Discovering the Heritage Trail, Live Oak, Florida

Travelling through North Florida on US 90? You can stop in Live Oak for a walk, jog, or pedal on the Heritage Trail.

The Discovery Trail portion of the Heritage Trail

The Heritage Trail is a short--just over a mile and a quarter--paved rail trail spanning the southeast quadrant of Live Oak. The northern terminus of the trail is located just off US 90 (known locally as East Howard Street) on Trailhead Avenue SE. Trailhead Avenue was apparently previously known as Cooper Street; your favorite map app may still know it by the the old name. There are a few paved parking spots at the trailhead and more than a few places where you can park in the grass along the trail. Alternatively, you could park a bit farther south along the trail at Heritage Park--but then you'd miss the Discovery Trail section of the path.


Discovery Trail is the name of the 700 yards of the Heritage Trail between East Howard Street and Helvenston Street. Every few yards along the way, the Suwanne River Regional Library System has a page of a book posted in a display. On the day of my visit the book was Click, Clack, Moo Cows That Type. By the time we reached Helvenston Street we had discovered what had become of the typing cattle. Along the way the trail had passed from the open ground near the trailhead to a shady wooded area, and then into a forested swamp. Street lamps lined the trail.

The current south end of the trail

South of Helvenston, the street lamps are gone and the pavement changes from concrete to blacktop. For a ways south, you can see Heritage Park through the trees on the east side of the trail. Trees surround the trail all the way to the next road crossing at Ada Street, not quite a mile from the trailhead. Between Ada Street and Miller Street, the trail leaves the old railroad bed and becomes a kind of sidewalk out in the sun along 109th Drive, a dirt road. South of Miller Street the trail returns to the rail route and to the woods. For the next 600 to 700 yards, you can see 109th Drive through the trees to the east and Jenkins Avenue through the trees to the west. Abruptly, you come to a cul de sac and the south end of the trail. There are paths leading from this terminus to both Jenkins and 109th, or you can turn around and go back.


The only lights are on the north end of the trail, but there are benches along the entire route--seven in all, each with its own trash can. The trash cans don't appear to be critter proof. Artwork is placed along the trail--quilt designs on the day I was there. Fences line both sides of the trail except at road crossings. The fences are low enough for pedestrians to step over, but are enough to discourage vehicles from getting onto the trail. Between the trail and the fences, there's a grassy shoulder wide enough to run or walk on if you're tired of pavement.

A milepost from railroad days along the Heritage Trail

As a rail trail, the Heritage Trail is absolutely flat. The route had its origins in the 1880s, when railroad tycoon Henry Plant laid rails from Live Oak to Branford, Florida, the Live Oak and Rowlands Bluff Railroad. Later, this became part of Plant's Live Oak, Tampa, and Charlott Harbor Railroad. The road was acquired by the Atlantic Coast Line, the Seaboard Coast Line, and CSX before being abandoned in the 1980s. South of Live Oak around Branford, the rail bed is being used for another paved rail trail, the twelve-and-a-half mile long Suwannee River Greenway. About twenty miles of new rail trail would connect the Heritage Trail to the Greenway, which in turn connects to the twelve miles of the Ichetucknee-to-O'Leno Trail. That would make for 45+ miles of bike trail, surely worth an overnight trip to Live Oak. However, the only extension in the works for the Heritage Trail is a short link to connect the north end of the trail with the downtown--City of Live Oak Community Redevelopment Agency's Heritage Square Master Plan. That plan was published in May 2018, so don't hold your breath.


Links

• More Trouble Afoot! photos of Live Oak, Florida's Heritage Trail on 26 February 2023
  https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10120530402665333
  
  
• Looking for races in Live Oak? Try the Trouble Afoot! calendar
  https://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/search/label/calendar?max-results=1
  
  

#2896

From Grandin to Keystone Heights on the Palatka-Lake Butler State Trail

Florida's Office of Greenways and Trails lists the Palatka-Lake Butler State Trail as "In Development." You won't find a trace of the trail in either Palatka or Lake Butler, but it's not just a project on paper. There is already about ten miles of rail trail in place, a twelve-foot wide paved multi-use trail stretching from Grandin to Keystone Heights. We checked out the existing trail on 13 February 2011, starting from trailhead at Twin Lakes Park, near the midpoint of the trail. Based on that trip, here's an east-to-west description of the trail.


