On Monday, August 27th, please join us at the eBar to celebrate the release of the book “Building the Cycling City: The Dutch Blueprint for Urban Vitality.”

Enjoy laughs, learning, and a pint, as Melissa and Chris Bruntlett discuss the process of the Netherlands becoming the world’s top cycling nation, and how North American cities are starting to implement Dutch-inspired ideas and infrastructure.

Presented by the Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation.

Copies of the book will be available for sale. More about this project: http://www.modacitylife.com/building-the-cycling-city/

The E-Bar is located at 41 Quebec St in downtown Guelph. Doors open at 6:30pm. The program starts at 7:00pm.  Please let us know you are coming. Tickets are available on Eventbrite

So many June Bike Month Events to choose from!

Listed below are the events hosted or co-hosted by Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation!

June 16, 1-3pm “Trees, Bikes and a Pint: A tribute to Henry Kock
June 19 6pm-9pm “Why We Cycle” movie and discussion
June 23 9:30 am, “Love Your Bike” Festival

And of course, don’t forget the culminating event, the  Tour de Guelph on June 24!

So many different events for so many different bike styles!
For a full listing of events, click here!

Why We Cycle

Afterwards, Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation will be hosting a discussion of “Where do we go from Here?” at the Greenroom of the E-bar, with Benita Van Miltenburg, TDM coordinator, City of Guelph will be attending. Come for a drink, snack, or just for the discussion!

Time

Movie: Tuesday, June 19 at 6:00 pm – Tuesday, June 19 at 7:00 pm

Discussion: after the movie, 7pm Greenroom at the E-Bar

Event Links

http://whywecycle.eu/

There are more bicycles than people in the Netherlands. More than 25% of all trips are by bike. In some cities this adds up to over 60%. But do the Dutch ever think or talk about this? Not much. This may be part of the success of Dutch cycling: it is self-evident. But what if we would talk about the self-evident?

In this movie regular cyclists and regular scientists from all walks of life paint a picture of Dutch cycling culture. We learn that cycling leads to happiness, health, keeping up cognitive functions and creativity and a state of readiness. Cycling also leads to happy children who enjoy the autonomy of independent travel. Because cyclists are open to their surroundings and each other, city life tends to be more open. Trust among people grows as they interact through cycling.

Join this free event hosted by the City of Guelph to experience the world of cycling in the Netherlands and challenge conceptions of City life, social interaction and every day travel.

Contact

tdm@guelph.ca / 5198221260 ext 2357 (movie)

info@gcat.ca (discussion aftewards)

Celebrate the good things in life!

When: June 16, 1-3pm

2Rivers Festival and Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation team up to offer 10km tribute ride to the late Henry Kock, Guelph’s beloved horticulturalist, to celebrate his passion for trees, river systems, bikes and local beer. Enjoy stops along the way with University of Guelph arborist Sean Fox to discover some of Guelph’s magnificent trees. This is a family friendly ride on gravel trails and quiet streets. Mountain/hybrid bikes and helmets are encouraged.

Note: We will meet at the intersection of Florence Lane and Lawrence Avenue. The trip ends up at the Royal City Brewery where we reflect on the experience and slacken our thirst.

Please RSVP at https://www.2riversfestival.org/20event_trees_bikes_a_pint_a_tribute_ride_to_the_late_henry_kock

For more information, contact info@gcat.ca

June 23, starting at 9:30 am, Front lawn of St Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, 161 Norfolk St.!

Come out for the fifth annual “Love Your Bike Festival!” This festival includes the young and old in celebrating Guelph’s favourite mode of transportation – The Bike!

Give your bike some love! Three of Guelph’s cycling shops (Backpeddling, Paramount Sports and Speed River Bicycle) will be on hand to offer free mechanical checks in preparation for the Tour de Guelph which rolls out the following day.

Here are some of the highlights:

• A“Wrench-Off” at 10:00am featuring Guelph’s top bike mechanics in a friendly flat-fixing competition
• An antique bike display, courtesy of  Clayton Foxall from Backpeddling
• A moment of silence at 10am for fallen cyclists followed by a “Blessing of the Bikes”
• Try out a demo bike!
• Free coffee and treats before 11am!
• Two Group rides leave at 11am sharp (registration starts at 9:30am; helmets required)
  • A police escorted family ride, called  The “Easy Rider Parade,” around Exhibition Park, led by Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation (GCAT)
  • The “Two Rivers Ride,” along the recreation trails to Guelph Lake and back, led by  Guelph Off Road Bicycling Association (GORBA)
  • Rides finish at The Wooly at 12:00 noon with a BBQ, refreshments and prizes provided by Steam Whistle Brewery, and activities hosted by GCAT.  Kids who participate get a free hotdog and a drink!

• Rides finish at The Wooly at 12:00 noon with a BBQ, refreshments and prizes provided by Steam Whistle Brewery, and activities hosted by GCAT.  Kids who participate get a free hotdog and a drink!

For more info, contact info@gcat.ca

For information about more June Bike Month events, including those co-hosted by GCAT, click here.

Jordan and Yvette from Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation  recently attended Share the Road‘s 2018 Ontario Bike Summit. Here is a short recap of what we attended with some links worth checking out!  

 Bicycle Friendly Community Awards 

Our neighbours in Waterloo were awarded the “Gold” Bicycle Friendly Communities designation Way to go, Waterloo!  (They’ve surpassed us. Guelph is at the “Silver” level.) 

