WABA Quick Release

WABA’s “Got Lights?” project gives away 1,000 free sets of front and rear lights (provided by DDOT) and will continue all year in various locations throughout the District.  We are committed to giving each and every light set to cyclists who are riding without lights when we find them. If you already have lights on your bike, please consider helping us put these lights on the bikes that need them. Call 202-518-0524 x200 or email advocacy@waba.org to help out! This post was written by WABA member and volunteer DC Bike Ambassador Jason Clock.

WABA's branded bike lights for the Got Lights? giveaway

The Dark Ages

Daylight Savings Time ended on November 6th, and since then WABA has been waiting for their bike light sets to be paid for/arrive (as a volunteer, information isn’t always easy to come by). The first few weeks after the time change are statistically some of the worst to be a pedestrian (or a bicyclist), as the number of crashes jumps up.

But for most bicyclists, evening commutes stay dark well into the late winter/early spring, so even though WABA’s lights only arrived last week, the need for lights on bikes hasn’t gone away. This is definitely the time of year when many cyclists are not visible due to lack of lights and reflective clothing.

Bike Lights For the Lightless

WABA’s goal is to target cyclists “riding dark”, i.e. people who don’t have any lights on their bike at all. Whether it’s due to a lack of knowledge about the laws requiring lights, an inability to afford them, not knowing where to buy them, or just plain forgetfulness, these people are the ones who are the most vulnerable.

So when the DC Bike Ambassadors were asked to sign up for the Bike Light Blitz–riding around with a bag of light sets and handing them out with a smile and a “Got Bike? Get WABA” business card, I was happy to help out. Here’s my timeline of the evening.

• 6:00 PM: I arrived at WABA HQ in Adams Morgan and grabbed a bag of bike lights. 15 white front lights and 15 red rear lights in the “knog” style, single-piece lights with a silicon strap that loops around handlebars, seat posts, or pretty much anything else.

• 6:10 PM: I decked out my bike with a few light sets to draw attention and designated a pocket each for front lights, rear lights, and WABA cards. Joined by the rest of the Bike Light Blitzers, I headed out. We were allowed to pick our own routes, and I chose to head towards downtown, riding along the 15th street cycle track with an eye out for “stealth riders” to start blitzing. I quickly encountered a few “False IDs”–riders with rear red lights but no front white lights. I told them that a front light is not only good for visibility, but is required by law when riding at night.

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  6:30 PM: Feeling like a bike messenger, I pushed hard to chase down one stealth rider after another, standing on the pedals and hoping for a red light that would give me a few seconds to pull up alongside and enlighten them. The adrenaline rush helped break the ice, since most riders were a little suspicious at first. “I am just going across the street,” complained one single-speed cyclist–decked out in dark clothing on a black bike. “How much?” asked another rider. “No trick here,” I assured him, “I’m just shedding some light on the stealth riders of the District.” My pun went unnoticed, but the bike lights were appreciated.

• 6:45 PM: I fully expected that the morning’s rain would keep the number of cyclists low in the evening, but I was shocked to find myself out of light sets in just 35 minutes!  I was surprised by how many cyclists did not have lights.  Many of them also wore dark clothing which certainly did not help visibility. And worst of all, most people didn’t even realize they were putting themselves in unnecessary danger.

A Brighter Future

I have to say I had a blast helping out with the Bike Light Blitz, and I plan to grab a few more bike light sets to keep on hand for when I come across stealth riders on my normal commute.  And, after counting dark cyclists while walking my dog, I might stash a few sets in my coat pockets for those times when I’m on foot, too.

You Can Help Too

Become a volunteer Bike Ambassador and help spread the word about bikes to your community, workplace and friends. We educate cyclists and motorists about safe cycling and have a good time doing it. You can contact Daniel Hoagland, WABA’s Bike Ambassador Coordinator by emailing daniel@waba.org

Thank you to WABA & DDOT for making free bike lights possible!

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Last night WABA, MoBike, and other advocates testified in support of restoring funding for the Metropolitan Branch Trail in the County’s Capital Improvement Program (CIP) budget.  WABA’s testimony is below.  MoBike’s is available HERE.

