Good day for a very long walk: The Manhattan Waterfront Greenway is getting closer to being a complete loop around the island

In Louisville, the first Saturday in May is the Kentucky Derby, a race of 10 furlongs, a mile and quarter, that the thoroughbreds will run in two minutes at about 37 mph.

In Manhattan, the first Saturday in May is the annual Great Saunter, a non-race of 256 furlongs, 32 miles, that participating bipeds will take 12 hours to complete moving at 3 mph.

And so just for fun and exercise, not any type of competition or fundraising effort, 2,500 people will step off from the Battery early this morning and start walking up the Hudson shoreline, always keeping the water on their left side, and 12 hours later or thereabout, roughly half of them will be back in the same place, having circumnavigated the 32 miles of the island of Manhattan.

Right of way. (Theodore Parisienne/for New York Daily News)

The Great Saunter, sponsored by the group called, appropriately Shorewalkers, began 39 years ago with a dozen folks led by Cy Adler, who died in 2018. That first hike in 1984 was five mayors ago when there was no Hudson River Greenway and no East River Greenway and no Harlem River Greenway and the waterfront was mostly desolate and often unreachable.

Each year, those greenways are being improved, with gaps gradually being filled in as they merge into a seamless whole. The Adams administration has put the city Economic Development Corp. as the lead agency to work to finish the task by the end of the decade. The remaining holes in the green ribbon around the island are the most challenging parts, such as in Inwood, along the southern stretches of the Harlem River and by the United Nations and FDR Drive. But each gap will be closed.

The plans and designs are going forward and money has been set aside, with the goal, as always, to try to stay as close to the water as can be.

The people out walking today will have to take some necessary detours around the gaps. Soon though, it will be impossible to get lost by just keeping following the shoreline.

The Daily News Flash

Weekdays

Catch up on the day’s top five stories every weekday afternoon.