Happy trails to you

From the Lug-nutty clamor of the downtown riverfront to the owl hoots of Hawk Island Park, from Lake Lansing to Michigan State University, from Old Town to Valhalla — in any direction you choose, the reach and connectivity of Greater Lansing’s River Trail system is at an all-time peak this year.

With the coming of spring, bikers (along with walkers, joggers, dog escorts and assorted e-bike and scooter jockeys) are discovering new stretches of trail and new routes to explore, with even bigger things to come.

MSU to Lake Lansing Phase II

Since the 1990s, a bike trail from MSU to Lake Lansing has been one of the most requested routes in the community — and among the most difficult to bring into being.

Starting from MSU, Phase I of the trail was the most expensive and hardest to piece together. When Phase I opened in 2023, the stage was set for Phase II. It finally opened last fall, and it’s a beauty.

The River Trail system excels at threading its way through surprising pockets of nature in the midst of urban development (check out the Scott Woods section just north of Hawk Island Park), but the Phase II stretch of the MSU to Lake Lansing Trail feels like a different world.

“This is the first time we’ve done a paved trail through a land preserve,” Dan Opsommer, Meridian Township’s director of public works and engineering, said.

Lawrence Cosentino/City Pulse Dan Opsommer, Meridian Township’s director of public works and engineering, takes a stroll along the MSU to Lake Lansing Trail.

From its southwestern terminus at Campus Hill Apartments off Grand River Avenue in Meridian Township, the path curves through more than a mile of natural area, using an old two-track road that services township utilities. The paved trail, 10 feet wide and ADA accessible, is graced by gentle hills, thickly wooded areas, open meadows and hardly a sign of human activity, except for a railroad that runs nearby. Its northeastern terminus is Nancy Moore Park off Okemos Road, where there are several options for further travel.

Users can continue toward Lake Lansing on a widened, half-mile pathway along Okemos Road that joins up with the existing Inter-Urban Trail, which runs just over a mile to Marsh Road. From there, a brief stretch of trail, the Shaw Street Connector, takes the user to Lake Lansing Park South.

Users can also turn south from Nancy Moore Park and enjoy a spectacular boardwalk over frequently flooded wetlands that allows bikers to travel along this stretch of Okemos Road even when motorists can’t.

Turning east from Nancy Moore Park, users have a third alternative: a paved pathway that leads past Central Park South, with its picturesque fishing pond and historic village, and continues all the way to the Meridian Mall. This section sees a lot of action when the nearby farmers market is open for business.

Phase III will pick up at the east end of the Inter-Urban Trail and continue to Haslett Road and Lake Lansing.

The MSU to Lake Lansing Trail is the culmination of more than 20 years of urban planning and thorny, three-dimensional real-estate chess.

“In the 2000s, the township and the county had to abandon the effort to create the trail because we couldn’t acquire the land,” Opsommer said.

Back then, the trail faced resistance from local landowners. Some of those landowners are gone from the scene, but Opsommer said that attitudes toward trails have also changed.

“This time around, property owners saw it as an amenity,” he said. “We’ve heard from many of the property owners who have apartment units along Phase I, and they’re floored by the response.”

Students living in those units, along with other trail users, can now thumb their nose at one of the most congested intersections in the tri-county area, Hagadorn and Grand River.

Starting from MSU, Phase I of the trail begins at the intersection of Shaw Lane and Hagadorn Road with a dramatic bridge over the Red Cedar and adjoining wetland behind the MSU Community Music School. It runs about a mile, threading along the river and ending at the parking lot of the former Foods for Living, near the intersection of Grand River Avenue and Park Lake Road.

Raymond Holt for City Pulse A dedicated bicycle trail on the MSU campus.

Raymond Holt

Bear Lake Pathway and Fenner extension

The newest Lansing River Trail extension, through Fenner Nature Center and Evergreen Cemetery, is less than 2 miles in length, but it connects a lot of dots in the system and adds something new to Lansing’s 25 miles of biking and pedestrian trails.

“It gives us a loop,” Lansing parks director Brett Kaschinske said.

