I've been riding Ogden to 26th to Riverside repeatedly over the years. Always on weekend mornings and the ride is generally enjoyable.
Yesterday afternoon was the first time I tried it inbound and it was a complete CF.
26th was bumper to bumper traffic, I really didn't like turning from 26th to Ogden, and Ogden inbound feels less safe than outbound (I knew that from previous rides)
Any thoughts on alternative routes from Riverside into the city?
Thanks!
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I often head north through Berwyn and Oak Park, e.g., Longcommon/Riverside, cross 26th, north on Home, pedestrian bridge across I-290, east on South along the L, north on Ridgeland, east on Diversey / Belmont / Addison / Montrose.
Ditto. Or some variation. You can use Wrightwood east bound from Narragansett all the way to Logan Square.
You may already have considered and rejected this idea, but what about taking Washington out to Oak Park and then winding your way to Riverside from there? I seem to recall biking from Oak Park to the Brookfield Zoo once, much of it on quiet residential streets.
I've sometimes used Ogden for the start of the trip, then California south to 31st, and 31st to Central or Ogden (less busy there) or Austin. 31st is interrupted by a rail yard west of Austin and continues again west of Ridgeland.
If you take 31st to Ogden to Oak Park, you can do a quick right-left and get onto 32nd, which has a stoplight (beg button) to cross Harlem and becomes Addison on the Riverside side of the border.
If you want to avoid 26th street entirely, you can take Desplaines north. However, Desplaines north of Cermak has fast moving traffic, although there is a sidewalk now. Then, a half mile north of Cermak go right on Greenburg. Go around the cemetery to 16th street and take that east of Harlem. From there, you can take any number of streets thru Berwyn/Oak Park/Cicero/Chicago.
Or take 26th to Riverside Dr to Cermak to East, north on East.
There are a number of routes into Chicago - 16th/18th, Jackson, Washington, Lake, Augusta, Bloomingdale/Armitage, Wrightwood, etc. I've taken all of these except 16th/18th.
I should have been a little clearer, in that I want to end up on the north side.
So I went with djm and Jared's suggestions and came up with this:
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