The Mountains-to-Sound Greenway extension on Beacon Hill is complete, and there will be a ribbon-cutting ceremony Saturday, October 29 at 2:30 p.m. at Daejeon Park (see poster below).
A couple friends and I took a detour on our way to Georgetown Brewing the other day to try out the new trail section (see video above, and apologies in advance for the awful wind sounds). As many people have figured out, the trial has been completed for many weeks now, and it is beautiful. The trail is wide, leaving plenty of room for people to bike, stroll and walk their pets through the greenbelt. And the views of Sodo and downtown are remarkable.
It’s also a lot of fun to ride next to I-5 and notice that you are going faster than everyone stuck in traffic on the highway.
The trial ends abruptly at the point where Beacon Ave turns into the Holgate St Bridge down to Sodo. It’s a connection that is awesome if you are headed downhill, but its usefulness for people trying to get up Beacon Hill is limited. It is definitely not a family-friendly trek up Beacon Ave from the trailhead.
An extension to connect the trail through to the International District has been delayed. See a rough map of that route.
More details on the ribbon-cutting Saturday:
Construction of the Mountains-to-Sound Trail from the southwest end of the Jose Rizal bridge south along I-5 to Holgate is substantially complete with a grand opening scheduled for this Saturday, October 29. Join Mayor Mike McGinn, Deputy Mayor Darryl Smith and a host of partners for the ribbon cutting and community event to celebrate this new trail through Beacon Hill!
What: Ribbon Cutting & Community Event
When: Saturday, October 29 at 2:30 p.m.
Where: At approximately 900 Sturgus Ave. S – adjacent to Daejeon Park
Come hear from Mayor McGinn, Deputy Mayor Smith, Mountains to Sound Greenway Executive Director Cynthia Welti and others about the collaborative work that is creating a new chapter for the East Duwamish Greenbelt.
Discover volunteer opportunities for this area and participate in a tour with City Staff and community members to learn in greater detail about all of the improvements on and along the trail.
All modes of travel are welcome! Parking is available along 12th Avenue S and on S Charles Street as well as Sturgus Avenue S near Daejeon Park, where the event will take place.
This event is part of Mayor McGinn’s Walk Bike Ride initiative launched in 2010.
Bring your bike or running shoes to take advantage of the new trail after the event is over!
Construction of this section of the Mountains-to-Sound Trail, which travels through Jose Rizal Park and state-owned right-of-way property, began on June 20, 2011. The only remaining project element is installing final fencing around the off-leash areato create a four-plus acre site.
Comments
12 responses to “Mountains-to-Sound Greenway ribbon-cutting Saturday + Video spoiler”
That end connection is terrible! Yeah you could ride down the hill with traffic but coming up it, then having to cross two lanes to get to the trail on a blind corner. Looks like another war on bicyclists. Kill them off while using their trails.
At one point I remember seeing a dedicated bike/ped overpass as part of this plan, connecting to the SODO bikeway via Massachusetts St . Does anyone know what became of that?
A connection under the freeway to Massachusetts St would make much more sense because it would drop you right on Airport Way South instead of making you take Holgate all the way down to 6th.
Going towards Beacon would be much, much safer!
I found a document with the map I remembered: apparently phase II of the project will include an I5 overpass:
http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/docs/mtstosoundPresentation.ppt
I haven’t been able to find any projections about the start date of phase II. Does anybody have info about that?
On that map it looks like there is suppose to be an underpass on Beacon St for people coming up the hill. I didn’t see that on the video but there was a trail up and to the left. Maybe that’s where it goes? Tom? What did you see at the Southern end of this trail?
There’s no underpass there. Just a driveway (see video). The only underpass is under the Jose Rizal Bridge.
The tortuous route of Phase II is a perfect reminder of the damage caused by freeway construction, and the difficulty and cost of mitigating it. Wow. (obviously the grade of the hill suggests the best route wouldn’t be straight, but without the freeway in the way a more direct, more flexible, and more pleasant route could be created for a lot less money — possibly even without any new paving, depending on what sorts of paved connections existed already).
This looks like a job for a kolelinia… http://www.dsgnwrld.com/kolelinia-a-bike-lane-in-the-sky-by-martin-angelov-14827/
Wild! But you won’t catch me up there. I have a fear of falling. Better to put a pedal powered chair, let me hang my bike from the back and I’ll ride it over on the cable.
http://shweeb.com/
rode “up” to I90 via this new extension today from the sodo trail.
that holgate section is lame!
we decided to take the stairs to the sidewike, and ride up the north hand side sidewalk… after that, it was a lovely example of a seattle fall.
[…] noted the lack of usefulness in our previous post about the new trail extension. As a recreational route or place to stroll and enjoy the scenery, […]
[…] greenway follows the I-90 corridor. A recent extension of the trail brings it a little closer to Puget Sound, terminating (awkwardly) at Holgate on the west side of […]