Find the top rated trails in Chicago Ridge, whether you're looking an easy walking path or a long bike trail, you'll find what you're looking for. Click on a trail below to find trail descriptions, trail maps, photos, and reviews.
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The 9-mile Green Bay Trail runs parallel to Chicago's Metra commuter rail line north of the Chicago city limits. Stretching through North Shore towns such as Kenilworth, Winnetka, Highland Park and...
The Buffalo Creek Trail makes a loop around the scenic Buffalo Creek Forest Preserve in Long Grove. The crushed-gravel trail provides access to facilities throughout the park. Along the way, you’ll...
The Marquette Trail offers picturesque views of Lake Michigan as it travels through the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. This scenic route follows an abandoned rail line through a variety of diverse...
The Prairie Point Trail is a scenic neighborhood route that connects twice to the longer Grove Road Trail. While never far from houses, the trail offers surprising scenery, including a stretch along a...
The Kankakee River Trail is fairly wooded and runs primarily through Kankakee River State Park. Walkers, bicyclists, and cross-country skiers can enjoy more than ten miles of trail along the north...
The Orland Park Bikeway provides a great connector across the Chicago suburb of Orland Park. On its southern end, the trail begins at W. 159th Street and winds its way through Centennial Park, which...
Although just shy of two miles, the Veterans Memorial Trail provides a wooded, paved trail experience for residents in the Chicago suburbs of Romeoville, Lemont, and Woodridge. Those seeking a longer...
The Northerly Island Trail offers access to a vast, natural oasis in one of the largest cities in America. Chicago’s Northerly Island—actually a 91-acre peninsula—was designed by Daniel H. Burnham,...
The Techny Trail links downtown Glenview, a charming village northwest of Chicago, with the Techny Basin, a scenic wetlands area adjacent to the West Fork of the Chicago River's North Branch....
The Busse Woods Trail system is located within Ned Brown Forest Preserve, a 3,700-acre property in the northwestern suburbs of Chicago. There are 11.2 miles of paved trails for cyclists, equestrians...
El Paseo runs through the vibrant Chicago neighborhood of Pilsen, once home to a large Czech population but now the center of the Lower West Side’s Latino community. The neighborhood is filled with...
Located east of Lakeshore Drive, the Chicago Lakefront Trail is an 18.5-mile linear park along Lake Michigan that includes beaches, volleyball courts, playgrounds, baseball diamonds, tennis courts and...
The Fermilab Trail garners its name by running though the campus of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), the former home of the Tevatron particle accelerator. The 3.9-mile particle...
Ridgefield Trace currently consists of two short segments open for use. The western section runs from McHenry County College on US 14 in Crystal Lake to just west of N. Oak Street. Active railroad...
The Commonwealth Edison Bikeway is a short paved trail that occupies an overhead electric utility corridor owned by Commonwealth Edison, the local utility company—hence the trail's name. While lacking...
The Poplar Creek Trail is a 9.5-mile paved loop around Poplar Creek Forest Preserve near Hoffman Estates. The trail has a couple of hills but is otherwise level and makes for a pleasant journey...
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The Tinley Creek Trail is currently in two segments. This northern segment stretches from Palos Heights to Oak Forest and largely falls with several Cook County Forest Preserve areas, including Rubio...
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The Fox River Trail features 43 miles of spectacular biking, hiking and cross-country skiing along the scenic Fox River. The paved path can be challenging at times, but the extra pedal pushing is...
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An excellent example of land use in greater Chicago, the entire Skokie Valley Trail corridor is a rail-with-trail, paralleled by double tracks that sit about 40 feet to the west of the trail surface....
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The Monon Trail in Lake County, Indiana—not to be confused with the trail of the same name in Indianapolis—links the two Chicago suburbs of Hammond and Munster. The paved trail occupies an abandoned...
The Des Plaines River Trail and Greenway traverses north–south along the route of its namesake river along its course through both Lake and Cook counties. The corridor protects 85% of the riverine...
The Tinley Creek Trail is currently in two segments. This northern segment stretches from Palos Heights to Oak Forest and largely falls with several Cook County Forest Preserve areas, including Rubio...
The Oswego Prairie Trail is a short paved route that occupies an overhead electric utility corridor owned by Commonwealth Edison. The path forms a direct link between two parks in Oswego—Farmington...
The Cal-Sag Trail (or, Calumet-Sag Trail) is currently under active construction. As of August 2015, it has a competed section of about 10 miles, stretching from near its eventual western terminus to...
The Palos Heights Bike Trail offers a north-south route through residential and commercial areas on the west side of the community. It's also a key connector between two regionally important...
The DuPage River Trail spans nearly 30 miles across two counties: DuPage and Will. It's currently open in several disconnected segments mainly in parks and forest preserves beginning in Warrenville...