Thank you to the hundreds who emailed in support of the MBT.  If you have not yet emailed the Montgomery County Council you can still do so HERE in advance of next week’s Transportation & Environment Committee hearing on the CIP.

2012 MBT CIP Testimony, Montgomery County Council

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BikeFest 2012

Once again we’re hosting the biggest bike-themed party in the DC-metro region – and all the proceeds make their way back to you in the form of stronger advocacy and, ultimately, better bicycling.  We’re planning now to make this year’s BikeFest our most lively and successful fundraiser to date.

In order to celebrate a year as great for biking as 2011 and keep the advocacy strong through 2012 and beyond, we need your support.

Supporting BikeFest 2012

Will you help WABA by connecting us to individuals or groups who may be able and willing to participate in this year’s BikeFest? We are in need of potential venues, sponsors, and in-kind donors.

All it takes is a connection. Here’s how you can help:  if you think your neighborhood baker, sports club, or  favorite bike mechanic is  able to help out, or maybe your company is interested in sponsorship opportunities, let us know.

It only takes a minute. Just send me a quick email at nelle@waba.org or give me a call at 202-518-0524 x202.  And be sure to use the buttons at the bottom of this page to share this with your networks on Facebook or Twitter.

We’re on the lookout for:

A venue: An approximately 5,000 square feet space to accommodate the event.

Sponsors: Title sponsor and lead sponsors for financial support.

Silent Auction Items: Components of experiential bike-related silent auction packages.

Raffle Items: Desirable items for our raffle contests.

BikeBuild Participants: Four local bike shops to build and auction-off handcrafted bicycles.

Food and Drink: Local restaurants/caterers and liquor distributors to keep us happily satiated.

How and why your support matters

BikeFest is an opportunity to the region’s bicycling community to come together to celebrate the progress we’ve made in making the area more bike-friendly.  It is also an opportunity for WABA to raise funds to be used in areas in which funding is hard to come by.  Those parts of our region with the greatest need for better bicycling facilities and programming also tend to be the areas in which we have the fewest members and the least financial support.  Thus, we need to raise funds at events like BikeFest to fund our overall mission and continue to work in undeserved communities to get our message to those outside our core audience.

We’re already looking forward to BikeFest 2012, and we have some big ideas in mind.  But we need you to help us fill in the details with the types of people and things you want to see.  Love that bike shop?  Ask them to enter the bike build contest.  Favorite restaurant? We’d love to feature their food.  We just need your help to bring the right partners together.

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As our members and supporters know, WABA has worked for decades to help bring about a high-quality trail connection between Silver Spring and downtown DC.  The Metropolitan Branch Trail (MBT) can provide this connection, but its progress is threatened.

This year, the budget proposed by the Montgomery County Executive cuts design and construction funding for the county’s portion of the MBT for the next six years. We need the County Council to ensure that these years of effort are not wasted and that the County’s commitments to prioritize the completion of the trail are kept.

Priorities are determined not in empty words, but in budgetary commitments. In this budget the promises to build this trail are broken.

Your opportunity to tell the County Council to return the MBT to the county’s budget is this Tuesday, February 7^th at 7pm.  Please come and show your support for the trail.  If you are unable to attend in person, CLICK HERE to email the County Council to state your support for the trail and to request that funding be restored.

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WABA will be hitting the streets tonight to begin our “Got Lights?” program for 2012, giving away 1,000 free sets of front and rear lights (provided by DDOT). The program is designed to target bicyclists riding after dark without lights. This post is a personal story from Gina Arlotto, who handles WABA’s Planning and Organizational Development, about teaching her kids about bike safety and the importance of having lights (and other safety equipment) on bikes.

WABA's branded bike lights for the Got Lights? giveaway

One Parent’s Perspective

It will come as no surprise to you to learn that kids really don’t like being told what to do. And they dislike it even more when they hit adolescence. Trust me, having to repeat the same lessons (pick your battles!) a million times gets old from a parent’s perspective, too.

Happily, teaching and practicing safe bicycling habits is one of those battles that we pick. It’s how I combat the anxiety I feel about them riding to school alone every day. I know they have the skills to control what they can–by following the rules of the road, by signaling, by stopping at stop signs and red lights–and the proper safety equipment. And I hope they can handle what they can’t control, especially the drivers commuting through our neighborhood without regard for bicyclists.  My kids know that following the rules of the road and having the proper bike safety equipment is not only the law, it’s also the safest way to ride.

