Fox River Trail Closed sign before the tunnel

Well we finally got out to the Fox River Trail this past weekend so I can post an update of the trail conditions from Dundee to Aurora.

There were 2 sections of the trail that were closed. The first section was at the Tunnel/Bridge where the Fox River Trail connects to the Illinois Prairie Path (just  South of Elgin).

This section has been closed for years now! A large part of the trail has been washed out right at the tunnel and there is a steep drop off from the pavement. I don’t know why they can’t manage to get this repaired!

If you do go around the “trail closed” signs (and I can not recommend that here, of course) you REALLY NEED TO BE CAREFUL AT THE TUNNEL.

Fox River Trail at the Washout

 The other section of the trail that was closed off made absolutely no sense to me at all! This is the section just north of the bridge in South Elgin. We went around the signs and proceeded cautiously. Other than the path being in terrible shape and having a lot of large bumps in the pavement it was just fine.

I think that having these sections closed off causes more problems due to people getting accustom to going around the “trail closed” signs which could have more serious consequences when there is a legitimate need to close the trial

Other than those two sections, the trail was clear with no major problems from Dundee to Aurora (a 55 mile round trip for us).

One really nice improvement (for me since I had not been on the trail this year) is that they finally finished the Stearns Road Bridge project!

They have also built a Bike Repair Station at the part right before the bridge in south Elgin.  This is actually pretty cool but I think that they missed out on one important feature. It is not very obvious that it is there and there is NO SIGN that says that there is a bike repair station there. This can easily be overlooked!

Anyway, at the repair station they have an air pump and tools that are attached to cables. The pump was already a little beat up but it still worked and the tools were all still functional. So if you have a bike problem and can make it to the bridge in South Elgin, you will have some tools available there.

I’ve added a few photos of the new bridge and the bike repair station on the related Fox River Bike Trail Photo Page.

And one final note, which has more to do with our ride than with the Fox River Trail conditions, is that we took a little time to get some photos of the Fabyan Windmill in Geneva, which I had not previously had posted on this site.

Since this is such an obvious landmark along the Fox River Trail, I selected and posted a page with a few of the Fabyan Windmill Photos here.