Minneapolis Diagonal Trail Revisited

Posted by Bikeverywhere, June 29th, 2009

Diagonal Trail

Diagonal Trail

Diagonal Trail North

Diagonal Trail North

I spent a couple of hours revisiting the Diagonal Trail at New Brighton Blvd and I-35W on Sunday. The visit generated a series of changes and updates to the Twin Cities Bike Map. The most obvious change is the addition of a second leg to the trail at New Brighton Blvd and Stinson Blvd. The Stinson Blvd segment runs south to Hennepin Av. From there 18th Av is signed as a bike route south to Elm St. SE. This makes a good north-south connector in an area that has been underserved by bike trails. Use caution on the Stinson Blvd bike trail, however. It runs next to the road and intersects driveways and streets in an unsafe way. The problems are inherent with any two way bike trail placed next to a street.

Minneapolis has designated Talmadge St as a bike route between 18th and 27th. It’s a pleasant residential street and connects student housing to the greater campus area. It’s a good local connector, but it is short and doesn’t serve the larger area covered by the Twin Cities Bike Map very well, so I haven’t symbolized it as a bike route. While researching it, however, I discovered a very good alternate to the Industrial Blvd/Hennepin Av/29th Av SE route. See the attached map for the alternate. I’ve also added Ridgeway Pkwy between Industrial Blvd and Stinson Blvd. This has always been a very pleasant road, with a substantial hill in the middle, but it didn’t connect well to the rest of the routes until the Diagonal Trail was built.

Just north, on the overview side of the map, I added part of Long Lake Rd and 33rd Av and eliminated most of W. Co Rd C. The new routes, although not as direct, are more bike friendly.

This area still needs some work. One intriguing possibility is to run the Stinson Blvd bike route north to Silver Lake, then connect with 44th/Cty Rd E. If anyone has insights into this option, please let me know.

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