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So, a duder at work asked me last night if I’ve ever heard of the East Coast Greenway. I told him that I have not. He told me it is a bike trail that is in development that will sort of run like the Appalachian Trail (thus the joke of this subject title posting if you’re from SC or the surrounding states you may get it) that will run from Florida into Canada.
Who’s up for a 3000 mile ride?
"The East Coast Greenway is a developing trail system, spanning nearly 3,000 miles as it winds its way between Canada and Key West, linking all the major cities of the eastern seaboard. Over 25 percent of the route is already on safe, traffic-free paths."
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Awesome. Really hope they get it done!!
And in the great Mr. Sanford’s defense, "hiking the appalacian trail" does sound a like like "in Brazil getting some tail" 😆
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I am not aware of the other states but here in New England the ECG is all street riding. There may be some paved traffic free trails in Mass and RI but all of it in NH and Maine is in traffic and on the road. I ride parts of it quite often on my road bike. Would be better if it were all dirt.
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If it’s in Maine, and dirt … it will likely be equestrian only. 😢
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I was at a meeting last night to review an amendment to the Master Plan for Pocohontas State Park in Central VA and learned that a small portion of the East Coast Greenway runs along the northern border of the park. It is road right now, but it sounds like they would like to include enhancements in the Master Plan which would get riders off the road, at least for that small portion.
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I’ve ridden portions of the Maine section of the trail and contrary to previous post…It is not all road riding. The southern portion of the trail from ME border into Portland is known as the EasternTrail [url:39646q28]http://www.easterntrail.org/[/url:39646q28]. A little less than 50% of the trail is "off road", and more importantly they have plans to convert many more sections of the trail to "off road". The trail is well marked throughout the road sections making navigating fairly simple. For this type of riding, the ME section of trail from Kennebunk into Portland (~30 miles) is nice and mostly off road.
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The American Tobacco Trail in Durham, NC is supposed to be a link in the chain as well. It was just done YEARS ahead of schedule. 😀
http://www.singletracks.com/bike-trails … trail.html
A lot of these big trails start out with road connections and over time local communities find ways to re-route the tougher sections.
A good example is the Georgia Pinhoti Trail which is a 100-ish mile, mostly singletrack trail but with some forest road and even paved road connections (particularly through Dalton). But the Pinhoti folks are working, one stretch at a time, to get turn those stretches into singletrack. The Arizona Trail is sorta being pieced together in the same way… But it can be a decades-long process.
Now, here’s an idea I’ve been sitting on for a couple years: what if we identified a MTB-legal Appalachian dirt trail route from GA to Maine? On the GA end, you can start with the IMBA Epic Bull mountain trails which are just a mile or two (as the crow flies) from Springer Mountain, the southern terminus of the AT. Gravel forest roads crisscross the AT for miles before the AT enters the Blood Mountain Wilderness where the MTB route would need to diverge.
Dave Muse has done some good work laying out the Trans North Georgia route which could be a good basis for getting to the NC/SC border… http://www.firstworks.com/tnga/route.html
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"jeff" wrote
The American Tobacco Trail in Durham, NC is supposed to be a link in the chain as well. It was just done YEARS ahead of schedule. 😀
http://www.singletracks.com/bike-trails … trail.html
A lot of these big trails start out with road connections and over time local communities find ways to re-route the tougher sections.
A good example is the Georgia Pinhoti Trail which is a 100-ish mile, mostly singletrack trail but with some forest road and even paved road connections (particularly through Dalton). But the Pinhoti folks are working, one stretch at a time, to get turn those stretches into singletrack. The Arizona Trail is sorta being pieced together in the same way… But it can be a decades-long process.
Now, here’s an idea I’ve been sitting on for a couple years: what if we identified a MTB-legal Appalachian dirt trail route from GA to Maine? On the GA end, you can start with the IMBA Epic Bull mountain trails which are just a mile or two (as the crow flies) from Springer Mountain, the southern terminus of the AT. Gravel forest roads crisscross the AT for miles before the AT enters the Blood Mountain Wilderness where the MTB route would need to diverge.
Dave Muse has done some good work laying out the Trans North Georgia route which could be a good basis for getting to the NC/SC border… http://www.firstworks.com/tnga/route.html
The Virginia Mountain Bike Trail is based on that same concept Jeff. Though not complete, the general route has been picked out. Chris at Shenandoah Mountain Touring has been the driver on this. The hard part is hooking up seperate sections where national forest trails and roads run out.
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Was going to mention the VMT but CCR beat me to it. Here is some additional info.
http://www.blueridgeoutdoors.com/biking/the-big-ride/
http://www.vabike.org/the-virginia-mountain-bike-trail/
http://mountaintouring.com/
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