Santa Fe on Thursday officially opened its newest bicycle and pedestrian trail -- the Museum Hill Trail from Old Pecos Trail east to Camino Corrales, through land being groomed for the Santa Fe Botanical Garden.

About 45 people, some of them on bicycles, gathered on Thursday afternoon for a ribbon-cutting on the 10-foot-wide, 2,000-foot-long, pink concrete trail that has been completed for several months.

Leroy Pacheco, an engineer with the city Public Works Department, said this is the first phase of the Museum Hill Trail that eventually will be extended up Camino Lejo into the Museum Hill complex.

City Councilor Patti Bushee led the ceremony, recalling how only about three people on bicycles showed up some 15 years ago for the opening of one of the city's first trails -- the Arroyo Chamiso Trail.

She said about $9 million in bonds authorized by voters in 2008 went to trails, and more will go to new trails if voters approve another bond issue on the March 6 ballot.

Nina Mastrangelo, an original member of the city's Bicycle and Trails Advisory Committee, cut the ribbon to open the trail.

Nina Wells, vice president of the Botanical Garden board, invited everyone to take a walk through the five acres of city and state land leased for the garden.

The most recent addition to the property is an old truss bridge that was moved to the site this month from its original site at Kearny Gap about two miles south of Las Vegas, N.M., and is now painted red.

"We are going to have formal gardens up there," Wells said, referring to the part of the property just off the overflow parking area across from the state museum complex.

Along the Arroyo de los Piñones, between Camino Corrales and Old Pecos Trail, "We're going to have walk-friendly paths," she said, "but we're also going to restore the arroyo. This arroyo has been degrading ... and we've already set some structures in place to keep it from eroding."

Other recent additions to Santa Fe's trail system include:

• The Camino Real Trail just beyond the city limits near N.M. 599 and Caja del Rio Road, involving a mile of new paved trail and two bridges, which should be complete this spring.

• The St. Francis Trail, involving 4,736 feet of new trail and an underpass beneath St. Francis Drive to connect the new trail with the existing Rail Trail. Work crews are building a zig-zag trail that will connect the St. Francis Trail with the dead-end of Galisteo Road. Work on the underpass is expected to begin in March.

• Connections for the Acequia Madre Trail, from Santa Fe Railyard Park to Otowi Road, that will link already-completed sections through Ashbaugh Park and near Larragoite Elementary School by this summer.

• The Santa Fe River Trail recently was extended from Camino Alire to Frenchy's Field Park.

Contact Tom Sharpe at 986-3080 or tsharpe@sfnewmexican.com.