Welcome to my virtual ride of the bicycle path along Brays Bayou in Houston.
We start at the intersection of the trail with Greenbriar Rd. Our current location is marked by the green cross on the above map. In the photo below, Greenbriar Road is immediately behind the camera, which is facing west. (Unless otherwise stated, all photots are facing generally west.) From here, we'll ride west until we reach (almost) the western limit of the trail.
Why start here, in the middle of the trail? Houston Metro is building a light rail project which crosses the Bayou one street east of here, so there's a detour behind me, which I didn't feel like riding today. As you can see, we're on the upper bank. You can also see a perfectly serviceable path on the lower bank, except it's closed while Metro build their light rail project. While I was taking this picture several riders mentioned that a Metro Cop was giving tickets (up to $500 fine) to people riding through the construction zone. But noone else was working there this day, which was a Sunday morning. It really riles me that Metro is taking years to build a bridge over this little bayou, and that the bike path is closed for all that time.
A little further to the west we have to cross North Braeswood and Main. If we were on the lower trail, this would be a non-issue, but on the upper trail it's a bit of a problem.
As you approach North Braeswood, it looks like you should continue directly across the street to the path on the other side. Wrong! It's really very dangerous crossing Main in the pedestrian crossing. The walk light going green coincides with the green for traffic on North Braeswood, much of which wants to turn left onto Main. I feel a lot safer riding through this intersection on the roadway.
You can either stay in the right lane to turn right onto the extrawide bicycle path on the far side of the lights. A very short distance to the right, the on-road bicycle route along Morningside begins.
Alternatively, to continue along the Brays Bayou trail, I get into the lane second to the left, and turn slightly left to rejoin the upper trail.
Going east (towards the camera) you have no choice but to cross in the crossing; this isn't so bad since you can see the oncoming Braeswood traffic.
Shortly we come to a ramp connecting the upper and lower trails. Well, it's a little bit hard to actually see the ramp itself from this angle. One clue is the (small) image of the rider coming up the trail. This man also complained to me about the Metro Cop giving out tickets.
I think the upper trail terminates at the first bridge. If you're riding east (towards the camera) and want to ride up Morningside, there's an unofficial short cut to the right of the top of the ramp. Carefully cross North Braeswood and ride two blocks north to Morningside.
After passing under the two bridges and up past the sewerage plant outlet, the lower trail climbs back to the upper level, where it stays.
At Buffalo Speedway the trail switches from the north bank to the south bank, so we have to cross the bridge. Take extra care crossing the road before turning left. There's no safety island in the middle of the road.
Just to the right of trail at this point is a water fountain. Great for hot days when the water bottles are getting empty.
After crossing the bridge, there's a bench in a nice spot just under a shady tree. Here's a photo looking back east taken from that bench.
There's quite a long section of quality path before the next street crossing.
When crossing Stella Link, you can either cross on top, or go underneath. The top crossing has a center island.
I've ridden North from here by crossing the bridge, going one block west on North Braeswood and turning north onto Academy.
After Stella Link, the trail climbs a steady incline at the top of which is a railway line. Shortly after crossing the railway line, the trail switches back to the north side of the bayou. Cross the bridge then carefully cross the road. There's a center island but before crossing the roadway you've got to look back to check for cars.
Just before the bridge, you can cross South Braeswood to Greenwillow, and thus to the Willowmeadows neighborhood.
Crossing to the west is relatively painless.
Going east (see photo), it's difficult to cross with the pedestrian signals. I prefer to get on the road.
After the loop, there's a nice section of trail. Just past the walker in the photo, you can cross the road and ride north a couple of blocks to get to the Meyerland shopping center.
The next crossing is S. Rice and it has a very wide center strip, making it very simple to cross.
In "Bicycling the Houston Area", S. Rice is listed as part of an early morning weekend ride. I've ridden it from here to Westpark. Traffic was fairly light, but the surface was very variable (quite bad in places).
The next crossing is Chimney Rock, and the trail again switches to the southern side of the bayou, so to follow the trail you have to cross the bridge. Once you've crossed Chimney Rock, there's a nice long section of recently repaved path.
If you want to get to the bicycle route along Renwick, do not cross the bridge. You want to turn right on the first street after Chimney Rock, but there's no paved trail on the other side of Chimney Rock. When I ride on weekend mornings, I just ride along North Braeswood for a block.
There isn't a real center divider at Hillcroft, which is usually busy. So it needs particular care to cross without incident.
North Braeswood joins Sourth Braeswood here. There's a nice wide center space.
This is a straight-forward road crossing. There's a small traffic island in the center.
On one old bikeway map I had, there was a bicycle route going to north from here (turn right on Wanda, then left on Bonhomme).
This intersection is easy to remember (note the major chain video store in the photo). Most cyclists think this is the western end of the Brays Bayou trail and just turn around here.
Actually, it's not really the end. You can cross the bridge, this time in the center, then continue on the northern side of the bayou as far as Bissonnet. In fact, you can cross Bissonnet to get to the tennis center. However, the distance involved is very short and the path quality is extremely poor.
You can also continue straight across S. Gessner and follow the path behind the shopping center. Very soon you come to a crossing of S. Braeswood that doesn't have cutouts in the kerb, so you'll have to carry your bike across the road. A narrow trail continues on. I think this will eventually become the start of the Keegan's Bayou trail.