The east end of the trail is in Grandin, just north of the intersection of State Road 100 and County Road 315. You won't find any signs or a formal trailhead here, but trail users park on the undeveloped rail bed on the east side of CR 315. The trail starts on the west side of CR 315, heading roughly west and north parallel to SR 100. This phase of the trail was completed in October 2010 according to the Office of Greenways and Trails. It's also a lonely stretch of trail, veering quickly away from SR 100 to traverse woods and prairies--or maybe the prairies are seasonal lakes. It certainly wasn't the season when we went by, but drainage culverts through the trail bed about ten feet above the prairie indicated that someone expected a lot of water in the area. Nearly 2-3/4 miles from Grandin the trail comes back into sight of SR 100 at Putnam Hall. There's a gas station and convenience store just south of the trail at Putnam Hall in case you need any essential supplies like chips or soda, or you just want to spend a few seconds in air conditioning.


After Putnam Hall the trail and SR 100 veer apart again as the trail crosses from Putnam County into Clay County. The Clay County stretch was the first phase of the trail, opened in 2008. Upland pine forest is punctuated by the occasional pond (none of which had much water in them when we explored the trail). Just past 5-1/2 miles the trail passes Twin Lakes Park, the only real trailhead along the trail. Located at 6065 Twin Lakes Road in Keystone Heights, the park has water, rest rooms, and parking.


West of the park the trail and SR 100 start angling back toward one another, and by the time the trail arrives in Keystone Heights proper the trail and the highway are alongside one another. For a short stretch through Keystone Heights the blacktop trail pavement is replaced with cement. There are also quite a few road crossings in Keystone Heights, but not more than 200. These could get annoying if you were doing some serious cycling or running, but not if you're walking or just pedaling around. The stores and restaurants on this stretch are also a bonus for the casually-paced trail users.


On the northwest side of Keystone Heights the trail continues to run alongside SR 100, but a stand of trees separates the trail from the highway, and you can at least pretend that you're going through open country again. Soon, though, a sign announces "END TRAIL," and the trail does end, at SE 57th Street. Across the street you can see the old rail grade continuing through the pines, and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection has signs up letting you know that even if there isn't a trail here, this is part of the Palatka-Lake Butler State Trail, and alcohol and motorized vehicles are prohibited--so leave the beer and jeeps at home.


The entire trail corridor from Palatka to Lake Butler is similarly protected, all 47 miles of it, even though only just over ten miles of trail currently exists. I don't know when the whole 47 miles will be bicycle-ready, let alone the more grandiose plans for including the trail as part of a 100-mile path from St. Augustine to Lake City. But just outside Palatka, where the Florida Department of Transportation is rebuilding the SR 100 bridge across Little Rice Creek, they're simultaneously building a bridge across the creek for the trail. This doesn't mean the trail is coming any time soon; in Leon County the trail bridge across Fisher Creek was in place for years before any of the GF & A Rail Trail was built on either bank. But alt least we know that when it's time to extend the Palatka-Lake Butler Trail from Grandin to Paltaka, Little Rice Creek won't stand in the way.


Links:

• More photos of the Palatka-Lake Butler State Trail
  http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=3089086&id=5215641&l=b630091779
  
  
• Palatka-Lake Butler State Trail on the Florida Office of Greenways and Trails site
  http://www.dep.state.fl.us/gwt/state/palatka/
  
  
• Palatka-Lake Butler State Trail on traillink.com
  http://www.traillink.com/trail/palatka-to-lake-butler-state-trail.aspx
  
  
• Another Florida rail-trail: The GF&A Trail
  http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2009/01/another-visit-to-gf-trail-tallahassee.html
  
  
• Another Florida rail-trail: Madison's Four Freedoms Trail
  http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2008/12/four-freedoms-trail-madison-florida.html
  
  
• Another Florida rail-trail: The Monticello Bike Trail
  http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2009/01/monticello-bike-trail-monticello.html
  
  
• Another Florida rail-trail: The Stadium Drive Bike Path
  http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2009/02/stadium-drive-bike-trail-tallahassee.html
  
  
  

Four Freedoms Rail Trail expansion under way

On a 27 November 2010 visit to the Four Freedoms Rail Trail north of Madison, Florida, I discovered that after years of promises and rumors, the trail is being extended southward into Madison. Over six miles of new trail has been graded between Madison and Hanson and the blacktop can't be far behind. I saw one pair of cyclists who couldn't wait for the pavement; they were already pedaling the freshly graded dirt of the extension.


