In September, the City of Winston-Salem announced the Winston-Salem Area Greenway Guide, a free online resource from the Winston-Salem Area Transportation Planning Organization and Piedmont Legacy Trails. It covers 19 greenways and trail segments across Winston-Salem, Kernersville, Clemmons and Bermuda Run, with more than 30 miles of trail in total. Across those entries, one trail holds the others together.
That trail is the Salem Creek Greenway. The guide calls it "a central spine of the city's trail network." The Salem Lake Trail, the Strollway, the Long Branch Trail and the Peachtree Greenway all connect to it. If you walk Salem Lake on Saturdays and someone else walks the Innovation Quarter at lunch, you're both on branches of the same 5.2-mile paved path. That changes the longest walk you can take this fall, the spots where that walk can get cut off, and where the network grows next.
One spine, several branches
Here's how the downtown-side trails fit together, using the guide's own figures.
| Trail | Length | Surface | How it connects | Restrooms per the guide |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Salem Creek Greenway | 5.2 miles | Paved | The spine itself | At each adjoining park |
| Salem Lake Trail | 7-mile loop | Unpaved, crushed limestone | Meets Salem Creek at Salem Lake Park | Salem Lake Park |
| The Strollway | 1.2 miles | Partially paved | Ties Salem Creek to downtown and Old Salem | Old Salem Visitor's Center |
| Twin City Trail | 0.9 miles | Paved | Branches off the Strollway toward West End | Truist Stadium and downtown spots |
| Long Branch Trail | 1.6 miles | Paved | Joins Salem Creek from the Innovation Quarter | Private restrooms at businesses along the trail |
Parking follows the same pattern. The guide lists four public lots for Salem Creek: Marketplace Mall at 2101 Peters Creek Parkway, Washington Park at 1490 S. Broad Street, Reynolds Park at 2450 Reynolds Park Road, and Salem Lake Park at 1001 Salem Lake Road or 230 Linville Road. For the downtown branches, the guide points you to decks. The Strollway entrances are at Old Salem Museums & Gardens, 900 Old Salem Road, and the Liberty Plaza Parking Deck, 235 Town Run Lane. Any of the Salem Creek lots can start a trip onto three or four different trails.
The long walk the map makes possible
The guide never lays out one end-to-end route. It does describe each connection, so you can piece one together yourself. Here's a chain that stays on trail from the lake to the West End edge of downtown:
- Start at Salem Lake Park. Do as much of the 7-mile limestone loop as you like before heading onto the pavement. Per the guide, the Salem Lake Trail connects to the Salem Creek Greenway.
- Follow Salem Creek west. The guide describes it as mostly flat with a few hills, running through wooded stretches with creek views and connecting to Reynolds, Central, Happy Hill and Washington parks, plus Gateway Nature Preserve.
- Turn north onto the Strollway. Past the Heritage Bridge, a timber covered bridge built in the style the area's Moravian settlers used, which marks the way into the Old Salem visitor center. The northern end crosses the Strollway Pedestrian Bridge, which the guide says was recorded as the first land bridge in North Carolina. It's lined with ornamental trees and native plants above the highway.
- Take the Twin City Trail west. It starts on a pedestrian bridge off the Strollway, runs under Salem Parkway, and passes S. Broad Street and the award-winning Green Street Pedestrian Bridge. From there it goes by Truist Stadium and currently ends in the residential area on West Fourth Street.
The Long Branch Trail is the other way to leave the spine. It follows Research Parkway along an old railroad line from Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and runs through the Innovation Quarter to Salem Creek, with street access at MLK, 7th, 4th, 3rd and Research Parkway. According to the Innovation Quarter, Park Deli, one of the district's lunch spots, added an espresso menu in May 2026.
The Twin City Trail is still new to most people. Winston-Salem's transportation department held its ribbon-cutting on August 28, 2025, as WFDD reported via BPR. Before the community naming campaign, it was called the Salem Parkway Multi-Use Path. If your sense of the network dates from before that summer, the downtown-to-West End link is the piece you haven't walked yet.
