I just run on a track at WPI, lake park, or Quinsigamond Community College.

Ten uninterrupted miles in a city is a huge ask.

Alot of people just circle Elm Park a bunch too. Thats pretty popular.

You can try the trails at the audobon society

Shore Dr -> Norton Dr -> West Boylston St -> Grove St -> Holden St -> Shore Dr is used as a 5k run. You could run that circle a few times with very limited breaks/waiting on traffic.

You could also extend that down to Salisbury, Highland, etc but you run into much busier streets where you'd be waiting on lights.

You could also stay on Grove St instead of taking Holden St and head into Holden turning at Main St/Shrewsbury St to head back into Worcester though there are definite breaks in the sidewalk.

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It's a city. There's very little chance of 10 interrupted miles unless you leave the city limits. The only place it might be possible is if you run through a bunch of connected trails at the cascades, but even then that's a stretch.

10 miles might be tough, but I'm *almost* positive that this route is entirely sidewalked, could just run it twice.

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You might be able to organize your run so as to have part of hit the Blackstone River Bikeway. It starts on Paul Clancey Way in very South Worcester. But you'd certainly get a lot of uninterrupted miles.

> So basically no 10 uninterrupted miles as asked

well yeah, to be pedantic I should have told them to go to a track or a highway since they're likely to hit a driveway wherever they go.

The Shore Dr 5k circle is the closest thing you're going to find that has sidewalks throughout with the least likelihood of needing to wait on a car.

This is the biggest perpendicular intersection where 90% of the time there will be no need to do more than look both ways.

Another 5k option would be the Newton Hill XC course.

You're not going to get 10 uninterrupted miles anywhere without running in the road. Your best bet is the West Boylston rail Trail or the Rutland rail trail. Both are decently high mileage, Rutland especially, and have very few road crossings.

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MCRT from Thomas to River is 2.5 miles.

It's tough in Worcester because this city doesn't invest in safe pedestrian infrastructure. Anywhere you run, you will have to deal with rageful drivers and ankle-breaking potholes, even on what few sidewalks exist. Feel free to DM me for suggestions, I run a lot all over town.

From where you live, I'd suggest the following route. It's a little complex but decent enough and if you follow your instincts and/or bring your phone the first time so you can see the turns on a map, you'll be fine. Here's a link to the route.

1. From Indian Lake, at the intersection of Holden St and Grove St, head up Nelson Place and into Assumption College by going around the yellow gate at end of Nelson Place, which is the back end of campus. Run through campus down to Salisbury St.
2. Head left on Salisbury and after just a couple hundred meters, turn right on Flagg St. The sidewalk is in very bad shape for the first bit here but improves after that. Take Flagg St. (which turns into Richmond Ave.) all the way to Pleasant St. You're about 2 miles into the route when you reach Pleasant.
3. Head left on Pleasant, then soon after turn right on Howland Terrace. Take Howland Terrace until it ends at Hadwen Rd. Take a left and connect down to June St. Turn right on June and continue a couple blocks to Chandler. At Chandler you're 3 miles in. Keep going on June St. to Mill St. It's another mile to get there, putting you at 4 miles.
4. Turn right on Mill St. This is a fast, busy road that's not great to run on, but it has a shoulder and a sidewalk. Both are often occupied by parked cars but by moving between them, you can manage. Continue on Mill St. about a mile, bending to the right, until you get to a stoplight. You're now back at Chandler St. and just over 5 miles into your run. You could turn around here for an out and back 10 miler if you want.
5. If you don't want to do the out and back, turn left on Chandler and continue to the next intersection. Go straight through it and then take a right on Tory Fort Lane. This is a small, one lane road that goes through a secluded area. No sidewalks but plenty safe. Continue for almost a mile on Tory Fort lane and follow the path you see on your left after the intersection with Caton Rd. Follow the path through a short stretch of woods and it dumps out onto a gravel road. Take the gravel until you can turn left. Turn left and you'll come out onto Olean St., a wider concrete road. You're about 6.5 miles in now.
6. Turn left on Olean St. and take it back to the intersection of Chandler and Pleasant, reaching 7.5 miles. Head left on Pleasant and continue back to the intersection with Richmond. Pleasant isn't great for running but it's not terrible iether. Now you're at 8.5 miles.
7. Continue back the way you came (Richmond to Salisbury to Assumption College, around the gate at the back and down the hill to Indian Lake. You're now back where you started, and you've run just under 11 miles.

I guess to be clear I'm not worried about stopping for intersections I'm just struggling to find 10 miles of sidewalk that are all connected which is weird. I moved here from Milwaukee and it was relatively easy to find that there I just think it's so strange that sidewalks just end here.

As far as other runners, there's the November Project.

Worcester has terrible transit infrastructure. Even for a car centric city, the car infrastructure is bad.

They just created a transit department for the city literally this past week or so, so who knows. Maybe it gets better.

I'm not worried about stopping for lights that's fine. I'm just having trouble finding 10 miles of sidewalk. In Milwaukee (where I'm from) we have miles of bike trails along the lake which was amazing, but even within the city 10 miles of sidewalk wasn't a huge ask. I just find this place so strange a city of this size should have sidewalks I don't know why they don't.

I feel like things are far more spread out in cities west of the Mississippi.

