New Bicyclist Needs Park Cities Routes
Okay, I’m not actually a new cyclist, but I just got a new ride and need some routes in the Park Cities.
I live next to the Katy Trail, so that’s the obvious choice, but where else do you ride, Parkies? I rode downtown to work today (not recommended, it’s still too hot and muggy), but will take anything between Uptown, Park Cities, Knox, Henderson, and East Dallas.
Help a brother out.
I live just north of UP in the Hollow, and I ride all the time. The best, IMO, is to take Southwestern and head east. Southwestern, after you snake through The Village, turns into Fisher. Fisher dead-ends into White Rock Lake. Once I figured that out, my rides expanded immensely. You can do laps around the lake or even take the Sante Fe Trail back into downtown and head north back to the Park Cities.
@John S.- I did the Santa Fe and White Rock loop yesterday; it was great. Not too crowded, with plenty of space. Good idea!
Shocking, but the City of Dallas actually has mapped some routes that aren’t half bad: http://www.dallascityhall.com/development_services/bike_links.html
A better (less trafficed) route to the lake than Southwestern is to take University to Abrams, right on Abrams and immediate left on Trammel, Trammel to Fisher and Fisher to the lake. For a longer ride, I also do Boedeker to Forest, right on Forest, pick up the trail behind the Starbucks and ride it to the lake. You can add a couple more miles and take that trail to its head, just north of 635, and then back down. If you ride to the head and meander through the neighborhoood, there’s another trail that picks up near Coit and Spring Valley that’ll take you up to George Bush.
On weekends we often ride John S’ Sante Fe loop in reverse – the Katy trail to downtown, pick up Main going East, and jog over at Henderson to catch the Sante Fe trail into the bottom of the lake.
I had no idea about the Santa Fe Trail until I read this. For the last 4 months I’ve been dying of boredom from cycling back and forth on the Katy. Great post, Brad.
Even lower traffic route is to take the Katy Trail to McCommas, cross US75 then take McCommas past Greenville and Skillman. From there make a quick left to Malcolm, across Abrams, left on Hillside, right on Bob-o-Link, right on Williamson. You are at the lake. 10 minutes from the Katy Trail to White Rock. Nice thing is that McCommas has road humps from US75 to Greenville so it’s a low traffic street. Couple of hills too. You also have nice stop lights at Greenville and Skillman, making it easier to cross the street on busy days.
I hate riding on Fisher Road. Too many near misses with traffic. Ever since they closed portions of Northwest Highway for construction, many of the hot headed drivers use Fisher as a detour.
From the Katy Trail at the AAC it’s really simple to get down to the levees on the river. If you have a mountain bike or even a hybrid cruiser bike, the levee roads are easy and fun to ride. 5 minutes from the AAC.