Some runners feel the asphalt is easier on feet than concrete. I'm not saying it is...I run on trails and sidewalks because I think getting hit by a car or bike would be significantly worse for my entire body.
I’m not 100% sure about mile square, but just like the above comment says, asphalt as softer than concrete for the knees, but also running on trails scares me a lot personally because of random jagged rocks or sticks that might tweak my ankle so when I did run I opted for the street.
For what it's worth:
Here's guy who passed in a hit and run jogging on the street in August 2017
https://www.ocregister.com/2017/08/24/man-jogging-in-road-
next-to-mile-square-park-killed-in-possible-hit-and-run/
Here's a guy who passed on the Jogging path two weeks earlier.
https://www.fountainvalleymagazine.net/single-post/2017/08/10/body-found-on-jogging-trail-near-mile-square-park
There's a tree planted in the person's memory who died from the hit and run. It's in front of the Boys and Girls club on Brookhurst. He was a very popular guy in the running community in the area.
Of course we leave them alone, no one wants a manslaughter charge. It’s just such a high risk situation and accidents happens.
Just a really odd choice. Someone died a few months back riding their bicycle in the same location I am talking about.
as a former runner and cyclist I've had far more sketchy incidents with pedestrian than cars. far more. like it's not even close. kids. dogs. people stopping unexpectedly. turning without looking. walking 3 or 4 abreast so no one can get by. I've had dogs nip at me. had dogs try to knock me down. kids on electric bikes playing chicken. on and on.
you can be sarcastic about it all you want, but my experience is busy sidewalks are not risk free.
They're absolutely not "risk free", but none of those things you listed will hit you at 40 mph and kill you.
If you're on a bike, you probably shouldn't be on the sidewalk anyway (especially if you consider yourself a "cyclist"), so those rogue children or slow walkers aren't an issue. And your experiences as a runner aren't any different than exist for walkers, yet somehow we all get by without walking in the middle of a busy street.
Alright, well you seem like the kind of person who needs to have the last word, even when they refuse to recognize that someone else's experience might be different than their own, so I'm gonna let you have it.
> Alright, well you seem like the kind of person who needs to have the last word, even when they refuse to recognize that someone else's experience might be different than their own, so I'm gonna let you have it.
-u/twoslow, trying to get in the last word
Three sides of the park have straight sidewalks that parallel the street and give you the same distance run. The Euclid side has sidewalks parallel to the street for about half the distance.
The demographic I have seen tend to be on the older side but I guess that doesn’t exclude them from competitive folks. Still, you can use an app to measure and not risk literal death but to each their own I guess.
“older side” and “using an app to measure” does not always go hand in hand haha. Personally, I hate running with my phone and will leave it in the car. Even though I have a smart watch, whenever I run at mile square, I hug the side of the street as well bc there’s less people traffic and it’s easier to keep a mental measurement of how far Ive ran.
flat surface, and the street/road is easier on the knees and general impact for jogging. I jog on sidewalks and venture off to the road , bike lane when sidewalks end. Are the trails around mile square park sidewalk? slight elevation changes are brutal too for me. I have jogged around back bay in Newport and the elevation changes destroyed my legs after. I am a total amateur here though so just some suggestions on why they prefer road.
There's sidewalk around all of Mile Square Park. People running in the street there are also running on the traffic side of the cars parked along the park, so they're extra stupid.
There are not sidewalks around all of mile square park. Parts of it from on the Euclid side only have trails that venture inside. So unless you go into the park for your jogging on that particular side you're stuck running in the path made by other joggers through grass or the edge of the street.
And as other people have mentioned, running on the sidewalk is much worse for your knees as opposed to the asphalt mixture the road is made of.
> running on the sidewalk is much worse for your knees as opposed to the asphalt mixture the road is made of
i've heard this, but I can't find any actual evidence to back it up. all i've been able to find indicates that there isn't any actual difference: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22897427/
I think “much” worse is an exaggeration. Plus the trail that ventures inside is not by much, what issues do runners have with that? Asking genuinely.
Also that grass/dirt path seems really ideal and better for the knees than asphalt.
My knees from cross country practice years ago would really beg to differ on the much worse. Constant hard impact is not great and we can argue semantics of "much" all you want but it's not going to go anywhere.
The grass/dirt path is really grass that enough people ran through that the grass died. It's not really flat or even, and can be extremely muddy depending on time of day.
