East Coast Greenway Trail? | Cycling Trail from Maine to Florida | Bicycle Trails | Bike Touring Map

Jim Dodson (aka The Florida Bike Guy): Today I want to talk about what's happening with the East Coast Greenway Trail. I came across this trail not long ago and I'm a little embarrassed to tell you that I didn't know much about it at all. So in 1991, a group formed the idea of creating a trail from Maine to Florida. I think it starts in Calais, Maine and has taken it down through Florida to Key West. It's over 3000 miles. And the unique thing about the East Coast Greenway Trail is that it goes rural to city. So rather than skirt around the major cities that it encounters it is designed to go right through them which is kind of interesting. And it, of course, then allows people in the cities to get onto the trail right away to get out of the city to get to the next area.

I'd love to hear from anyone who has experience cycling on this trail. Of course it's going to be incorporating a lot of the trails that we use already. For instance, the St John's River to Sea Loop trail. There's a lot of trails up in the area of St. Augustine that are going to be involved in this along with creating some additional trails to link it together. So let us hear your experiences and I'd love to have anybody tell us about their adventures.

[LLewis-vuqf]

I live in Virginia. I've never even heard of this trail. A few days ago however I watched a YouTube video of a young woman who did a solo ride following this trail starting in Maine all the way to the end. Very interesting video.

[sebastianinetsurfsport]

Jim -- I just stumbled across this video and thought I would tell you that our shop, Sebastian Inlet Surf and Sport, is directly on the East Coast Greenway Trail as it heads south through Brevard County and into Indian River County as it crosses the Sebastian Inlet Bridge. Just last week we saw several through riders on the trail heading toward Key West. A few years ago we hosted a forum with Greenway officials that was attended by, among others, a couple of the local Mayors, the owners of local bike shops and representatives of some of the local bike clubs, including Vero Cycling Club, Bike Walk Indian River County & Space Coast Velo Sport. I would like to tell you that said meeting led to a burst of interest in the Greenway but that happens not to be the case. There is still no signage in the area and virtually none of the residents have ever even heard of the Greenway. That said, we have over 40 miles of mostly protected Greenway between Melbourne Beach and Fort Pierce which includes beautiful ocean views and plenty of camping opportunities. If you ever get the urge to ride this stretch, I'd be happy to show you the way.

[jasonzisser]

I'm planning a trip along the ECG from Philly to Key West in installments. I heard that the coastal portion in the Carolinas is awful - no protected trails just busy roads and narrow shoulders in high cyclist fatality states. The problem is you have to cycle around Camp LeJeune military base. Not trying to be too much of a downer but I'm rethinking whether this section is worth the risk