How many Saturday mornings did you turn back at the fig roots past Cartagena Park because another ten minutes of jolting over broken pavement wasn't worth it? If you ride or walk the stretch of Old Cutler Trail that starts a few blocks from your front door in South Gables, you've made that call before. For years, the section right where the trail leaves the traffic circle at Sunset Drive, Old Cutler Road and LeJeune Road has been the part locals warned newcomers about. A recent rider report suggests that may have changed.
That circle, the one where three roads converge just outside South Gables, is officially Ingraham Terrace Park, and it's the northern trailhead for what Miami-Dade Parks designates as the paved four-mile core of Old Cutler Trail, running from the circle down to Pinecrest Gardens. Riders who keep going often treat it as the start of an eleven-mile run that continues past Pinecrest into the Biscayne Trail toward Black Point Marina. Either way, this circle is the first pedal stroke, and for a long time it was also the roughest one.
What Actually Broke, and What Got Fixed
The complaint shows up across a decade of trail reviews on TrailLink, AllTrails and Tripadvisor, and it's always the same one: banyan and ficus roots have pushed up through the asphalt for years, especially near the northern end, turning a leisurely ride into something you had to brace for. One Tripadvisor reviewer summed up the trade-off locals have made for years, noting the trail passes through beautiful neighborhoods but "for such nice neighborhoods one rolls down, the trail needs maintenance." Another called the pavement quality outright poor. It wasn't a rumor. It was the trail's reputation.
A 2026 review on Tripadvisor tells a different story now:
"It seems like they repaved the route recently and roots are not a problem anymore."
That's a small sentence carrying a lot of weight if you've been avoiding this stretch. The same reviewer noted the shade from the banyan canopy still holds and the breeze off the bay is still there, which suggests the repaving addressed the pavement without touching the reasons people liked the trail in the first place.
The Stretch You Can Now Do Without Stopping
Leaving Ingraham Terrace Park heading south, the trail runs past Cartagena Park at 401 Sunset Drive and Cartagena Plaza at 6999 Old Cutler Road, both inside the neighborhood boundary. The city has also been working on a pedestrian bridge connecting Cartagena Park to Ingraham Park, part of ongoing public works upgrades along this corridor. It's a small piece of infrastructure, but it matters if you're walking a dog or pushing a stroller between the two green spaces rather than riding the road shoulder to get there.
Keep going and the trail runs through Matheson Hammock Park at 9610 Old Cutler Road, a 630-acre county park built around a man-made atoll pool that fills naturally with the tide from Biscayne Bay. There's a snack bar, boat slips, and Redfish, the restaurant housed in the park's historic coral-rock building, if you want a reason to stop rather than just pass through. From there the trail continues past Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, an 83-acre collection of tropical plants and trees where an entrance fee applies if you want to go inside rather than just admire the tree line from the path.
None of this is new information about what exists along Old Cutler Road. What may be new is a smoother ride over this ground than earlier reviewers described.
The Rides You're Not Finding on Your Own
Bike Walk Coral Gables, the nonprofit that advocates for cyclists and pedestrians across the city, runs monthly guided rides in partnership with the Coral Gables Museum, and they start right at the museum rather than at the trail itself. Tours begin at 10 a.m., run two to three hours, and cost ten dollars, with a five dollar rate for museum members, Bike Walk members, city employees and children under twelve. Riders need to bring their own bike.
The themes rotate. One recent tour traced the historic bridle paths and stables that once ran through the city, including a stop at the Gables Riding Academy across from the museum. Another followed the entrances George Merrick built into his original master plan, led by a former city commissioner who knows the political history behind them. There's a springtime ride built around the Royal Poinciana bloom, and a Halloween-timed walk through Pinewood Cemetery, the oldest cemetery south of the Miami River, with costumes encouraged. None of these routes require you to already own a fast bike or know the city's back streets. They're built for people who live here and want a different reason to get outside on a weekend morning, which is a different kind of value than a repaved trail, even if both point in the same direction.
What This Actually Changes
The change reported here is narrow, and it concerns the surface. A recent rider says the roots are no longer a problem, and that is the only account of the repaving I found, with no official announcement to back it up. If your last ride down this stretch was rough enough to remember, the first mile from the circle is an easy way to see how the pavement holds up for yourself, and how it compares with what earlier reviewers described.
If you've been meaning to take the bike out again, the first mile from the circle is an easy place to start.
South Gables residents who want a sense of what else is shifting in the neighborhood, from park projects to the streets around them, are welcome to reach out to Renier Casanova, who rides this same stretch of Old Cutler and is always glad to talk through what's changing here, no agenda attached.