My son (15) has taken many of my lessons to heart, but he takes the Metro to school (and as a teenage boy, will be a safety work-in-progress for some time regardless). I usually ride with my daughter (9) to school before I head into work, so I am able to observe her bike behavior closely.

A Bike Safety Prodigy

But for my 12-year-old daughter MaryGrace, it is imperative that she follow our safe cycling rules as she rides the 10 blocks to Stuart Hobson Middle School alongside car commuters. If you’re at all familiar with middle schoolers, you know they especially don’t like being told what to do, and my daughter is no exception. For a long time, I couldn’t be sure if all our lessons on bike safety were sinking in.

Thankfully, I periodically get reports from neighbors complimenting her for stopping at red lights and riding safely around the neighborhood. And if I needed any more reassurance, I only have to think of her response when I praised her on a long ride about how well she was doing. “Mom, I’m a bike safety prodigy,” she said with all the attitude of a typical 7th grade girl. Nevertheless, I could tell she was proud of herself.

Bike lights as critical bike safety equipment is a common theme in our house. We installed lights on the kids’ bikes before they rode them for the first time, so the conversation mostly consists of reminding the kids to turn the lights on, even during the daylight hours. When we’re out and about on Capitol Hill we see a lot of bicyclists riding around without lights, and my kids are often the first to point them out.  “Wow. That’s not safe,” they say, “You can’t even see them!”

Needless to say, I was thrilled when, a few weeks ago, I came home to find MaryGrace out on the sidewalk installing a set of lights on her friend’s new bike. When MaryGrace saw the bike, she said the first thing she told her friend was that she needed a set of lights.  After school let out they rode to our house and, after rummaging around in my husband’s basement work bench, fortunately located a spare set.  Not content to just give the lights to her friend to mount on the bike later, MaryGrace had grabbed a screwdriver and they worked together to get everything attached for the now-dark ride home. A “bike safety prodigy” indeed!

Visibility is Your First Priority

All of this is to say that if a slightly stubborn (but always adorable) 12-year-old middle school girl can recognize the importance of a set of bike lights, then you probably should too. And to any other parents out there, sometimes you really do have to repeat an important lesson a million times before it sticks. If you’re very lucky, you’ll be there when it does.

WABA’s “Got Lights?” project begins today and will continue in various locations throughout the District until we’ve given away all 1000 sets.  We are committed to giving each and every light set to cyclists who are riding without lights when we find them. If you already have lights on your bike, please consider helping us put these lights on the bikes that need them. Call 202-518-0524 or email advocacy@waba.org to help out!

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Last Saturday we celebrated the 500+ bicyclists who resolved to ride responsibly throughout 2012.  The Resolution to Ride Responsibly is a year-long commitment to be a responsible bicyclist, to respect the rights of all road users, to yield to pedestrians and to do your part to make our roadways safe places.

Once again we invited our members and supporters to join us for an easy, fun ride to demonstrate these commitments. And this year, the weather cooperated fully, providing us with an incredibly warm January morning!

More than 60 bicyclists from all over the region joined us for the ride, a jaunty 6.5-mile ride through some of the District’s most vibrant neighborhoods.  As a group we discussed the importance of respectful and predictable riding behaviors, and showed that groups of bicyclists belong on the roads along the way. We enjoyed each other’s company and talked about what unites us all, our sincere appreciation for bicycles.

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Join staff from WABA and Rails-to-Trail Conservancy for Meet & Greet on February 1st, 2012 at 6:00 pm at the Rails-to-Trails Offices. This event is open to all interested in participating in the Climate Ride NYC-DC, May 19-23, 2012. Past Climate Riders, members of the 2012 Team WABA and Climate Ride staff will provide an introduction to the Climate Ride including tips on fundraiser and advice on training. This is an opportunity to have all of your questions answered. Light food (pizza) and drinks (beer) will be provided!

Event Time: February 1st, 2012 at 6:00 pm

Event Location:
Rails-to-Trail Conservancy
The Duke Ellington Building
2121 Ward Ct., NW, 5th Floor
Washington, DC 20037
See on Google Maps

Please RSVP for the meeting (not mandatory, we just don’t want to run out of pizza)!

