If you live in the valley, you already know the shortcut from Beverly Road to the library, the loop at Avon, the wildflower stretch out of Masters Park. What you might not have thought about is how oddly consistent the story behind each of them is. The parks in Haw Creek were not handed down from a city plan. Neighbors organized, wrote checks, and negotiated deals until each one existed. The greenway opening later this year is the newest link in that same chain, not a departure from it.
That is the through-line worth knowing before you plan the next few weekends. Every trail you walk here has somebody's fundraising binder behind it, and the one about to open follows the same script.
The Greenway on Beverly, and Why It Matters More Than It Looks
The Haw Creek Community Association has secured full funding to build a public greenway in the Haw Creek valley, is now beginning the process to bring the project to fruition, and is aiming to open it to the public in the fall of 2026, if not sooner. On a map it is a short line. In practice it changes how the valley connects to itself.
The route starts on Beverly Road across from Creekside Taphouse and PennyCup, meandering through the woods and a meadow alongside Haw Creek, giving the first public access to the creek and linking the East Asheville Public Library, Haw Creek Park, and the neighborhood's small commercial area with the surrounding homes and the nearby elementary school. Read that again. First public access to the creek the neighborhood is named for. People have lived here for generations without a legal way to stand at the water.
The greenway will be natural surface, mostly flat, and drawn up pro bono by a senior water resource engineer at Wildlands Engineering.
That last detail is worth pausing on. The trail sits on land contributed by the City of Asheville and civic-minded private landowners, with plans donated by Jake McLean of Wildlands Engineering. The project got built cheap because the neighborhood knows how to ask, and because people said yes.
The Pattern: Every Park Here Has a Fundraiser Behind It
Once you see it, you cannot unsee it. Look at how the existing green space in the valley came together.
| Park | Where | How it happened |
|---|---|---|
| Masters Park | Maple Drive, 9 acres | When the property came on the market in 2009, HCCA organized a fundraising effort that resulted in local residents, the City of Asheville, and Buncombe County each providing a third of the $720,000 purchase price |
| Haw Creek Park | 40 Avon Road, 6 acres | HCCA was the force behind creation of this park at the intersection of Beverly and Avon Roads, with paved and unpaved trails, gazebo, picnic shelter, and historical markers describing the history of Haw Creek |
| Charlie Bullman Park | Off New Haw Creek Road, 6 acres | A three-field complex named after Charlie Bullman, who in the 1960s helped found what is today Bullman Field in Haw Creek, his lifelong home |
Three parks, three organizing efforts, one association doing the work. HCCA was founded in 1984 to give residents a voice on growth and development issues, and its members work to balance continued growth with civic improvements such as parks, sidewalks, greenways, and preservation of open spaces. Forty years of the same playbook. The greenway is chapter four.
What You Can Actually Do This Weekend
Set the history aside for a minute. Here is what the network looks like on a Saturday.
Haw Creek Park, 40 Avon Road. The looped trail is short and paved, which makes it the default first stop with a stroller or a slow-moving dog. The park has an off-street parking lot, picnic shelter, swings, paved trail, and restrooms open April 15 to October 31, and the picnic shelter can be reserved online or by calling 828-259-5800. If you have hosted a birthday there this summer you already know the shelter books up fast in July.
Masters Park, Maple Drive. This is the one to send your out-of-town cousin to when they want a hike but not a drive. The nine-acre park has a trail connecting Haw Creek to the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, and over 210 different wildflowers have been observed growing along the hiking trail. That wildflower count is not marketing copy. It is a working botanical record kept because people in the neighborhood actually walk the trail and log what they see. The trail passes through a botanical environment and begins in Masters Park, winds through open areas and thick hardwood woods, and is a haven for bird lovers with frequent sightings of blue jays, northern cardinals, tufted titmice, and American crows.
Charlie Bullman Park, off New Haw Creek Road. Three fields, which is why the youth soccer families treat it like a second living room from March through October. The East Asheville Recreation Club at 40 Bell Road has been serving the Haw Creek community since 1968, with a family-friendly atmosphere. That predates almost everything else recreational in the valley.
