Clif’s 2 Mile Challenge is really important to me and my cycling style. I appreciate a good recreational ride as much as the next cyclist, but for me, it’s not about excessive mileage or speed. I don’t race (often), I don’t torture myself with hill repeats or sprints. And I firmly believe that the best way to use a bike is as a form of transportation. Using bikes as transportation has serious implications for the state of our environment and our health. My feelings on this are why I really support Clif’s 2 Mile Challenge, and why I’m the leader of Team Gold, which represents the non-profit The Alliance for Biking and Walking.

Clif Bar gave three nonprofit organizations each a grant of $25,000. But Clif has committed to giving away $100,000. You can see how that math doesn’t quite add up…So Clif is using the 2 Mile Challenge to decide which nonprofit gets the extra $25,000. Want to help the Alliance for Biking and Walking win that extra grant? All you have to do is ride your bike…

Here’s how you can help the Alliance For Biking and Walking win $25,000 from Clif Bar:

Go to www.2MileChallenge.com.

Sign up (be sure it’s for Team Gold).

Ride your bike as a form of transit.

Log your miles.

That’s it! You can log up to four trips per day, and each trip is worth 2 points (we’re counting trips, not miles, here people!).  You can also challenge other members (or your friends, invite them to join!) to earn extra points. And if that isn’t reason enough, I also do trivia contests, give-aways, and challenges.

Speaking of Challenges:

I have one for new and current members alike. If you’re on Team Gold, you have the chance to win an awesome 2 Mile Challenge package. I (via Clif Bar) will send you team colored socks (by Sock Guy), arm warmers (also by Sock Guy), a bandanna, stickers, a keychain, some 2MC buttons, and some 2MC postcards to put out at your local bike shop or mail to friends.  Sounds good, right? Here’s the challenge:

Ride your bike as a form of transportation three times in one week.

On each trip, be sure you ride to (or past) a sign that displays the date (ideas: banks, schools, some fast food restaurants, you get the idea).

Take a photo of yourself with the sign in the background showing the date (this might take some coordinating if the date flashes for a only a brief amount of time–I realize this, but it’s part of the challenge!).

Send the photos (all in one email, please) to kaitlin (then the at sign) bicycleboulevards.com. (the weird email format is to avoid spam emails). At the end of the challenge, I’ll pick at random 3 of the folks who completed the challenge and send them the prize package. I may also pick several runner-ups for smaller prizes.

The challenge starts NOW, and runs through the end of August (that’s midnight PST, August 31, 2010).

Get out there and RIDE!

Hey you bicycle-loving readers of mine!

It has been pointed out to me that VH1 is having an awards show called The Do Something Awards! So, why do I share this information with you, my fine readers? Naturally, because something bike-related is happening!

In the “City” category, Austin, TX has been named a nominee, in large part because of the improvements made to cycling infrastructure in the city. I would encourage you to vote for Austin, to support cities who are making it happen for cyclists! Now, Portland, OR is also in the running, and we all know they have some FABULOUS bike boxes at intersections, bike paths, and traffic control systems in place to keep cyclists happy. So I suppose you can feel free to vote for them too. But I personally think it’s nice to vote for a city who is striving to take those first steps in making change! Anyway, Portland was nominated for their sustainable foodie culture. Even if you don’t vote for Austin or Portland, it’s great to encourage cities (and people–there are other categories!) to really “do something”. I am encouraging you to GO VOTE!

Here’s some more info, courtesy of VH1’s website:

DoSomething.org and VH1 have partnered to present The Do Something Awards to honor young people’s commitment to social change. The Do Something Awards will air live July 19, 2010 on VH1 and will be hosted by Jane Lynch (”Glee“).

The final five nominees and grant recipients were announced Monday, May 24, 2010 during a star-studded DoSomething.org event at the Apollo Theater in New York. Each nominee was honored for his or her commitment to social action with a community grant of $10,000. Of these five nominees, Do Something, Inc. with the help of your votes will select a grand prize winner which will receive a $100,000 grant for his or her cause during the live VH1 broadcast of the ceremony at the Hollywood Palladium.

Since 1996, DoSomething.org has honored the nation’s best world-changers, ages 25 and under. The Do Something Award is the premiere national award for social action. Nominees and winners represent the pivotal “do-ers” in their field, cause, or issue.