Learn more about the 2012 Climate Ride and Team WABA

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In the past few months, WABA has been receiving more questions about taxis and how to better educate taxi drivers on safe driving near bicyclists and bicycle infrastructure. Educating the District’s 8000+ taxicab operators is a daunting task, made more difficult by both communication and logistical issues. Last November, with the help of DDOT, WABA’s Bike Ambassador attended a meeting of the DC Taxicab Commission and presented on bicyclists’ concerns and discussed potential opportunities to work with the Commission and drivers on alleviating these issues and improving our access to taxicab operators.

More recently, WABA submitted the following testimony on the proposed taxicab industry reform law.  Essentially, our testimony seeks to create an opportunity to ensure that bicycling is addressed in licensure and training standards, and that the goal of the legislation be broadened to include roadway safety generally, rather than simply regulation of the driver-passenger relationship.

Realistically, the particular standards that District taxi drivers will need to meet, as well as the educational and training elements that will be required of them, will most likely be set through a series of rulemakings–not through this legislation directly.  So while it is important that the legislation make clear that the interests of roadway users in general, and cyclists in particular, are relevant and important to the development of these rules, it is as important that cyclists be ready and willing to participate in the Commission’s rulemaking process that will ultimately set these standards.

WABA will continue to work on this issue and seek the necessary resources to develop a more robust and region-wide outreach and education program directed toward taxi drivers.  Meanwhile, we encourage those interested in this issue to CLICK HERE to sign up for alerts on the issue, and to support the development of this program.

Taxicab Legislation Testimony

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This winter, we’re looking for the brave, the bold, and those willing to get cold. We’re having a bike education class for our committed Bike Ambassador volunteers on Saturday, January 21st. While this class is primarily for the Bike Ambassador volunteers, it is also open to the general public.

The class will be our Confident City Cycling 1 curriculum, which covers basic bicycling information and on-bike skills. Half of this class will be in the WABA classroom and half will be on-bike practicing bike handling skills.

Please register by clicking here.

You might be asking “Who are the Bike Ambassador volunteers?”

The Bike Ambassador program is our way of outsourcing our bike outreach and education. Bike Ambassador volunteers are just like you–people who love bikes and bicycling. We give them tools and resources to go back into their own communities and workplaces and help WABA spread the word about bicycling. They answer questions, attend events, and generally act as one-stop mobile information booths for all things bike-related. It’s a lot of fun, and we’re always looking for more volunteers.

You can fill out this form, and our Bike Ambassador Program Coordinator will let you know how you can join the Ambassadors!

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Last Thursday, The Bike Rack offered a new educational opportunity to its customers and we were happy to help out. Our Bike Commuting Seminar has been one of the services that we offer to are employers looking to show the benefits of biking and physical activity to their employees.  Traditionally, we have held the class as a “brown bag” lunchtime education session for employees, complete with a slideshow, folding bike demonstration, free maps and guides for attendees, and a discounted WABA membership offer.

But The Bike Rack wanted to offer the class not to its employees but to its customers–giving non-commuter cyclists a chance to ask questions and current bike commuters an opportunity to expose their friends to the idea in comfortable environment. We worked with them to be able to provide the class for free, and as a result, we may have created some new bike commuters! More than 20 curious bicyclists packed the bike shop and helped themselves to free wine and pizza provided by local pizzeria Pizza No. 17.

We want to thank Chuck and the rest of The Bike Rack staff for inviting us out to the shop and for giving us the opportunity to expand our bike education offerings, and for providing such a great event space!

But one class isn’t enough…we want to extend this opportunity to other bike shops throughout the region. We want to give you the opportunity to bring your friends out so they can learn about bike commuting in a fun, easy way. So let your local bike shop know that you would be happy to see a class offered there. Let them know that they can get in touch with us to set it up.

And of course, our Bike Commuter Seminars are still available to employers as a great way to encourage bicycle commuting, provide a little education to your employees and make some headway on that “Bicycle Friendly Business” application…

Contact info for Bike Commuter Seminars:
Daniel Hoagland
202-518-0524 x200
daniel@waba.org

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