The current trail stretches five-and-a-half miles from Hanson north through Pinetta and on to the Withlachoochee River and the Florida-Georgia state line. When the addition is complete, the trail will be just over twelve miles from Madison to the Withlacoochee. The new trail construction is part of a Florida Department of Transportation project to improve and resurface State Road 145, the Colin Kelly Highway. Most of the new section of trail will run along the east side of SR 145; just south of Hanson it will cross to the west side of the highway where it will meet up with the existing trail on the north side of Hanson.


With a new southern terminus in Madison, just off of US Highway 90, the extended Four Freedoms Trail will be more accessible than before when the only trailheads were in relatively remote Hanson and Pinetta. A twelve-mile trail should also attract a wider range of cyclists than the current five-and-a-half mile trail, pulling in more tourists with bike racks. With views of farming country alternating with stretches of woodland, the new trail will be worth exploring just for the scenery. Stay alert for news that the trail is ready for rolling.


Links:

• 2008 Trouble Afoot! report on the Four Freedoms Trail
  http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2008/12/four-freedoms-trail-madison-florida.html
  
  
• More photos of the trail under construction
  http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=3038795&id=5215641&l=aa39cf020d
  
  

Centerville Trail, Tallahassee, Florida

The Centerville Trail is a paved, ten-foot wide, 1.72-mile long multi-use trail in the northeast of Leon County. Also called the Centerville Conservation Trail, the Pisgah Church Pedway, and the Centerville Pedway, the trail runs along the north side of Pisgah Church Road and the west side of Centerville Road, hugging the border of the Centerville Conservation Community. The trail's pavement is a coarse, permeable blacktop, covered in many places with leaves or pine needles as it meanders underneath huge live oaks.

Here's an end-to-end description of the Centerville Trail, starting from the west.

The west end of the trail is along Pisgah Church Road, less than a tenth of a mile from the intersection with Bradfordville Road. Residents of the Baker Place subdivision can access the trail using a footpath leading about 100 yards from a greenspace along Grenville Road. The rest of us are out of luck; Baker Place has their path marked by a friendly sign reading "PRIVATE PROPERTY--Baker Place Homeowners Association."

Heading east, Pisgah Church Road is close at hand on the right, while a longleaf pine and wiregrass environment is on the left. This is designated on maps of the Centerville Conservation Community as a gopher tortoise preserve. At 0.30 miles the trail crosses Wiregrass Way and the longleaf pines give way to live oaks and rail fences. This is horse land; occasional signs ask that you "Please avoid contact with the horses." East of Wiregrass Way the trail crosses two small wooden bridges across seasonal streams (drainage ditches to anyone who doesn't write poetry or real estate ad copy). At 0.70 miles there is a small parking area to the right of the trail, only large enough for two or three cars. This is the closest to a trailhead that the Centerville Trail has.

The trail reaches the intersection of Pisgah Church Road and Centerville Road at 0.86 miles, and makes a sharp left turn to follow Centerville Road. On the left there is a view of a holding pond inside the horse fence. The trail starts a respectable climb here; this is not a pancake-flat rail trail. Centerville Road is busier than Pisgah Church Road, so you can usually hear traffic noise. On the other hand, the trail is often far enough away from Centerville Road that the traffic doesn't intrude on your eyes even if it trespasses on your ears.

At 1.12 miles the trail crosses Conservation Drive. A plaque here reads:

Centerville Conservation
TRAIL
____________________

This trail is dedicated to the citizens of Leon County
by Conservation Community Group as scenic byway
for the everlasting enjoyment of our canopy roads.
____________________

July 2007

The Centervillle Conservation Community is a lot more hospitable than Baker Place.

On the other hand, Centerville Conservation Community maintains about seven miles of trails for the sole use of its residents. You can see one of these blue-blazed trails intersecting the Centerville Trail on the left at 1.38 miles and another at 1.42 miles. These flank a swamp that has been set aside for snakes and birds. At 1.63 miles the trail crosses Lick Skillet Drive, a short dead-end road that is home to four vacant lots. Shortly after crossing Lick Skillet is the east end of the Centerville Trail, 1.72 miles from the west end. Beyond the trail's end is City of Tallahassee / Leon County Fire Station Number 11. If you have a moment, stop and admire their memorial garden.