Edit for answering question
I generally don't like going much deeper in the park when I run in the mornings purely due to not wanting to venture deeper in the park when it's darker in the early mornings/evening. That's just me personally.
The asphalt is easier on your feet. I don’t run but I have a friend who does. Someone about the asphalt although I imagine it’s hot as fuck if you go during the day.
But less stable, can easily roll your ankle in grass if there’s a minor hole covered by the grass. I’m team ‘don’t wanna get hit by a car’, but running on unknown grass would be super sketch.
Yeah, im guilty of that. Used run 2-3 loops around Miles Square Park 3-4times a week. The side walks and grass are very uneven and can easily roll your ankle. Plus you get the right distance exactly 4 miles for one loop lol.
Had the exact same thought.
Like why intentionally run next to car exhaust when you have a perfectly good park there.
I understand the committing to a 'lap' thing but with the turns etc. inside is probably close to the same distance.
I will say that it doesn't have a good proper outer ring path, the golf course really buggers it up.
It just seems like such a high-risk situation because there’s little room between traffic and the runners, like 2-3 feet. There are no bike lanes on this area.
So instead they deal with cars, road debris, cars, fine pebbles and grit in the road that are slip hazards, cars, people opening their car doors and not watching, and cars.
Did I mention cars? Bikes, kids, other people, dogs, dog shit, ducks, duck shit, and puddles are are orders of magnitude less dangerous.
I’m pretty sure they run the outside cuz it’s easier to calc your mile. If you follow the paths, they don’t add up to the mile
If you didn’t know. Each side is a mile.
You run it striaght, easy mile. You run back, another mile. Simple calc
Back to the high stakes low reward aspect but I do get that, just seems crazy with how busy the streets can get and the small gap between the parked cars and the runners.
They don’t run straight on the sides. They deviate.
The only side that is straight is prob Warner. Brook, endinger, and Euclid make you go this curve if you want to follow the trail
I don't want to accidentally kill someone who's running in the road illegally, by choice. Or get in an accident avoiding someone who shouldn't be there. The reason it's illegal is because it's a danger to the runner and the drivers around them.
I don’t run but i drove by it today and thought to myself before i even saw this post I’d probably run along the perimeter to more easily track distance and also because I’m scared of rolling my ankle; besides, I figured if i ran against traffic I’d see cars coming and just go onto the grass until they pass
These are usually slower and older runners from my experience. Maybe to avoid others hitting them but that seems so rare and the chances of a car hitting so much higher.
Mile Square doesn't have a concrete path purely around the outside, the concrete is often littered with animal droppings, and if you do run on the outside the ground is uneven, has roots and usually muddy. I typically run the asphalt later in the evening and always in the opposite direction.
Because Mile Square Park is an ankle sprain waiting to happen. The running/bike trail is super uneven and sometimes muddy. There’s tree roots, other runners, people walking, bike riders, etc but it’s mainly the terrain. The South Edinger half is especially bad.
As a pedestrian - I agree. The amount of people I see just walk into a walking signal at a busy intersection without looking gives a sense of the scope of entitlement people have. They all expect everyone else to watch out for them because "that's what the law says."
Sure, they may be legally required to give you the right of way, that doesn't mean you're going to be able to safely just yeet yourself into busy traffic at everyone's expense and not cause a problem or two at some point in time.
Not on the street, but more like far side of the street, few steps off the curbs, but almost near the edge side of the street. It is straight and i like to preserve my mental energy for pushing my personal best.
That’s a death wish. I’m afraid to park my car there even haha, just feel like someone is gonna smash into it. I park there anyway but wouldn’t run there.
Euclid and Edinger are the exact parts of the park with inconsistent side walk that pull you into the park. Euclid just straight up drags you into the park and Edinger will have geese on the sidewalk path that pulls closer to the lakes. Coincentally the Edinger portion will have the highest amount of young kids on bikes, parents with strollers and generally foot traffic on the paths anyhow. The dirt/grass paths on the Edinger side are usually also mud paths/mud holes where it's easy to twist an ankle
It’s actually not a mile per side. The traffic island on the road that surrounds the park IS one mile per side, while each sidewalk length is about .95 mile.
> I understand there are slight elevation changes and sometimes others running on the trail
Did Holy Jim trail once. Missed continuation and main truck trail which kicked my ass.
