by Larry Lagarde

Yesterday, the Mercury News reported that several new segments of bike trails in Silicon Valley have recently been opened. Last week, it was a short section of the Stevens Creek Trail that straddles Mountain View and Sunnyvale. The week before that it was sections of the Guadalupe River Park Trail in San Jose. On top of that, add segments of the Los Gatos Creek Trail that opened in San Jose last year as well as a new segment of the Los Gatos opening this summer and it's easy to see that Silicon Valley cyclists have good reasons to be excited. (Map right: bike trails in Silicon Valley - Mercury News)

Although all of the above new segments only amount to a few miles of paved trail, the fact that the construction occured at all says quite a lot. Real estate is very expensive in Silicon Valley and paved trails can easily cost $500K per mile in areas where land is much cheaper.

Mercury News: "Valley's bike-trail network grows with new tunnel in Mountain View"
http://origin.mercurynews.com/valley/ci_8910062?nclick_check=1