Years ago, I visited my grandma who had a Hallmark Channel made-for-TV movie on in the background and I heard a scene where one of the characters suddenly started ranting about how angry he was that the Burke-Gilman Trail Missing Link was still unfinished.

I’ve been trying to figure out the name of this movie for years and honestly wasn’t totally sure if I really saw it or just dreamed / misheard it. But yesterday I realized you can stream Hallmark movies for free through the library and finally tracked it down!!!

Love to the Rescue (2019)

• The part where they first mention the Burke Gilman Trail starts around 26:50.
• The scene where he starts complaining about the missing link is at 29:30.

The Burke Gilman Trail is part of a sub plot about the guy being unhappy with his job at the department of transportation. They go on a date hiking along the trail (which looks ABSOLUTELY NOTHING like Seattle) when he starts going off about the missing link:

“For 20 years we’ve been trying to find a safe way to close a gap on this trail, and we finally found a solution that was going to work for everyone but that Marina is now suing. Yeah, we finally found a solution that works for everyone but the Marina is suing because they don’t want to lose parking spots… And people keep telling me be patient, we’ll figure it out. But people are getting hurt and it’s making me crazy!”

(Yes, he really does say the exact same sentence twice in a row.)

I only skimmed the rest using the skip ahead button, so I’m not sure if it comes up again but as far as I could tell it does not and this movie does not have a happy ending for urbanists: (#spoileralert & #triggerwarning for YIMBYs) This plot thread is resolved when he quits his job as a transportation planner and goes to work for an affordable housing advocacy group that fights against developers. (😔🪊 womp womp)

Side Note: Finding this scene was not easy! I remembered it was a cheesy rom com about a couple who meet cute when they both want to adopt the same dog. What I didn’t count on is that at least a dozen Hallmark movies have essentially this exact same plot. Slogging through all this treacle was painful and probably will taint my book and movie recommendations forever, but worth it.