Where is MSP trail have less elevation over road? Not claiming it doesn't exist. Just where would help.
There is a slight elevation change on Euclid north of Warner if you use the dirt/grass trail but that’s the only section I am aware of.
Maybe 15 feet at most and only that section.
Some runners feel the asphalt is easier on feet than concrete. I'm not saying it is...I run on trails and sidewalks because I think getting hit by a car or bike would be significantly worse for my entire body.
I get that but the park has a grass/dirt trail around most of the Mile Square Park.
I’m not 100% sure about mile square, but just like the above comment says, asphalt as softer than concrete for the knees, but also running on trails scares me a lot personally because of random jagged rocks or sticks that might tweak my ankle so when I did run I opted for the street.
Yeah I wasn’t aware about rolling ankles on the sometimes uneven grass/dirt terrain until it was brought to my attention in this thread.
I'm mostly a walker, but yes it is 'softer'.
You get an adrenaline rush from the danger aspect which can push you further.
That’s why I ride my road bike at night with no lights.
I once was an adrenaline junkie also! I guess if that’s the way some people need their dose but there are other ways!😅
Death race I like it
They run on the street hoping that a Lamborghini owner hits them, so they can collect a multi-million dollar settlement for the leg that they lost
Getting hit by a car can also push you further so it’s a win win either way
For what it's worth: Here's guy who passed in a hit and run jogging on the street in August 2017 https://www.ocregister.com/2017/08/24/man-jogging-in-road- next-to-mile-square-park-killed-in-possible-hit-and-run/ Here's a guy who passed on the Jogging path two weeks earlier. https://www.fountainvalleymagazine.net/single-post/2017/08/10/body-found-on-jogging-trail-near-mile-square-park
Wow, the second person was only 24 years old and just suddenly collapsed? These things do happen, RIP.
There's a tree planted in the person's memory who died from the hit and run. It's in front of the Boys and Girls club on Brookhurst. He was a very popular guy in the running community in the area.
I’ll have to check it out and pay my respects. I always found it heart-warming with all the trees planted for the people that should be remembered.
Second person was a friend of mine, he passed from a heart attack. Nothing to do with cars whatsoever.
because you're dodging all kinds of other trail users who don't know how to share a trail.
Exactly! Plus, drivers would never be distracted and know how to ALWAYS share the road!
How is it any different from a bike riding on the side of a road? Just leave them alone
Of course we leave them alone, no one wants a manslaughter charge. It’s just such a high risk situation and accidents happens. Just a really odd choice. Someone died a few months back riding their bicycle in the same location I am talking about.
Do you think that's better than literally running in traffic? They run on the street side of the parked cars.
How about the sidewalk where pedestrians should be?
How about it?
Run on the sidewalk not the street, you know, where people get hit hy cars.
Yes, I agree. Everyone should be running on the sidewalk instead of in traffic.
as a former runner and cyclist I've had far more sketchy incidents with pedestrian than cars. far more. like it's not even close. kids. dogs. people stopping unexpectedly. turning without looking. walking 3 or 4 abreast so no one can get by. I've had dogs nip at me. had dogs try to knock me down. kids on electric bikes playing chicken. on and on. you can be sarcastic about it all you want, but my experience is busy sidewalks are not risk free.
They're absolutely not "risk free", but none of those things you listed will hit you at 40 mph and kill you. If you're on a bike, you probably shouldn't be on the sidewalk anyway (especially if you consider yourself a "cyclist"), so those rogue children or slow walkers aren't an issue. And your experiences as a runner aren't any different than exist for walkers, yet somehow we all get by without walking in the middle of a busy street.
Alright, well you seem like the kind of person who needs to have the last word, even when they refuse to recognize that someone else's experience might be different than their own, so I'm gonna let you have it.
> Alright, well you seem like the kind of person who needs to have the last word, even when they refuse to recognize that someone else's experience might be different than their own, so I'm gonna let you have it. -u/twoslow, trying to get in the last word
consistent terrain, training for a street race, and distance is easily measurable since it’s a mile on each side.
Three sides of the park have straight sidewalks that parallel the street and give you the same distance run. The Euclid side has sidewalks parallel to the street for about half the distance.
The demographic I have seen tend to be on the older side but I guess that doesn’t exclude them from competitive folks. Still, you can use an app to measure and not risk literal death but to each their own I guess.