I wouldn't necessarily expect you to know this but Milwaukee is east of the Mississippi. The Mississippi runs along the western WI border with MN through the Twin Cities southward. Milwaukee is in South Eastern WI on the shore of Lake Michigan just about 80 miles or so north of Chicago.

Regardless your point is well taken the Midwest is much more spread out than New England for sure. I also feel like the Midwestern cities are "newer" i.e. they were founded after the advent of modern urban planning which I think makes a difference.

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Haha oh sorry my bad.

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Mill Street is about three miles long from Park Ave to Tatnuck Square and it has sidewalks on both sides all the way down. There are only a couple of side streets on it that get a meaningful amount of turning traffic so your chances of a mostly uninterrupted run are quite good. So not quite 10 miles but there you go. Mill street is also very flat which is nice. You could extend the run and add a hill by going up the street that brings you to the Washington heights apartment complex off Mill (Williamsburg Dr) There is a network of mostly gravel streets up in those hills that is easy to kinda get lost in without a gps but there's almost no traffic.

I would suggest you poke around on Google Maps regarding this area to see what I mean about the street network on the hill. I might be misremembering which street takes you there. If it's not Williamsburg it is First, Second or Third Ave off of Mill.

IrregAHHdless

FTFY

I can't help with your area directly without knowing what street you're on, but you should be able to connect to some of my longer loops without issue (likely via W. Boylston Street). My go-to almost-10 mile loop is, from my house, Newton Square, east down Highland, left onto Park, cut into Institute Park boardwalk via Rumford Ave, cruise down Grove St, stay right onto Humboldt, left onto Salisbury, right back onto Grove and on to Main St for a downtown run, up Elm Street back to Elm Park (you can look around Elm Park for extra distance), down Park Ave, right onto Chandler all the way to Tatnuck Square, right onto Pleasant St, Pleasant back to Newton Square. I will sometimes cut across June St and do Pleasant before Chandler depending on what kind of hill situation I want to deal with (going up Chandler is mostly uphill but fairly gradual; going up Pleasant is extremely steep but gets it over with). Also the hill up Elm St from downtown is a beast but short and satisfying. If you really want some hill pain I suggest adding miles on where the map says June Street--Morningside, Havelock, Colonial, Westview--or between Highland and Park/Institute Park you could do Germain and Farnum up to Bancroft Tower. I will add that only Pleasant St has relatively shitty sidewalks; you could cut back to Chandler along May St (or any other route) if it was particularly bothersome.

Here's the route: https://onthegomap.com/s/fvrulaal

Only major slowdowns are intersections at Highland and Park, Grove and Main, and Elm and Park. For most of the rest of it you shouldn't get too bogged down at intersections if you stay on the inside of the loop.

Bonus is that it's very easy to turn off this route pretty much anywhere to cut into some other neighborhoods and add more mileage. I'd say just about any street inside of this route will have sidewalks or, if not, will have next to no traffic and is safe for road running. I added Richmond and Vassar to that route to show a common loop I'll throw in for an extra mile ish.

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Oof Havelock, that is some hill pain. Could also add a little loop up Manhattan Rd and loop around Rydal to get back to Chandler to really brutalize yourself.

Out of curiosity, do you typically need to wait at the light at Chandler and Mill? I was following along and expected you to run up Mill to get to Pleasant.

Surprisingly no, I'm usually able to sneak across without waiting more than 10 or 15 seconds. If it's really backed up and looks like it's going to be a minute then I will just turn up Mill but I think I've only ever done it once.

Try the West Boylston rail trail. Trail is about 8 out and back, but there's lots of good options to tag extra mileage.

If you don't mind driving, the Assabet River Rail Trail is almost exactly 5 miles from end to end, you can park your car in Marlborough or at the East Hudson trail head and run out and back to your car. There's one spot where the trail disappears and you have to run on the sidewalk for a bit, but that's about it. If you don't want to do an out and back, there's plenty of sidewalk infrastructure around the trail, especially thru Hudson, if you want to branch off the trail.

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I moved to Worcester recently and have the same problem. So far I've basically looped around the city more or less and try to stick to long roads like Main and Park.

I do run trail at Cascades as they have some loops you can double up on to get 6+ in. I've yet to find anything great.

I’m not a runner at all but more just encountered this trail.

East-West trail goes through Worcester parks. It does look like it goes on various roads (no idea about sidewalks) but maybe someone else will know. Says it is about 14 miles.

https://www.parkspirit.org/the-eastwest-trail

I don’t live in Worcester anymore but I used to run around Lake Quinsigamond. Adding the small side and large size together will give you 10 miles but there will be points where you are running in the bike lane.

The West Boylston Rail Trail was good. It was 10 miles out and back from the parking lot to the end of the trail. Bonus to that was the way back was mostly downhill.

The Rutland rail trail is where I used to go to run over 10 off of the roads. I could easily get in 20+ there.

From Indian Lake, follow Holden St. north into the town of Holden, then go northwest on Shrewsbury St. and Main St. into downtown Holden. Turnaround near the Holden town hall should give a 10 mile out and back

Can confirm it is!

Rutland Rail Trail (I think it’s called Mass Central Rail Trail)

Hi! I have a bunch of go-to long routes (all side walk) on the RunGo app:

http://routes.rungoapp.com/route/62AHpsYikD

I like zigzagging through the residential area on the other side of Elm park all the way up to Cooks pond and the parks up there.