Beautiful trail, views, wildlife and such. Nice mix of sun and shade. But, the trail never stops climbing until you go down to Vernonia last little bit, then a long climb back up. Sure, you coast all the way back but the trip up is grueling for those of us who are casual riders. Long climb in the lowest gears.

The Banks-Vernonia, one of TrailBear’s favorite Oregon rail trails, has gotten even better with the completion of several upgrade projects in 2010.

TrailBear rates it:

5* Scenery. It’s a well shaded forest ride: Farms, fields, one historic wooden trestle to ride and one to look at – the ruins at Tophill.

5* Trailbed. This is a fast blacktop trail. A few root heaves but miles of smooth riding.

4* Facilities. Trailheads at Banks, Manning, Buxton, Tophill, Beaver Creek and Vernonia. Banks and Vernonia have restrooms and water. The others have vault toilets. A short climb from the trail crossing in Stub Stewart takes you to the Visitor Center – flushies, water, information, parking and wifi.


What’s new??

NEW TRAILHEAD AT BANKS…

The Banks Vernonia Trail is now finished. It now runs from Banks to Vernonia and is paved all the way. The new trailhead at Banks has blacktop parking, two unisex flush toilets, a water fountain and information kiosk. There is overflow parking across the street. Good highway signage guides you through Banks to the trailhead. Expect this trailhead to be packed on good summer weekends. It would be a good place to sell ice cream.


TOPHILL TRAIL REALIGNMENT…

The trail on both sides of the valley at Tophill Trailhead is new and relocated. The remains of the burned trestle still stand, but the trail up from Stub Stewart State Park diverts into a new set of switchbacks down the slope. There are some 10% grades here with sharp turns. The sign tells you to walk the bike.

Sure, uphill. Downhill, well … perhaps a bit of coasting. Best you be coasting really slow at each hairpin turn. They are not banked for 30 mph. Once down and across the road, you get to climb up the next set of switchbacks.

Walk the bike. TrailBear did. The old cut, last seen in 2010 as a muddy quagmire, has been abandoned and bermed closed. The trail hangs on the outer slope of that hill. From there the gravel track is now fresh blacktop. Enjoy.


NEW MAP AND BROCHURE...

A new map and brochure has been printed. If yours has riders at the Buxton Trestle on the cover, it is the old version. The new one shows a new trailhead parking area located where the trail makes the last right turn on the edge of town and squares away for Anderson Park. As of June 2011, that facility is not there. It is waste ground. This is probably a “Stay Tuned” item. Dedicated trail end parking will be a nice addition to the trail.

As before, there are restrooms, water and a fine picnic shelter at the park. If staging out of Vernonia, TB will often park at the library, about a block off the trail. He prefers to stage at the bottom of the ride, climb in the cool of the morning, then bomb back downhill in the afternoon.


Ride on!

TrailBear
Dreaming of triking the BVT

The Banks-Vernonia Trail will actually run from Banks to Vernonia at last. You should be able to ride on blacktop from Banks up to Vernonia. The Tophill section is being paved and realigned around the quagmire cutting by the Tophill trestle, so it should be an even better ride.



The opening ceremony is on Friday, Oct. 29, 2010 at 11 PM in Banks. The trail will open at 11:30. Be there and score some refreshments along the line.

There is a new trailhead down in Banks at 45.622173° -123.114092° (Newhalem Hwy x NW Banks Rd.).


Ride on!
TrailBear

A CONSTRUCTION CLOSURE AROUND TOPHILL - FALL 2010


The TrailBear was looking forward to getting out of the rainy San Juans and doing the Banks-Vernonia. (He was rained off it in June - both ends of summer were wet.) Checking for current data, he came across this notice, both in the state web site and in the local paper.

We quote from the Forest Hill News Times...



"Construction set to close Banks-Vernonia trail near Beaver Creek
Closure will remain in effect until at least Oct. 15, say parks officials

The Forest Grove News-Times, Sep 22, 2010

A segment of the Banks-Vernonia State Trail between the Tophill and Beaver Creek trailheads will be closed for trail construction beginning Sept. 20.

The trail will be closed from McDonald Road just over one mile south of the Beaver Creek Trailhead to the bridge over Highway 47 near Tophill until at least Oct. 15.

The bridge is about one mile north of the entrance to Stub Stewart State Park.

The Beaver Creek Trailhead, which is just over four miles south of Vernonia, will be open only on weekends until Oct. 1 while workers there repair a bridge crossing the creek to the site from Highway 47.

The trail closure will remain in effect while an Oregon Parks and Recreation Department contractor paves a three-mile stretch of unpaved trail. The entire 21-mile trail will have a paved surface once the paving project, a trail realignment near Tophill and work on a new Banks Trailhead are completed.