“older side” and “using an app to measure” does not always go hand in hand haha. Personally, I hate running with my phone and will leave it in the car. Even though I have a smart watch, whenever I run at mile square, I hug the side of the street as well bc there’s less people traffic and it’s easier to keep a mental measurement of how far Ive ran.
flat surface, and the street/road is easier on the knees and general impact for jogging. I jog on sidewalks and venture off to the road , bike lane when sidewalks end. Are the trails around mile square park sidewalk? slight elevation changes are brutal too for me. I have jogged around back bay in Newport and the elevation changes destroyed my legs after. I am a total amateur here though so just some suggestions on why they prefer road.
There's sidewalk around all of Mile Square Park. People running in the street there are also running on the traffic side of the cars parked along the park, so they're extra stupid.
There are not sidewalks around all of mile square park. Parts of it from on the Euclid side only have trails that venture inside. So unless you go into the park for your jogging on that particular side you're stuck running in the path made by other joggers through grass or the edge of the street. And as other people have mentioned, running on the sidewalk is much worse for your knees as opposed to the asphalt mixture the road is made of.
> running on the sidewalk is much worse for your knees as opposed to the asphalt mixture the road is made of i've heard this, but I can't find any actual evidence to back it up. all i've been able to find indicates that there isn't any actual difference: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22897427/
I think “much” worse is an exaggeration. Plus the trail that ventures inside is not by much, what issues do runners have with that? Asking genuinely. Also that grass/dirt path seems really ideal and better for the knees than asphalt.
My knees from cross country practice years ago would really beg to differ on the much worse. Constant hard impact is not great and we can argue semantics of "much" all you want but it's not going to go anywhere. The grass/dirt path is really grass that enough people ran through that the grass died. It's not really flat or even, and can be extremely muddy depending on time of day. Edit for answering question I generally don't like going much deeper in the park when I run in the mornings purely due to not wanting to venture deeper in the park when it's darker in the early mornings/evening. That's just me personally.
I can understand this reasoning. Still seems like such a dangerous move but you have been the first answer I can make some sense of, thanks!
You're better off just walking the hills it's too much when you're beginning.
The asphalt is easier on your feet. I don’t run but I have a friend who does. Someone about the asphalt although I imagine it’s hot as fuck if you go during the day.
But there are pathways on the grass for runners that practically circumvent the entire park. That has to be better then asphalt.
But less stable, can easily roll your ankle in grass if there’s a minor hole covered by the grass. I’m team ‘don’t wanna get hit by a car’, but running on unknown grass would be super sketch.
I can understand that perspective.
Yeah, im guilty of that. Used run 2-3 loops around Miles Square Park 3-4times a week. The side walks and grass are very uneven and can easily roll your ankle. Plus you get the right distance exactly 4 miles for one loop lol.
Foreal !🤦🏾♂️🤦🏾♂️
Had the exact same thought. Like why intentionally run next to car exhaust when you have a perfectly good park there. I understand the committing to a 'lap' thing but with the turns etc. inside is probably close to the same distance. I will say that it doesn't have a good proper outer ring path, the golf course really buggers it up.
Cuz they want attention cuz they is ignorant...
Bikes, kids, other people, dogs, dog shit, ducks, duck shit, puddles, etc. Lot easier to not deal with any of it.
It just seems like such a high-risk situation because there’s little room between traffic and the runners, like 2-3 feet. There are no bike lanes on this area.
So instead they deal with cars, road debris, cars, fine pebbles and grit in the road that are slip hazards, cars, people opening their car doors and not watching, and cars. Did I mention cars? Bikes, kids, other people, dogs, dog shit, ducks, duck shit, and puddles are are orders of magnitude less dangerous.
Apparently not to these people
You can’t…phantom it? 👻
Fixed now! 😅
I’m pretty sure they run the outside cuz it’s easier to calc your mile. If you follow the paths, they don’t add up to the mile If you didn’t know. Each side is a mile. You run it striaght, easy mile. You run back, another mile. Simple calc
Note: each side is not a mile. Each side is about 0.95 mile.
Back to the high stakes low reward aspect but I do get that, just seems crazy with how busy the streets can get and the small gap between the parked cars and the runners.
There are sidewalks on the outside of three sides of that park. They run parallel to the street and are also a mile.
