The Cycle Lane Tour

Mayor Michael Bloomberg said it was there. He said it was a reality. So we decided to see for ourselves.

On Sept. 30, New York's mayor cut a ribbon across the Harlem River Speedway, a 19th century horse racing track that now forms the linchpin in a $6-million NYC Greenway network of bicycle and pedestrian paths - resulting in, Bloomberg said, "a continuous 32-mile pathway all the way around Manhattan ... that includes over 23 miles of waterfront pathways and facilitates access to over 1,500 acres of parkland throughout the borough."

As an avid biker who has long bemoaned the lack of connections between New York's hundreds of fractured pieces of street bike lanes and pathways, I found this announcement thrilling. My biker buddies - Mike Vatis and Mike Winter - agreed: We had to test this out.

"Manhattan Mike" Vatis and I made a quick run the next Sunday, completing the 32-mile circuit in about 2 1/2 hours. On Columbus Day, the three of us repeated the circumnavigation in a more realistic 3 1/2 hours, making frequent photography stops. The reviews are mixed.

Those who haven't really thought of New York as a recreational, athletic city will be stunned by the numbers of newly built tennis courts, soccer fields, baseball parks, jogging lanes and, of course, the often breathtakingly beautiful bike paths that now line the Hudson, Harlem and East rivers. The Harlem River Speedway stretch, now 2 miles long but scheduled in coming months for expansion, is a particular revelation, open to the public for the first time in 40 years.

But much of this ride would be dangerous for novices, children or anybody who lacks the urban-savvy biker skills of car and bus dodging. At some busy intersections, the green-and- white Greenway signs are hard to spot or confusing, and there were none pointing the way to the bike path when we rode into Manhattan across the Brooklyn Bridge. In several sections we found the bike "pathway" little more than a narrow ditch between slabs of concrete. In more than a few spots it's frankly ugly. And some of the most visually gorgeous legs of the ride suffer from turf tension between bikers and pedestrians.

Noah Budnick, projects director for Transportation Alternatives - the advocacy group that has pushed hardest for this and other bicycle paths - applauds the new route, but hastily underscores Bloomberg's use of the word "interim" to describe it. Though most of the new sections are safe and easy to navigate, there are significant portions of the trek that Budnick says need serious work - and money - to make them safe for novice riders and children. Bloomberg admitted at the opening ceremony that the stretch around Battery Park is dicey, and scheduled for immediate upgrade.

Still, it's a ride that in toto for ace bikers, and in parts for novices, can be a joyous experience. We finished with smiles and a sense of elation in discovering aspects of Manhattan we'd never imagined, including sections that felt like country lanes.

Bikers ought to grab the few remaining weekend days of autumn to do the circumnavigation - which can be done in either direction, starting at any point. (Greenway maps are available at two spots along the circuit, or in advance via a phone call or the Internet.)

Along the Hudson, from the Ground Zero area all the way to West 77th Street, there is now a continuous, paved, two-lane bicycle path running between waterfront parks and the streets. The entire length is spotted with parks and recreational activities, and is easily accessible from cross streets and subways. This is the most user-friendly, novice-accessible stretch, but it suffers from serious tension between cyclists and pedestrians, despite clear signs and path markings indicating the location of a separate pedestrian strollway. Among the worst spots: near the heavily touristed Chelsea Piers and the USS Intrepid, and around the 79th Street Marina and Boathouse Café (where barricades force cyclists to slow to a crawl).

A little past the marina the bike path leaves the water, ascending to palisade level in Riverside Park, a lovely stretch of gardens and boulevard-width shared bike/pedestrian paths. At 96th Street, bikers descend back to the water level, meandering through a pleasant Morningside Heights expanse of lawn and cherry trees that stretches serenely to 125th Street.

A Hudson River power plant at 125th Street forces an unsightly detour up to 12th Avenue, under the Henry Hudson Parkway and onto an abandoned road. But at 135th Street the road turns into the most magnificent 4-mile stretch of the entire ride. The family- and novice-friendly path diverts into a short stretch of arbored lane paralleling Amtrak's rails. This is a surprisingly peaceful spot that feels like a tree-lined country lane - except, of course, when a train passes.

When the path returns to the waterside, it winds along Harlem's edge toward the George Washington Bridge through a park filled with anglers, picnickers and strollers. Sailboats drift by, and glistening sun sparkles on the Hudson. The bridge forms a majestic demarcation between the urban section of the river and the rural waterway that promises to reveal itself further to the north. The river deepens here, and both shorelines rise in sharp palisades, lined with trees and draping shrubbery. Under the bridge sits the Little Red Lighthouse, built in 1880 - an excellent spot for a picnic break.

The path then ascends a small but steep hill to the palisade level, where the panorama of the Hudson forms a dramatic view all the way up to 201st Street. Shortly before the Cloisters and Fort Tyron Park we paused to take in the vista from the Grecian Temple, a row of Ionic columns erected along Riverside Drive in 1925.

At the top of the Cloisters the bike path descends and hits a long staircase, leaving the views behind and heading into Washington Heights traffic. But it was light enough to allow us to safely dodge double- parked vehicles that, here and there, blocked the bike lane.

An easily overlooked sign (we missed it on our first ride) points the way to the Harlem River Speedway bike path, which we had nearly to ourselves for the full two miles. As is the case with other neighborhoods on the bike ride, the Harlem River section has been utterly transformed. It is a beautiful spot, particularly as arced street bridges spanning the river form concentric semi-circles that frame the distant skyscrapers of midtown.

The Harlem River ride, sadly, ends abruptly at a chain-link fence. We had to find our way across a busy intersection. But soon we were relaxed again, traveling along the periphery of St. Nicholas Park in well-painted street bike lanes, taking us through Central Harlem to 120th Street, and then across town to the East River.

At 120th Street, the path takes a pedestrian bridge to the East River Esplanade, for a lovely ride to Carl Schurz Park at East 84th Street. (Below 100th Street, where bicyclists again have to deal with strollers, hexagonal concrete tiles on the path bump hard on a biker's spine, so you have no choice but to slow way down.) At 84th Street, the path ends abruptly, and cyclists must carry their bikes up or down a steep staircase.

At 63rd Street the path stops again, and cyclists must maneuver a bridge over the FDR and head for busy Second Avenue. From 63rd to 38th Street, bikers must ride on the avenue without benefit of painted-out lanes. This is clearly the most dangerous section of the trip, filled with speeding cabs and fleets of buses. Only experienced city riders should attempt it. (Budnick says the city has a plan for continuing the bike path along the East River, past the United Nations. But until negotiations are completed with the UN, and money can be found to meet its concerns about security, bikers and pedestrians are forbidden access to the riverfront for that mile-and-a-half span.)

Riders are supposed to turn off Second Avenue onto 38th Street, make their way past cars headed to the Midtown Tunnel, and navigate under the FDR Drive until the route opens onto a pretty East River stretch below 37th Street. There's another tricky maneuver around 23rd Street, then about a quarter mile of lovely waterfront.