|
Official Bike to Work Day
site
Team Bike Challenge
Form your team and pedal for prizes during the month of May.
Hundreds of Thousands Get Into the Spirit of Bike to Work Day
May 14, 2010…Hundreds of thousands of Bay Area residents changed their commute routine yesterday, packing up their briefcases, backpacks, kids and dogs to bicycle to school, work and errands — while leaving their cars in the garage.
Early numbers show a significant increase in Bike to Work Day participation across the Bay Area during the morning commute time.
Bike to Work Day Coordinator Andrew Casteel reported brisk business at the Energizer Station at the Marin County side of the Golden Gate Bridge. “We were pretty packed for most of the morning over there,” he said.
In San Francisco, bicycles accounted for 75 percent of the morning roadway traffic on Market Street, according to the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition and the city of San Francisco. That equates to one-third more people choosing to pedal to their jobs in San Francisco on Bike to Work Day this year compared to last year’s event, based on counts at Market and Van Ness from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. Advocates for bicycling attribute this record-breaking increase to the newly separated, green-painted Market Street bike lanes and other improvements that are making streets all across the city safer.
San Mateo reported 20 percent more bike traffic at its energizer stations during the morning commute compared to last year, while Alameda county was showing an average 10 percent increase in traffic at select energizer locations, according to reports from the East Bay Bicycle Coalition.
The free pancake breakfast for bicycle commuters at Oakland’s City Center was a sell-out affair, while the free, all-day valet parking for bicycles was packed by 8:30 a.m. In a greeting to the crowd, Oakland City Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan vowed to make Oakland “the bicycling-est city” in the nation.
The month-long Team Bike Challenge is also picking up steam, with the 2,220 participants registered to date already logging 129,016 miles by midday on Bike to Work Day -- enough to circle the globe over 5.2 times, while saving the planet over 71 tons of harmful toxic emissions. Participants form groups of up to five members, recording their daily bike trips in an effort to earn the most points and win prizes. This year’s Team Bike Challenge contestants have a cool new tool in the form of a GPS-enabled iPhone app that let’s them record their trips and miles while on the road. Casteel said that based on the mileage to date, participants are on track to log nearly 300,000 miles by the end of the May competition, which would be a 10 percent increase over last year’s Team Bike Challenge.
Santa Clara County Supervisor and MTC Commissioner Ken Yeager did his part for the planet by not only bicycling to his office at San Jose’s county government center yesterday, but also cycling another 12 miles for an appearance at another event.
Bike to Work Day is a project of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Bay Area Bicycle Coalition, with major underwriting this year by Kaiser Permanente, and sponsorship by a number of other cities, local bicycle coalitions, bike shops and the like.
— Brenda Kahn
|
Photo: Karl Nielsen
Photo: Karl Nielsen
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: Noah Berger
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: Peter Beeler
Photo: Peter Beeler
Photo: Peter Beeler
Photo: Peter Beeler
Photo: Peter Beeler
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: David Beaty
Photo: Sean Co
Photo: Sean Co
Photo: Sean Co
Photo: Sean Co
Photo: Brenda Kahn
Photo: Brenda Kahn
Photo: Brenda Kahn
Photo: Brenda Kahn
Photo: Brenda Kahn
Photo: Brenda Kahn