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Yesterday's event , hosted by the various bike coalitions in San Francisco, Marin, East Bay, and San Jose, was much quieter than usual.
There were still pop-up booths along popular bike routes to distribute free bags (pre-printed last December, when life was relatively innocent) and to sign up new members, but no morning Energizer Stations with snacks and cowbells, no gatherings, no Bike Away from Work Parties.
One of Bike East Bay's pop-ups was at Tip-Top Bicycle Shop on Telegraph Avenue, where the brand new parking-protected bike lanes are lined by a growing number of new parklets for nearby restaurants and bars to create a lively scene. Some of the people who stopped by to pick up bags were brand new to riding - one said he had started riding when he saw the new road diet and bike lanes. Some were local residents who bring their children on bikes through the quiet nearby streets and on to the new Telegraph bike lane, no longer fearful that the area is too dangerous for the little ones to ride in.
Image: Cynthia Armour
The parklets filled up as the day progressed, which meant riding the bike lane was a slow meander through the crowd, passing busy waiters and even hands holding phones reaching way out into the lane to take selfies of the people enjoying yesterday's stunning Bay Area weather.
Another pop-up was set up at the Crucible along Seventh in West Oakland, where some riders stopped by to pick up BTWD bags as well as free food from a neighborhood mutual aid station. That route out of downtown, while well-used now by bike riders, is rough, with bad pavement, faded lane markings, and no space marked for bikes. But the city plans will make it better, according to Bike East Bay's Robert Prinz, who ran that station, if the city can get the funding. Eventually, Seventh will be repaved with protected bike lanes and protected intersections.
Bike to Wherever Day will be a lot more fun in W Oakland once we get some real infrastructure on 7th Street & calm this gnarly stroad. Learn more about the @OakDOT’s plans here: https://t.co/I9JZrqycgcpic.twitter.com/hKpAVdkCUs
Silicon Valley Bike Coalition is celebrating Bike to Wherever days, which includes an ongoing challenge for residents to log their bike miles and compete for prizes.
They are also hosting a booth tomorrow along the Guadalupe River bike path to pass out bags.
We'll see you tomorrow, Sept. 26, from 7 a.m. to 11 a.m. at the River Oaks Bridge in San Jose! Bike by for your #BTWD bag, snacks, and goodies! Don't forget to log your ride on https://t.co/IS4BG8G2p0. pic.twitter.com/e6WW1tS3dY
As a long-time bike rider in California - mostly but not exclusively in the Bay Area and L.A. and S.F Bay areas - I am sometimes amazed when taking stock of how these events have changed over the years. Also, of how riding has changed. I used to stick closely to certain routes that I knew would bring me quickly, relatively safely, and with relatively little stress to where ever I was going. Usually that meant studying a map like the early East Bay Bike Coalition's painstaking efforts to map out the least stressful, least car-traffic-heavy routes possible. It meant sticking to quiet side streets, and sometimes taking circuitous routes to stay away from the main roads where most destinations are. The last piece, arriving where I wanted to be, could mean taking a sidewalk, or going the wrong way down a street, or walking the last bit.
But that is changing in many areas. Now more main streets have bike lanes on them, more routes are marked, more signals can detect bikes, more drivers expect to see people on bikes. When you get a facility like the new, much-fought-over road diet with parking-protected bike lanes along Telegraph Avenue - pictured below - a bike rider feels downright welcome, on a road that used to be a nightmare to be avoided (and meant maybe going somewhere else to shop).
New parking-protected bike lanes on Telegraph Ave in Temescal. Image: Bike East Bay
I'm not saying it's perfect. Too many places still serve only cars, and the safety concerns of a white lady like me are not the same things Black and brown riders are worried about - highlighted by the timing of this BTWD, coming on the day after the announcement that Breonna Taylor's killers would not be charged.
Much, much more remains to be done.
In downtown Oakland, a vigil for Black and brown victims of police violence. Image: Melanie Curry
But events like these are a fabulous way of both celebrating the hard-fought changes we have seen and of reminding everyone why better facilities are important and necessary. The advocates who work to make Bike to Work Day, and CicLAvia, and San Gabriel Golden Streets, and the Modesto Bike Rollouts successful are doing fabulous work that we all benefit from. It's well worth everyone's while to join and support their local bike advocacy group, so we can have more of this.
Streetsblog California editor Melanie Curry has been thinking about transportation, and how to improve conditions for bicyclists, since her early days commuting by bike to UCLA long ago. She was Managing Editor at the East Bay Express, and edited Access Magazine for the University of California Transportation Center. She also earned her Masters in City Planning from UC Berkeley.