and planned trails into a contiguous “spline route” between Atlantic coast cities was conceived by a group of cyclists and long-distance trail enthusiasts in NYC in 1991 and East Coast Greenway Alliance (ECGA) was formed.

Neuse River, NC

• The first five segment was designed in 1996 in the Baltimore & Annapolis Trail in Maryland, the Charter Oak Greenway in Connecticut, the Coventry Greenway in Rhode Island, the Farmington Canal Greenway in Connecticut, and the Delaware & Raritan Canal Trail in New Jersey totaling 56 miles.

Crabtree Creek Trail, Raleigh, NC

Crabtree Creek Trail, Raleigh, NC

• Within next 4 years a whopping 150 miles of trail segments were added to the network.

• Today the Greenway has pedestrian and bicycle route reaching 3000 miles from Maine to Florida along the East Coast of the United States of which 1000 miles of the route if off-road.

It’s remarkable how something started by a small group of passionate people grew into a national phenomenon touching lives of millions.

Tags: Biking East Coast Greenway

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Software Engineer at AWS using simulation to train robots. I am obsessed about history.

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