Traveling along the Wauponsee Glacial Trail, you'll be surprised just how quickly you can move from an urban environment into the rolling fields of the Midwest. Starting in Joliet, within shouting...
The Joliet Junction Trail is a paved path that travels north–south through the west side of Joliet. It occupies an abandoned Elgin, Joliet and Eastern Railway corridor that in its last years was known...
The Waubonsie Trail links Boulder Hill and the Village of Oswego via a greenway corridor within a residential community. The eastern trailhead is in Jaycee Park, which offers a playground, picnic...
The Middlefork Savanna Forest Preserve is a natural gem hidden in an high-income neighborhood of Lake Forest, Illinois. Those 600 acres are home to perhaps the best-preserved example of the rare...
The Millennium Trail is a planned 35-mile route through Chicago’s northern suburbs that will connect communities and forest preserves in northwestern Lake County. Currently, 28.5 miles of this...
This regional trail connects two of DuPage County's forest preserves—Herrick Lake and Danada—on a crushed stone pathway nearly 6 miles long. Together, the preserves cover more than 1,600 acres of...
El Paseo runs through the vibrant Chicago neighborhood of Pilsen, once home to a large Czech population but now the center of the Lower West Side’s Latino community. The neighborhood is filled with...
The North Branch Riverwalk is a 0.6 mile biking and walking trail located on Chicago's northside along the North Branch of the Chicago River, nestled between Gordon Tech High School and Lane Tech High...
The trail system in Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve makes a loop around the entire park. The preserve is geologically significant, featuring glacier-carved rock ridges, ravines and wetland potholes,...
Moraine Hills State Park Trail offers a wonderful experience for any geology or nature aficionado. A moraine is an accumulation of earth and stones carried and finally deposited by a glacier....
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The 4.4-mile River Bend Trail is so named for the loop of Fox River along which it follows on its eastern end. It's here that you can connect to the scenic Fox River Trail to travel 43 miles along the...
The Fermilab Trail garners its name by running though the campus of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), the former home of the Tevatron particle accelerator. The 3.9-mile particle...
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The Bloomingdale Trail, part of “The 606” park system, is a 2.7-mile, elevated rail-trail on Chicago’s northwest side. Built on a former rail line, the trail sits nearly 20 feet above four of the...
The Commonwealth Edison Bikeway is a short paved trail that occupies an overhead electric utility corridor owned by Commonwealth Edison, the local utility company—hence the trail's name. While lacking...
The Southern Dupage County Regional Trail connects multiple of the larger forest preserves in Dupage county together. Starting near the intersection of 75th st and Ogden Ave in Aurora, the trail runs...
The village of Palatine has connected many of its community assets with two long sections of off-road, multi-use trail. The more popular northern section is the one most references call simply and...
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The Prairie Trail—not to be confused with the Illinois Prairie Path—runs border-to-border, entirely within McHenry County, Illinois, and is managed by the McHenry County Conservation District. It is...
The Robert McClory Bike Path is notorious for its conglomeration of names over the years. At any given time—and depending on whom you ask—it has been called the Green Bay Trail and the North Shore...
Just 1 mile long, the Valley Line Trail—also known as the Sauganash Trail—extends between Bryn Mawr Avenue and Devon Avenue in the Chicago neighborhood of Sauganash. Two bridges allow for safe...
The John Husar I&M Canal Trail is the northernmost trail developed on the Illinois & Michigan Canal National Heritage Corridor. The Illinois & Michigan Canal provided the final link in the water route...
The 9-mile Green Bay Trail runs parallel to Chicago's Metra commuter rail line north of the Chicago city limits. Stretching through North Shore towns such as Kenilworth, Winnetka, Highland Park and...
The Northerly Island Trail offers access to a vast, natural oasis in one of the largest cities in America. Chicago’s Northerly Island—actually a 91-acre peninsula—was designed by Daniel H. Burnham,...
The Illinois Prairie Path (IPP) is one of the country's first rail-trail conversions. It consists of five connected trail segments with three main branches that converge at Volunteer Park in Wheaton....
The Virgil Gilman Trail travels through forest and prairie, from a quiet, rural community college campus all the way into suburban Chicago. The trail's namesake, Virgil Gilman,was director of the Fox...
The North Shore Channel Trail extends from the junction of Green Bay Road and McCormick Boulevard in northern Evanston to the junction of Lawrence Avenue and Francisco Avenue in Chicago. All but the...
The 20-mile Old Plank Road Trail travels over the original Michigan Central Rail Road (MCRR) line, a railroad started about 1850 that ran from Lake Station in East Gary to Joliet. The rail was...