Additionally, users can vote on celebrity categories, which spotlight areas of and individuals in the entertainment industry that continue to dedicate time and resources to activism and charity projects.

These two words are used a lot, usually by groups like the East Bay Bicycle Coalition, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, Bicycle Friendly Berkeley, and the like. And I fully support this thing called “bicycle advocacy.” I would even call myself a bicycle advocate. And as it’s Bike to Work Month, and there’s lots of talk of advocacy, I feel it’s a good time to discuss what it means to be a bike advocate.

I confess I don’t have a lot of time to donate to volunteering at events put on by advocacy groups. Occasionally I donate my time, and sometimes I donate some money. There are people out there who do a lot more with organizations than I do, yet I still consider myself to be a bike advocate. In fact, I have a great sense of pride about the particular type of bicycle advocacy I engage in. I think it’s the kind of bicycle advocacy that Gandhi would have been into.

My bicycle advocacy is simple. It is non-confrontational. It is peaceful, quiet, and not ostentatious. I simply ride my bike. I ride it as a means of transportation. I take it to the grocery store, to cafes, to the homes of friends and family. I ride my bike to the BART station, to doctor’s appointments, and to farmer’s markets. But my advocacy is only partly about the fact that I actually ride my bike. The other major part of my advocacy is how I ride my bike.

I always stop (or at least seriously slow down) for stop signs. I always stop for red lights. I ride on the right side of the road, and in the bike lane if there is one. I never yell at motorists, I never spit on their cars or bang on their windows (I’ve seen it happen, and it’s not very nice).

In general, I believe that a calm, rational approach to cycling is called for. I know there are angry, militant cyclists out there who passionately hate motorists. I know they break the rules, and I understand that the rebellion feels right because as cyclists we believe we are doing the right thing for our bodies and our planet. But I think progress is made when cyclists respect motorists, and in turn, motorists respect cyclists. We have come a long way–let’s not undo the progress we have made.

Besides, the most important thing about being a cyclist in a world full of cars is remembering to stay safe. Until we live in some kind of utopia that is car free, where everyone moves at slow, non-lethal speeds, we need to look out for ourselves. Following the rules of the road and respecting motorists is one way to make sure you don’t end up smeared on the pavement.

Take care out there, and if you’re commuting, don’t forget to log miles at Clif’s 2 Mile Challenge site. Go Team Gold!

As part of my commitment to my Earth Day resolutions, I decided to try biking part of my epic commute. I drive 50 miles each way on any given workday, and I feel pretty bad about my carbon footprint, and my general lack of exercise that are the result of so much drive time. We’ve had a fair number of storms recently in the Bay Area, so I haven’t had a chance to try my new plan yet. I figure Bike to Work Day gives me the perfect opportunity!

So on May 13th, I will be taking BART from MacArthur station to Fremont, the end of the line. From there, I’ll be following the route mapped out below, using Google Maps’ relatively new bicycle directions. For some reason, Google doesn’t let you embed maps that show only the green bike routes that you normally see when using the “by bicycle” option. But this should give you a general idea of where I’m headed–it’s about 20 miles each way:

View Larger Map

Anyway, I encourage you to join in the Bike to Work festivities. Click here for the list of East Bay Bicycle Coalition “energizer stations” and here for the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition list of “energizer stations”. If you check out the energizer stations, you can grab some coffee, snacks, and other goodies–definitely good motivation! I know I’ll be stopping at the energizer station at the Fremont BART station before I get on my bike to make the trek to San Jose. If you have a great story about biking to work, please leave a comment…the more we talk about loving being on bikes, the more people will give it a try, and find out they love it too!

Well, I don’t do very well with guilt (I think it’s the Catholic school girl upbringing). So, I’m going to try to set some things right. Besides, everyone makes New Year’s resolutions to improve themselves, so why not make Earth Day resolutions to improve the world? And why not make them bicycling related?

Here are my promises:

1. The 2 mile challenge: This is a program put on by Clif Bar, with the idea being that if your destination is in a 2 mile radius, you should probably ride your bike to it. From the website: “40% of US urban travel is 2 miles or less. 90% of those trips are by car.” Maybe I can help fix this.

