BIKE: note on exit of Austin State Hospital

[brickjones]

After exiting CM and crossing Lamar, just continue due west on 40th 
street until you run into Shoal Creek.  You will cross Medical 
Parkway via curb-cuts (and via a route that is not accessible to 
cars--part of the traffic-calming the neighborhood insisted on when 
CM was built).  If you're heading south, you may want to jog over to 
39 1/2 th street and intersect Shoal Creek from there.

This is a great route south for those of us who enjoy/prefer car-free 
routes through downtown.  From SCB just north of 38th, you can get 
all the way to 5th street, utilizing various combinations of the 
Shoal Creek trail and/or the Lamar Street sidewalk, and only have to 
cross a roadway used by cars a couple of times (in a 
lightly-travelled park road at the north end of Pease park).  If you 
have a moderately rugged bike and some nerve, you can even connect to 
the Town Lake trail and points south of the river without ever 
encountering traffic again.

If they would complete the Shoal Creek trail between 5th street and 
the the section of the trail behind the Austin Music Hall, this 
connection would be much more accessible.  Also, I note that some 
work on the trail between 5th and 9th is about to begin; kudos to 
whoever cares enough about providing safe, car-free routes through 
congested areas to have gotten this done.

Brick Jones



>On Fri, 24 Oct 2003, Mike Librik or Amy Babich wrote:
>>  As some of you may know, there is a good east-west connection through
>>  Austin State Hospital and Central Market, via a gate between the ASH
>>  grounds the CM loading dock. CM parking lot can be hairy sometimes. This
>>  is a direct path from Hyde Park to the south end of Shoal Creek Blvd.
>>
>
>
>I've looked for this gate a couple of times from the CM parking lot side
>and not been able to find it (maybe I need glasses again).  Next time I'll
>try coming from the ASH side and see if I can locate it.
>
>Question:  How is this a direct path to the south end of SCB?  What do you
>do once you get through the CM parking lot?