The Connecticut river forms the border between Vermont and New Hampshire, with dozens of historic colonial towns along it's length that include mill towns, Dartmouth college, and quintessential New England villages such as Woodstock, VT. There are 6 large bicycling communities in the valley, at Brattleboro, Bellows Falls, Mount Ascutney, Killington/Rochester, Lebanon/Hanover, and the Burke Mountain/Kingdom Trails. The scenery along the valley is easily on par with New York's Empire State or Erie Canal trails, and might be better than the Western New England Greenway, having both mountain ranges and our major New England river.
There are also 10 Rail Trails running east-west that connect with the valley:
Lamoille Valley rail trail (VT)
Presidential rail trail (NH)
Ammonoosuc rail trail (NH)
Cross Vermont rail trail (VT)
Granite State Northern rail trail (NH)
Toonerville rail trail (VT)
West River trail (VT)
Fort Hill rail trail (NH)
Ashuelot rail trail (NH)
Cheshire rail trail (NH)
In addition the Farmington Canal (starting at Long Island Sound) and the Mass Central rail trail reach to just south of Vermont at Northampton, Mass, and there are thousands of miles of bike trails to our north in the La Route Verte network in Quebec. A serious gravel bike route in the hills parallel to Route 5 is the VTXL. Active transportation and trails adjacent to the river are also supported in the five state Connecticut River Watershed Partnership Act (proposed Federal Bill H.R. 5216).
The missing link is Vermont's north-south Connecticut river valley. Despite 1/6 of Vermont's population living in just the towns along Route 5, (never mind the next towns over that are within bicycling distance, plus a similar number of people on the New Hampshire side), Route 5 remains stuck in 1950's car culture, ignoring everyday riders who want to travel the valley outside of a car. There has been advocacy for a safer and more comfortable Route 5 bicycle corridor over the last few years, and the first post on this blog is about these efforts.
Route 5 is the historical valley road all the way down river through Massachusetts and Connecticut, but it's no longer the major route now that Interstate I-91 carries the heavy and fast traffic. It needs to be updated to better serve local needs. However there isn't a regional corridor transportation plan, and even though the work is almost identical for the small towns each town must start from scratch. Many of the select boards do not have the wherewithal to add bike and pedestrian support to their budgets, even if they know transportation is becoming more local, multimodal, and they see successful paths and lanes around them. (Some of which have been shown to have positive local business benefits, made driving better for car drivers, improved public health, or increased road network resilience.)
In several river valley sections there is just enough room for Route 5, I-91, the railroad, and a tributary to be sandwiched between the river and a ridge, so a significant proportion of the work looks simply like better road shoulders and possibly narrower car lanes. In other sections there's a possibility of a separated bike path, or even Rail with Trail. There are also a couple of small sections that could run on bluffs overlooking the river. These pieces need to be connected together.
The Scenic Byways program in 2000 mapped out tourism routes on both sides of the river. Vermont House Bill H.177 in January, 2023 asked VTrans for a Study of the route's infrastructure. VTrans responded in 2024 with a Survey of the towns and regional planning commissions along Route 5. The response (from 21 of the 30 towns and 3 of the 4 RPCs) was unanimous support for a planning study. All but one response (for the improved section near the Springfield interstate ramps) felt that it was "Very important or Somewhat important to improve bicycling conditions", noting that bicycling conditions were either Poor or Fair. Recommended Next Steps include reviewing existing planning, making sure that improvements are priority goals written into plans, and forming a steering committee. However because of the drastic funding cuts by the Trump administration, roadway work has now been pared back to repairing only the worst potholes.
This website is an effort to connect people and pick up where the Scenic Byways program and the VTrans Survey left off. It is not part of VTrans or any government agency. It does receive help from volunteers at Vermont Sierra Club's Clean Transportation for All committee and other valley organizations. Would you like to partner on hosting a meeting for valley bicycling and walking groups to discuss this route? Do you have news of projects, plans, or events? Would you like your contacts publicized? Send them along and we'll put them on the news page, the calendar, contacts or one of the town projects pages.
If you would like to review the VTrans "U.S. Route 5 Bicycle Corridor Priority Assessment Survey Findings", a copy is at this link:
For more information, please contact me:
Karl Kemnitzer, VB admin
info@valleybiking.org
