A Spring Workday on Trails Along the South Fork of Peachtree Creek

By Sally Sears
March 25, 2023

Neighborhood volunteer and members of Emory's Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity

My hand was inches away from yanking invasive English ivy when I spotted a wandering Emory student. He sauntered along Peavine Trail, staring away from the creek and into the woods. He acknowledged neither my wave or hello at first. But two of his classmates, fraternity men, guessed he most likely was listening to something through his ear buds, Sure enough, he was.

The men from Sigma Phi Epsilon were on a mission, helping to clear the trail of messy invasive plants. Unlike me, they knew that walking students often listen to something through ear buds. Yet it turns out that the newcomer was a student on a mission, too. Nick was hunting mushrooms. Morels, he hoped. He’d already found some oyster mushrooms.

We all livened up at that idea. But then Nick shrugged in apology. “I’m from New Jersey,” he admitted. “I don’t know when things get ripe in Atlanta.”

Maybe we could tell him when he might find some chanterelles? Charmed that he didn’t claim to know everything already, I was happy to suggest that August might be a better time for mushroom foraging, and the woods along the tributaries upstream of Emory were good places to start. Olmsted’s parks on Ponce, particularly Deepdene? He’d never heard of these upstream parks and thanked us as he wandered away.

These trail workdays, including spending time with volunteer  Emory undergraduates, feature among the pleasures of living near the South Fork of Peachtree Creek. The two men who guessed at Nick’s ear buds were deep into junior year papers and projects. 

As they worked, Ace and Will swapped tales of a physics assignment on electrical conductivity in the lab and a paper due on Ursula K. Le Guin’s novel Dispossessed. I listened as Old Briarcliff Road neighbor Terry Krugman found homes along the rocks at the mouth of the Peavine Rain Garden for sharp spears of wild iris. As the new plants take hold, yellow blooms will feed butterflies. The roots and stems will filter pollutants from the tributary coming downhill from Briarcliff Road and Channel 5. More Emory students worked upstream from the rain garden, along the new loop at the Emory Road trailhead.

They tugged out privet, cleared winter-downed branches, and then discovered the buried pieces of a discarded bathroom, half-hidden in the leaves. Someone careless or just lazy long ago tossed the trash down a hill beside Emory Road at Harvard Road. The students shoved half a dozen wheelbarrow loads of bathtub shards and tile chunks up to Emory Road, where Emory’s Exterior Services Director Jimmy Powell saw to their eventual removal.

Volunteers check out the debris that they removed during the cleanup

The morning’s last best moment was discovered sleeping under a chunk of tile on the forest floor. A beautiful salamander, six inches long, and purple as an eggplant stirred in the leaf litter. We knelt quietly as fraternity member Russell rebuilt its hiding place with leaves and twigs.

Look closely to find the salamander

South Fork Conservancy Connects You to Nature

Whether you’re an Atlanta resident or a visitor to the area, you can take advantage of an expanding trail system in the heart of our city. South Fork Conservancy (SFC) is installing and refurbishing a series of trails along the South and North Forks of Peachtree Creek that eventually will allow you to walk from the Atlanta BeltLine spur at Atlanta’s Lindbergh Drive all the way to Emory University under your own steam.

Start your adventure right now! Visit a new trail segment that begins on Lindbergh Drive at the I-85 overpass. This road borders several neighborhoods along its length and links the Lindbergh Marta Station to points east. Here, you can access the trailhead of SFC's Creek Walk Connector (CWC), a paved, 12-foot-wide path that opens onto a glorious meadow.

Across the way, you'll spy trail-building activity on the Meadow Loop, a soft-surface trail that, when completed, will wind its way along the creek banks and join the CWC just as it straightens to go under the highway. You can zip along the CWC trail on your bike, skateboard, or wheelchair. Push a stroller, go for a run, or saunter along until you reach a new pocket park that serves as a nexus for several other partner trails. From here you can go north at Adina Drive towards Path400, or in the not-too-distant future, go west to a spur of the Atlanta BeltLine.

Photo by Rob Knight Buckhead.com

Don’t miss the recently opened and spectacular Confluence Bridge, built by SFC, which spans the creek near the junction of the North and South Forks of Peachtree Creek!

The spectacular Corten steel structure is reminiscent of railroad bridges of the past, and, from above the trees, you'll gain a different perspective as the natural world opens up to you and the city spreads out in the near distance. The bridge sports a 175-foot long three-tiered ramp system leading to an overlook that is currently under construction. This spring, it will allow visitors a way to walk down and experience the creek up close.

The ramp system is also your entry point to the Confluence Trail. This soft-surface trail is three quarters of a mile long and currently boasts one rain garden that slows down and filters stormwater that runs off streets and rooftops. Construction on a second rain garden farther along the trail will begin soon.

Volunteers help plant native plants near the rain garden at Armand Park to improve stormwater quality and attract butterflies.” Photo by Marcia Brandes

At the end of the Confluence Trail, lies a sweet gem, Armand Park, which includes an additional rain garden, pergola, and a playground which marks the current culmination of the trail.  This city park is heavily used by people living in the adjoining Lindridge/Martin-Manor neighborhood, and resulted from a collaboration among the community, the City of Atlanta, and SFC.

On a recent visit to one trail, we spotted a family of wood ducks gliding along the creek and a magnificent great blue heron, wings outstretched, riding the wind’s currents. Friends witnessed a pair of mating red-tailed hawks. People were out using the trail to walk their dogs and ride their bikes. Life going on in abundance.

A Cedar Waxwing enjoys the healthy habitats along the South Fork Conservancy trail system. Photo by Steve Rushing

In our busy lives, it’s easy to underestimate how much we need to encounter and care for the natural world, of which, we are a part.  As we step confidently toward the future, we are mindful that we also need to stop and take notice: absorbing birdsong, a pop of color signifying a waxwing in search of a mid-morning snack, or a turtle sunning itself on a half-submerged log. All there if we can but see it.

Nature’s gifts are all there for us, all if we just take the time to experience them.