The Fall Line's Next Stretch North of Bryan Park Starts in November

On October 13, the Henrico County Board of Supervisors awarded a $1,039,947.26 contract to Webb Development, LLC to build the first phase of the Lakeside Community Trail. The county's meeting recap describes a 3,500-foot path from Spring Park to the intersection of Dumbarton Road and Gillespie Avenue. Construction is expected to start in November and take about a year.

This news matters to anyone who uses Bryan Park. For the past two years the Fall Line Trail has been something being built inside the park. Starting next month, it becomes the first link in a route that heads north out of it. The new pavement by the soccer fields and the bathhouse is the city's piece. Henrico's pieces, starting with the 3,500 feet past Spring Park, will decide where a walk or ride that starts in Bryan Park can actually go.

What the city built inside the park

Richmond's Bryan Park segment is a $3 million project paid for by the Central Virginia Transportation Authority. The city's capital report for the quarter ending June 30, 2026, listed it as "Construction Underway." The most detailed progress report came at the Friends of the Fall Line quarterly meeting on July 28. By then:

• the gravel base ran nearly to Bellevue Avenue and past the soccer fields
• roughly 50% to 60% of the gravel section had been paved
• drainage, textured crossings and paving near the park bathhouse were in place
• completion was scheduled for August 21, 2026, and no ribbon-cutting date had been set

No ribbon-cutting has been announced since then. Sports Backers, the nonprofit that came up with the trail idea, now calls the Bryan Park stretch "the newest section of trail in the City of Richmond" on its event page for this fall.

The route was planned as more than a loop. When the city broke ground in August 2024, it named Bryan Park a designated trailhead, with parking, restrooms, picnic areas, water fountains and shelters. It also said the section would connect Lakeside Avenue to Bellevue and to the Spring Park section Henrico had just finished. A city routing memo puts the northern end at Hermitage Road and Bryan Park Avenue. According to the city's Fall Line FAQ, the chosen alignment links the playground, picnic shelters, parking areas, soccer fields, tennis courts and a new restroom near Shelter 1. Jordan's Branch Lane and other park roads serve as spurs.

So the Bryan Park segment is designed around arriving and leaving: you park, use the restroom, and head out. Right now, you can't head out very far.

Across Lakeside Avenue, the next piece is already open

Go north out of the park at Bryan Park Avenue and you reach Henrico's Park Street section, which runs to Spring Park. Henrico's Fall Line project page lists its construction as complete. Henrico's 2025-26 annual report calls it one of just two Fall Line sections open in the county. The other is the Chickahominy River Crossing between Woodman Road and Cedar Lane in Hanover.

Sports Backers has its headquarters on that short stretch. The organization moved into its Active Living Hub at 4921 Lakeside Ave. in March 2025, Richmond BizSense reported, after raising about $1.4 million for the renovation. The building has a fitness and training room, a community meeting room, outdoor space for programs and direct access to the trail. Last November it started group fitness classes led by Fitness Warriors on Wednesdays and Fridays.

Spring Park is where the trail stops for now. The contract approved on October 13 starts there.

How the route north fills in

Henrico breaks its part of the Fall Line into numbered sections. Here is what lies between Bryan Park and Parham Road, using the county's own limits and the latest status in its public documents.

The July meeting summary says the Lakeside segments between Bryan Park and Villa Park total about 2.3 miles. They include boardwalks, bridges, a road diet on Hilliard Road and pedestrian hybrid beacon crossings at Dumbarton and Hilliard roads. Once finished, the Lakeside Community Trail will be about 2 miles long and 12 feet wide, with several pedestrian bridges over a tributary of Upham Brook. Henrico awarded the Villa Park contract to Sagres Construction Corp. in March for $6.5 million. That section covers about 1.1 miles from Lakeside Avenue and Brook Road to East Parham Road and Villa Park Drive.

Henrico says all of its Fall Line sections are slated for completion by 2028. VDOT's estimate for the full 43-mile route from Ashland to Petersburg is winter 2028.

What connection does to a trail's traffic

Trail counters on finished sections show how many people a connected stretch can draw. According to the July meeting summary, a permanent counter at Gwathmey Church Road logged about 40,000 users from January 1 through July 7, 2026. That works out to roughly 239 a day, with a peak day of 632. A second counter at Woodman Road had logged about 37,300 users by the same meeting, close to 200 a day. Walkers and cyclists split the traffic nearly evenly, and Saturday and Sunday mornings were busiest.

The same summary says officials expect weekday trips, and more trips used for getting somewhere, to grow as the network links up. More permanent counters are planned as new segments open. In Bryan Park, Saturday-morning activity is already established. The Richmond Road Runners Club lists a weekly "Bryan Park Group" run at 7 a.m. on Saturdays, usually about six miles. It meets at Stir Crazy Cafe, 4015 MacArthur Ave., and the club's listing notes that details can change. Each Henrico phase that opens north of Spring Park gives that kind of morning a longer route out and back without leaving pavement.

Saturday, November 7: a hunt in the park

The free Fall Line Trailblazer runs from 9:00 to 3:30 on Saturday, November 7. It's a day of pop-up events at points along the trail, and you can join one, two or all of them. The Bryan Park stop is an Art Drop based at 4308 Hermitage Rd., where people search the park for hidden goodie bags of Fall Line treasures. If you want to cover more ground, the other two stops are farther north:

1. Bryan Park Art Drop, 4308 Hermitage Rd., Richmond: a goodie-bag search along the city's newest stretch of trail.
2. Woodman Road Art Walk, Woodman and Winfrey roads, Henrico: an art walk for kids on the connector trail between Glover Park and the Fall Line.
3. Town of Ashland, Center Street downtown: a Fall Line-themed pop-up near the Carter Park playground.

Sports Backers also posts a Trailblazer bingo card you can download for people who'd rather explore the trail on their own that day. You'll need a car to get between the three stops this year. The pavement that will eventually link the first two is the Lakeside and Villa Park work in the table above, starting with the section Webb Development is set to begin next month.

If you're weighing what a trail connection might mean for a home near Bryan Park, or just want to compare notes on how Northside is changing, Kelly Blanchard is happy to talk it through over coffee, with no pressure attached. When you're curious about value, a free home valuation is a good place to start.