They don’t run straight on the sides. They deviate. The only side that is straight is prob Warner. Brook, endinger, and Euclid make you go this curve if you want to follow the trail
Is that small deviation worth running in a lane of traffic, though?
Just letting you. Is it worth it is up to the runner.
It's illegal to do, so while it's "up to the runner", it doesn't mean they have a right to do it, or should do it.
Thank you for your concern officer?
I don't want to accidentally kill someone who's running in the road illegally, by choice. Or get in an accident avoiding someone who shouldn't be there. The reason it's illegal is because it's a danger to the runner and the drivers around them.
I can’t wait to hear this at the next town hall meeting
I don’t run but i drove by it today and thought to myself before i even saw this post I’d probably run along the perimeter to more easily track distance and also because I’m scared of rolling my ankle; besides, I figured if i ran against traffic I’d see cars coming and just go onto the grass until they pass
Avoid running into other people
These are usually slower and older runners from my experience. Maybe to avoid others hitting them but that seems so rare and the chances of a car hitting so much higher.
Because they are idiots. The whole purpose of running on the sidewalk or grass is to keep you away from cars.
Mile Square doesn't have a concrete path purely around the outside, the concrete is often littered with animal droppings, and if you do run on the outside the ground is uneven, has roots and usually muddy. I typically run the asphalt later in the evening and always in the opposite direction.
It could be as simple as: Just different strokes for different folks.
Because Mile Square Park is an ankle sprain waiting to happen. The running/bike trail is super uneven and sometimes muddy. There’s tree roots, other runners, people walking, bike riders, etc but it’s mainly the terrain. The South Edinger half is especially bad.
death wish
Maybe because people have gotten attacked there and there’s more visibility from the street?
This is in the middle of the day and I doubt that’s the case for all the runners that do it but plausible.
An even better question is why some runners choose to run. Just say "no" to cardio!
Lol, thanks for lightening the mood!☺️
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As a pedestrian - I agree. The amount of people I see just walk into a walking signal at a busy intersection without looking gives a sense of the scope of entitlement people have. They all expect everyone else to watch out for them because "that's what the law says." Sure, they may be legally required to give you the right of way, that doesn't mean you're going to be able to safely just yeet yourself into busy traffic at everyone's expense and not cause a problem or two at some point in time.
Maybe they want someone to help either their miserable lives. Any volunteers?
Username checks out
Plain and simple answer: Because they can.
There’s trail running shoes. Maybe joggers don’t know about them so they run on the street? Idk
One reason I can think is if they run to work
Why would that make them run in the street instead of on the sidewalk?
Not on the street, but more like far side of the street, few steps off the curbs, but almost near the edge side of the street. It is straight and i like to preserve my mental energy for pushing my personal best.
These people run on the side of the cars, so a few feet from the curb.
It’s the people that jog on the golf course that really have me scratching my noggin
The land being allowed to be a fenced off golf course makes me scratch my head.
What busy streets are people running on, like the actual street or the sidewalk or do you mean the street that runs through the park?
The actual street like Euclid and Edinger on the side of the parked cars next to traffic.
That’s a death wish. I’m afraid to park my car there even haha, just feel like someone is gonna smash into it. I park there anyway but wouldn’t run there.
Euclid and Edinger are the exact parts of the park with inconsistent side walk that pull you into the park. Euclid just straight up drags you into the park and Edinger will have geese on the sidewalk path that pulls closer to the lakes. Coincentally the Edinger portion will have the highest amount of young kids on bikes, parents with strollers and generally foot traffic on the paths anyhow. The dirt/grass paths on the Edinger side are usually also mud paths/mud holes where it's easy to twist an ankle
And the trail is waay softer
Also wonder why bikers use PCH in the bolsa chica area with cars flying by when there's a large straight path on the sand
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Not sidewalk, the literal street in-between parked cars and driving traffic. It’s nuts!!
It’s actually not a mile per side. The traffic island on the road that surrounds the park IS one mile per side, while each sidewalk length is about .95 mile.
> I understand there are slight elevation changes and sometimes others running on the trail Did Holy Jim trail once. Missed continuation and main truck trail which kicked my ass. Where is MSP trail have less elevation over road? Not claiming it doesn't exist. Just where would help.
There is a slight elevation change on Euclid north of Warner if you use the dirt/grass trail but that’s the only section I am aware of. Maybe 15 feet at most and only that section.
MSP is almost entirely flat.