People using the Olentangy Trail used to have to veer into a neighborhood between Clinton-Como Park and Northmoor Park.
Now, a new $9.6 million section of picturesque trail takes runners, cyclists and rollerbladers off the streets and instead winds them across and along the Olentangy River for a little over a half mile.
Caleb and Robyn Mackey, of Clintonville, came to check out the trail Thursday after keeping tabs on construction for more than a year.
"I think it's cool," Robyn Mackey said. "I think it probably makes more sense than routing it through a neighborhood."
Caleb Mackey said the area was very "aesthetically pleasing," but that he worries about the trail crossing West North Broadway so close to the State Route 315 ramps.
"Like is this the greatest place to do a crossing in this intersection, where there's a freeway coming in at the same place that we're having all this trail crossing? I kind of have my doubts," Caleb Mackey said.
Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission data from 2023 shows that on average, about 20,000 vehicles travel that section of North Broadway every day. Some 7,000 vehicles take the State Route 315 on ramp.
The trail used to cross North Broadway at a light on residential Milton Avenue. The area also sees around 20,000 vehicles a day, but is a quarter of a mile away from the highway ramps.
Columbus Recreation and Parks said that community feedback led them to include "robust safety features" at the North Broadway crossing.
Runners Jacob Lader and Jordan Klein, both sophomores at Ohio State University, were not impressed with the changes. Lader called the new section of trail a "terrible investment."
"Oh, I think it's worse. I mean, you're right next to a highway," Lader said.
"I don't think the signal makes it any worse. I just think that you have a to wait a longer time to cross Broadway," Klein said. "The addition doesn't really save time."
Rafah Asadi, on the other hand, said the new area was "really great."
"This is wonderful. It's very beautiful actually," Asadi said.
Asadi works at nearby OhioHealth and used to walk in the parking lot. Now, she plans to spend her time on the trail.
"It's much better than walking kind of in between cars in the parking lot," Asadi said. "I'm going to do more walking now."
Columbus Recreation and Parks estimates that more than a million people use the 14-mile Olentangy Trail every year.
A dedication for the new section of trail will be scheduled at a later date.