The Centerville Trail passes some rich wildlife habitats. You'd have to be totally oblivious not to spot a dozen species of birds along the way. Quail and red-headed woodpeckers seem especially abundant. Fox squirrels roam the live oak woods. There are only three road crossings, all Centerville Conservation Community roads, which will never see much traffic even when the development fills up.


Other than the few parking spots along Pisgah Church Road a couple of tenths of a mile from Centerville Road, there isn't any place for visitors to access the Centerville Trail. But at only 1.72 miles long, the trail may be too short to attract many visitors. It's a good trail for local users, though, and you can spot more than a few people walking it. I've never seen horses on the trail, but frequent patches of manure testify to their passage. And the Centerville Road Trail is not far away. Each of the two trails is less than two miles long, but if they could be connected then northeast Tallahassee would have a respectable multi-use trail--albeit a respectable multi-use trail in need of a trailhead.

Links:

• A previous report on the Centerville Trail
  http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2007/07/centerville-conservation-community.html
  
  
• More photos of the Centerville Trail
  http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2777178&id=5215641&l=fbaed7ff26
  
  
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The Great Bicycle Shop to open on the St Marks Trail

Imagine an interstate highway without gas stations. Life on the road would be a lot harder. Now, imagine a rail-trail without a bicycle shop.

Unfortunately, quite a few rail-trails get by without a bicycle shop, which is at the very least a horrible inconvenience. Driving past Atlanta last year, I was finally able to overcome my navigational incompetence and find part of the Silver Comet Trail. As luck would have it, we hit the trail right next to the Silver Comet Depot in Mableton. Instead of walking a couple of hundred yards on the trail and admiring the pavement, we were able to rent a couple of bicycles and spend an hour or two exploring the trail.

You don't have that convenience on the Tallahassee/St. Marks Historic Railroad Trail. The nearest bicycle rental is miles from the trail. If you need a new tube or a minor repair, you're not going to get it along the trail. At one time there was a bike shop at the trail head near Capital Circle, but that belongs to a dark past.

But lets look to the bright future. Sometime this year, the Great Bicycle Shop will be opening a store along the trail at 3624 Woodville Highway, about a mile and a half north of Capital Circle. The store at 1909 Thomasville Road will stay open, while most of the rental business moves to the new trail-side store. Repairs and a limited amount of sales will also be available at the Woodville Highway location.

The folks I talked to at the Thomasville Road store were cheerfully vague about a possible opening date. "In about a month," was mentioned, but with the stipulation that there have already been problems in changing an old house to a storefront, and there may be more. Work proceeds at the rate that it does and not always at the rate we'd like. But when it does open, I'll know where to go with out-of-town visitors who show up without bicycles.

The Pinellas Trail has the best map ever!

The Pinellas Trail is a 34-mile long rail trail that stretches from downtown St. Petersburg at the south end of Pinellas County to Tarpon Springs at the north end. I've never ridden the trail, but I'm looking forward to doing is some day soon. For one thing, it has the best map.

Some of the rail-trail maps that I've run across are almost rudimentary--a schematic of the route showing major highways. Others at least include the trail head parking areas along the trail. Better still are the maps that also show the mile marks and at least the major roads crossing or approaching the trail.

The Pinellas Trail map is really more of a guidebook. I bought a similar guidebook for north Georgia's Silver Comet Trail, but the the Pinellas Trail guide is much more detailed. There are twenty pages, each of which covers less than two miles of trail. A portion of each page is a map, showing the trail, spur trails, every street in the vicinity, parks, water sources, restrooms, restaurants, bike shops, coffee shops, and just about anything else that might be remotely useful while traveling on the trail. The remainder of the page is devoted to descriptions of the resources on that page.

Now, this isn't so useful for the competitive cyclist crouched atop a carbon-fibre dragonfly while he flashes from one end of the trail to another and back again without a pause, but he isn't the typical trail user anyway. The guide makes more sense for the casual cyclists out for a bit of active recreation. Want to pedal a few miles up the trail, stop for lunch, then ride back? You can plan it with the guide. Out for a walk on the trail and want to stop for coffee? Check the guide. Trail users from the local area may already know some of these things, but tourists not at all. The guide makes the trail more tourist-friendly, while letting them know where they can spend money along the trail.

