hey -

thought i'd pass on this link to everyone. lots of interesting info about more livable cityscapes and the things people are doing to make city living more enjoyable.

enjoy!

On Wednesday, June, 18th, the City Standing Policy Committee on Land Use, Planning and Transportation met to debate new cycling and pedestrian policies designed to make Calgary a better place to bike to work. Only two long distance commuters, Dave Fryett and myself, were present out of Calgary’s estimated five thousand commuting cyclists. We were joined by Peter Tombrowski who is a pedestrian commuter and author of the book ‘Urban Camping – a Testament to Living Without a Vehicle’.

This message was sent to the City:

"The detour signs are not clear and need to be improved. Cyclists are going every which way because of this. A cyclist is going to get killed or seriously injured unless we do something right away. I have been struggling with this detour all week and it is HELL. I went on the City web site and could not find a detour map for this project? Are we supposed to go down 7th Avenue?

This morning an agressive cyclist cut me off on my way to work near the Drop Inn Center. The incident occured on a detour near the Bow River on the bike path. He cut me off on the left and forced me to stop or I would have hit a steel post. Because I was clipped in, I fell off my bike onto my knee causing it to bleed. He kept on going, but the cyclist behind me asked if I was OK. I am OK, but I would like to give "my friend" a piece of my mind. Idiot!

I recorded my morning commute using a Flip Ultra camera attached to my helmet via a bungee cord. It's just over 30 minutes long, and gives a good idea of what bike commuting is like. (view the full post to see the embedded version of the video)

Please refer to the Midweek Mayhem link posted below. These criteriums are hosted every Tuesday evening until the end of August. In the fall, criteriums are replaced by Tuesday Night cyclocross races.

http://midweek-mayhem.ca/

This picture was taken after this cyclist, training for a triathlon, attempted to pass a group of school children on an outing in Fish Creek Park on May 21.
She was doing about 5 km/h when an off leash dog emerged from the pack of children and ran in front of her. The off leash dog was brought along on the trip by a parent volunteer.

The Alberta Tour for Kids goes ahead on July 18-20th. It's a fund-raising ride for kids with cancer, but with a difference. There's either a one-day ride option (100,175, or 200 km options), or a three-day ride (200 km per day x 3 days!).

The interesting thing about this event is that all food and accommodation is provided, there's a sag-wagon, and you have route options.

Great op-ed piece on the Globe & Mail website today entitled The PM can help break the cycle of energy dependency - with bicycles. Writing with humour, Torontonian author Albert Koehl suggests that we need a national policy to encourage the use of bicycles in order to reduce our harmful dependency on crude oil.

With the support of the Sierra Club Chinook Group, I have produced a series of pocket cards featuring photos from my Daily Ride series and info/links to resources on bike commuting in Calgary (bikecalgary.org in particular).

If anyone is interested in obtaining cards to share with family, friends, co-workers, etc. to promote bike commuting in Calgary, drop me a line at: gsemmens@gmail.com

You can see the ongoing Daily Ride series at: http://thedailyride.blogspot.com