Urban Riding

Tonight I headed south on the White Pine Trail without a real plan on where or how far I was going to ride. When I got to the ball park I decided to cross the river and head through Riverside Park. Much to my surprise I found a new, paved, marked, two way bike lane trucked between the park and and North Monroe. I decided to see how far this new bike lane went. As I neared the south end of the park the bike lane split to a single lane on each side of the road. I continued following as this area has had sporadic lane markings in the past. Now I was able to get all the way to the 6th Street bridge and the bike lane continued on. But I needed to turn back for home. So I crossed the river and followed the bike lane that runs along Seward Street. The roadway lane ends, but it then becomes a paved path which takes the rider north to Ann Street. At this point there are several directional signs pointing to the White Pine Trail. I followed these and ended up back at the south end of Riverside Park. This time I traveled along the path near the river, crossed the Grand river again on North Park Street, and then hooked up with the south end of the WPT. The entire trip was 22 miles. The great part is that I can now ride from my house to downtown Grand Rapids on bike trails or marked bike lanes the entire way. All the talk about being a bike friendly city appears to be coming true.