Roger Rudick of Streetsblog SF was among about 25 people who joined me on the Oakland Flatlands bike tour this weekend, and he wrote up a good summary.
The short version is, we had a good group, lots of good discussion, got finished before the rain started, and I think everyone got to learn some new stuff.
Many thanks to Chris Hwang of WOBO for sponsoring the event, and to everyone who shared their experiences:
- Rehema Allen (This Is Oakland bike tours)
- Phoenix Mangrum (Cycles of Change)
- RB Burnette (The Original Scraper Bike Team)
- Robert Raburn (BART)
I truly believe that the bicycle can be a democratizing tool, as Enrique Peñalosa suggests. But for that to be true, we have to visit all of the city, and talk to all of its cyclists and potential cyclists. It would be fabulous to have a real Ciclavia as they do in Bogota, where over 100km of streets are closed every week. Imagine being able to ride from Richmond to Hayward, all along San Pablo and International/San Leandro. That would be a much different event than a Sunday Streets with 10 blocks of food booths and vendors.
There is some interest for me to do this ride again amongst friends who couldn’t make it; I’ll probably plan for that sometime this summer.
