Rock Island Trail State Park
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The Rock Island Trail State Park is a 26-mile-long (42-km.) public trail in the west-central region of the U.S. state of Illinois. It passes through portions of Peoria County, Illinois and Stark County, Illinois. The southern end of the trail is in the small hamlet of Alta, Illinois, a suburb of Peoria, Illinois, and the northern end is in Toulon, Illinois, the county seat of Stark County. The right-of-way served as a railroad line from 1871 to 1965, was unused in 1965-1989, and has been a public trail since 1989.
[edit] History
The trail derives its name from the former Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad, commonly known as the Rock Island. The current Rock Island Trail is a fragment of what was once a spur line, built in 1869-1871, stretching southeastward from the Quad Cities of Illinois and Iowa to Peoria. The Rock Island owned extensive trackage throughout the North American Great Plains, and this branch line once delivered large quantities of barley, rye, and other small grains to the distilleries of Peoria for the manufacture of American blended whiskey. With the coming of Prohibition in 1920, use of the railroad for this purpose declined, and the roadbed was eventually abandoned.
The Rock Island Trail became one of the first rail-trail conversions in downstate Illinois. The right-of-way was acquired for public use in 1965, but it was only after a twenty-four-year period, in 1989, that the line was rededicated as a public trail.
[edit] Points of interest
From south (Peoria) to north (Toulon):
- Kickapoo Creek Recreation Area (Fox Road, north of Alta)
- Bridge over Kickapoo Creek (Cedar Hills Drive, south of Dunlap, Illinois)
- Class B tallgrass prairie remnant (County Line Road, north of Princeville, Illinois)
- Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Depot (east side of Wyoming, Illinois)
- Bridge over the Spoon River (2 miles west of Wyoming)
