Bike Corral in Long Beach, East Village—Wed Aug 4

A ribbon-cutting ceremony to inaugurate the first bike corral in Long Beach takes place Wednesday evening… timed perfectly to dovetail with the monthly Long Beach Cyclists general meeting. Don’t miss either one!

This month LBC meets in the East Village—at Utopia Restaurant (First Street and Linden Avenue). We meet at 7:17 p.m. In addition to addressing various items on the LBC agenda (advocacy, education and community), we will be present to celebrate the inauguration of our city’s first bike corral. You’ll have an opportunity to say ‘hello’ and ‘thank you’ to Charlie Gandy, Sumire Gant, Courtney Aguirre and other behind-the-scenes City representatives who have helped turn this idea into reality.

What IS a bike corral, you say? A bike corral means that a stall formerly used to park ONE car is converted into an area that now can accommodate MANY parked bicycles. From the point of view of local business owners, it is an adjustment to existing parking infrastructure which allows MORE potential customers to find a nearby space.

Utopia Restaurant, the Village Grind Café, City Grounds LBFG (the fixed-gear bike shop), and other businesses near the intersection of First Street and Linden Avenue stand to benefit from the construction of this bike corral. If Long Beach’s first bike corral proves popular with cyclists and with local businesses, it is possible that City planners may duplicate or adapt the model in other business districts.

So… be sure to join us for our regular monthly meeting—held this month at Utopia’s—and you will automatically be at the right time and right place to join in the festivities of the bike corral inauguration.

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MichaelB, August 1st 2010 | Tags: , , ,
Posted in Current News, event, meeting

Recycle your old bicycle

Imagine the joy of donating an old bike, knowing that it will be recycled and then given to a local youngster.

That’s what ‘ReCYCLE Your BiCYCLE’ is all about. Friends at the H.U.B. bike cooperative (on Long Beach Blvd. one short block south of PCH) love to fix up old bicycles. Now the H.U.B. and Waste Management of the City of Long Beach are working together to recycle old bikes… so that after donated bikes are repaired they can be given away to Long Beach children.

Saturday, May 22nd between noon and 4:00 pm, Waste Management vehicles will accept bicycles in any condition. There will be donation locations at many Long Beach public parks—addresses listed on the poster on the left.

Bikes in salvageable condition will be taken to the H.U.B. to be recycled. H.U.B. volunteer mechanics will piece together old bike parts to create recycled bikes. Later, the recycled bikes will be given away to local children. Old bike parts that cannot be reused will end up as recycled scrap metal. 

Donate your old bicycle Saturday, May 22nd (or Saturday, May 29th, or Saturday June 12th) at one of several local parks listed in the poster.

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MichaelB, May 20th 2010 | Tags: , , , ,
Posted in Bicycle equipment/gear, Current News

Busy weeks for cycling fun in Long Beach

Scan the various postings below for an overview of the many activities taking place in Long Beach this week. Also, click EVENTS at the top of the page to check out calendar entries. What a great time of the year to enjoy the outdoors. Happy cycling!

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LBCyclists, May 6th 2010 | Tags: , ,
Posted in Current News

Fixed Gear Festival in the East Village—May 7th

This year’s Long Beach Bike Festival starts in the East Village—First and Linden. It’s free, starts at 6:00 pm, and promises to be a blast. Click on the photos to enlarge them.

Fixed gear cyclists will do tricks, freestyle fun, skid competitions and more. And you might meet Josh, who is organizing the Gold Sprints, which are mad, brief races on stationary bikes where nobody goes anywhere, yet hearts throb to the moon and back! And for gentle fun, some members of the City Council will race down First on tricycles.

May 7th, cycle on down to the East Village.

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LBCyclists, May 6th 2010 | Tags: , , ,
Posted in Current News, Featured, event

Cycling in Long Beach, in the LA Times

Check out the recent “Long Beach makes way for bicycles” article by Tony Barboza, published in the Los Angeles Times. You can link to the article here:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-outthere26-2010jan26,0,3205517.story

Much has taken place since the article was published. And we know that many cycling events and activities during May 2010 will place Long Beach on the front page again.

If your bike’s tires need air and if your chain needs oil, NOW is a perfect week to get your bicycle into shape. The May 2010 calendar is sprinkled with lots to do, so you’ll want to have your bike in good shape so you can join us.

Barboza’s article can provide you with an overview of some cycling-friendly initiatives in the works. We already have Sharrows (the green lane) along Belmont Shore, and we have trial Bicycle Boxes. A Bicycle Box gives the cyclist at an intersection a designated place in front of motorists to wait until the signal light turns green. 

Barboza also mentions plans for protected bikeways, traffic circles on less-traveled streets, and talk of creating ‘bike corrals’ to favor convenient bike parking near certain shops and restaurants. Barboza quotes Charlie Gandy: “We can fit 15 customers where we used to fit one.” That is, 15 parked bicycles occupy the same amount of space as one car. The idea is that ‘bike corrals’ can help ease parking congestion by encouraging larger numbers of local people to drive a bicycle rather than a motor vehicle. 

Barboza also quotes experienced cyclists, motorists, and other City representatives. And he quotes Jennifer Klausner of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, a nonprofit advocacy group that is something like Long Beach Cyclists’ regional cousin. Klausner says that Long Beach is looking for ways to make east-west and north-south corridors safer and more inviting for cyclists. Klausner suggests that Long Beach is ahead of Los Angeles in that respect.

