A few weeks ago, I biked out to Oxbow Park for a friend’s birthday. Since it’s so much more lovely, I always take the longer Springwater Corridor out there instead of SE Division St–and this time, when I got to the end of the paved section, I saw this:
I’ve been back since then, and now there’s road equipment, too. I figured they were (finally!) paving the last two and a half miles or so that take you in to Boring, OR, and now that I’ve done some internet sleuthing I’ve decided that’s definitely the case. Though there’s surprisingly little news about it (I guess it’s not that big of a deal, though it seems pretty exciting to me), I did find an article in the Sandy Post from May, back when they were starting the process of deciding to pave it for real.
The article explains how they were deciding on a contractor and whatnot and anticipate the trail to be paved by the end of October. I wonder if that’s still the case? But the really exciting part isn’t even that the trail will finally be all the way paved, but that there’s more to come. From the Sandy Post article:
But finishing the Springwater Corridor Trail is not an end in itself. The trail is part of Metro’s plan of a regional network of trails that eventually will connect.
The Springwater is destined to connect to the Cazadero Trail in Boring, which eventually will cross Deep Creek and lead to the Clackamas River and Estacada.
The Springwater also is destined to connect to the Tickle Creek Trail in Sandy, and eventually a trail will be established beyond Sandy to Government Camp.
I would be so psyched to be able to hop on the Springwater, maybe 2 and a half miles from my house, and then take multi-use trails, car-free, all the way to Government Camp at Mt Hood. I haven’t done any research about how far away this sort of potential trail is (I imagine years and years out), but man, I’m psyched!
In the meantime, it’s going to be pretty sweet to at least get all the way to Boring:)
I’m gonna be the contrarian here and say I wish they would have less paved paths and more packed gravel. I remember how great the Springwater by Oaks Park was before they paved it. Less crowds, no strollers, no people training for the Tour de France. Just more leisurely and less intense, I suppose. We have enough blacktop in town already. :)
heh. I’d probably be totally with you on this if my bike could handle gravel:)