Rails-to-Trails Across the Country

(based on an article published by Rails-to-Trails Conservancy in the Winter 2021 Edition of their magazine for members, Rails to Trails.)

         In 2020, the United States had over 40,000 miles of multi-user trails open for biking, hiking, horseback riding, cross country skiing, etc., and over 24,000 of these miles were on 2200 former railroad right-of-ways.                                   

         It all began in Chicago in 1963 when the Chicago Tribune published a reader's letter entitled "Future Footpath" written by May Theilgaard Watts, a naturalist who proposed converting the neglected and unused railroad corridor of the former Chicago, Aurora, and Elgin Railway into a trail. It ran from Chicago to several western suburbs and she proposed that it "preserve the region's tall grass prairie, connect critical garden and ecology centers, and provide a footpath with a separated bikeway for the community."  Today it is the 62 mile Illinois Prairie Path, comprised of a stem and four radiating spokes, all of which I have biked numerous times.

The next year, 1964, Wisconsin agreed with the suggestion of local communities that the recently abandoned 34 mile section of the Chicago and North Western Railway track running from Elroy to Sparta should be re-purposed as a "linear recreation way." 

Both projects "served as the earliest major blueprints of the rail-trail movement" which then spread to the rest of the country over the next thirty years. In 1986, the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy was founded, and in 1992, I joined.

But such railroad route conversions weren't actually new, because over 30 such rail-trail conversions had previously been effected across the country, mainly in "remote backcountry locations" where railroad tracks had been replaced by hiking trails in state and national forests. The oldest such conversion was in Danville, Pennsylvania in the 1890s!

In 2007, the Conservancy began recognizing exemplary rail-trails around the country through its Rail-Trail Hall of Fame and now, each year, they select another based on scenic value, high usage, trail and trailside amenities, historical significance, excellence in management and maintenance of facility, community connections, and geographic distribution.  Here are the 36 current honorees (gray ones are live links to my photos and comments):

RTC Hall of Fame Trails

• Great Allegheny Passage (Maryland/Pennsylvania)
• Katy Trail State Park (Missouri)
• Fred Marquis Pinellas Trail (Florida)
• Burke-Gilman Trail (Washington)
• Minuteman Commuter Bikeway (Massachusetts)
• Illinois Prairie Path (Illinois)
• Elroy-Sparta State Trail (Wisconsin)
• Bizz Johnson Trail (California)
• W&OD Trail (Virginia)
• Monon Trail (Indiana)
• Silver Comet Trail (Georgia)
• Chief Ladiga Trail (Alabama)
• East Bay Bicycle Path (Rhode Island)
• Pere Marquette Rail-Trail of Michigan
• Little Miami Scenic Trail (Ohio)
• Paul Bunyan State Trail (Minnesota)
• Wabash Trace Nature Trail (Iowa)
• Prairie Spirit Rail Trail State Park (Kansas)
• Springwater Corridor (Oregon)
• High Line (New York)
• George S. Mickelson Trail (South Dakota)
• Prescott Peavine National Recreation Trail and Iron King Trail (Arizona)
• Longleaf Trace (Mississippi)
• Trail of the Coeur d'Alenes and Route of the Hiawatha (Idaho)
• Historic Union Pacific Rail Trail State Park (Utah)
• Island Line Rail Trail (Vermont)
• Greenbrier River Trail (West Virginia)
• Virginia Creeper National Recreation Trail (Virginia)
• Heritage Rail Trail County Park (Pennsylvania) and Torrey C. Brown Rail Trail (Maryland)
• Midtown Greenway (Minnesota)
• Hudson Valley Trail Network (New York)
• Tammany Trace (Louisiana)
• Cardinal Greenway (Indiana)
• Tanglefoot Trail (Mississippi)
• Mon River Rail-Trail System (West Virginia)

Over the years, I've biked 256 trails across the country, many of which which were rail-trail conversions. Twelve of the trails were Hall of Fame Trails (links to the 12 with my comments and photos are above.)