Now, you can also do this with the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy's interactive maps at TrailLink.com and Google, but with a printed map or guidebook the work is already done for you and you don't have to haul around a computer or wireless device. There is a problem with keeping a guidebook up to date (my ride on the Pinellas Trail might end up being more interesting than I'd like).

Close to home (i.e., my home), the St. Marks Trail could benefit from such a guide. For instance, there are places to buy a drink that you can't see from the trail, but are only a block or two away. Weekend cyclists would like to know this, and business owners would like them to know. The guidebook would make both groups happy. Perhaps both groups would support a guidebook through sales and advertising, making the author of a guidebook happy as well.

Meanwhile, I'm going to look at my maps of the Pinellas Trail and plan a ride.

Stadium Drive Bike Trail, Tallahassee, Florida

The second rail-trail in the Tallahassee area was the Stadium Drive Bike Trail which runs from the intersection of West Pensacola Street and Stadium Drive near the Florida State University campus to a point on Ocala Road just south of West Tennessee Street (US 90). The trail follows part of an old rail route to Bainbridge, Georgia which was later re-routed to south of town. Portions of the railroad continued to be used over the years for various reasons, such as to deliver coal to the FSU heating plant and to service a cement factory. Over the years, though, more and more of the track was removed and by the 1990s it was abandoned entirely. During that same decade it became a rail trail.

In the first years after the pavement was laid down not much was done in the way of maintenance. Brush grew up on either side of the trail turning it into a tunnel through the jungle. This created safety issues. Among FSU students, the proverbial height of foolishness was taking the trail at night.

A few years ago, though, the city of Tallahassee came through and cleared the brush around the trail, eliminating cover for potential ambushers. Not coincidentally this happened just before college football season--thousands of fans use the trail to reach FSU's Doak Campbell Stadium on game day. The following year, lighting and emergency call boxes were added to the trail. The lighting is better than on most streets and the call boxes are spaced closely enough that you are never more than 200 feet from a call box (and often much closer, because the call boxes are not spaced evenly). A few places have been patched where cracks in the pavement threatened to swallow bicycle tires, but the whole trail really needs to be re-paved. Football season is still months away, so maybe the city will get around to re-paving later this year.

The north end of the trail is on the east side of Ocala Road between two holding ponds, just south of the intersection of Ocala Road and West Tennessee Street (US 90). From here it climbs a small rise; this peaks quickly and most of the rest of the trail slopes downward to the FSU campus as you come off the high ground near San Luis Ridge. To the right is the first of two side-trails into Heritage Grove; other apartment complexes along the route have also hooked into the trail. Just past a quarter mile, a concrete walk twins off to parallel the trail. For the next 0.37 miles the trail is a concrete walkway on the left and an asphalt bike path on the right.

At 0.44 miles the trail crosses Chapel Drive. After crossing Chapel, the land to the right of the trail is mostly residential, with apartments and scholarship houses on the left side. Through the trees on the left you can catch your first glimpses of the FSU campus, making out the medical school and the soccer stadium. On a clear day (and most days in Tallahassee are clear) you can spot buildings downtown, including the state capitol.

At 0.87 miles the trail arrives at a monster tunnel under Stadium Drive, wide enough for a two-lane highway. A smaller tunnel goes south under Pensacola Street. The large tunnel runs for 150 feet and comes out across a parking lot from the University Center, a complex of brick building wrapping around FSU's Doak Campbell Stadium. In plain view is an enormous stained-glass window depicting Coach Bobby Bowden, dwarfing the larger-than-life bronze statue of the coach below it. Looking past the stadium, in the distance you can see the State Capitol, the Department of Education building, and other large buildings downtown.

