Worst Place to Run?

In your parents' 15 meter backyard.

O BLOCK

I 2nd the poster that said running from strange hotels in the US that are just off the highway or strip mall. Often times you arrive at dark. Then you wake in the morning and try to find a way out of the hotel to some type of sidewalk only to realize you are in a bit of a concrete jungle designed only for cars.

Obviously you don't live in Manhattan. Central Park is the running mecca with a 6 mile loop, dirt trails, reservoir with 100m markings where you can do some speedwork, and you have miles of paths on the West end and all along East River. There all also multiple public tracks to run on.

95-97% of the hotels you stay at for college track and field or cross country meets. 🙄

I have heard of Central Park but I can't imagine it's very safe if you have to run after dark (I used to go along main roads as I used to finish work when it was dark for a lot of the year) and if you were running solely in Manhattan you'd have to do every run in the same place. Also unless you lived right on the doorstep of it you'd have to cross a tonne of roads to get there. IDK, I just think it would be bad as it's one of the busiest places on earth for traffic and people. So I can't imagine Manhattan is amazing for running...

I also think it's individual in terms of what's good for one person is bad for another... for example I'd absolutely love to run in Death Valley or a lot of places in rural California and Arizona. I hate busy places. One person's worst isn't another person's worst... if I lived in Manhattan (unlikely) I can imagine running from the door is v. difficult but could be wrong. I've run in Birmingham (UK) city centre and hated it due to constantly stopping to cross streets.

For me it might be Brooklyn. I was staying in Bushwick and ran about miles through the city to Prospect Park and was very disappointed when I got there and it was just a paved road. Then I had to run back.

I'm not saying it's the best place for running, but definitely not the worst. At least there are running clubs, races, parks, etc. Better than some rural town in Alaska or something.

Death Valley is one of my all time favorite places to run. Visiting there in the fall / winter / spring and camping out. Miles of dirt roads and paved roads. Open desert to run, complete with rock-and-boulder-hopping. Sand dunes for extra challenge and fun. Flat roads, uphill/downhill, rolling. At altitude or at sea level. Flat dry lake beds for wide-open speedwork. Plenty of great biking and hiking, for cross-training.

One of my lifetime favorite runs was jogging across a boulder-strewn expanse in glorious 72 degree sunshine, with a rainstorm within view on one mountain range and a snowstorm within view on another mountain range.

Another time, it was a vigorous long tempo run on a dirt road, headed into a lovely sunrise coming up over rocky hills, the sweeping desert plains dotted with flowers.

This is some folks' worst place to run? OK. Me, I'll stay away from urban spots where you have to, as the man says, keep it on the 'crete.

As soon as I saw this thread I knew someone would say it. Bad place to run, bad place to go to school, bad place to live, can't have sh*t in that city. It is, however, a great place to get an overuse injury or be a victim of a crime.

not even just the south side. essentially anywhere that’s not the lakefront path downtown sucks for distance running. traffic, intersections, poorly maintained sidewalks/roads, and of course the crime.

The running in rural Alaska is actually quite nice. You have to watch out for bears, and maybe few crazies out there but it's a live and let live culture.

Mogadishu, Khandahar, Sana'a, they all kind of suck.

I won't say that it is bad, because it's actually pretty great overall, but Deer Valley, UT sucked in a way because you couldn't go for a long run without either doing a bunch of short loops of the same thing or constantly going downhill. Then of course you're going to turn around and have to do the last half of your run continuously uphill.

Victorville CA sucked when I was briefly working there. It's hot af much of the time, windy, ghetto, and you're running on sidewalks.

A lot of European cities and towns have their centers paved almost entirely in cobblestones. These can't be good for the joints in the long term.