A federally funded $100,000 Recreation Trails Program grant and Oregon State Lottery dollars are paying for the $500,000 paving and realignment projects, officials said.

Updated information on the reopening of the trail segment will be available through the OPRD website (www.oregonstateparks.org) and the state parks information center, 1-800-551-6949. "

@@@ ARE THEY FIXING THE TOPHILL GAP?

TrailBear was poking around the Tophill section in June 2010 The trail is paved from Stub Steward up the line to the bridge at 45.745861 -123.196621. From there up the line past the Tophill TH, it is gravel road. Not a bad surface from the Tophill TH down to the bridge. Only two sections of small mire.

On the other side of the highway there is a cutting where they have let the ditches go and it was about 50 yds of utter mire contained between the wall of the cutting. For shame!

The RR had ballast and ditches there. Where did they go? No way to tippy toe thru the slop and TB was not about to go mountain biking thru the mire when he has to sleep with the bike in the van. Worse than snuggling up to a wet Lab.

The upper end of the closure is vicinity McDonald Rd. at 45.792261 -123.220615. Looks like about four miles closed vicinity Tophill. The ride out of Stub Steward down to Manning - or even Banks if they have finished that section of extension and the new trail head - is a delight.

BANKS VERNONIA LINEAR STATE PARK – Buxton trestle open to riders.

Snapshot Stats…
It’s a nice place to spend a weekend riding on a good blacktop trail bed. The BVT starts at Anderson Park in Vernonia. (Camping, hookups, showers, covered picnic shelter). Runs down to dead end (no trail head here) outside of Banks. Distance is 21 miles. The trail is 8’ of nice blacktop most of the way. The exception is the Tophill diversion around the trestle there. The terrain runs from forested hills (shade) to farmland in the valley bottoms.

Check out the trail brochure and map at:
< http://www.oregonstateparks.org/images/pdf/bv.pdf>

Coming down the hills from Vernonia toward Portland, there are trail heads with parking at Anderson Park, Beaver Creek, Tophill, Stub Stewart State Park, Buxton and Manning. See the trailhead notes for the GPS coordinates and facilities notes. Water can be found at Anderson and Stub Stewart.

I see that TrailLink has the route, but none of the tail head details and shows a Banks-Vernonia State Park that does not exist. The Banks-Vernonia State Linear Park (rail trail) does. On the other hand, they don’t show the Stub Stewart State Park, which does exist.
“L.L.” Stub Stewart State Park is about midway and very modern (2007) with two RV campgrounds, a tent campground, horse campground, cabins, etc. Stop at the Visitor Center there for trail maps and facilities.

The BVT is paved down to the vicinity of Tophill Trestle. From there you take a gravel diversion down into the valley, across OR 47, and back up the other side of the valley to rejoin the rail bed. Blacktop picks up beyond there and continues down to the end of the trail.

I took the section from the SSSP trail crossing down to the Manning Trail Head as a Down & Up. It was a delicious downhill ride on excellent blacktop. You are in the forest until you exit the park, so you ride down a green tunnel and the air is cool. Then out of the park, across the fields to Manning.
I left the SSSP trail crossing (Elevation 875’) at 0938 and was at Manning (Elevation 257’) at 1010. Milage: 6.16. Max speed 21.5 mph and moving average 14.3 with little effort (just wait until the return – 13.5 max and 7.6 average). Picnic tables and benches are located along the route, usually where there is a view.

The best bit is the refurbished curved trestle at Buxton Trailhead. They have decked it with Trex boards, laid diagonally, and railed it with 3x material to breast height. On the way back, take the horse bypass down below and get some photos of the trestle from the bottom. There are so few of these left. The time had been when they were all over the west.

The Vernonia Voice reports that the state has the funding to complete the backtop on the Tophill section of the trail. The trestle there will be removed. (Check the TL picture file - the poor trestle is only part there.) The trail will be extended into Banks where a trail head will be constructed. Expect completion in 2010 or 2011. The park folks say that the mountain bike single track project in the park is in the plan – but has not happened yet. Stay tuned for this one.

