Richmond man has run on all 2,200 of the city's streets

Kirk Millikan runs these streets. All of them. Literally.

Shortly before sunset last Tuesday, the Richmond native completed a six-year journey spanning nearly a thousand miles on all of the city’s 2,200 streets.

“I figured a long-term motivating goal would be to run all the streets of Richmond. Back then, I didn't know that there would be a finish,” he said after reaching the milestone. “It was really just something to keep me motivated moving forward.” 

An experienced runner, Millikan has run in 38 marathons across the United States and Europe. When he’s been homebound over the last decade, though, Millikan gradually worked on his passion project after discovering in 2019 that he had already covered about 15% of the city’s streets training for races and world records. 

“There’s so many neighborhoods that I’d never stepped foot in before, and now I’ve run every foot of every street in all of the neighborhoods, all of the roads,” he said.

A graduate of Robious Middle School and Maggie L. Walker Governor’s School, the former high school track athlete is no stranger to the spotlight.

In London two years ago, Millikan ran a marathon in a lumberjack costume – complete with a plastic axe and lace-up boots. He narrowly defeated a similarly dressed competitor to earn a certified Guiness World Record. 

“At mile 19, my girlfriend screamed out to me, ‘He’s a minute behind you!’” Millikan said. “I didn’t know if I was getting further ahead or if he was getting closer, but I ended up finishing faster than he did, and I still have that record today.” (Yes, seriously. He also broke the record for fastest marathon dressed in lederhosen in 2019.)

For Millikan, there’s more to running than sophomoric glory. Since his days in high school, he’s always enjoyed the communal aspect of races and training for them with others. Competing in track and cross country was how he made friends when he arrived at Maggie Walker without most of his middle school buddies. 

In recent years, finding out where the city could make streets, sidewalks and bike lanes safer motivated him to keep running. 

“Kirk is a graduate of the Bike Walk RVA advocacy academy,” said Brantley Tyndall, director of the Sports Backers program. “His journey is in part about exploring discrepancies in access to safe walking and biking infrastructure. That is a core value of Sports Backers.” 

In addition to Bike Walk RVA, Millikan serves on the city’s Safe and Healthy Streets Commission. The group advises city officials on how it can achieve goals under Vision Zero, its policy initiative to eliminate traffic fatalities and severe injuries through traffic-calming measures and community engagement.  

“He’ll talk your ear off about it,” his girlfriend, Tasha, said of his zeal for traffic safety and urbanism.

Millikan said part of his challenge was running in unfamiliar parts of the city where local runners don’t typically workout. He planned and tracked his progress using CityStrides. The app doesn’t require running on freeways and private streets to complete a citywide achievement. But many of the city’s roads don’t have sidewalks, especially in more suburban areas of South Richmond that were annexed from Chesterfield County about half a century ago. 

Millikan said a recent run along Hull Street Road was especially illuminating. In February, 66-year-old Charles Hunt of Richmond was killed when an SUV struck him in the westbound travel lane in the 3800 block.

“That section of Hull Street is very dangerous, and an unfortunate reality is that there are Richmond residents that are being killed on it every year,” Millikan said before describing the sight of families and individuals walking along the shoulder of the road on a Sunday morning. “There’s no sidewalks but people are just walking with their groceries, because that’s what they have to do to live. So, there’s work to do.”

On the last run of Millikan’s project, Tyndall noted how the group was running along a section of Richmond Highway that’s slated for pedestrian infrastructure improvements for the Fall Line Trail, a regional 43-mile route between Petersburg and Ashland.

While the location of Tuesday’s two-and-a-half mile run highlighted another area where infrastructure improvements could uplift the community and make it safer for pedestrians and cyclists, MIllikan said he saved the final street for a personal reason.

Coles Street, the last stretch of asphalt he needed to pound, shares the name of his grandmother’s two cousins who died serving overseas during World War II. After running the Berlin marathon, around the same time he started his Richmond journey, Millikan traveled to Luxembourg to see where Ashton Cole and Morris Irby Cole Jr. are buried. 

“It was an opportunity to honor their legacy and memory, as well,” he said. Millikan isn’t done running yet. “I love using marathons as an excuse to travel,” he said. 

With marathons in 19 states already marked off, his next challenge is completing a race in all 50. The rest of the country is waiting.