“Back in the ‘70s, when the trail started, we looked to go along the river to the edges of the city, and we’ve done a very good job of that,” he added.

With the extension in place, users can choose multiple routes in all directions.

“You don’t have to double back on the same pathway,” Kaschinske said. “We’re also excited about the connections the extension makes possible.”

The Fenner extension will introduce many trail users to one of the River Trail system’s hidden gems: the Bear Lake Pathway, completed in 2021.

The Bear Lake Pathway is an ingeniously woven thread of easements and utility rights of way connecting the main River Trail with the McLaren Greater Lansing Hospital grounds and the north side of MSU’s campus. The trail branches off at two points from the system’s more heavily used route, which stretches from downtown Lansing through the Potter Park Zoo area and northward through Scott Woods and Hawk Island Park, all the way to Valhalla Park in Delhi Township.

From the south, bikers can join the Bear Lake Pathway at the Maguire Park lot near the intersection of Jolly and Aurelius roads, turn eastward past Biggie Munn Park and follow the trail north past the eponymous lake, some smaller lakes, a thickly wooded MSU Bear Lake Natural Area and the Beekman Center.

Until the Fenner extension was added in November, the Bear Lake Pathway ended at Forest Road. Now, a cyclist or walker can cross the road and continue through Evergreen Cemetery and a wooded stretch of Fenner Nature Center to hook back up with the main east-to-west and north-to-south branches of the River Trail.

The trail also brings the user within spitting distance of the short stretch of Fidelity Road leading to another hidden city gem, Crego Park.

Courtesy Meridian Township A proposed “superloop,” currently in the planning stages, would connect the Lansing River Trail, MSU’s River Trail, the MSU to Lake Lansing Trail, and utility corridors to the southeast into one circular route.

Trails to come

There’s much more to come in the River Trail system and its growing web of connections and extensions, including links to a trail that crosses the entire state and a proposed “superloop” encompassing the entire system.

Along with the MSU to Lake Lansing Trail, a connection from the River Trail system to Mason’s Hayhoe Riverwalk is one of the most eagerly awaited projects in the region.

A newly completed stretch of the River Trail system already connects Esker Landing, a 16-acre park in Holt overlooking Cedar Lake, to College Road. According to Ingham County Parks millage coordinator Natalie Trotter, the county is working on a state Transportation Alternatives Program grant to connect College Road to the Hayhoe Riverwalk, bringing the River Trail system all the way to Mason.

The trail will follow Cedar Street, circle around the Dart Container campus and soar across U.S. 127 via a separate pedestrian bridge.

Trotter said construction is planned to begin in 2026 or early 2027, if the grant comes through.

The Tri-County Regional Planning Commission is soliciting public input on how to connect tri-county trails to the Mike Levine Lakelands Trail, a linear route that runs 33 miles through woods, pastures and wetlands from Hamburg Township in Livingston County to Blackman Township in Jackson County.

The Levine trail is part of the larger Great Lake-to-Lake Route 1, which runs 275 miles from Port Huron to South Haven.

At a stakeholder meeting in Vevay Township on April 28, a route was proposed from Vevay and Leslie through Stockbridge, but public input is welcome since the project is still in the early planning stage.

Meanwhile, in Meridian Township, planners are working on a tantalizing project that will make the “loop” created by the Fenner extension look like a shriveled noodle by comparison.

The master plan is to enable riders to traverse the entire Lansing River Trail, the MSU River Trail and all three phases of the MSU to Lake Lansing Trail and loop back around to where they started, filling the gap by using a Consumers Energy right of way that runs south from Haslett Road all the way to Dunckel and Jolly roads, near the southern limit of the Lansing River Trail.

“You could ride the whole system as a great big loop,” Opsommer said.

If the Ingham County Trails and Parks Millage passes in 2026, construction on the first phase, from Haslett Road to Tihart Road, can begin next year.

“We’ve already secured an easement for that trail,” Opsommer said. “I don’t know how many miles it would be, but it would be substantial.”

Raymond Holt for City Pulse A rollerblader utilizes the MSU River Trail along Kalamazoo Street.

Raymond Holt