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Katy Trail: Confluence is the eastern 40 miles of the Katy, from the wine town of Augusta through St. Charles to the trail's end at Machens, a vanished rail junction near where the Missouri meets the Mississippi. It is the busiest and most connected stretch of the trail. Limestone bluffs border the crushed limestone through Klondike Park and Weldon Spring Conservation Area, then the trail turns urban along the St. Charles riverfront past the restored 1893 Katy Depot in Frontier Park before running out through bottomland to Black Walnut and Machens. Greenways tie in at Weldon Spring and St. Charles. West of Augusta the trail is Katy Trail: Wine Country.
Katy Trail: Confluence
Your comfort. Prognosticated.
-Cory
In a typical year the Katy Trail: Confluence has about 98 to 142 days of excellent weather for popular activities such as hiking, dog walking, running, e-biking, birding, biking, and walking, with April, October, and November the best months.
Hourly comfort scores for the next 15 days of weather, tuned to your activity and your own thresholds.
Plan your visit to this trail. Get the best windows for a comfortable outing.
Enjoy the Katy Trail: Confluence!
In half of past years, color along the Katy Trail: Confluence peaks October 22 to November 3, typically around October 28. The trail has 27% deciduous coverage, with the majority being white oak, northern red oak, sugar maple, black oak, silver maple, shagbark hickory, and American elm.
An October 1986 Missouri River flood tore out the Katy's track between Sedalia and Machens, and the railroad chose not to rebuild. The corridor was far older than that flood. The Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad, the Katy, ran its first train from Sedalia to Clinton in 1870, living on Texas cattle and farm traffic. In 1874 it bridged the Missouri at Boonville. In the 1890s its subsidiary, the Missouri, Kansas and Eastern, laid a new line down the Missouri River valley to St. Charles and Machens to reach St. Louis. After the washout the Katy asked to abandon almost 200 miles across Missouri. Missouri State Parks took the corridor under the rail banking amendment to the National Trails System Act, and Ted and Pat Jones gave 2.2 million dollars toward the purchase. Construction began in 1987, and the first section opened at Rocheport in 1990. Union Pacific donated the Sedalia to Clinton corridor in 1991. The Great Flood of 1993 damaged 75 of the trail's first 126 miles. The trail reached Sedalia in 1996, Clinton in 1999, and Machens in 2011. It is now 240 miles long, and in 2007 it became the second trail inducted into the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy Hall of Fame. This segment is the river's eastern end, from Augusta past Defiance, whose 1894 depot stole the Katy's stop, through St. Charles to Machens, the Texas Junction where the Katy met the Burlington. The St. Charles to Machens stretch opened last, in 2011.
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