The Hustle, Third Year Running
If you have not run it yet, this is the year. The Haw Creek Hustle is a neighborhood race morning based at Charlie Bullman Park with a 5K and a shorter Fun Run, the Fun Run starting first at 8:30 AM followed by the 5K at 9:00 AM, both starting and finishing at the park, hosted by the Haw Creek Community Association, with all proceeds going toward local association projects and the restoration of Charlie Bullman Park, and this being the third Haw Creek Hustle.
A few practical notes if it is your first one. The 5K runs counter-clockwise on mostly quiet roads through Haw Creek with one water station about halfway, signs at every turn, volunteers on course, and police at important intersections, while the Fun Run stays around Charlie Bullman Park and uses the trails of Evergreen Charter School, with chip timing on the 5K and awards for top overall runners, masters runners, and age-group finishers. Counter-clockwise matters if you are one of those runners who studies the elevation profile. Bring a stroller for the Fun Run without guilt. Almost every neighborhood family does.
The connection to Charlie Bullman Park restoration is the reason to actually pay the entry fee rather than just show up to cheer. This is how the next round of park improvements gets funded. Same pattern as the greenway. Same pattern as Masters.
Where the Trail Goes When You Leave the Valley
The reason the greenway matters is that it closes a gap in a network that already exists. From Masters Park you can already reach the ridge. From the ridge you can reach the Blue Ridge Parkway. And from the Folk Art Center at milepost 382 you can walk back down toward the valley from above.
If you want the classic version of that walk, park at the Folk Art Center. Haw Creek Overlook is accessible from several points on the Parkway, but the one with the most parking is the Folk Art Center at mile marker 382, with the trailhead just past the entrance, marked by the Mountains-to-Sea trail sign; heading from the FAC to Haw Creek Overlook is 4.8 miles total, and you should plan for between 2 and 3 hours on the trail. One section requires crossing the parkway itself, so be careful and watch for cars, and bears have been reported in the area.
Two to three hours is the honest number. Do not let the 4.8 mile figure trick you into thinking this is a fast out-and-back. There is real climbing.
The payoff at the top is not scenic exactly. It is orienting. You look down at the valley you drove out of and see the whole shape of it. Roofs, the church steeple, the ballfields, the road you live on. It is the view that makes people who grew up in Haw Creek stay in Haw Creek.
A Weekend Blueprint if You Want One
For a Saturday that uses the whole network without turning into a project:
- Start with coffee at PennyCup on Beverly. Walk over to the future greenway trailhead across the street so you know where it is.
- Drive up to the Folk Art Center. Do the first mile or two of the MST toward the overlook. Turn around when you are ready.
- Back down for lunch at Creekside Taphouse.
- Afternoon at Haw Creek Park with whoever you brought. Reserve the shelter next time.
- Sunday morning, easy loop at Masters. Bring the wildflower app if you have one.
None of this is a secret. The point of writing it down is that most people who live here use one or two pieces of the network and never string the whole thing together. When the greenway opens this fall the walk between pieces gets shorter, and the network starts behaving like one thing instead of five.
Why the Fall Matters
Watch what happens once that first section along the creek opens. Foot traffic between the library, the small commercial cluster on Beverly, and the neighborhoods on the other side of the creek starts running on trail instead of shoulder. Kids at Haw Creek Elementary get a route to the park that does not touch a car. The interactive STEAM nature trail at Haw Creek Elementary that is open to the public becomes part of a longer walk instead of a stand-alone stop.
That is what a neighborhood-built greenway does. It does not add a feature. It knits the features already there into something that behaves like a valley instead of a collection of streets.
The people who made all of this happen are still on the association board and still at the potlucks. If you have lived here a while and you have not been to an HCCA meeting, this is the year. If you just moved in, introduce yourself. The trail you are about to walk exists because someone before you asked.
If you have questions about the valley beyond the trail map, whether you are thinking about the long term or just want to talk about what makes Haw Creek tick, Leah Miller and the rest of the Mike Miller Team live and work here too. Come say hello and start your buying or selling journey with people who know the ground under your feet.
