The path more taken

By Charles Sowell  

JULY 27, 2011 12:55 p.m. (0)

The little girl whizzed by on her bike at the intersection of the Swamp Rabbit Trail and West Blue Ridge Drive – a fluff of blonde hair capped with a pink and white helmet – and straight out into traffic on the busy four-lane highway.

Riders and walkers screamed warnings that were lost in the sound of screeching tires and billowing blue smoke of burning rubber.

Half a dozen cars stopped mere feet from the girl, who froze in the middle of the eastbound lanes.

Shakily she peddled to the safety of a shrub-lined median only to set off another flurry of slammed brakes as oncoming drivers reacted.

Finally, a young couple waiting on the far side, waved the little girl forward, and she crossed the busy highway.

“What were you thinking?,” the woman shouted.

The girl, red-faced with embarrassment, quickly peddled off without a word.

“Eventually somebody’s going to get killed at one of these intersections,” said Lawrence Bullard, a regular bike rider on the Greenville Hospital System Swamp Rabbit Trail. “It’s sad, but I think it’s going to take that to convince the highway department to put up flashing warning signs where the trail crosses these busy highways.”

The Swamp Rabbit, unarguably, has become a favorite biking beat for thousands of enthusiasts of all ages in Greenville. Given good weather, on any given weekend, a traffic cop would be hard pressed to keep track of the throngs of riders.

Ty Houck, director of greenway programs for the Greenville County Recreation Department, said the trail has adequate warning signs.

“There is a warning sign that a high volume highway is just ahead warning riders to walk their bikes across and a stop sign is prominently displayed at that crossing,” he said.

Mike Jenkins, a deputy assigned to the trail, said he’s written memos that were forwarded to the state Department of Transportation, asking for improvements on the roads at the busiest intersections.

The state transportation agency is aware of the problem and intends to install flashing lights this fall warning drivers of the crossway, officials said.

The trail is a work in process, with plans to eventually follow old rail lines from Fountain Inn to the Blue Ridge Escarpment.

About 13.5 miles of trail are open between Travelers Rest and Greenville Tech. Plans connecting that section to the Conestee Nature Preserve are to largely be done by August, said Houck.

About 1,000 people per day use the trail, according to first-year data compiled by Julian Reed, associate professor of health sciences at Furman University, who is compiling data for the recreation department on trail usage.

Trail users are overwhelmingly white (more than 90 percent), male (62 percent) and bike riders, Reed said. Overall trail users rate the trail as well kept (97 percent) and safe (84 percent).

“The numbers show a high satisfaction rate with the trail as it stands now,” he said.

Weekends see much heavier usage, he said, and as the trail grows in popularity he expects to see those numbers climb in his second year survey.

“One of the reasons the trail is so popular is that women feel safe and if they feel safe then the kids are going to be there,” Bullard said. “The police patrol it regularly and you see them on bikes and four-wheelers, keeping an eye on things.”

But the police patrols can’t be everywhere and there are not enough officers to man the busiest crossings.

Bullard drives over from his home in Easley almost every day and usually chalks up at least 100 miles a week worth of pedal time on the trail.

“Some weeks it’s more like 130 miles,” he said.

Jenkins patrols the trail on the sections located in the county using bikes and ATVs to get out and cover the more remote sections. Crime is virtually non-existent along the trail, data from the Sheriff’s Office and Greenville City Police Department shows.

Jason Rampey, spokesman for the police department, said the city recently acquired two electric all-terrain vehicles to patrol the trail as it passes through town. “There’s never been much in the way of crime along the trail,” he said.

Accidents, too, have been of the minor variety so far.

From the trailside there are abundant warnings for users that they are approaching high automobile traffic areas.

The trail crosses busy four lane highways four times on the sections that are open but few are more dangerous than the ones in the county where driving speeds and traffic volumes are higher during rush hour.

The section of the trail between Roe Ford and White Horse roads is closed while work is completed on paving the trail as it passes through an old industrial site. That work is scheduled for completion this week, ending the need for the detour.

Riders and walkers are detoured off the trail at Old Roe Ford Road and up and onto White Horse Road, a six-lane highway.

Normally the trail would carry riders underneath White Horse in the relative safety of an old rail underpass. There are several crossings that shield trail users from the dangers of traffic in this manner.

The trail crosses roads and highways 22 times, Houck said.

On a recent Saturday hundreds of riders could be seen pedaling up White Horse, almost like a bike race but without the requisite police escort.

Riders had to cross over all six lanes at one point to rejoin the safety of the trail and the recreation department responded to the potential danger with new signage and a mowed path that would more easily connect users to the safety of the trail itself.

At the northern terminus of the trail in Travelers Rest restaurants and shops have become dependent on the business the trail brings their way.

Some businesses that operate along the trail would not exist were it not for the customer base the trail generates, Reed said.

“There are some businesses that report as much as 75 to 80 percent of their business comes from trail users.”

Reed has anecdotal information from trail focus groups that shows some industries have considered the Swamp Rabbit a pivotal factor in the decision to locate in the Greenville area.

Jenkins said reports he keeps on conversations along the trail finds a surprising number of foreign visitors using the Swamp Rabbit.

Most of those trail dependent businesses are located in Travelers Rest, Reed said, where city fathers see the trail as an expression of the same pedestrian friendly atmosphere that has made Greenville’s downtown so prosperous, albeit written on a much smaller scale.

“Most of our business this time of year comes off the trail,” said Emily Coggdins, a barista at the Leopard Forest coffee shop on Main Street.

Travelers Rest has taken great pains to make its downtown pedestrian friendly and the little shops that sell ice cream and food have found backing up to the Swamp Rabbit to be an ultimate sign of success.

“Sure there are issues,” Coggdins said. “A lot of the riders come in here still wearing those cleated shoes they use to connect to the pedals.”

It’s not the most wood floor-friendly thing a patron can do. But so long as the business keeps pouring in, especially on the weekends, the business owners are not going to complain too loudly.