jmX

If that's what you've gathered off this forum, it's totally incorrect. I've probably put 10,000 miles on the SART over the last 4 years and I never ride slower than 20mph these days. It's hands down the best place to train, aside from Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon. I'm out there on a TT bike every once in a while and can simply hammer away for 3 hours and see maybe 10-15 people total during the entire 60 mile ride. I've had one SART flat in that 10k mile time.

If you're out there on a weekend in a paceline with your serious face on and your fresh leg shave, you're gonna have a bad time. If you're out there past dark in Santa Ana, you're going to have a bad time. If you're easily agitated by the occasional family taking the full girth of the path, you're going to have a bad time. No doubt things happen, I hit a dog once at 5mph as the owner let go of the leash right as I showed up, that's been my one incident. Glad it wasn't a "thing happening" with a car tho.

If you're just a regular person with a level head trying to get some training in without getting hit by a drunk texting 19 year old on meth in a mercedes, you're gonna love it.

mwandaw

I'm the OP, and I want to add my voice to those who value the SART and SGRT. I ride on them regularly without any trouble, and I'd much rather ride on them than on city streets. Of course, like any transportation corridor, they have their troubles in certain areas and at certain times.

Be careful and have fun!

That's the same message I'd like to give to the person whose poor decision I complained about in my original post.

diphthong

i'm sure both the sart & sgrt are generally fine as are most mups. all about awareness, personal decision-making and time of day. i was just messin.
there have been more than a few sart/sgrt threads over the years chronicling adverse "incidents" tho. just sayin. none have ever made me say
"i'll never ride that bleeping mup" tho. and hell, i grew up in the la area. i don't blame anyone wanting to cross that interminable basin asap.

p.s...no fresh leg shaves here. =)

Jan Feetz

Gotta agree with JMX here.... I find that afternoons are the best times, almost deserted. Weekends 7 am to noon are the when the SGRT and SART are crowded, I hardly ever ride during that time.

diphthong

intrigued enough to create a strava route riding sart & sgrt in their entirety along with a little carbon canyon/grand ave & pch action to make the long connection possible for my next century.
you can bet i'll have all the applicable posts running through my head as i'm enjoying the concrete views.

side note...hit a portion of the la river trail yesterday. caught the portion between victory blvd south to glendale blvd. how far does it go and does it connect with anything?

Lesper4

Here is my route from a couple weeks ago if that helps at all?
Bike Ride Profile | 72 miles near Anaheim | Times and Records | Strava

TrojanHorse

That's further north on the LART than I've ever been. I don't think it's totally seamless from there down to the southern portion of the LART but LART also joins up with the rio hondo trail down by Downey. You can go north on RHRT and connect up with the SGRT or you can go south to Long Beach and ride down PCH to either SGRT or SART. I've done both plenty of times.

Here's a big loop I did a couple months ago from my house, over to SGRT, down to PCH and back up SART to my house: Bike Ride Profile | Grand Tour of OC near Whittier | Times and Records | Strava (the dogleg north is where my son had a soccer game that day)

If I want to add about 10 miles normally, I'd ride north on SGRT to San Gabriel Blvd and connect to the Rio Hondo trail going south, which merges with LART etc.

In terms of pleasant riding, I'd rate the river trails thusly: SART north of the big A, SGRT, SART south of the big A, Rio Hondo, LART (I'm only familiar with the part from downey to Long Beach)

You could modify my route a little and take in the lovely Turnbull Canyon road, which is much nicer to ride than Carbon Canyon IMO. If you really want to go nuts, ride up SART to either Lincoln or Imperial and head inland towards Santiago Canyon and then back via PCH.

Draft up a route on ridewithGPS and post it, I'm sure you'll get plenty of useful suggestions on how to improve it.

diphthong

after the eternal flatitudes of the river trails, a nice vertical leg stretcher up turnbull or imperial might be just the ticket.

TrojanHorse

There are plenty of hilly options between SART and SGRT in the Hacienda / Whittier area in addition to Turnbull.

TGT1

I'll do Garvey to Grand, to Diamond Bar Blvd, to Pathfinder, then (with fat tires) thru Shibarum Park to Colima, over Colima to Lambert to the Whittier greenbelt MUP to the SGRT and then up to the dam to the end of the loop and back to West Covina. Or bail at Peck road, Valley, or Workman Mill Rd. if I've had enough.

Almost all of that has designated bike lanes or MUP

There are some other options I've tried over to Colima and Hacienda through the Whittier hills, but most of them are not skinny tire friendly or quite circuitous. I don't think I've found the best route yet.

The definitely, suicidal, you don't want to go there roads in that area are Whittier Blvd, Azusa Ave, and 39 on the west side of the hills.

TrojanHorse

Diamond bar is good, pathfinder is good, both East and West are good cycling. I ride Whittier blvd ALL the time from about first ave. east to Harbor. The only part of Whittier Blvd I don't like is between first over to about Greenleaf, but you can take Janine or La Cuarta to avoid that. I used to take Whittier Blvd to get from mar vista over to the SGRT pretty often, but I only like doing that in the morning. Otherwise it's the Greenway Trail from Mar Vista to the end.

Garfield Cat

Do Mr Beanz and Gina still ride the SART?

mwandaw

I Googled "Mr Beanz and Gina" and found a blog with an entry from just two days ago. So, to answer your question, yes... they are still riding the SART.

I'd post the link, but Mr Beanz was banned from BikeForums.net, so it might not be appropriate.

diphthong

finally made it out to the sart today. late start w/an appt in rancho santa margarita at 4pm so didn't get to incorporate any of the sgrt into the ride as originally intended.
other than me assuming the path would be solely on one side of the river the whole time and a little construction detour near imperial, it was surprisingly fun and low-key.
started at pch/avocado in corona del mar/newport. left the sart at imperial, grabbed lunch at in-n-out on the north side of the river, then decided to hit imperial southbound for
extra giggles. the giggles had clearly moved elsewhere and left no forwarding address. finished by riding the newport back bay even tho i told myself i wouldn't earlier in the ride.
will hit the sart again soon.

TrojanHorse

I presume you mean the back side of Cannon? Extra giggles indeed! Next time you do the extra giggle route, keep going and turn left on Santiago Canyon and make sure you have extracted all the giggles available.

diphthong

oh yeah. had done that chapman/santiago cyn part before. a good challenge to be sure.