By matthewguidera in July, 2009
Maybe it was because I rode it on such a glorious Monday morning, but the Traverse Area Recreation Trail (TART) was one of the best trails I have biked. It is nicely paved so it was not as strenuous or bumpy as gravel can be. I loved that it was only 11 miles. I did an out and back and it didn't take long at all. For such a relatively short path, it was loaded with scenery. I parked at the trail endpoint in Acme just outside of Traverse City with the light breezes from the Grand Traverse Bay to my left. In the warm summer months, I recommend starting in Acme, because I had a nice westerly tailwind "pushing" me on the return.
There are a number of other trails which spur off the TART with others planned (pending funding) so there are a number of opportunities to explore the area and make a larger trip out of it.
Also worth mentioning what others have previously posted: be careful at all crossings. Some of them are tricky. This is a tourist town and is congested. Use the crosswalk signals and be patient.
If you are into geocaching, there are a number of caches along the trail, but there were a bunch on the opposite side of the railroad tracks which is separated from the trail by a fence. I chose not to search for those because climbing the wire fence would have damaged it and looked a little hard to do.
This is a great trail for families and everyone I passed seemed to be so very friendly! Highly recommended.
By Kim in August, 2006
"I just received an email about a change in the crossing at US 31/37 Grandview Parkway mentioned in another review here. They are moving it to make it safer. The left turners who don't yield as instructed to by signs will no longer be an issue with the trail crossing to the east of the intersection instead of the west. Last night I noticed the paint markings on the concrete, so hopefully they will be making that change this summer yet!"
By Tom in January, 2006
Several people have written about the dangers on this trail. It is true that when you are crossing the road down by the bay that the west bound traffic has a red light and is stopped while the east bound traffic has a green light and visa/versa. There is no way to deterimine if its safe to cross the road unless you look at the walk/dont walk lights alone and obey them to the T. Its another MDOT debacle. Be very careful when crossing any intesection on this trail. One lady who was stopped at the light actually waved me to cross in front of her not realizing she was waving me right in front of traffic that had a green light. I saw two girls almost get hit 4th of July weekend too. Someone will get killed on this trail soon unless they take a servious look at the dangers that they have created and fix them!