GEARS will hold its annual meeting and Bike Swap on Monday November 28th from 6 to 8 pm at Hilyard Center, 2580 Hilyard St.  All GEARS members are invited to join for free Pizza and a soft drink ($5 for non members)!  We will vote on a By-Law change, have a presentation about the bRamble and elect and present the Executive Board. A Bike Swap, from 7-8pm, that will offer cyclists an opportunity to sell and exchange bicycles, bike parts and accessories, will follow this. Each “seller” who is not a GEARS member will be charged $5. Memberships are available starting at $12/year at the event or online athttp://eugenegears.org/membership

Both events are open to the general public.

Recycle Your Bicycle

Ghost Bike in Death Valley. Via flickr: hluisi

This month we are pleased to have long time GEARS member and ride leader Gary Cook present his tour of Death Valley and the surrounding areas of California and Nevada, finished in Jan/Feb of 2010. Gary is a very familiar face to anyone that has been on a GEARS Recreational Ride. He is always available to help guide riders on the correct route, to help change a flat, or offer one of many stories about touring or recreational riding. To Gary, there is no bad ride or difficult hill to climb, he just puts the pedals in motion and moves to the next bend of the road! He is a master at telling touring stories and has a special story about a trip to the Kelso Ranger station in the Mojave Preserve. He mentions, “You will have to attend the General Meeting to get the whole truth.” It is always a pleasure to “live” a cycling tour through slides and stories and Gary will make that happen.

posted by Anya Dobrowolski, Advocacy Committee Chair

Riding the success of our spring advocacy efforts, the GEARs Advocacy Committee (AC) will be meeting in June to discuss to start putting together a local advocacy strategy.  The June meeting will cover two important actions that will help us move forward to make bicycling in our community even better than it already is:

1) Create a draft mission statement for the AC that we can share with the people and groups that we will be engaging with;

2) State developing an outreach strategy to educate local politicians and community leaders about the important role that active transportation plays in the community.

GEARs Advocacy Committee Meeting
Tuesday, June 14th, 6PM
University of Oregon, Hendricks Hall, Room 100 (across University St. from the EMU; find a UO campus map here: http://map.uoregon.edu/)

The meeting is open to all GEARs members.  If you’d like to get more frequent updates on the AC’s work and join in on the discussion, you can join our Google group by going to http://groups.google.com/group/gears-advocacy-committee?lnk=srg&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8 and clicking on the “join group” button on the right side of your screen.

• Two-way cycle track from Amazon Creek to River Paths
• Bike boulevard improvements on 15^th Ave (Fairgrounds to campus)
• Connecting the north end of the river path north of Beltline
• Bike facility improvements on 18^th Ave (better pavement, buffered bike lanes)
• Coburg/Oakway bike safety improvements

The poll is still open!  You can fill it out here.  Pending the poll’s final results and the Board’s approval in April, these will be the official GEARs-endorsed projects for submission to the city’s Planning Department to include in the Plan.

Two weeks later, the committee got together to sort through the dozen bills that have been proposed for the 2011 legislative session to create recommendations on whether or not GEARs should officially endorse them.  In all, we decided to support the following bills:

• LC 3905 – Bike Trailer Safety Standards bill
• HB 2331 – Bike License Feasibility Study
• HB 2332 – Gross Vehicle Weight Fines Amendment (with a suggestion to increase Class A violation fines as well)
• HB 2712 – Maximum Automobile Fines Amendment
• HB 2824 – Stolen Bicycle Trafficking Bill
• SB 40 – Non-profit Funding Structures
• SB 344/HB 3150 – Speed Limit Reduction (along designated byways)
• SB 660 – Stop Sign Fine Amendment

This was in preparation for the upcoming Oregon Active Transportation Summit, which will be held on March 29^th and 30^th.  While there, at least four members of the committee are going to be advocating to our elected state officials from the southern Willamette Valley to support biking.  This list of positions on state bills is a huge step forward in that effort.

And finally, Price Armstrong (yours truly) just got back from Washington, DC for the National Bike Summit.  I wrote about it in more detail here, but suffice it to say, it was an amazing experience.  GEARs got a lot of name recognition, all kinds of networking took place, and our elected officials in Washington are definitely aware of the urgent need to defend bicycle-related programs and funding.

Once April rolls around, things are sure to quiet down a bit, though the Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan is going to continue having open houses and won’t be adopted until June 2011.  It’s been a productive advocacy year so far; thanks for all the support from the community, GEARs members, and the GEARs Board of Directors.  And, as always, if you have any questions, please feel free to email me at pricearmstrong@gmail.com.

