Last Friday at Scranton Flats, a host of local dignitaries touted a $700,000 Clean Ohio Fund grant that will enable the construction of Stage 3 of the Towpath Trail through Cleveland.

The Towpath Trail project has been ongoing for decades, but as it moves forward through dense urban terrain, it becomes more and more complex and difficult to understand. Hence, we offer up the following bullet points to help clarify the status of this growing urban treasure.

1. There are four stages to the Towpath Trail project in Cleveland, which are not coming online in a numerical or geographically linear progression.

2. The work announced Friday will include 1.9 miles of new trail from the northern end of the complete Stage 2/Steelyard Commons trail loop at Quigley Road to the intersection of University and Literary Roads in Tremont. Scheduled completion date: 2017.

3. The $700,000 Clean Ohio grant is part of a complex $43 million finance package for all four stages that includes various federal and state funds as well as $27.5 million in support from the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency (NOACA).

4. Although not associated with any of the stages, Scranton Flats is another completed section of Cleveland's Towpath Trail. The recently opened Cleveland Foundation Centennial Trail (formerly the Lake Link Trail) is not officially part of the Towpath Trail, although it does connect to it at Scranton Flats*.

5. Stage 1 will eventually connect the Harvard Road trailhead (just west of Alcoa) to the Steelyard Commons loop in 2019. Until then, you have to travel via Harvard and Jennings Avenues to link the two trails.

6. To get from the Steelyard Commons loop to Scranton Flats, you're back on grade via Quigley, West 14^th Street and Kenilworth Avenue (or you could cut over via Clark Avenue) to Scranton Road. This route will be replaced by Stage 3 (2017) and Stage 4  (2018).

7. Here is the simplest map showing those on-road connections and complete and planned trails/stages.

8. When you enter the Harvard Road trailhead, you are at the northern terminus of some 85 miles of completed shared use trail that goes straight through to New Philadelphia, Ohio.

9. The finished trail network is aptly described by Richard Kerber, chief planning and design officer at Cleveland Metroparks, as a pedestrian "interstate or freeway—the highest class of off-road trail."

10. What trail users will not likely notice as the miles unfurl before them is the Herculean effort that brought this remarkable amenity to fruition and the staggering collaborations between all the cities and counties (Cuyahoga, Summit, Stark, Tuscarawas) the trail traverses, an array of local and county park systems, the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District (NEORSD), Canalway Partners, corporations, private residents, the Cuyahoga Valley National Park (CVNP), the Ohio & Erie Canalway, the state of Ohio and a host of organizations that while too numerous to list, were all key pieces in the larger puzzle.

Lastly, a suggested activity while you wait for these few remaining urban trail connections to be complete. The following nearly two-mile stroll will take your breath away. Every view is worthy of a camera and then some. This simple loop will also connect you with your city: where it's been, where it is and where it's going. So queue up Google maps if you haven’t already, and follow along.

Get your person down to Scranton Flats and get on that trail that hugs the river. Head south, up the incline. Go right at the fork in the trail and over the two pedestrian bridges (you're on the *Lake Link Trail, by the way). When you reach the trail's end at the intersection of Franklin Avenue and Columbus Road, turn right and walk over the Columbus Road Bridge. Continue north on Columbus to Center Street and take a right. Go on up the hill and take a right to head over the Carter Road Bridge. Then go left toward the defunct Eagle Street Bridge and take a moment to consider that massive iconic structure.

You ought to be at the northern tip of Scranton Flats, which is where you started.

So go on: take a hike. Cleveland's waiting for you.