Thriving Communities / News & Views / A Summer of Smart Commuting: Hitting the Trail
A Summer of Smart Commuting: Hitting the Trail
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- Pete Farmer: Nice to read about the big picture of music around here. I am sure the scene will only get bigger as TC grows. We plan on helping in our own little way with a small venue at our workshop. All procee...
- Pat Weber: The music tradition in Traverse City begins in its schools- the feeder system as it were. Traverse City Area Public Schools has had a long and rich music legacy in both vocal and instrumental instruct...
- Mario: Great article Hans Well written and an important message....
- Cory Johnston: Your reasons to vote NO are reason enough for me. This is 1960's mentality being used to fix 2015 and beyond problems. While mentioned, is there any guarantee that alternatives to one driver/one car w...
- Gerald Wilgus: Much of this is disingenuous rationalization in support of a "lesser of two evils" argument. This is how privatizing profit and socializing risk is maintained. We all agree that transportation inf...
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I successfully made it out to Suttons Bay this past weekend, and I have some good news and some bad.
The good news is that I managed to ride both ways and feel very accomplished, but the bad news is that I don’t have an experience with BATA to share. So, I’ll save busing for a later article and rave about the TART trails for a bit.
The Leelanau Trail takes you from Traverse City to Suttons Bay by way of the trail along the bay in downtown TC. You quickly leave the city behind and are surrounded by open fields, farmlands, and forested areas. It’s a pretty impressive project to have uninterrupted trail for 17 miles and it provides such a cool opportunity for a bike trip.
There was a wide variety of people out on the trail, from experienced riders in bike jerseys and spandex shorts to families with young children. The trail is paved the entire way and is mostly flat—I realized as I coasted downhill on the way back that it must have been a gradual uphill on the way there. I was pleasantly surprised to find a couple of water stations along the trail with a picnic table, water jug, and sometimes a dog bowl. It helped make the trail feel even more comfortable and accessible.
Maybe it’s easy to forget about the trails when they’re right in your backyard, or to feel like they’re not for you, but you don’t have to ride all the way to Suttons Bay to be able to enjoy them. Even just a few miles outside of Traverse City it becomes quite the peaceful ride. They’re worth giving a try.
