America has its fair share of success stories. Being the first to walk on the moon. Digging the Panama Canal. Numerous rail-trails stretch from sea to shining sea. If you’re not already familiar with rail-trails, you’ll soon want to visit as many as you can. They provide perfect opportunities to soak up the outdoors and make for great road-trip destinations.
They started as old railroad corridors that trains no longer used. Instead of letting the tracks rust and decay over time, communities removed them and converted the paths into walking, hiking, and biking trails. Every state now features rail-trails, with a whopping 2,380 completed so far—adding up to 25,376 miles.There are currently 880 rail-trail projects in the works.
Rail Trails are eco-friendly at their core. The offer myriad recreational experiences that boost health and happiness. They act as a method of transportation for two-wheeled commuters. These trails make use of something old, turning it into something new and viable. They also can help to increase tourism in an area, which means that the region benefits as well. To learn more about these transformative trails, read on.
HISTORY
Rail-trails owe their start to naturalist May Theilgaard Watts. In 1963, she penned a letter to the editor in the Chicago Tribune saying that a local abandoned rail line should be turned into a trail. That letter sparked the start of what would become the Illinois Prairie Path. In the meantime, the very first rail-trail was developed: Wisconsin’s Elroy-Sparta State Trail in 1965. These two trail innovations led to the thousands of rail-trails we know today. After that, several rail-trails were created. Eventually, in 1980, Congress passed an act that permitted the discontinuance of rail lines that were no longer making a profit (otherwise known as “railbanking”). These abandoned corridors opened possibilities for plentiful rail-trails.
From their inception to the mid-1980s, rail-trail projects were tackled by local communities. In 1986, a nationwide non-profit organization began to foster the creation of these trails, the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy. They started with just 250 collective miles of rail-trails in the country. Now, nearly 40 years later, they oversee more than 25,000 miles. Found in urban centers, far-flung prairies and wildlife-filled marshlands, rail-trails are seeing more visitors than ever before. This is thanks to an increased interest in conservation and commuting to work by bike. From 2000 on, Rails-to-Trails Conservancy has posted all their trails and accompanying information on their TrailLink website. This makes it easy to find trails that are local to your area; they can be found along a road-trip route. You can shoose to suit your needs; from flat, paved paths to ones that provide lots of inclines for an added challenge.
IMPRESSIVE SUCCESSES
Ever since Rails-to-Trails Conservancy started in 1986, rail-trails have seen plenty of successes. As of 2021, the non-profit was delivering key resources and information to over 7,000 professionals throughout the U.S. who are continuing to develop trail networks. The conservancy has also gone to bat for trails legally, with over 60 state and federal cases that have protected rail-trails. Millions of people turn to the TrailLink website every year to learn all about rail-trails—in fact, 10.5 million people visited the site in 2021.
The conservancy is also hard at work to develop major, in-the-works trail projects, like The Great American Rail-Trail, which will one day stretch 3,700 miles between Washington, D.C. and Washington State, making it the first coast-to-coast rail-trail. There’s also the Route of the Badger in Wisconsin, a regional trail system that will ultimately encompass 700 miles and provide trails to marginalized areas in and around Milwaukee.
TOP ONES TO VISIT
Since there are so many rail-trails throughout the United States, it’s a cinch to add them to your road-trip itinerary. For the most bang for your buck, head to the Midwest—Minnesota has the most rail-trails of any state, with over 2,000 miles of converted paths. Most of Wisconsin state trails are rail-trails, including the Elroy-Sparta State Trail, the oldest rail-trail. If you’re in it for the long haul and want to traverse the lengthiest rail-trail in the country, set your GPS to Missouri, where you can hike, bike or walk the Katy Trail State Park, with 240 miles dotted with rural areas and sprawling prairies.
Aiming to spot some wildlife during your rail-trail hike? Then don’t miss Washington’s 90- mile Olympic Discovery Trail, punctuated with tide pools filled with creatures and sea lions and otters flanking ocean-side views. Perhaps you’d love to visit some rail-trails while also hitting up some National Parks. In this case, consider the 9-mile Mammoth Cave Railroad Bike & Hike Trail near Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave National Park, the desert-lined, 13-mile Moab Canyon Pathway that winds around the edge of Utah’s Arches National Park or the Greater Yellowstone Trail—it’s not yet completed, but you can walk or bike portions of it. One day, this trail will stretch 180 miles between Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks.
To learn more about rail-trails, visit the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy website at railstotrails.org or read the book From Rails to Trails: The Making of America’s Active Transportation Network by Peter Harnik (University of Nebraska Press, 2021).
This article on Rail Trails was originally published in Girl Camper Magazine.
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