Come celebrate the newest jewel in the KCMO trail system this Friday 10/29/21 at 2PM. Event details here.
This nearly two mile trail activates the Big Shoal Greenway and is a collaborative effort from multiple KCMO departments and connects multiple neighborhoods in Gladstone and KCMO between Chouteau and Brighton. Long story short, the water department installed a waterline along the greenway, the public works department secured $1.35M in federal bike/ped funds for a trail connecting Brighton and Chouteau, and the parks department used those funds to construct the trail along the tree cleared waterline corridor. Truly a successful project for everyone and now you get to enjoy it. The best place to access it is on North Indiana right around NE 55th Street where there is a new graded play field and trailhead parking lot.
Map of the project below with the trail shown in blue. It goes under both Indiana and Brighton in case you are wondering why there are curvy squiggles on the map.
I do have to warn you that there is a long and rather steep hill along Chouteau but that is what happens when building a trail in a fully developed area with floodplain and topographic challenges. This is looking northeast from where it starts near Chouteau and you can see the cut that was needed to get the trail at an acceptable slope. There is a gap in the trail south of here down towards NE 53rd Street as the developer for the old mall is supposed to construct the gap.
This is a 170 feet plus (I think, I don't remember as the plans were done 3 years ago) bridge spanning the floodplain.
It provides the newest IG or FB picture background in the area. This is looking west back towards Chouteau. I love seeing all of your trail bridge pictures.
This connection opens up the greenway. Who says engineers can't design things that aren't straight.
The project has a low water crossing because the floodplain is large through here. These are always great places for kids to play with sticks and rocks and the creek. This is looking west back towards Chouteau.
There is a connection and crosswalk on North Indiana but the trail also has the option of going under.
You can enjoy some free artwork by local students. I wish someone would paint a picture of B.A. Baracus....
This is a new parking lot/trailhead on the east side of Indiana. There was a maybe 120' x 80' field graded out where there was unmanaged slope which could be used for practices or pickup soocer/frisbee/football and the baseball diamond fences were replaced.
This is looking west back at Indiana around a bend on the trail. The trees you see were planted by the waterline project for mitigation of clearing and in anticipation of the the trail and have a few years of growth under their belt.
The picture below shows where the trail is right on top of the waterline clearing. Note how the waterline construction had as minimal intrusion as possible and how the clearing opened up a perfect corridor for the trail.
This leads to another open area underneath some old growth trees. When I was going through here, there was a young family on a blanket just enjoying being outside.
The trail then goes into an area which has never been maintained and has an amazing tree canopy with some old oaks and sycamores.
There is a stretch where the trail had to be straight because of property lines and to be away from the creek but the engineer was able to sneak a little curvature into the design.
The trail does cross Jackson at the street level because the Jackson bridge is short and there isn't clearance to go underneath. This is another section which isn't flat but just so you know, when I was in a wheelchair post Achilles tendon surgery this summer, I did roll through the trail just to see how it felt from an ADA perspective.
The area between Jackson and Cypress was platted in the 1950's and there was a lake mentioned on the plat with Cypress as the dam. I am assuming at some point it breached and someone dropped a metal culvert in place, paved over it, and called it good. It's the only explanation for why there's a bridge at Jackson and downstream 500 feet at Cypress there's a metal pipe. It does get a little tight through here and sometimes one just has to roll with the constraints in the design like snaking between a property corner and a sewer manhole because the creek is just ten feet to the left of the trail.
I have a ton of pictures but I'm going to hop over to just east of Cypress where we have a low water box culvert crossing on the trail. This is also where the trail goes onto a 40 (+/-?) park tract that has some amazing tree specimens that's never really been accessible to the public.
The trail is built on top of the waterline clearing and in a few years, the tree canopy will fill in and fully shade the trail. This is looking east towards Brighton.
This is looking east towards Cypress.
The trail connects to the west side of Brighton where it uses the sidewalk on the bridge to cross over to the north and then loop around and underneath the trail.
I encourage you to come out Friday. There are plenty of places and things money can be spent on so if you enjoy these trails, show up and thank your elected officials who provide the support for funding to implement them. If you can't make it on Friday, check it out this weekend or the next as the trees start to show their colors. Repeating the link to the event details again so you can put it on your calendar and enjoy.