- The NKY Regional Trails Plan proposes a 934-mile braided network of paved and natural-surface trails connecting parks, neighborhoods, schools, business districts and recreational destinations throughout Northern Kentucky.
- The plan was developed through collaboration among the OneNKY Alliance, Cincinnati Off-Road Alliance (CORA), Tri-State Trails, local governments, nonprofits and economic development stakeholders.
- The OneNKY Connector Trail, a proposed 31-mile route linking seven Northern Kentucky cities, is expected to serve as a backbone of the larger regional trail system while supporting quality of life, tourism and economic development.
After years of preparation and planning, regional officials unveiled the NKY Regional Trails Plan – a comprehensive master plan outlining a network of paved and natural-surface trails spanning Boone, Kenton and Campbell counties.
The plan, developed with input from 45 local governments, nonprofit leaders, and economic stakeholders, promotes a “braided trail network’ that links parks, business districts, school grounds, and other recreational destinations through interconnected routes designed for walking, biking, hiking, and other outdoor activities. In total, the plan aims to link 934 miles of natural-surface and paved trails across Northern Kentucky.
The initiative progresses due to collaboration among the OneNKY Alliance, Cincinnati Off-Road Alliance, and Tri-State Trails — organizations that have worked behind the scenes to bring the project to its current stage.
In particular, OneNKY Alliance has a stake in the trail plan through the OneNKY Connector Trail, a proposed 31-mile network of off-road and on-road trails and paths for walking, running, and biking. Unveiled in 2024, the trail will connect the cities of Covington, Newport, Ludlow, Erlanger, Fort Thomas, Bellevue and Dayton. The trail will serve as the backbone of the broader trail network.
“As we looked at it holistically, how do you create a healthy, vibrant community, which means so much more than just riding a bike or walking a trail? It means vibrant, healthy talent that can fill great jobs, that can live in good housing stock, that can have a superior quality of life, and so just tying all those things together into one really made the base for this initiative,” OneNKY CEO Karen Finan said. “It’s been a prime initiative now for several years.”
The plan was inspired by a vision from Jason Reser, the head of the CORA, a nonprofit dedicated to developing and preserving multi-use natural-surface trails across Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. An avid cyclist and owner of Reser Bicycle Outfitters in Newport, Reser approached several Northern Kentucky community stakeholders in years past to explore the potential for developing an interconnected regional trail network.
After visiting other areas in the United States with robust trail networks, such as Knoxville, TN, Boulder, CO, and Santa Cruz, CA, Reser felt that Northern Kentucky’s natural attributes, including hillsides, river corridors, parks, and undeveloped green spaces, had the potential to rival those areas.
“I saw how they started linking their communities together with trails and activating these spaces, and sometimes it’s very easy, like a dirt or gravel trail out of a park and into a neighborhood and onto a quiet street, and it would connect entire neighborhoods, entire communities,” Reser told LINK nky. “When I came back, I’d see our undeveloped hillsides, the spaces along the riverbanks, and think, ‘wow, look at the greenbelt that we have, we could totally outdo these other places.’ We have so much more potential. How do we activate that potential on a large scale?”
A major theme of the plan is regional collaboration, which Finan and Reser both credited with enabling the project’s progress. Reser said that rather than imposing a top-down vision, the process allowed different communities to contribute directly to the plan. Organizing efforts included extensive outreach, community meetings, listening sessions, and planning workshops to ensure the final plan reflected local priorities.
“I think in this particular case they’re able to do things in parallel and get to that common goal,” he said.
Economic development was also a consideration for the planners, who felt the extensive trail network could serve as a magnet for tourism and workforce development, providing Northern Kentucky with an amenity to attract out-of-towners.
“A business expands or comes to an area because the amenities are already here,” Finan said. “They don’t want to build the amenities themselves, and so when you think about the investment we’re going to have a decade out, how do we keep a DHL and Amazon here bigger and better? How do we keep people coming to the urban core?”
Looking ahead, OneNKY, CORA and Tri-State Trails plan to continue assisting communities with implementation, trail construction, grant applications and technical support. Ultimately, the plan will serve as the guidebook for communities moving forward.
The NKY Regional Trails Plan can be viewed below.
