As an avid cyclist/mountain biker/triathlete etc. I am very excited about the silent sports inititive that's underway thanks to Mayor Rybak and many others.
I have three additional ideas to add to the list (and I'm willing to volunteer if others are interested in joining me...) 1. The River road should be closed to vehicular traffic on Saturdays and Sundays during the day. When I lived in Washington, D.C., I loved riding my bike on a car-free Rock Creek Parkway on the weekends. Rock Creek Parkway is a very busy commuter route during the week, but is completely shut down the the weekends during the day. The car and neighborhood ninnys went nuts in Washington when it was first done, and now its nearly universally accepted as a great thing. The crowds in DC are huge...you see everyone from families with strollers to Cat 1 cyclists. 2. Host a stage of the Nature Valley Grand Prix. This three day stage race brings the best US Pro Road Cyclists to Minnesota and is covered on the OLN network. The races in Stillwater and St. Paul this last summer were awesome. The crowd turnout in Stillwater was incredible, but the turnout for the stage around the Capitol grounds in St. Paul was rather lame. If St. Paulites don't come out for such an amazing event, it should come to Minneapolis, home of Flanders Bike Shop (which had several real contenders in both the men's and women's races). 3. Do a better job of getting donated skates and hockey equipment for local rinks, especially those in low income areas. I play lots of pond hockey at local rinks, and there are some donated skates at McRae and Matthews parks for example. But I also see lots of eager kids who run around the ice without skates, or who have to wear skates that don't fit. Just ideas. If anyone wants to work on these fun issues with me, please contact me. Dave Harstad Whittier __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? HotJobs - Search new jobs daily now http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/ _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:mpls@;mnforum.org Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
