The Fort Circle Trail located east of the river is one of DC's oldest bike trails. Though underused, and a fraction of what it was once promised to be, it's beloved. The trail provides a mountain biking opportunity within the district as well as a natural hiking path through wards 7 and 8, but there steps - some simple and some not - that we could take to make it better.
The FCT is a 7-mile long, mostly unpaved, trail through the east side of DC from Fort Stanton to Fort Mahon - though many maps and sites (such as this one) show it covering a shorter distance. It was supposed to be more.
1974 Fort Circle Plan
From 1930 to 1965 NPS planned a Fort Circle Drive for people tour the forts by car, and they spent decades trying to acquire the necessary land, starting with the War Department handing over the forts themselves in 1933. But in 1968 they produced a new management plan which replaced the drive with a continuous hiker-biker trail because the drive was deemed impractical and impossible to build due to residential expansion into the area. Detailed plans for the full trail were created and the first sections of the trail, a section in Rock Creek Park along Military Road and the one in east DC, opened in 1971. The plan was still to build a 23 mile long arcing trail from Fort Greble in far SW to Fort Marcy in Fairfax County as part of preparation for the bicentennial. But only one other section of the trail, a portion of the C&O Canal towpath that predated the plan, was ever completed. Funds earmarked for the Fort Circle trail were used to cover bicentennial cost overruns elsewhere, and no further money was ever allocated.
In 1987, NPS developed a plan to improve the trail. It included extending the trail to Kenilworth Park, the Frederick Douglass home and the Suitland Parkway as well as repairs and smaller improvements. A year later, WABA submitted a report that advised against paving the trail at this time, as it was a unique and useful facility as it was, and NPS dropped it from consideration. Not that it mattered, as little from the '87 plan was ever done.
In 2004, NPS again updated the management plan and this time they dropped the idea of a continuous hiker/biker trail for environmental and aesthetic reasons. They deduced that it would have required bridges, switchbacks, tree removal, retaining walls and trail widening that would have lost the "sense of wildness" in the existing parks. Instead they would encourage development of a foot trail consisting of the sections from 1971 and existing sidewalks, as well as connection sidewalks and signs. It was to be designed in coordination with DDOT, but no such planning has occurred.
It's unfortunate that NPS closed the door on a multi-use path, especially since there is space for one. (They have mapped out an on-road bike route for part of the way). It would be similar, though not identical to what was mapped above. The bridge across the Anacostia would be in a different place, for example, and perhaps that would push the route west to the MBT trail instead of north to Eastern Avenue, but fundamentally the same and forming a sort of inner bicycle beltway.
But, let's assume the door on that is closed for a generation, there is still room for improvement with what we have. As it is, the FCT is the only mountain bike trail in DC. It is officially a hiker/biker trail, but ped volumes are low and generally the pedestrians using the trail are walking dogs or hiking. This makes it ideal for mountain biking, but still usable for transportation.
One problem is that how to get to the trail is not obvious. DDOT/NPS could improve that by doing a better job connecting it to nearby trails, as it gets extremely close to several of them. On the southern/western side of the FCT, it comes within a city block of the Suitland Parkway Trail, and it could be connected via a small extension behind the Anacostia Museum using the existing foot trail and a small connector.
In the middle, the trail already connects to the Pennsylvania Ave SE sidepath, but a less stressful connection to the ART is possible by developing a short segment of trail along the existing gravel road in Anacostia Park and then pass underneath DC-295 by going over the derelict Shepherd Railroad Spur. On the east side, trail users could continue along the blue line below, along G Street SE to reach the southern side of Fort Dupont, where a nature trail takes cyclists over some charming footbridges, into the main valley of Fort Dupont, and riders can continue up to reach the main line of the trail system.
Alternatively, once on the east side of 295 a trail could be built along the red line below along the Ft Dupont Tributary through the green space between F and G and then across Minnesota Avenue. Maybe the tributary could be daylighted on the west side too.
NPS could also develop connections within the park to the Ice Arena and the Nationals Youth Baseball academy (light blue lines).
If some expansion was in the cards, carrying the trail across the Suitland Parkway at Stanton Road and then building another trail on the south side, up the valley on St. Elizabeths campus to the Entertainment Arena and the Capital Heights Metro station.
The trail network in this area is developing into a truly world-class network, but DDOT needs to connect the different facilities, while continuing to expand the overall network and improve neighborhood access. A trail along the Shepherd Branch would aid with this too.
Some good ideas here. One issue with the proposed connection to the Suitland Parkway trail is that I think there is a fairly steep hill dropping down to the parkway from the museum area. NPS also needs to do better maintenance on the Ft Circle trail in general, and especially in the section south of Good Hope Rd. Another place where a connection could be made is from the "main stem" of the trail in Ft DuPont Park near Ridge Rd. From the trail you can see the road at one point, and it looks like there is an old service road or ROW up to the road. Roughly in the area of the Ridge Rd community center I think.
Posted by: Purple Eagle | June 28, 2020 at 04:55 PM
There's room for ramp down to the parkway trail.
Posted by: washcycle | June 29, 2020 at 11:45 AM
do you delete all comments thata link race and class to bicycle infrastructure?
Posted by: michael ross | July 07, 2020 at 07:21 PM
I unpublish all comments that whine about the CCT pavement. In other words, all comments from you.
Posted by: David C | July 08, 2020 at 02:37 PM
I ran on this trail yesterday and I am happy to report that there has been recent maintenance/improvements made. Several large trees have been clear. In some of the wet spots gravel has been added, reinforced/held in place with wood placed parallel to the trail. This seems to be a design with bikes in mind (on hiking trails rocks might be used as stepping stones instead). Water bars (anti-erosion, placed perpendicular across the trail) have been added in a few places. I did see one large tree that has not been cleared.
Posted by: Purple Eagle | August 26, 2020 at 09:16 AM