Ridgefield Trace currently consists of two short segments open for use. The western section runs from McHenry County College on US 14 in Crystal Lake to just west of N. Oak Street. Active railroad...
The Burnham Greenway is composed of two distinct portions that both run along a former railroad corridor between Chicago and Lansing, Illinois. There are plans to extend and connect these short...
The Thorn Creek Trail offers a paved 17-mile route traversing woodlands abundant with wildlife through several communities on the southern outskirts of Chicago. The trail travels from Brownwell Woods...
The Bloomingdale Trail, part of “The 606” park system, is a 2.7-mile, elevated rail-trail on Chicago’s northwest side. Built on a former rail line, the trail sits nearly 20 feet above four of the...
The Orland Park Bikeway provides a great connector across the Chicago suburb of Orland Park. On its southern end, the trail begins at W. 159th Street and winds its way through Centennial Park, which...
The Prairie Point Trail is a scenic neighborhood route that connects twice to the longer Grove Road Trail. While never far from houses, the trail offers surprising scenery, including a stretch along a...
The Chesapeake and Ohio Greenway (also referred to as the C&O Trail) offers a short, paved route through Merrillville, a town just a few miles south of Gary and the southern tip of Lake Michigan. The...
The popular Rock Run Greenway Trail is a balanced mix of natural areas and cityscapes that alternate over the length of the trail. The natural areas are frequented by recreational users. The...
rode sw from Brandon Road lock. do not ride this trail on a road bike with anything less than 700x28. I flatted on one of the sections of loose gravel. The ride itself is pleasant enough in that area...lots of tree cover...but the canal itself is overgrown, and not what I expected as far as scenery goes
I have been chunking out 5-10 miles per trip. I have so far made the trek from Seneca to the Illinois River. There is a bridge out about 2 1/2 east of Utica. The trail is pretty quiet and easy to hike. It's relatively flat with some neat little history lessons on the way.
I rode north from the Fox River Trail to just a little past Hwy 14. The trail was about perfect as it seems to have been repaved in the not-so-distant past. There were plenty of benches to stop and rest if one chose. It was a bit of a suburban trail in that it doesn't really connect to much. At one point I thought about stopping at a gas station, but there was a wide ditch with native plantings separating the gas station from the trail, so there was no access. All in all, though, it's a great trail for a recreational ride.
Now if the Calumet Trail was maintained and not completely ignored, maybe we would consider chipping in help maintain it. But obviously no one has cared to already do their job to maintain the constant standing water and unfinished work on that trail. It could be so beautiful!!! Between the poorly and unkempt trail and garbage, something has to be done. It is so not enjoyable to ride bikes on. The husband and I would rather pack up and go to Michigan!!! Sad with what's to offer here.
Thanks.
Previously, I have ridden this trail from Channahon going west. See that review from 2016.
Today, I was on the I&M canal attempting to go east from Ottawa to Morris, IL. (25 miles +/-) I was on the trail for less than 3 miles and had to get off and ride on the adjoining road. I was riding a hybrid bike with full rear panniers. In the 2-3 miles on the trail, I went over, through, or around no less than 5 downed trees. Only one of them was a recent fallen tree. The others had to have been over the trail for some time. The "trail" is really a dirt path that looks more like a rough hiking path. I would not recommend this trail for bicycle riding. It is slow, potentially dangerous, and is likely to cause a flat tire (I did not have one today).
Avoid the trail from Ottawa going east.
I rode this trail on 7-14-17 from the small Harlem Avenue parking lot to just east of the Metra Station in Matteson. This is a good, straight, smooth, and level, paved trail. The section I was rode was interesting in that there were ponds, open fields, woods, and wetlands along the way. An added bonus was Rail Fan Park in Matteson, which features nice informational placards about the Railroad industry of the Chicago metro area. Also there's an old caboose and an observation platform high in the air, on which you can ride your bike to the top.
I love hiking this trail. lots of scenery between Fairfield and Marl Flat. Just be cautioned that the some disc golfers at Fairfield may take exception to hikers and bikers. But nothing at all to worry about.
It was a nice trail once I found it. Takes you thru a few subdivisions which us ok but once back on the trail there is a hairpin turn that could send you over a cliff if your going fast. Connects to Prairie Duneland trail. Overall a scenic ride.
Well maintained with beautiful scenery. We started at the trail head off of Willow Springs Rd. and rode west to Lamont. Nice ride and at 11AM on cool July Saturday morning bit was surprisingly quiet. We will definitely head back for more.
Beautiful stretch of crushed gravel. All flat, no hills. 6 miles to Lock #8, great beginner ride
Tree down about 2 1/2 miles east of Utica. Blocks trail, gotta carry bikes through. A mile or so later, bridge is out gotta carry bikes across creek. Not a great trail, not much to dealing the way.
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