Time to run on the grass

Running along Colorado Avenue NW recently, I came across this scene: a sidewalk missing, so no place to run that’s not in the street. Now the usual response to this is to run on the pavement, but why? Isn’t the flat grassy area all public property? If you look in the distance, you can see a utility pole in that same flat grassy area, so its city property, not private property.

So I ran on the grass.

My knees were happy, as grass is softer than pavement, and Taxi Dog was happy, her paws like grass much more than pavement. But I wonder if the homeowners are going to be happy? Would you be? Especially if you were excited because your home didn’t have a sidewalk just to keep pedestrians away.