The Little Econ Greenway: 7.4 Miles of Paved River
From Alafaya Trail to Forsyth Road, through Blanchard Park: the Little Econ Greenway is Union Park's linear park, its commute for cyclists and its daily argument that the east side is wilder than it looks.
1 minute read
The Little Econ Greenway is the thread that stitches Union Park to the east side: a paved multi-use trail, 7.4 miles of it, following the Little Econlockhatchee River from the Alafaya Trail and Lokanotosa Trail area in the east, through Jay Blanchard Park, to Forsyth Road in the west. Orange County Parks and Recreation manages it, and on any morning it is busy with the county’s walkers, runners and cyclists.
The ride through Union Park
The greenway’s heart is the Blanchard Park stretch — riverside riding under canopy, with parking and access at the park off Dean Road, at the Econ Soccer Complex, at Arcadia Acres and on Harrel Road north of Colonial Drive, plus a trailhead on the north side of SR-50 east of Goldenrod Road. Bridges cross the river along the route; the water is the constant companion, slow and tea-coloured, with the birdlife of a working Florida river corridor.
A trail with a future
The greenway is planned to extend further, tying the east side’s trail pieces into a longer whole. For Union Park it already does the essential work: it gives a corridor suburb a second geography, measured in river miles instead of traffic lights, and it makes the community’s best feature — the Econ itself, covered next in this hub — into something you travel along, daily, for free.
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