The Lakefront Trail at the Hour the Runners Own It

The Lakefront Trail at the Hour the Runners Own It

The Lakefront Trail runs 18.5 miles along Lake Michigan from Ardmore Avenue on the north side to 71st Street on the south, and it is Chicago's greatest public asset — a continuous ribbon of pavement, parkland, and beach that gives every neighborhood it touches a front yard the size of an ocean. I start at North Avenue Beach at six in the morning, when the runners have the path and the lake is so flat and silver it looks like the city was built on the edge of a mirror.

Running south, the skyline assembles itself on your left — first the Gold Coast towers, then the John Hancock (Chicagoans refuse the new name) needling the sky, then the full downtown cluster hitting you at Oak Street Beach with a density of architecture that makes your breath catch for reasons that have nothing to do with the run. The trail separates walkers and cyclists (thank the city), and the etiquette is Chicago-blunt: stay right, pass left, don't stop in the lane.

At Monroe Harbor, the sailboats rock in their slips and the Buckingham Fountain throws water 150 feet in the air with the showmanship of a city that doesn't do subtle. South of the fountain, the trail passes the Field Museum and Shedd Aquarium and enters Promontory Point on the south side, a limestone headland that juts into the lake and provides the best skyline view in Chicago — north, across five miles of water, the buildings stacked like a mountain range that someone lit from within.

Best season: October, when the humidity breaks and the lake turns from summer-green to autumn-blue and the light on the skyline goes gold at five o'clock. Summer is glorious but crowded. Winter belongs to the brave — the lake throws waves over the path and the wind coming off the water makes your face feel like a statement about endurance. Spring is mud and hope, and Chicagoans know the difference between the two is mostly attitude.