Mallard Creek Greenway

Great news for bike commuters in the University City area! The extention to the Mallard Creek Greenway should be completed during the next few weeks. This is especially wonderful for people riding to the UNC-Charlotte campus from the neighborhoods to the north and west. Previously, this commute was very hazardous as the campus is blocked off by many four-lane highways. Soon, one will be able to cruise through a leafy green corridor along the creek and tunnel under Highways 29 and I85.

One problem is that the greenway does not connect directly to the campus but ends at the playing fields on Mallard Creek Church Rd. near Hwy 29, so you must ride up the hill on Mallard Creek Church Rd. to Mary Alexander Rd. and to the rear entrance of the campus. The planning office for the University informed me that there are plans to build a greenway along Toby Creek and a bridge at its intersection with Mallard Creek, but construction won't begin until about Spring 2007. This would provide an even more direct route to campus with no hills at all!

The new section of greeway is wide and paved like the existing sections of Mallard Creek and Clark's Creek greenways. But the old section between Mallard Creek Rd. and David Taylor Drive in the University City Research Park is hard-packed gravel. You may need a mountain or trail bike to ride this section, but if I were riding it regularly I would simply put wider tires (size 28 or up) on my road bike.

I have been running on the new greenway already and can't help but marvel over the fact that I can go five, ten, or even many more miles without crossing a street except David Taylor Drive!