Cycling the New York Central Fitness Trail in Russell-Embrun

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When I was writing my blogpost about the short lived Ottawa – New York Central Railway, I noticed that part of the former tracks were paved between Russell and Embrun in Eastern Ontario, south east of Ottawa and baptised as the New York Central Fitness Trail.

Of course that required a visit and finally in late August we checked out the pathway on our way to friends in Elma (Elma?) and Russell. And we discovered Russell and Embrun are doing something right.

Starting in Russell

We choose to park the car at the northern end at highway 200, just off Hamilton Rd. as that saved us 12 km of extra driving, but it was a bit of a gamble, as there are only six, perhaps seven parking spots if people park tightly. There are many other places to start though such as the arena at the east end of the trail with abundant parking space, and at the dog park parking lot, somewhat halfway the trail.

4 cars are parked at a trailhead. Once red car has its trunk open to unload bikes — Tight parking at the northern end of the pathway

You could bike to the trailhead of the New York Central Fitness Trail from Ottawa, as it is 20 km from Findley Creek (you’ll be cycling on country roads) and ‘only’ 30 km from the future LRT Bowesville Rd Station.

The trail runs right through Russell and Embrun, with lots of vegetation on both sides. Many homeowners backing to the trail have built little bridges across the ditch along the pathway and some even created their little forest patio at the back of their property.

A mowed grassy path runs between and underneath trees — North of the trailhead you could theotically walk a bit further in this near Impressionist looking pathway (there is even an apple tree on the right)

It is also really nice to see that the several new developments are connected to the pathway, with shortcuts between homes to the pathway making it much more intuitive to take a bicycle somewhere.

a woman in a blue jeans short on a bicycle approached a pathway between two houses — A shortcut to the pathway

We cycled off the track into a new neighbourhood with expensive looking houses overlooking a stormwater pond. Karen brought her binoculars and spotted a handful of Greater Yellowlegs on the causeway in the pond.

a pathway runs past a wate body. On both sides is freshly cut green grass. On the right hand area several homes overlooking the pathway and the pond — The stormpond where we saw a handful of Greater Yellowlegs and about 30 Killdeer

Several north – south roads are crossing the trail, but at every place you cross you’ll find a PXO, a pedestrian crossing with those blinking LED lights when you push the button.

an intersection of a pathway and a road. there posts with push buttons to activte a blinking LED light that is placed next to the road. A laddered cross walk with a zebra pattern crosses the raod

Approaching Embrun

Approaching Embrun, the first thing you will notice is the Sportsplex, with currently (2024) lots of construction going on. The second thing is a roundabout with a separate bidirectional pathway going around the roundabout at the southside. The former railway track runs at the northside of the roundabout but is not in use.

I never assume drivers stop for me at roundabouts. Once a moving truck barreled right in front of me into the roundabout at Prince of Wales at the Farm in Ottawa (I was in the roundabout, not on a pathway). I made a friendly gesture that that wasn’t right and they stopped in the bike lane/shoulder after the roundabout. We had a friendly conversation (really), in which I explained that all traffic in a roundabout has right of way, but they maintained that was not the case for cyclists. I left it at that and we went our own way.

But in Russell, a driver even stopped in the middle of the roundabout to let us cross. We continued into Embrun and I noticed that a new development at the north side of the path is also getting a shortcut to the pathway. Near the east end, you ‘ll find an old train station. The original station has been moved and is now a home but instead, you will see the station that was moved from Berwick to Embrun. Take a peek through the windows. There are a handful of parking lots at this end of the trail too.

A middle aged man in a fleece say "escape' holding a silver coloured road bike. He is standing in front of a green paitned one storey train station of approximately 100-120 years old. — The Berwick station along the New York Central Fitness Trail

However, while not part of the trail, the route, with flexiposts in a community zone, continues for another 700 meters and even has a quick built (flexiposts) offshoot to an elementary school north of the pathway. The extended pathway eventually ends at the Embrun Palais de Sports.

Two people cycling on the road both with child trailers with kinds in it. another kid cycles alone on a tiny bike. A woman in a jeans jacket bikes the opposite direction. On the left are parked cars on a parking lot. the pathway is separated from other road suers with flexiposts.

Morphed into a spine cycling route

It is really interesting to see how the New York Central Fitness Trail has morphed into a spine cycling route, connecting the new developments with a school, several arenas, several eateries (https://euphiedici.com/). That is exactly what you want to get people cycling: create a safe network for short distances connecting destinations where people want/need to go to. And people do; we saw a quite a number of people walking and cycling and notably several groups of teenagers on their bikes.