Barboza reports that Long Beach has raised $17 million in grants that will be translated into traffic improvements, bike share programs, and education.

Although Barboza’s article does not mention Long Beach Cyclists, we’d like to toot our horn here by mentioning that LCI instructors offer Traffic Skills courses for cyclists. Click EDUCATION at the top of the longbeachcyclists.com web page to see the schedule of upcoming sessions and to link to the online registration process. It’s springtime, 2010. Be sure your bicycle is in shape, and be sure to take Traffic Skills 101 so that you can improve your skills cycling safely and legally on city streets.

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LBCyclists, April 26th 2010 | Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Current News, Education, Featured, advocacy

City Council approves cycle-friendly projects

Soon we will be able to drive our bicycles through the heart of downtown Long Beach along separated lanes. Also, an east-west residential street will be improved for traffic calming, to become our first ‘bike boulevard.’

On April 20th, during its regular meeting, City Council approved construction of two street improvement projects that are part of larger efforts underway to make Long Beach a great city for travel by bicycle. City Council approved construction of separated bike lanes downtown along 3rd Street and along Broadway. And it approved the ’bike boulevard’ project along Vista Street, which will improve neighborhood calm and provide a new, quiet, safe, east-west cycling route. The Vista project will serve as a model; other neighborhoods can view it and may wish to then convert one of their own streets into a ‘bike boulevard.’

Long Beach Cyclists was present at the meeting. More than a dozen LBC members sat in the City Hall chamber, and prior to the council vote, member Chris Quint spoke at the podium on our behalf. Quint thanked the many individuals who are helping to improve the livability of our city, including Sumire Gant of Public Works. Quint pledged our support to help City planners and engineers address minor concerns so that these projects be as well designed as possible.

Having learned how to travel all roads in our city safely and legally, experienced vehicular cyclists are generally not intimidated by motorized traffic. On the other hand, cyclists who are less comfortable driving near motorized traffic will especially love the approved projects. New lanes in the downtown area will be built that are physically separated from motorized vehicles, and traffic calming features will be created along a street in Belmont Heights.

A great BIG ‘thank you’ goes out to the following Long Beach Cyclists who were present at the April 20, 2010 Long Beach City Council meeting: Bernadette McKeever (president of the LBC board), also Travis, Chris, Donald, Tom, Lee, Amanda, Allan, Scott, Jessica, Josh, Cal and Michael.

Click above right to read the two City Council motions as recorded in the draft of the meeting minutes. To watch a video of the entire board meeting, click on the link below. Look for April 20, 2010 City Council meeting. Chris Quint started speaking 3 hours, 5 minutes and 35 seconds into the meeting… so you may wish to fast forward:

http://longbeach.granicus.com/ViewPublisher.php?view_id=12

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LBCyclists, April 22nd 2010 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Current News, advocacy, meeting

The Hub: Opening Day, part two

Lots of food, lots of friends, lots of music, lots of amazing tricks and fun on bicycles, and lots of enthusiasm for The H.U.B.—Long Beach’s new bike-repair cooperative. Dan Gutierrez posted several hundred photos on his Facebook page of some of the Opening Day action.

Click on any image to see it larger. Check out more photos by Dan Gutierrez on Facebook. Other people will likely post more great photos later. Best wishes to The H.U.B.!!!

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LBCyclists, April 4th 2010 | Tags: , ,
Posted in Current News, Featured, event

The Hub: Opening Day

This (early) morning started with volunteer efforts by Dan, Graham, Marga and Bernadette

Come join the celebration TODAY.  Party starts at 12 p.m. 1741 Long Beach Blvd. (at Ester)

 

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bmckeever, April 3rd 2010 | Tags: , ,
Posted in Current News, Featured, event

Pedal Movement’s H.U.B. – Grand Opening Sat, Apr 3rd

just as the title of this post states, Saturday April 3rd sees the Grand Opening good times for Pedal Movement’s The H.U.B.—the new and fantastic bicycle cooperative in this fair city of ours.

what will be, will be:  Trick Competition, Gold Sprints, Food Stuffs, musical DJs, Raffles from the event’s sponsors*, & LIVE Music from Ghosts of NIHM, Water Laso, Tiger Tank Euphoria, and Chase Long Beach!

when will this be that you’ll be able to take part in the happenings?  starting at noon and continuing through 10 in the nighttime, Saturday April 3rd.

location: 1741 Long Beach Blvd, Long Beach, CA 90813. (That’s just south of PCH, and close to the Metro Blue Line PCH station.)

* Sponsors include city grounds, vans, jax bicycles, syndicate barber shop, trader joe’s, and others

PedalMovement

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LBCyclists, April 1st 2010 | Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Current News, Featured, event

North Long Beach Access to the Metro — March 25

City representatives seek your input regarding Metro Blue Line station access. On March 25th, Audit findings will be discussed near Del Amo Blvd. and Atlantic Avenue.

A few months back, many of us participated in the assessment of Metro Blue Line stations in Long Beach. We visited various stations and surrounding neighborhoods, observed conditions and made recommendations to improve access for pedestrians and cyclists.

You are invited to meet at the NPAC (adjacent to Scherer Park, at 4891 Atlantic Avenue near Del Amo Blvd.) on March 25th, 6:30-7:30 pm, to review the Audit Summary and to provide your input. To see a map, click EVENTS at the top of the longbeachcyclists.com page and scroll for Metro Audit Assessment at Atlantic/Del Amo.

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LBCyclists, March 24th 2010 | Tags: , , , , , , ,
Posted in Current News, advocacy
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