Martina Alavarez came for the free snow cone, but she was impressed with the new trail along Hiram Clarke Road all the same.

“Watch me run,” Alvarez, almost 4, told her mother, Grace Smith, as she dashed along the new paved trail.

With roughly four miles of new trail in the neighborhood along Sims Bayou and a electric transmission route, officials in southern Houston’s Five Corners District as well as park advocates said they expect a lot more running.

“It really is a milestone and I think it is going to open up all kinds of possibilities for us to complete the system and demonstrate that people will use these corridors,” said Beth White, CEO of Houston Parks Board, the nonprofit spearheading the Bayou Greenways 2020 effort.

The trail runs north of Sims Bayou for about 1.5 miles, parallel to Hiram Clarke Road to West Airport. The path, open to walkers, runners and bicyclists, runs along a CenterPoint Energy utility easement. A host of destinations, including three schools, and hundreds of single family homes are within 1,500 feet of the trail, the first in the city to run along a utility easement.

Perhaps more critically than what is along the route, is the connection it provides to the trail system along Sims Bayou, recently spruced up and expanded with nearly 2.6-mile segment featuring vibrant murals. The new portion runs from Heatherbrook Drive to Buffalo Speedway. Though unconnected to the rest of the trail system, the two southwest Houston segments offer some relief from on-road riding, and greatly expand the number of people who can easily and safely travel to Townwood Park near Orem and Buffalo Speedway without a car.

Close Connections A number of destinations are within walking distance of the new trail. Three schools with a combined enrollment of around 2,000 Ten churches Two city parks department centers Vinson Neighborhood Library Hiram Clarke Multi-Service Center West Orem YMCA Source: Houston Parks Board

Read More

“I think once everybody gets used to it, you’ll see a lot more people out here,” said Carl Pointer, 64, who lives within steps of the trail.

From there, the hope is the trail is a catalyst for development and more community engagement, said John Richardson, senior pastor of First Outreach Church and a local business owner.

To mark the completion of both trails, elected, community and business officials on Saturday hosted a celebration at the junction and offered tips to local residents for how they could use the trail to bike or run for recreation.

Whether via a bayou or utility trail, elected officials said more walkable places are critical to reviving Houston neighborhoods and reducing automobile travel.

“I want Houston and Harris County to be remembered for these walkable places,” Precinct 1 Harris County Commissioner Rodney Ellis said.

Getting even this short segment of utility easement trail open, however, has been a long journey. City and CenterPoint officials celebrated an agreement in 2014 that untied some of the thorny issues related to public use of the utility right of way. The deal even became the template for state legislation passed in 2017 allowing counties and municipalities to partner with companies for combined use trails along power line routes.

“In a built-up city you have to take advantage of every corridor that you can,” White said.

Then slight delays set in for the first trail, from working out the final language of cooperative agreements to planning and design approvals. By 2017, the connection still was just a blueprint.

The slow-going hasn’t dampened expectations for more connections, more miles of bayou and utility easement trails, providing more people easy access to trails, White said. The parks board remains on pace for its 2020 goal of 150 miles of trail along seven Houston bayous, she said.

From there, they have hopes of adding key connections between the bayous, via partnerships with utilities such as CenterPoint, city and regional government assistance and other methods.

“We think this is imminently doable,” White said of the efforts for miles of more trail, called Beyond the Bayous. “It doesn’t mean it is easy. I mean it is doable from the land available and the design to do it. It just takes that long term commitment.”

dug.begley@chron.com

twitter.com/DugBegley