The Oakwood Bikeway, a self-guided tour on the streets of the city, has been revived.  The Dayton Cycling Club was instrumental in getting bikeway signs erected in a number of communities sometime in the 1960s. Over the years the Oakwood signs have been stolen or new poles erected and the signs not transferred.  Newly designed signs were installed the first week of October, 2011, retaining the old route with a couple of tweaks.

Oakwood City Manager, Norbert Klopsch, oversaw the design and placement of the new signs.  The route’s official start/end is at the tennis court parking lot, behind the Oakwood Community Center on Collingwood Ave. The old route followed Thruston Blvd. to Acorn Drive but the new signage directs cyclists straight down Collingwood. The 5.4 mile route takes cyclists on both the “grid-style” east side streets and the more “organic,” winding west side, past a variety of homes and estates that make up the city. Sites include the Oakwood City building, the Wrights’ Hawthorn Hill mansion, the junior/senior high school and Hills & Dales Park. It also passes near Wright Library and Smith and Harman Elementary schools, each of which is a short detour off the way. The original route passed Smith School on Shafor Blvd. then turned left on Telford to Hathaway Rd.; the new route directs riders down Forrer Blvd. to Hathaway, avoiding the sometimes busy Shafor traffic and a left turn that could be difficult with children or a group of cyclists.

The city is in the process of creating a map, which should be available by the end of the year.  A brochure, which will contain information about some of the homes and features along the route, is also planned.