At this point it's hard to say what the trail does. It can't follow the old railroad right-of-way, because that was obliterated during stadium expansion in the 1990s. In fact, University Center Building C sits directly over a portion of the old rail route. Until a couple of years ago, an asphalt path stretched from the tunnel to Chieftain Way, but that was removed right before the 2007 football season. If the trail continues at this point, it follows the wide, concrete sidewalks past the tunnel. This is easy enough to follow to the one mile point in front of the entrance to the Al Dunlap Football Practice Fields. The issue is confused at this point by a lot of intersecting concrete walks, but if you follow the wide one that curves next to the baseball stadium and the ticket office, you'll go by the Heritage Fountain and arrive at the intersection of Chieftan Way, Champions Way, and Pensacola Street (1.18 miles). Cross Champions Way to reach the south side of Pensacola Street, where a wide sidewalk with a "center line" of painted tomahawks appears to be the trail. Follow the trail to the intersection of Varsity Drive and St Augustine St, where you'll be directed to cross Varsity Drive and then continue south to West Gaines Street. Once you cross Gaines Street, though, you have to admit that the trail is over. No sign says as much, but there just isn't any place to go. There are plans for a connector going from here to the north end of the St Marks Rail Trail on Gamble Street, but you can't ride a bike on a plan.

Even if you measure all the way from Ocala Road to Gaines Street, the the Stadium Drive Bike Trail is only about a mile-and-a-half long, so you aren't going to get a lot of people driving miles to use it for recreation. There isn't any parking for them anyway, except for some metered spots near the University Center. Local use is heavy, however. There are always people on the trail walking their dog, doing part of a run, out for a fitness walk, commuting to or from the FSU campus on foot or on bike, walking to the grocery store on Ocala Road, or biking to a restaurant on Tennessee Street. It's generally not crowded except on home game days for FSU during the college football season. If the connection to the St Marks Trail is ever made, the lack of a trailhead parking area could be a problem, but right now this workhorse of a trail does just fine without one.

-- Herb Wills

Links:

• Stadium Drive Bike Trail on TrailLink
  http://www.traillink.com/ViewTrail.aspx?AcctID=6015428
• Older (2006) photos of the trail
  http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2117044&id=5215641&l=7afcdba3e3
  

Monticello Bike Trail (Monticello, Florida)

Unless you live in Monticello, Florida, you probably don't know about the Monticello Bike Trail. You may have noticed it if you've run in the Melon Run 5K, or if you've driven through Monticello on US Highway 90 and were particularly alert to the scenery. The Florida Office of Greenways and Trails doesn't list the Monticello Bike Trail on their website, nor does the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy.

And the Monticello Bike Trail is a rail-trail, but the railroad has been gone for a good long time--over seventy years. After being passed over by the east-west Jacksonville-to-Pensacola line in the 1850s, Monticello beat out Tallahassee for a north-south connection to Georgia around 1900. For a time, Monticello was directly on a rail line that ran from Chicago, Illinois to Tampa, Florida. Later, the Atlantic Coast line straightened the route, taking it west of town. Monticello citizens consoled themselves by noting that the old tracks still ran through town and connected with the main line. But during the 1930s, railroad workers crept into town one night and removed the tracks under cover of darkness. The next morning the people of Monticello woke up without a railroad. Legal action was threatened and may have even been taken, but the rails never came back. Only the name of Railroad Street hinted that trains had ever come through town. Somehow, though, over seven decades the right-of-way stayed open enough that in 2006 Monticello was able to dedicate a bike trail on part of the old railbed.

The Monticello Bike Trail runs north-south, with its north end on Cypress Street at the intersection with Mamie Scott Drive. This is just across Cypress from Jefferson County Elementary School, which must certainly contribute traffic to the trail on school days. Catty-corner from this end of the trail is an old, wooden schoolhouse--the Howard Academy High School building, which was being restored for use by the Boys and Girls Clubs of the Big Bend when I visited. Just off the trail at this end are some attractive benches, useful for anyone who needs to take a breather after reaching the end of the trail. From here the trail heads south, going past the kind of warehouses and factory sites that you'd expect to find along a rail corridor. The trail crosses some small streets on this stretch starting with York Street and Pearl Street. At Dogwood Street some arrows appear on the trail's pavement; this is where the course of the annual Melon Run 5K joins the trail. Just after Dogwood is the first stop sign on the trail, just over 0.4 miles from the north end. This is the intersection with Washington Street, aka US Highway 90. Crossing the highway, you find another set of benches and a bronze plaque. The plaque reads: "DEDICATED IN HONOR OF ISHAM L. 'IKE' ANDERSON 'MAYOR EMERITUS' OF MONTICELLO AND AVID BIKE ENTHUSIAST. DEDICATED 2006." Included is a drawing of a heavy man wearing a cowboy hat on a cruiser bike, the same picture that appears on all the trail signs.

