Aaron Crandall originally asked <Are there any thoughts on the effectiveness of hosting an advocacy ride or several rides sometime this spring?> I had two thoughts when I saw this, first was the UW Bike Ambassador rides which Matthew and Dar have already mentioned. The second was something I had just read in the current issue of Bicycling magazine on Critical Manners rides. Among the original concepts of the UW Bike Ambassador rides were (a) to orient new students to how to get around Madison by bike. This included both getting around campus as well as getting to a grocery store and other locations around town. (b) orienting bicyclists new to Madison about the types of bike facilities we have and how to use them safely. Bike lanes go one way, how to share the paths, how to ride on the streets, make left turns, etc. The safety, Road 1 type info is easy to interject as you take a group of people out on a ride. >From what I can tell, the Critical Manners rides started in San Francisco as an alternative to Critical Mass rides (note: I am not bringing this up as a comment on critical mass in general or in Madison in particular, I am only presenting an example of a series of rides that may be of interest for the purpose Aaron started this thread). see http://groups.google.com/group/critical-manners-ride-sf and http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/04/14/MNGB6P8R1U1. DTL and from Arkansas http://groups.google.com/group/critical-manners-ride-sf/browse_thread/th read/11e8d95991c2b67c In San Luis Obispo they are called Bikes are Happening rides. See http://bikehappening.org/?page_id=4 Arthur
Arthur Ross, Pedestrian-Bicycle Coordinator City of Madison Traffic Engineering Division 215 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd, Suite 100 PO Box 2986 Madison, WI 53701-2986 608/266-6225
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