The trails that stand on their own, and two October dates on them
Some of the 19 entries are separate systems. You'll need to drive to them, and the fall calendar puts events on a couple of them.
The Bethabara Greenway runs 2.7 miles, partly paved, with parking at Historic Bethabara Park. It connects Reynolda Commons, nearby neighborhoods, the park's trails and the historic sites. Visit Winston-Salem's October events guide lists Boo! at Bethabara for Saturday, Oct. 24, from 1:30 to 4:30 p.m.
The Village Point Greenway in Clemmons is 0.7 miles and paved. It has limited accessible parking at Village Point Lake and more at the Medical Center, and it links the lake with Morgan Elementary and Novant Medical Center. The same events guide lists the Monster Dash & Goblin Hop there on Sunday, Oct. 18.
Back at Salem Lake, the city's October 8 notice says the Salem Lake Nature Center at 815 Salem Lake Road houses more than 20 native species, including snakes, lizards, turtles, frogs, toads and fish. It's open whenever the park is: 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. on weekdays and 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on weekends. If you start the long walk from Salem Lake, the Nature Center is right at the trailhead.
Where the spine itself gets interrupted
Since so many routes pass through Salem Creek, a problem on the spine affects more than one trail. The city's feasibility study puts the weak spot just north of Reynolds Park Golf Course, near the greenway's eastern end. Water often flows over the path at a low point there, and even minor flooding can reach the route. The city describes "recurring flooding and periodic closures" at that section. On the route above, that section sits between Salem Lake and the rest of the spine.
The fix is a long way off. The study's published schedule puts alternatives and a public meeting in October 2026 and a final feasibility report in February 2027. Design is expected in 2028–2029, depending on funding, with construction anticipated in 2030.
The October step is coming up soon. The city is holding a drop-in open house for the Salem Creek Greenway Low Water Crossing Feasibility Study on Wednesday, Oct. 21, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Salem Lake Marina, 815 Salem Lake Road. You can review the study findings, see the recommended options and comment on the proposed path. There's also an online project page and survey.
Where the network grows next
Every extension now in planning stretches one of the branches further out from the spine.
Long Branch Trail, heading north. The June 2026 guide describes a future 1.2-mile extension across Martin Luther King Jr. Drive to 25th Street near Blum/Blanding Park. Back in 2024, the Go-To Winston-Salem reported the design contract and an $8.6 million budget, and projected completion for late 2026. The city's September release already treats 25th Street as the starting point for Phase 3. That phase is a feasibility study of routes toward The Grounds development, Wake Forest athletics facilities, the Winston-Salem Fairgrounds, Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum and the Intergenerational Center. We haven't found a public opening announcement for the segment north of MLK, so check the city's project updates before you plan a walk up there. The Phase 3 project page collects feedback for a final feasibility report and lists no construction date.
Twin City Trail, heading west. The plan is to extend it from West Fourth Street to Lockland Avenue, connecting toward Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center. As of a June 2025 update from the Go-To Winston-Salem, that phase was in design, with construction expected to begin in 2027. The first phase cost $5 million, and city officials described it as the start of a larger effort to connect downtown to the medical center.
The Piedmont Greenway, heading east. The guide shows a planned 1.3-mile paved segment from Salem Lake, under Salem Parkway, to East Forsyth High School in Kernersville, with public parking at the Salem Lake trailhead. It's listed as planned, not open.
Liam Bowman, the bicycle and pedestrian coordinator at the Winston-Salem Area Transportation Planning Organization, said in the city's release that the guide puts "everything from trail distance and surface to parking and connections" in one place. Long Branch heads north, Twin City heads west, the Piedmont Greenway heads east from Salem Lake, and the one fix on the calendar is on the Salem Creek spine itself, just north of Reynolds Park Golf Course.
Most of what Melanie Pipes does is help Triad families make sense of a place before they move there. Sometimes that means telling you which trailhead sits closest to the street you're considering, and which segments the city still lists as planned. If you're weighing a move within Winston-Salem and want a straight answer on what's actually open near a particular home, schedule a free consultation and we'll go through it together.