South of US 90, the trail continues south into residential areas, with houses and the more-than-occasional church to each side. For half a mile, the trail resembles a sidewalk for South Railroad Street on your left. Around 0.7 miles, the houses on the right give way to an old pecan orchard. Just past a mile Railroad Street ends, the course of the Melon Run leaves the trail, and the trail crosses Chase Drive. Beyond Chase Drive the left of the trail is a woods of planted pines, while to the right is Clifford Brown Memorial Park. Past the park, the right of the trail is another old pecan orchard, which is becoming the Pecan Hills subdivision. Where houses have already been built some ornamental trees have been planted along the trail.

The stretch south of Chase Drive is unbroken by street crossings for over half a mile, all the way to the south end of the trail at Martin Road. There are plans to extend the trail another half a mile to Nacoosa Road. In fact, beyond the current end of the trail you can see an unpaved road (blocked by a chain) that continues along the old rail route. Perhaps this is the future south end of the trail. For now the total length of the trail is about 8100 feet, or just over 1-1/2 miles.

At a mile-and-a-half (or a future two miles), not a lot of fitness buffs or eco-tourists are going to be traveling to Monticello to take in this trail. Even though it's not an engine for generating tourist dollars, local use more than justifies its existence. On my one visit, I saw plenty of walkers and a few cyclists and runners out on the trail. No one was walking their dog on the trail, but there was plenty of evidence that dogs had been there. As Pecan Hill expands, even more people are going to be living near the trail and find it a convenient place to exercise or to stroll to downtown Monticello. The Monticello Bike Trail isn't one of the long trails on which you can stage a bike tour or a backpacking trip, but it's a community asset, valuable and useful to the folks who paid for it, the people of Monticello.

Gopher, Frog, and Alligator Trail Construction

For years I've been hearing about the GFA Rail Trail, to be built on the bed of the old Georgia, Florida, and Alabama (aka Gopher, Frog, and Alligator) Railroad between Tallahassee and Carrabelle. Never mind that some of the railbed is in people's yards or beneath city streets or under a runway of the Tallahassee Municipal Airport. Don't worry about the hostility of hunting interests to a trail in the Apalachicola National Forest. Forget about the problem of bridging the Ochlockonee River. One Day the trail would be built, all 53 miles of it. Run a marathon on the St. Marks Trail? You would be able to run two marathons back-to-back, on the GFA Trail and never re-trace a single step. And it would indeed happen One Day. After all, the Florida Department of Transportation had added a ten-foot bike lane to the bridge over Fisher Creek on Springhill Road. A mile to the north,the United States Forestry Service had added the legend "GFA Trailhead" to the sign for the Trout Pond Recreation Area (and only those of little faith would point out that the USFS had also added "CLOSED" to the same sign).

This past week I heard that construction on the trail had actually been spotted along Springhill Road. I wanted to see it. I have faith and hope in this project, but I still wanted to see it. So Saturday (2008 July 26) I went to take a look.

You have to drive a long way south of town on Springhill Road before you spot the first construction a bit south of the Trout Pond Recreation Area. The farthest south the current stage of the project goes is Helen Guard Station Road, just north of the Wakulla County line. North of Helen, the railbed has been graded and a layer of crushed lime laid down. Or maybe sand mixed with gravel. Anyway, something to serve as a foundation for the first layer of pavement.

At Fisher Creek, the trail veers east of the old railbed to cross the creek on the bicycle lane that has been added to the Springhill Road bridge. After the bridge the trail jogs back to the west to rejoin the railbed. The railbed is a bit higher than Springhill Road here,so you get something you seldom see on a rail-trail: a hill.

A bit north of Fisher Creek, the trail suddenly makes a hard turn to the east, leaves the old railbed, and crosses Springhill Road. After crossing Springhill Road, the trail turns gently to the north, apparently towards Trout Pond Recreation Area, which is on the opposite side of Springhill Road from the old railbed. On this side of Springhill Road, a layer of blacktop has already been added to the trail.