Bike Advocate Extraordinaire, Anya Dobrowolski

In our last GEARs Advocacy Committee Meeting on February 21 we discussed the proposed Eugene-Springfield Bike-Ped Masterplan, and talked about what we believe should be priority projects.  We also discussed several pieces of legislation that are up for debate in this year’s state legislative session.  Our next meeting will focus further on the state legislation.  The meeting details are:

Monday, March 14
7:00 pm – 8:00 pm
Coquille Room, Erb Memorial Union, University of Oregon (near the food court)

In this meeting we will take a look at the dozen pieces of legislation that may impact the GEARs community and make decisions about which bills we will lobby for, against, or remain neutral on.  Once we have developed some recommendations, they will be taken to the GEARs Board in March so that they can be formally adopted and presented at the upcoming Active Transportation Summit in Salem at the end of the month.   Some of the bills we will be reviewing include topics such as:

-Amendments to bicycle helmet laws
-Bicycle trailer safety standards
-Bicycle licensing feasibility studies
-Stolen bicycle trafficking penalties
-Penalites for unsafe bicycle operation
-and much, MUCH MORE!

The Friday before our meeting I will be sending out a spreadsheet to Advocacy Committee members and anyone else who asks to be included summarizing each of the bills and providing information on their current status in the legislative process.  Anybody who plans to attend what should prove to be a lively meeting should email me to at anya.dobrowolski@gmail.com to ensure that they receive the summary spreadsheet.

If you are interested in reading a summary of the bills we will be discussing please email me,  Anya Dobrowolski, at anya.dobrowolski@gmail.com.  Please feel free to email me with any other questions you might have as well.

Monday, February 21
7:00 pm – 8:00 pm
Coquille Room, Erb Memorial Union, University of Oregon (near the food court)

The meeting will focus on two items in particular:

1. Developing recommendations for priority bicycling projects for the Eugene and Springfield TSPs.
2. Developing recommendations for potential state legislation dealing with bicycling.

Other groups have already done a lot of analysis and commenting on the above items, and so our deliberations won’t be starting from scratch.  Once we have developed some recommendations, they will be taken to the GEARs Board in March so that they can be formally adopted, and then submitted to the cities/legislature. We can also use these as firm footing when we go to Salem for the Active Transportation Summit in March!

As always, let me know if you have any questions by emailing pricearmstrong@gmail.com.

Dear Eugene area Members, Friends, and Volunteers,

Two of our programs staff, LeeAnne Fergason, and Joel Holly, will be in the area next week, and we’d love to talk to more people while we’re there.

On Friday, August 27th, from 6:00-8:30, we’ll be at the World Cafe/New Day Bakery (449 Blair Boulevard, Eugene). They’ve invited us to take over their patio, so come join us for a non-structured meet-and-greet to tell us what you’re excited about, and get a first-hand story on whatever you’re interested in knowing about the BTA, whether it’s about our new Executive Director, our process in drafting the 2011 Legislative Agenda, or our plans for Bike Safety Education and the Bike Commute Challenge.

We both work in BTA education and outreach programs, so that’s our area of expertise, but we’re happy to share what we know about other advocacy and
membership topics as well.
Looking forward to meeting you or seeing you again,

The Ride of Silence is a slow-paced, silent ride, similar to a funeral procession.  Besides honoring those who have been killed while bicycling, the Ride seeks to give a visible reminder to motorists and bicyclists alike of their responsibility for ensuring safety on our shared roadways.

According to the Oregon Department of Transportation, eight bicyclists were killed in motor vehicle collisions in Eugene-Springfield from 2004-2008 (the most recent data available).  Another 37 collisions resulting in serious injuries to bicyclists were reported to ODOT during the same period.  At least two additional bicyclists were killed in rural Lane County from 2004 to 2008..

Wednesday’s ride will depart from the EMU around 7 p.m. on a flat, 10-mile route that will stop by three different locations at which bicyclists have been killed.  A brief memorial to the cyclist involved will occur at each site.  The ride is open to bicyclists of all ages and abilities.  Helmets are required by law for all cyclists under the age of 16, and are strongly encouraged for all.  For more information, contact Sue Wolling at 541-345-2110 or sue@eugenegears.org.

Paul Freedman of Rock the Bike (AKA The Fossil Fool) is working with the University of Oregon’s Bike Program (a project of the Outdoor Program) to build a Pedal Powered generator.  They’ll be holding an informative and exciting expose of the program’s new bicycle electricity generation system, dubbed the “biker bar” on Friday night in Agate Hall (May 7th, 7-8pm, 18th & Agate).  WeBikeEugene did a good write up on the $10,000 grant that was received for the project.

via rockthebike.com

The Biker Bar will be debuted at the Bike Music Fest, the mainstage of the Willamette Valley Music Fest on Saturday (May 8th). Besides the music powered by your legs there will be free bike repair, bike blended smoothies, screen printing, and MORE all day long in the EMU Amphitheater, corner of 13th and University.  For the bicycle centric events, come down between 10am – 4pm.  A bicycle ride, and live on bike performance by Fossil Fool will take place at 4pm.  Music will keep going until midnight!

For a good write-up by Paul (just what we need, another Paul in the Eugene bike scene!) about the Pedal Powered Stage checkout this Rock the Bike blog post.

We’ll see you at the Biker Bar!

ODOT WRB – Path detour flyer – 4_8_10