2. Attempt sustainable transit to work: This could be a serious pain. It means getting up at 5 AM, getting to BART, taking the train to Fremont, then riding the 20 miles from Fremont to San Jose. Then I have to change from my spandex to my professional clothing and hope I’m not sweaty. Then, after 9 hours at the office, I have to ride back to Fremont, and take BART home. It makes for a long day, so I’m going to attempt it once, and see how it goes. Perks include 40 miles worth of work out, not putting miles on my car, saving a little gas and parking money, and having a greener footprint. Problems include getting up early and being super tired, possibly getting sweaty and having to shower at work, carrying a bunch of extra clothes and shoes with me, and probably getting lost the first few times I try the ride. *Sigh* This will be the most time-consuming and challenging goal on my list.  But Bike to Work Week is happening this month, so now’s the time to try my best.

3. Volunteer: I’m going to an East Bay Bicycle Coalition training tonight. I encourage all of you to come! 7:30-9:00 PM, at the Rockridge Library, 5366 College Avenue. I’m going to learn how I can help get other people on bikes more often, even if I can’t commit to living car-free.

I’m certainly open to suggestions, too. So if you can think of some way that I can commit to riding my bike rather than driving my car, post a comment!

The paths will link parts of town that cyclists could previously only get to by riding on bumpy roads in need of repair that are also heavily used by motor vehicle traffic.

I’m hoping Emeryville will catch on, and make more of an effort to link itself to the Berkeley paths so I can use these new routes!

You can read more about the details of the expansion in the article from today’s Contra Costa Times.

photo courtesy of: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nafmo/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

San Francisco got a new bike lane! It’s the first new bike lane in the city in three years, and it’s green! SF Streetsblog has a great video of the press conference about it. In it, Mayor Newsom informs us that we currently have 45 miles of bike lanes in the city, and over the next six months want to stripe six more miles. The city will also be installing five bike racks per day.  And they’re painting the pavement different colors so everyone can see it’s a bike only zone. Some of those painted areas will be in front of the cars at stop lights, so that cyclists can be easily seen by cars at lights, and will get to go first when the light changes green. On top of that, they’re changing the timing of traffic lights so that bikes have enough time to get through.

Maybe it’s more like twelve steps forward, two steps back? Wow. Good job, San Francisco!

By why the sudden increase? As it turns out there was an injunction in place that prevented the city from making cycling improvements. Since that injunction, there has been a 53% increase in cycling. Mayor Newsom asks us to imagine what the increase could look like if we had bike lanes everywhere. He states that our goal is to increase the percentage of bike commutes in the city from the current 6% to 10% of commutes.

The lifting of the injunction is for sure yet, and the Mayor warns us that we may have to undo our improvements if the injunction isn’t permanently lifted. But there’s an air of optimism around the event–I think we’ll be seeing a total lifting of the injunction, and a lot more bicycle advocacy in San Francisco.

You can also read more about the new bike improvements at the San Francisco Citizen blog.

Traffic lanes on the 40th St/Shellmound Bridge were reduced from 2 to 1 in each direction in Sept 2008 to provide a buffer for cyclists. Due to complaints from Emery Go Round and Bay Street shopping center management about traffic congestion the City of Emeryville is studying whether to return lane striping to the way it was. Even though staff is recommending to keep the lane configuration the same it is extremely important the the public speaks out against this challenge to cyclist safety. The city council will consider this at their meeting Tuesday night. The item will be at the end of the evening’s agenda.

I live pretty close to this bridge, and I’ve definitely ridden my bicycle over it many times. The wide bike lanes are great, especially since the bridge is a little bit of a hill, and some people are a little bit slow getting over it. It’s nice for them to not have to worry about traffic while they’re pushing it up and over the hill. It’s also nice for going down the hill quickly–they don’t have to worry about how tightly they’ll have to take the corner. I’m definitely opposed to narrowing or eliminating bike lanes. It’s not that I’m afraid of riding in traffic; I don’t think narrowing the bike lanes would stop me from riding the bridge. But I do think that it will cause more congestion–not alleviate it.

Think about it. If the bike lanes are narrowed (or eliminated–it’s hard to tell exactly what the plan is from the EBBC blurb), then cars may have to move over to go around cyclists. Then they’ll be entering the left lane, causing traffic to slow. It’s going to be a traffic jam, instead of an organized reduction to one lane. And whatever the Bay Street management people say, that 200 yard stretch of one-lane road is not keeping people out of their shopping center. It’s only 200  yards. Let’s let the cyclists have a little more room on the bridge, and save the city a little money and paint. Leave the lines the way they are!