Trail Head Information…
MANNING Trailhead (N45d 39.892’ x W123d 09.809’) - small gravel parking lot, 2 picnic tables, NO toilet or water. Closest to Portland and bottom end of trail, so it gets used.
BUXTON Trailhead (N45d 41.905’ x W123d 11.009’) - large gravel parking lot, vault toilet, covered picnic shelter, numerous scattered picnic tables. Horse facilities. No water seen. The Buxton Trestle is at the bottom of the trailhead. Best feature on the trail.
STUB STEWART STATE PARK Trail Crossing (N45d 44.257’ x W123d 11.721) - limited time parking & limited spaces. I staged out of the Visitor Center up the road for toilets, water, phone, wifi hotspot, parking, etc.). SSSP is new and has several excellent campgrounds from full hookup to tent sites.
TOPHILL Trailhead (N45d 45.501’ x W123d 12.091’) - gravel parking lot, vault toilet, picnic table, horse facilities, no water. There is a gravel diversion around the Tophill Trestle (crosses over OR 47). This is the only gravel on the trail.
BEAVER CREEK Trailhead (N45d 48.641’ x W123d 13.863’) - large gravel parking lot along highway and trail heading over bridge to the BV Trail. Picnic tables along the trail. The vault toilet is hidden about 100 yds down (toward TopHill) the trail. No water.
ANDERSON PARK (VERNONIA) Trailhead & End (N45d 51.374’ x W123d 11.686’) - The park has camping (hookups), flush toilets, showers, water, and a large covered picnic shelter, etc. Nice place to stage out of if you can arrange a shuttle and do the trail downhill.

Apparently this is the summer that major changes are happening on the trail. We started at the Manning Trailhead on Pihl Road, just off Highway 47. The parking lot was filled with construction equipment and gravel piles. Another trail user told us to go a hundred yards east to Pongratz Road and continue north on the gravel road until we met the trail again. It was about a 1 1/2 mile detour, but when we got there, we could see the trail was under construction and will probably be complete in a couple of weeks. I just viewed the area on Google's satellite view and saw that when the picture was taken, at least part of this section was a cultivated field. It should be completed shortly.

We continued on up the trail, now a beautiful newly paved path with a woodchip border for equestrian traffic. It was a steady uphill climb for the next seven miles. The only exception was the horseshoe trestle just south of the state park picnic area. It too is under construction and looks like it will open any day now. In the meantime, you take a good but steep path down and up the other side of the valley to the picnic area. We continued on several more miles to another crossroad in the state park. Beyond the road was a steep grade and a ballast trail, so we decide to turn around at this point and enjoyed a zippy ride down to our starting point. A 2 or 3% grade kept us at 15 mph without pedaling, all the way to the detour.

Even though it was a hot day in August, trail users are under a tree canopy for most of the ride. It is a thoroughly enjoyable trail.

Lyle Clugg

We rode our tandem from "Stub" Stewart State Park (listed in our GPS as "Hares Canyon State Park" a GPS glitch) almost to Banks. The trail ends 1/2 mile before Banks, but turns into single track that crosses a rickety railroad tressel 1/4 mile later. We turned back. At "trail end" there is a short gravel road to Highway 47 to Banks. This highway has no shoulders and logging trucks travel both ways along with moderate heavy traffic. We chickened out. There are occasional 2" thick gravel crossings on this end of the trail, however the 1 mile gravel stretch of the trail was not a problem. We returned to Manning for lunch, then back uphill 5 miles to the campground. If you're only riding 20 miles we recommend driving to the bottom of the hill and riding up to State Park. You can almost coast your way back. Whichever way you go, this is one of the nicest trails we have ridden. We ride 50 trails a year and plan to come back to this one.

Pretty ride with a brand new state park at the middile point.

"Great trail, can be enjoyed in many ways. Long, short or whatever your desired distance you won't be disappointed. Easy access from several points. Kids like it too as there are many novice and intermediate stretches. Spend some time here and you'll know why they call Oregon ""The Pacific Wonderland."""

"This is a wonderful trail with two different personalities.

Tophill (at the broken trestle) lies right in the middle of this 20 mile trail and allows for coasting in either direction. The trail north from Tophill to Vernonia is paved asphalt, with some valley views but quickly lowers to the grade of the highway, which you parallel into Vernonia.

A pleasant community park awaits your arrival for a rest stop or meal. I found the gravel portion of the trail south from Tophill to Manning to be much more scenic, with mountain views, trails through wooded canopies and high ridge line trail.

You will get off the trail just short of Manning on a heavy graveled county road with about a half mile ride to the parking area. The 2.25 mile paved trail to Banks follows the highway and is a flat easy ride to the end and back.

I highly recommend this trail if you can do the shuttle to Tophill.

Regards, BD"

"The Banks-Vernonia Trail is a mild ride that can be either a 20 mile up-and-back or a simple end-to-end run. If you start in Vernonia, you will get about 9.5 miles of gradual uphill and then 10+ miles downhill. The only bad spot is the trestle at the top. You will have to drop down to the road and back up for about 1/2 mile. No big deal!"