TheUnderground Railroad Bicycle Route is a 2,000-mile bicycle touring route fromMobile, Alabama, toOwen Sound,Ontario. It was developed byAdventure Cycling Association with the Center for Minority Health (now called theCenter for Health Equity) at theUniversity of Pittsburgh.[1] The route was built to loosely follow theUnderground Railroad, the network of paths thatAfrican American slaves used to escape to theNorthern United States andCanada.[2]
The route begins on the shores of theGulf Coast of the United States inMobile, Alabama, where the lastslave ship to bring slaves to the United States docked in 1860.[3] Cyclists thenfollow the Drinking Gourd north, with stops to visit historicUnderground Railroad sites like museums and safe houses. Since its development in 2007, the original route has been augmented by spurs toPittsburgh, Pennsylvania andCincinnati, Ohio, and an alternate route throughDetroit, Michigan. The endpoint isOwen Sound, Ontario, "the Underground Railroad's most northerly safe haven."[3]
The route varies from flat farmlands and rolling hills inAlabama andMississippi to steep climbs and descents inTennessee,Kentucky, andIndiana.[4] The route is mostly rural aside from the spurs into Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, and the alternate route through Detroit.
