A paved ribbon of parkland running through some of Northern Virginia’s busiest neighborhoods and greenest countryside, the Washington & Old Dominion Trail—known to many as the W&OD—is more than just a trail. It’s a place to move, connect, and explore. At 45 miles long and just 100 feet wide, it's also affectionately called “Virginia's skinniest park.”
The trail stretches from Shirlington all the way to Purcellville, touching a number of communities along the way. “It really brings people together,” said Ryan Corder, who manages the trail for NOVA Parks. “Somebody who lives in Arlington has direct access to get all the way out to Leesburg and Purcellville virtually uninterrupted.”
A Trail with History
Originally a rail line, the W&OD had its last commercial run in 1968. “It was owned by VEPco Power, which was the local power company at that time,” Corder explained. “Then it changed hands from them to NOVA Parks in 1974.”
The first paved section opened on September 7, 1974, with a ribbon-cutting by the mayor of Falls Church. “It was sort of like a test: ‘Hey, we’ll pave this little section of trail and see if people like it,’” Corder said. “Well, everybody loved it.” Fourteen years later, in 1988, the trail was completed to its full length, with the final nine-mile section reaching Purcellville.
A Beloved Outdoor Corridor
Today, the W&OD Trail attracts an estimated three million visitors each year. Cyclists, walkers, runners, wheelchair users, and even equestrians share the route.
“The trail means so much to so many,” Corder explained. “There are just so many different people from all walks of life that use the trail in some fashion, all over the Northern Virginia area.”
But managing a park this long and narrow has its challenges. “You may have someone that sends an email and says, ‘Hey, there’s a tree down in Dunn Loring or Vienna,’ and it’s like, okay, well, that takes 20 or 30 minutes to get to—or if it’s in Purcellville, it could take 45 minutes,” Corder explained. “But trail safety is our number one priority.”
Recent improvements include Dual Trails in Falls Church—side-by-side paths for walkers and cyclists—and the Wiehle Bridge in Reston, which lets trail users bypass busy intersections. “That is the model we’re looking to move towards in the future,” Corder said.
NOVA Parks is continuously enhancing the trail to ensure it is user-friendly for its wide variety of uses. Over the years, the trail has transitioned from a weekend recreational resource into an important carbon-free transportation network for its more than 2 million users per year.
One of the trail’s appeals is the variety of experiences it offers.
“As you make that journey from, let’s say, Arlington out to Leesburg, you’re passing through all of the other locations—Dunn Loring, Vienna, Falls Church, Sterling, Herndon,” Corder explained. “And you have the chance to partake in activities that those locations may have going on, whether it be festivals like the Viva Vienna festival or simply a restaurant or something that you may see or go to that’s right off the trail.
“It’s the access that it provides,” he added. “You’re kind of in parkland the entire way.”
Friends of the W&OD Trail
The W&OD Trail’s success also depends on the help of dedicated volunteers. “The Friends of the W&OD is a huge part of what we do,” Corder said. “They’re awesome. They’re a volunteer group of very dedicated, very passionate people who care about the trail.”
This group supports events, promotes trail safety, and even fields a Trail Patrol—a team of about 60 regular trail users who report maintenance issues like downed trees or broken glass. “That’s a big part of how we keep tabs on what’s going on,” Corder said. “It’d be a lot harder for me to do my job without them.”
The Friends group also contributes to education and community events. “We just did a partnership with Trailside Middle School where the kids did a seed bombing on a piece of property that runs adjacent to the trail,” Corder said. “The Friends showed up there and had a booth and promoted trail safety to the kids.”
Want to get involved? “It is $20 for a year membership to join the Friends of the W&OD,” Corder said. “If you get $20 worth of entertainment or use of the trail in a year, then consider joining. And I think that’s a no-brainer for a lot of people.”
Learn more at wodfriends.org.
“The Friends of the W&OD is a huge part of what we do," says NOVA Parks' Ryan Corder.
Known as "Virginia's skinniest park," The Washington & Old Dominion Trail is 45 miles long and 100 feet wide. It draws about three million visitors annually: cyclists, walkers, runners, wheelchair users, and even equestrians.