Living in a City With No Bike Shop
November 11, 2015
Contributor
Jeffrey Devereux
as if you didn't already know the BL&D team resides in the Beat: a city of great history and, for some time now, great promise. it's a place that gave rise to the mass consumption of bicycles a century ago, but as of about a year ago became a city with over 125K residents and no bike shop. at this point, it's undeniable that we have some general momentum around here for various things, but as is often the case (or maybe just the case this early in the game), we have another crazy dichotomy where we simultaneously can have a transportation infrastructure project that costs half a bill but no place to get spare inner-tube in the same city.
you probably already know, but there is pretty amazing thing going on right now. it's called BICI Co., a community bike workshop made with the intent to move hartford forward together. many don't know the back story, so let us catch you up real quick.
we weren't the only people who thought figuring out how to fill in this asset gap was important. after a couple of posts to the social network, we quickly determined that others wanted the same thing. then Hartford did a great thing (which it seems to be doing a fair bit lately): they got a community of people together around a table to find a way to create a collective solution. the group spitballed ideas and we quickly made our way to assembling some assets together to see if we could find a way for Hartford to support a bike-co-op-like situation.
it also just so happened that our man tony was going through his dont-call-it-a-mid-life-crisis and quit his job to work for a community organization. not to mention, director yanil couldn't be more excited about youth and bikes. now if you ask us, hartford has tons of young cats on bikes doing things. depending on who you ask, that's either a good or bad thing but it's probably neither. but any dude or dudet who can wheelie around the block without thinking about it has our appreciation.
so now, a dozen or so slow rolls, a whole bunch of overly excited bike meetings, a summer youth bike repair training program, a very generous landlord in SAMA, a couple above ground swimming pools worth of volunteer sweat, a few new bike lanes, and even a cross country road trip is culminating in a movement that is BiCi Co.
3squaremealsaday here, is very excited to be part of a team and a whole raft of volunteers that is helping the Center for Latino Progress bring another something a bit special to park street.
if you are free this sunday the 6th, come slow roll with us one final time and let us show you some thanks for being part of the movement. we'll be at majorca at 3 pm.
