Picking a running route in a city you do not know
Arriving tonight, running tomorrow. How to judge a route before you have seen it, and why corner count matters more than scenery when you cannot read the signs.
Curated city routes
A route is geometry until something names its corners. These pages publish the route data city by city and explain what a runner can judge before ever seeing the path.
Articles in this topic
Waterfront running routes for travellers
Promenade and riverside routes across several cities, measured the same way, with distance, surface and corner count so you can choose before you land.
The Imperial Palace loop, measured for runners
Tokyo's default running loop is a little over five kilometres with four corners. What the route data says, which way round runners go, and how to use it.
Three running routes in San Francisco, measured
Crissy Field, the Embarcadero waterfront and the Lake Merced loop, with distance, surface and corner count for each, plus what the downtown grid does to a track.
Central Park loop or the Hudson River Greenway
Two long Manhattan runs, measured: a park loop that closes on itself with almost no corners, and a riverside line. Which suits the run you actually planned.
Two almost corner free routes in central Seoul
The Cheonggyecheon stream path and the Gyeongui Line Forest Park, measured. Two paved routes with almost no corners, each reachable from a subway exit.
Three measured running routes in London
Hyde Park, the Thames Path at the South Bank and the Tamsin Trail, with measured distance, surface and corner count, and what is spoken at each corner.
How a running route becomes spoken corners
A curated route is geometry until something names its corners. How turns are detected from a route shape, what gets announced, and why this is not navigation.