I love bike lanes. I feel much more comfortable on streets that have them. But sometimes they are inexplicable and frustrating. No, make that always! For example, the way they often interact (if it can be called that,) with right turn lanes at intersections. At least in Campbell and San Jose, which is where I mostly ride.
We will soon be full swing with bike parking season. It's something I really enjoy, as long as it's not toooo hot. A chance to be out of doors, meet a lot of people, and do something of service.
For SVBC staff, BTWD is the culmination of months of work and anticipation. On the actual day, we each took some time to ride around and visit a few energizer stations, and, yes, bike to work!
My first stop was at 7:00 at the Barracuda building on Winchester in south Campbell, which is just a few blocks from where I live. Barracuda does a really nice energizer station, with lots of good food (you could pretty much eat your breakfast there,) and a mechanic from Summit Bicycles if you need help with your bike. (Last year, he fixed a problem I was having with one of my gears.)
One of my favorite events leading up to Bike to Work Day is the bag stuffing party. That's when volunteers join us to put items in the musette bags and sort them out to go to the various energizer stations. It's a busy time and a lot of fun. We have a number of hardy volunteers who have been there multiple times.
Did you know that you can benefit SVBC as well as yourself by recording your exercise? (You are exercising, right?)
I discovered this when I realized that here it is, almost May, and I still have the 10 pounds I gained over the winter. So I resolved to exercise daily, and decided to check out the Plus 3 Network fundraising possibility.
I attended the dinner held last Thursday for the 2011 Women of Influence in Silicon Valley, at which our ED, Corinne Winter was honored. And it was an honor; to think that the ED of a bicycle advocacy organization was included! It is one of the indications of the inroads we have made. Also, it is great that the spotlight was on women. I can remember the day, not so long ago, when there would not be anything like this focused on women.
Well, none of us likes to see our gas bill going up. But I think the good news is that people will consider other forms of transportation. On Monday I did a combination of bike and light rail to work. I couldn't believe how crowded the light rail was at late morning! At one point there were nine bikes in the car!
Last time prices were high it really seemed like there were more bikes on the roads. The prices are a reminder that we can't continue the way we have been for the last 80 years. I'm trying to drive less (and I get 30 mpg!) but when gas prices are lower I get lazy.
Colin has already blogged about the Bike Advocacy Summit, so I won't go into any detail, but I do want to say that I found it very interesting and got a bunch of new ideas. If you can make it to the Friday program in San Jose, be sure to come. Don't worry if the ticket website is closed; you can deal with that at the door. Go to the SVBC website home page for more info.
I didn't either. And, it turned out, neither did the friends I was bicycling to Niles with. The description of the ride said we would start at Coyote Hills Regional Park, by the bay, and ride 9 miles up the trail to Niles, where we would stop for lunch before riding back. That was all. I had debated even about going, as 18 miles is a little far for me. But I decided to chance it.
This is about public transportation. Someplace else.
I am a big believer in having good, easy-to-use public transportation to help us get out of our cars. The problems and cutbacks we are experiencing here make me very sad.
I think I'm supposed to be telling people what I am doing at SVBC. Problem is, what I do is pretty boring: Paying bills, sending out invoices, updating payroll, making the deposits, working with insurance issues, writing letters, proofreading, getting supplies in, keeping up the files. Are you yawning yet? Yeah, not something anyone wants to hear too much about. But I do love the job. It’s an organization I really believe in (and someone has to take care of these things!) and I’m working with and supporting such great people.
Well, I'm the "back office" person at SVBC, and also the "late-in-life rider." I haven't been riding a lot, due to the weather and short days, and also it's not so easy to get from my home to the new office. It used to be a nice ride down the Los Gatos Creek Trail for a few miles, and thence down Willow in the bike lane (which is really nice now that they finally paved the road, which had to be the worst!) So, they paved; the office moved.
