Export to Trail Guide
Create Guidebook 
Download GPX 
Print Friendly MapThe Turtle Creek Trail is a part of the City of Dallas trails system. This trails runs adjacent to Turtle Creek. The trails roughly parallels the southern portion of the Katy Trail. Although the two trails do not directly connect, users may use the many parks along the route to access either trail.
There are some nice parts, especially by the Turtle Creek Conservatory Area. But there is a lot of homeless camped under the tunnels which is scary. There is also a ton of trash- we saw a page of a porn magazine and a condom. Ended up just walking on the sidewalk for most of it.
This is a beautiful trail, more suitable for running and walking than biking. Extremely neglected in areas, with fallen trees literally on top of the trail. With the neighboring areas, I was very surprised. Also, there are some very isolated areas.
My family and I rode the Katy Trail south intending on riding the Turtle Creek Trail back north (partially, anyhow). It isn’t marked, obvious, maintained, or clean. Pretty embarrassing to be listed as an option. I am guessing that the Katy Trail was built and the city left this one to die.
A beautiful new section of the Trail is now open between Bowen St. and the Cedar Springs Road underpass. This section replaces the old boardwalk that would wash away during flash flooding.
It's the flash floods that wash the garbage into the creek...the garbage that eclaire122 refers to in the March 2014 post below. Turtle Creek is part of the Dallas storm water system and street trash flows directly into the storm drains and into the creek. It is also the storm water outfall for Mill Creek running from Uptown...under Cole Park and Blackburn St. into Turtle Creek at the footbridge upstream of the Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dean Park. We have installed trash booms to capture the Mill Creek trash before it is washed downstream.
The Turtle Creek Association and City Park & Recreation Dept. spend money and hundreds of volunteer hours cleaning the creek and banks by hand. It's an endless and thankless job, and we rely on everyone to do their part and use the trash cans provided by the Turtle Creek Association and Park Dept.
Unfortunately eclaire122 used the Trail on a day when the garbage had not been cleaned-up. Today it looks much different...hence the ***** five star rating!
Regarding the smell, this is a live spring-fed creek with wildlife at ever turn...including some two-legged creatures. One deterrent to our ever-present homeless population is expanded use and constant activity. The more we appropriately use Turtle Creek Trail and keep it clean, the more the homeless population will retreat into seclusion. Let's all do our part to improve the quality of life...both wild and human...along beautiful Turtle Creek.
For more information on how you can help, go to turtlecreekassociation.org
by the amount of garbage that is located on and around the trail. We just went today to check out this trail - I figured it would be scenic since it is adjacent to Turtle Creek, where there are a lot of beautiful houses. We saw a lot of garbage, the area was decidedly smelly in some parts and overall, I was unimpressed.
This is a beautiful creekside concrete trail. It is currently under construction, but when it's done, it will be amazing. It connects to the Katy Trail at one end and then dead ends near Blackburn - I hope they extend it to connect again to the Katy (like an upper and lower Katy Trail). It is all concrete with some stairs. I love that it goes right along Turtle Creek close enough to hear the cascading water and to wade-in if you want - a hidden gem in the busy city.
_209587_nb.jpg)
_128091_nb.jpg)
TrailLink is a free service provided by Rails-to-Trails conservancy
(a non-profit) and we need your support!
_67887_sc.jpg)
_48348_sc.jpg)