That's how things stood the day of my visit. This part of the project should be done soon, but you won't be able to run a marathon on it--it's only around two miles long. You could run an out-and-back 5K on the trail, but I wouldn't advise it because of the Springhill Road crossing. It could be very important as a segment of the longer trail, but I don't know when that's going to happen.

Bill Crooks once told me that there was a running track inside of the Federal Correctional Institute off of Capital Circle. That was interesting information, but not immediately useful. In fact, I'm inclined to hope that it never becomes useful. I have to put this news about the GFA Trail in a similar category of interesting but not immediately useful. The difference is that I remain hopeful that this GFA information will be useful one day.

[ Since I wrote the above, paving of this first portion of the GF&A Trail has been completed. We're still over 50 miles short of a paved rail-trail from Tallahassee to Carrabelle, but it's a start. ]

Original appearance:
http://www.gulfwinds.org/Trails/GFA%20Trail%20(07-30-8).htm

Map at USATF's America's Running Routes:
http://www.usatf.org/routes/view.asp?rID=234168

More photos of the trail under construction:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2477240&id=5215641&l=39a2010ec3

Another visit to the GF&A trail:
http://troubleafoot.blogspot.com/2009/01/another-visit-to-gf-trail-tallahassee.html

Four Freedoms Trail, Madison, Florida

It's not listed in the Florida's Office of Greenways and Trails guide, nor is it listed by the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy but Madison has a very nice rail-trail, the Four Freedoms Trail.

The south end of the trail is in Hanson (which is little more than a sign along the highway), about seven miles north of Madison along the Colin Kelly Highway (SR-145). The trail parking area are on the west side of the highway, and is not particularly inviting. There isn't a huge sign marking the trailhead, and the surrounding weeds don't provide much shade. A large, black lump on the ground shows where the trail paving crew dumped their excess asphalt at the end of the job.

Just a few hundred yards outside of the parking area, though, the trees close in and the trail is protected by a leafy canopy. The way is mostly wooded for about two miles until you approach the village of Pinetta. At this point I can only guess that there was some trouble obtaining the right-of-way to the old rail grade, because at this point the trail ceases to follow the old rail route. Instead, the trail follows a paved bike lane along Persimmon Drive. In the center of Pinetta the bike lane vanishes for a block or two and you're on the streets. This isn't much of a problem, though, because this part of Pinetta hasn't seen much traffic since before the railroad left. If you want to visit the village store or barbecue restaurant, those are a block east of the trail near the Colin Kelly Highway.

After another brief spell on bike lanes, the trail resumes north of Pinetta on the west side of Persimmon Drive. Around the 3-1/2 mile point, the trail crosses to the east side of the road, passes a good-sized parking area with picnic tables, and then plunges into the woods. For the next two miles you'll see little but trees to either side of you. Additionally, the trail acquires a noticeable downward grade--you're headed downhill to the Withlacoochee River and the state line.

Five-and-a-half miles from the Hanson trailhead, the Four Freedoms Trail ends at the Withlacoochee River. There's a picnic table under a shelter at the south end of the trail and an observation deck overlooking the river. The opposite bank of the river is Lowndes County, Georgia. Part of the old railroad trestle that carried the trains across the river still stands on the Florida side of the Withlacoochee. This is a pleasant spot to stop and eat a snack, watch birds, or fish. Or you could stare at the water, and imagine what an amazing ride you could have if the trail continued across the river and up the old rail grade into Valdosta.

I've bicycled the Four Freedoms Trail twice; there wasn't much traffic on it either time. In fact, I don't remember if I saw any other bicycle riders, altho' there were several folks walking on the trail. At only five-and-a-half miles (an eleven-mile round trip), it's probably not worth a long drive to visit, but if you're near the area you should definitely check it out. From the center of Madison, Florida head east on Base Street (US 90), and then turn left (north) onto Duval Street. Duval Street ends at Livingston Street, where you should turn right (follow the signs pointing to Valdosta). Livingston Street becomes the Colin Kelly Highway (SR-145).

Links:

• Madison County's map of the trail:
  http://www.madisoncountyfl.com/showFile.aspx?FileUploadID=1001817&PostID=3423


• Photos of the trail:
  http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2361514&id=5215641&l=98248ff090


• Another Four Freedoms Trail report:
  http://behindthecrank.blogspot.com/2008/03/four-freedoms-trail.html