The Creek Bluffview Is Named For Is Walkable Again, and It Is Still Growing

"I recently discovered this trail through the woods in my own backyard," wrote a donor to Friends of Bachman Lake this summer. The donor is a birder. "I walk the trail with binoculars and a camera every morning."

That trail follows Bachman Creek, the creek beneath the rocky bluff that gave Bluffview its name. For decades the corridor was overgrown with privet and you couldn't get through. In its June 2026 newsletter, Friends of Bachman Lake described the greenbelt as "formerly overgrown with privet and impassable for decades." The creek is the oldest landscape in the neighborhood. As of this year, it is also the newest place to walk here. The ground you cross this fall is a first draft. Over the next three years it should become a native meadow, and it should link to a trail network that currently ends at the lake.

How the privet came out

The greenbelt covers about 40 acres east of Bachman Lake, by the count Friends of Bachman Lake uses for its Project Greenbelt campaign. The Dallas Morning News and a North Texas Trails profile of Greenspace Dallas put it at 58. Clearing it took several years and more than one approach.

1. The first loop. Greenspace Dallas cut the original loop trail. Friends of Bachman Lake president Ryan Moore credits his group with lining up partners and private donations to start the privet removal. Dallas Park and Recreation then paid for the master-plan design.
2. Hand clearing near Cochran Chapel. The Dallas Morning News reported that Friends of Bachman Lake, Greenspace Dallas and Texas Conservation Alliance worked together one June to clear privet near Cochran Chapel. Volunteers planted native trees behind them.
3. Operation Goat, spring 2025. Goats went onto the privet in April 2025. "The goats we had out last year were just not able to make enough of a difference," Friends of Bachman Lake board member Susanna Brown said later.
4. The forest mulcher, March 2026. "We had to resort to mechanical removal because those privet bushes were basically trees," Brown said. ArborMasters finished on March 3, twelve days before bird-nesting season began on March 15.
5. The first acre of natives, April 2026. Volunteers from AT&T planted it.
6. New paths, June 2026. The June newsletter took readers on a stroll through the clearing toward the newly created paths.

The goats are the step people remember. The deadline is what explains the timing. Privet left standing past mid-March would have stayed until the nesting birds were done, which would have cost the project another year.

What you walk into now

Access is easy once you know where it is. Both entrances are tucked away, and parking is limited.

The loop has a natural surface. Its length depends on who measured it: a North Texas Trails guide from 2024 lists 0.8 mile, and a 2026 profile of Greenspace Dallas calls it a one-mile loop. The 2024 guide describes wide dirt paths, benches, two bridges and interpretive signs. It also notes that the creek is easier to reach on the Shorecrest side.

The ground looks rough, and that is intentional. The chopped privet was left where it fell to hold the soil until new roots can. Along the water, the creek edge is "natural as can be," according to Friends of Bachman Lake. Trees shade the banks, and turtles, fish, birds and a resident beaver use the habitat. The 2024 trail guide lists ducks, egrets and birds of prey.

A meadow on a three-year clock

Taking the privet out was the quick part. Keeping it from growing back will take about three years, according to the March 2026 Candy's Dirt report. The long-term vision is wildflower fields like those in the Texas Hill Country. "It is now easier to imagine those fields of wildflowers," she said.

The plantings are planned carefully. Friends of Bachman Lake says privet crowded out the native grasses that once held the creek bank together, and that mature trees and pieces of land have been lost since. Inland Sea Oats, Soft Rush and Eastern Gamagrass are planned for the creek edge, and more deep-rooted grasses will go up in the meadow. The group has connected with Angie Tripp of Inevitable Technology, who grows natives hydroponically so they are available year-round at reasonable prices. They met through Texan by Nature, Laura Bush's conservation nonprofit.

Watering is just as practical. A gravity-fed drip system uses 3,000 feet of drilled drip line to water 1,800 plant plugs. It replaced a ram pump the group installed at the end of 2024. So the walk you take this October shows the meadow in its first year. The same loop will look different each spring until the grasses fill in.

Where the trail goes next

For now the greenbelt connects to one place, the Bachman Lake loop. Friends of Bachman Lake has made extending it a priority, and several pieces are already under way.

• Lemmon Avenue Trail. A 1.7-mile paved trail along Lemmon Avenue was completed in late 2025. The Department of Aviation paid for it, and it connects to Bachman Lake. Friends of Bachman Lake describes it as including an aircraft observation area. Dallas Love Field's own project page still lists the observation area as under construction, so check before you plan a visit around it.
• A trailhead at Marsh Lane and Lemmon Avenue. Work has started on the QT site at Northwest Highway and Marsh Lane/Lemmon Avenue. As part of the land deal, QT agreed to build and fund landscaping and a trailhead for an easier route onto the Bachman Lake Trail. The newsletter gives no completion date.
• Sidewalks on Northwest Highway. In September, crews were pouring a new sidewalk on the north side of Northwest Highway across from Bachman Lake Park. Friends of Bachman Lake first asked for sidewalks about seven years ago, at a meeting at Bachman Lake Library. The group says it doesn't know who is paying for them.
• A link west to Irving. Dallas County picked the engineering firm IEA Inc. to study whether a multi-use trail could connect Bachman Lake Trail to the Campion Trail. The study will look at floodplain impacts, bridge crossings, transit connections and parking. It is a feasibility study, and nothing has been committed to construction. The group also hopes for connections north to the Northaven Trail.

Each of these links makes the Cochran Chapel cul-de-sac a more useful starting point. Today it opens onto a creek loop. If the planned pieces get built, the same entrance could lead to Love Field's runways and, eventually, Irving.

Ways in this fall

• Hike for Life–Dallas takes place at Bachman Lake Park, 3500 W. Northwest Highway, on Saturday, October 10, from 8:15 a.m. to noon.
• Friends of Bachman Lake meet-ups happen on the fourth Wednesday of each month at 5 p.m. at On Rotation Brewery & Kitchen, 7707 Lemmon Ave., Suite 200, weather and schedule permitting. This month that is October 28.
• The Texan by Nature video. In August, Friends of Bachman Lake filmed an interview on the greenbelt trails for Texan by Nature's Conservation Wranglers program. UNT interns, their professor Jaime Baxter-Slye and two Texas Master Naturalists took part. The video is expected in late October.
• Bring a planting team. The group welcomes teams who want to plant grasses along the creek. Reach it through Friends of Bachman Lake.

If you'd rather stay closer to the shops, our walk through Bluffview between Inwood Village and Lovers Lane covers the other side of the neighborhood.

The Bachman Creek Greenbelt is being restored in public, one acre and one season at a time, and much of that work happens just past the end of Cochran Chapel Road. At Darla Ripley, we follow the places that shape daily life in Bluffview as closely as we follow the homes. If you'd like to talk about the creek, the trails or what's coming to your corner of North Dallas, Let's Connect.