Keynote Address:  Dale Bracewell, Manager of Transportation Planning – City of Vancouver 

Some impressive success stories and challenges from Vancouver who are at the forefront of urban transportation planning  

http://vancouver.ca/streets-transportation/walk-bike-and-transit.aspx 

Some highlights: 

• 32% decrease in distance driven per resident since 2007 
• 10% of residents bike to work 
• Half of all trips are using sustainable modes (walking, biking, transit) 

• 25% of their cycling network is AAA (All Ages and Abilities) 

• Vancouver’s 10 Guidelines for AAA Bike Network: http://vancouver.ca/files/cov/design-guidelines-for-all-ages-and-abilities-cycling-routes.pdf 

• Bracewell described his job in the following way:  Ensuring that 100% of “new trips” in the city are not taken by car. In other words, the number of car trips stays the same or decreases while other trip types increase as the population grows. This is a good way of thinking of Guelph given the projected population growth. 
  

Keynote Conversation:  Ontario Minister of Transportation Kathryn McGarry 

• Did you know:  The provincial cycling “file” is shared between Ministry of Transportation and Ministry of Tourism, Culture, and Sport 

• The province has just released their Cycling Strategy Action Plan (CycleON 2.0 Action Plan.) Worth a read to learn about new funding streams, and the province’s strategies for benefiting from cycling: 

http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/publications/pdfs/cycle-action-plan.pdf  

• The province has just released an update of the Cycling Skills Guide: http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/safety/pdfs/cycling-skills.pdf 
  

State of Cycling Presentation by Share the Road CEO, Jamie Stuckless

New polling data collected by Nanos on behalf of Share the Road was presented. This is good stuff for presenting to local decision makers as it shows that there is majority support for investments in cycling infrastructure.

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2018/04/16/poll-shows-ontario-voters-care-about-biking-issues-advocates-say.html 

http://www.sharetheroad.ca/opinion-poll-data-s17022 (includes additional link to full Nanos results) 

 Finding the Right Metrics for Your Project Session – Behind the Scenes of North America’s Most Extensively Studied Bike Lane 

This was about Toronto’s Bloor St. Protected Bike Lane Pilot Project. There were a HUGE amount of contributors to this from cycling advocacy, BIA’s, resident associations, Toronto city hall, researchers, consultants, doctors/health advocates. 

Photo credit to http://news.engineering.utoronto.ca

Final report to Council 

https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/8ef6-cycling-bloor-backgroundfile-107582.pdf  

 Highlights from the data collection for Bloor St. Protected bike lane project: 

• Daily cyclist count went from 3,300 in June 2016 to 4,900 in June 2017 (49% increase) 
• The total number of conflicts/near-misses between all road-users decreased by 44% 
• Bike/vehicle conflicts reduced by 61% 
• 85% of cyclists now feel safe, compared to 3% before 

 Other advocacy/community organizations that contributed to this (a few out of many): 

• Toronto Centre for Active Transportation 
• Cycle Toronto 
• Doctors for Safe Cycling 
• http://bellsonbloor.org/ 

 These lanes have now been made permanent. 

 Community Inspiration Session 

This was a “20×20” session where presenters had 20 slides and 20 seconds for each slide to present their inspirational projects.  

BikeOttawa is doing INCREDIBLE bike network mapping 

• https://blog.mapillary.com/update/2017/11/17/completing-the-map-for-bicycle-advocacy-in-ottawa.html is a very cool mapping project designed to enhance the advocacy-case for infrastructure improvements… which they’ve now used to create https://maps.bikeottawa.ca/ . These are interactive maps based on a “traffic-stress” that is assigned to every street in the city using the data previously collected. You can use these tools to create a route that meets the level of stress you are comfortable with. Check it out! 
• https://ibikeibuy.ca/statistics/ is a tool to show that people on bikes are spending money all over the city.

 The Halifax Cycling Coalition developed a crowdsourcing app called Cycle snApp to capture geo-tagged citizen feedback on anything cycling-related 

https://cyclehalifax.ca/learn/snapp/ 

 The Toronto Bicycle Music Festival is a bicycle-powered mobile music festival that’s been taking place since 2010. Their message:  “Just add bikes” to your event. 

http://torontobicyclemusicfestival.com/   

Hope this gives you a good summary of the Ontario Bike Summit!

When: March 23, 2018 , 11:30-12;30

Where: University Centre, University of Guelph,  room 335

Can the bike save your city and you?

We’ll discuss how biking makes a city more liveable, and you happier. We’ll inspire you to see how biking is such an important mode of transportation in making a city, and your life more resilient. We’ll also provide you the support to get you started and to keep you going.

Yvette Tendick is president of Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation, a local advocacy group whose mission is to increase the amount of people who are comfortable and safe walking and riding bikes around the city.

Hello all! 

I am graduate student at the University of Guelph in the Capacity Development and Extension program. I have an assignment for one of my courses that requires me to work in collaboration with a community organization and develop a media product that addresses an issue in the Guelph community.  

A few weekends ago I was at the Farmer’s Market representing 10C (a local co-working space) and sharing a table with Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation as the volunteers were promoting GCAT’s AGM and collecting annual memberships. After hearing the GCAT’s member’s comments about cycling in Guelph and the concerns around bike safety, I thought it would impactful to put together a documentary that can be presented to the City of Guelph to raise attention of the cycling community’s needs and narratives.  

I would really appreciate it you took five minutes next weekend (February 17, 2018) at the Farmer’s Market to sit down and have a conversation with me. I will be videoing and recording these interviews, if you have any comments or concerns please do not hesitate to email me and we can figure out other ways that you can participate! My email is asmart01@uoguelph.ca. 

 Thank you for considering this, 

Sacha Smart 

University of Guelph Masters Student,  

Capacity Development and Extension