For 50 years, Northern Colorado had one big goal. We wanted to build a single paved trail that connected our communities along the Poudre River. The plan was to link the foothills above Fort Collins all the way out to Greeley. It happened a little at a time. A mile here. A mile there. One gap closing, then the next.
As of today, it is done.
The Poudre River Trail is now 45 miles of continuous, paved trail. You can start in Bellvue, northwest of Fort Collins, and ride, walk, or run all the way to Greeley without ever leaving the path. On Saturday, June 13, 2026, the community is held a free public celebration called “Connecting Communities” to mark the moment.
This is a big deal. And if you are thinking about moving to Northern Colorado, it matters more than you might think. It affects where you may want to live, what your home could be worth, and what your daily life looks like out here.
What Just Happened
The trail runs from Bellvue to Greeley, and the numbers behind it are impressive.
About 18 miles sit inside Fort Collins and are managed by the city. The other 27 miles or so run through Larimer County, Timnath, Windsor, Weld County, and Greeley. No single city built this on its own. It took all of them working together for decades.
The timeline tells you a lot about how this region works. Fort Collins closed its final two gaps at the end of 2024. That made it possible to travel without stopping from Bellvue all the way to Timnath. Then Larimer County finished the last stretch, between Timnath and Windsor, in spring 2026. That was the final piece. Now the whole thing connects.
What a Trail Like This Is Really Worth
It is easy to look at a paved path and forget it is a serious piece of infrastructure. Let me put some real numbers on it, because the value here is bigger than most people guess.
Paved trails are not cheap to build. In Colorado, recent multi-use trail projects have run anywhere from about $800,000 to $2.2 million per mile. The price swings based on the terrain, the engineering, and how many bridges and road crossings are involved. The Poudre River Trail has plenty of those. The final stretch alone, the piece between Timnath and Windsor, cost about $2.4 million and included a new bridge over a canal.
Now do the math on the whole thing. At 45 miles, even at the low end of that range, you are looking at a trail network worth tens of millions of dollars to build in today’s money. Think of it like a road or a bridge. It is public infrastructure that took decades and a lot of careful funding to put together.
Here is the part I really like, though. Most of that money did not come out of your property taxes. A big share came from Great Outdoors Colorado, which is funded by Colorado Lottery proceeds, along with grants from Colorado Parks and Wildlife and the state transportation department. In other words, a 45-mile asset got built for the community largely through lottery dollars and grants, not by raising the taxes on your home. That is a rare kind of win.
And people use it. The Poudre River Trail sees around 300,000 visits a year. That is not a quiet path in the woods. That is a heavily used public resource that connects five communities.
How It All Connects
The Poudre River Trail is the spine of the system. But it links up with a lot more.
Fort Collins has about 46 miles of its own paved trail, on top of the regional route. The Spring Creek, Fossil Creek, Power, and Mason trails all tie together inside the city. So the regional trail sits on top of a dense local web.
People ask me all the time how connected Fort Collins and Loveland really are. Here is the answer. A path called the Long View Trail was built to link the two cities. It is 4.4 miles long and 10 feet wide, and it connects Fort Collins to Loveland’s trail system. Once you are in Loveland, you are on a system of about 32 miles of paved trail, including a finished 21-mile loop around the city.
So in practice, you can string together Fort Collins trails, the Long View connector, and the Loveland loop and put together something close to 50 or 60 miles of mostly off-road riding between the two cities. I want to be honest that the exact number depends on your route, and a few short stretches run along streets. But people do this ride, and it is a great one.
Windsor is no slouch either. The town has more than 40 miles of trails, though that figure mixes paved paths with soft-surface ones. The Poudre River Trail runs right through Windsor, so you can hop off the main route and onto the local network. Greeley anchors the east end, where the trail reaches Island Grove Regional Park and ties into a growing local system.
Step back and look at the whole picture. Four cities. One river. A connected paved network that lets you move between communities under your own power. Not many places in the country can say that. It is a Northern Colorado thing, and it is a big reason people fall in love with living here.
What This Means for Buyers and Sellers
Let me put on my realtor hat for a minute.
So what does that value mean for you as a homeowner? Quite a bit. Study after study has found that homes near trails tend to sell for more. The most common finding is a price bump of about 3% to 5% near a quality trail, and in some markets the premium has reached 10% or higher. On a typical Northern Colorado home, even a few percent is real money. You are not paying for the trail, but you may benefit from it every time you sell.
If you are a buyer, trail access is one of the most requested features I see. People move here for the outdoor lifestyle, and “can I bike to town from this house” is a real question. Now that the regional trail is complete, being near any connected piece of it means being near the whole system. When you are house hunting, pull up the trail map next to the listings. A home near a trail has a lifestyle feature built right in. You can remodel a kitchen later. You cannot move a house next to a trail.
If you are a seller, this is a selling point worth leaning into. If your home sits near a trail link, that is a headline, not a footnote. Right now, with the trail freshly complete and getting local attention, buyers respond to that story.
Trail access is almost always a plus. But think about the specific lot. Some buyers want to back right up to the trail. Others want to be a block away for a little more privacy, since there can be foot and bike traffic behind the house. For most people that is a feature, not a problem. Just know yourself. And before you commit, go walk or bike the trail near the home at different times of day. See how it feels.
Where This Is Headed
The 45-mile finish line is really a milestone, not an ending. Every city out here is planning to build more.
Fort Collins adopted its 2025 Strategic Trails Plan. It calls for more than 71 new miles of trail, which would grow the city’s system to about 117 miles at full buildout, with a horizon around 2050. It also plans 35 new crossings that let you pass under or over busy roads without stopping. One goal I love: building the network so that nearly every kid in the city could one day walk or bike to school on a trail.
Greeley adopted its own updated Trails Master Plan in March 2025, its first update since 2002. It includes about 16 miles of top-priority trails for the next decade. Loveland’s 2023 plan found that more trails were the number one amenity residents asked for, at 61%, and the city keeps adding both paved connectors and new natural-surface trails. Windsor took a different path, voting in 2022 to preserve about 1,300 acres of open space, with trails growing on that land over time.
Add it all up and the message is clear. Every one of these communities looked at what people want and said: more trails.
So if you buy near a trail today, or even near a planned route on one of these maps, you are buying into something that should only get more connected and more valuable over time.
Thinking About a Move?
The trail-connected lifestyle is a huge part of why people move to Northern Colorado, and helping people find that is exactly what I do. If that sounds like you, reach out. I would love to help you find the right community, the right neighborhood, and yes, the right trail access.
And if you already live here, do yourself a favor this summer. Go ride the whole thing. Maybe I will see you out there.