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Active Transportation Canada - New Posts June 3, 2011
by Beth McKechnie 03 Jun '11

03 Jun '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Haynes <activetransportation(a)rogers.com> Date: Fri, Jun 3, 2011 at 10:00 AM Subject: Active Transportation Canada - New Posts June 3, 2011 More than 20 new items have been posted on the Active Transportation-Canada Website over the past month. A complete list of titles may be found in the "Blog Archive" box, located on the right margin of the Website. Some sample new items: 1. Halifax - Active transportation plan stalls 2. ‘Cycle tracks’ in cities could save bicyclists lives 3. Nova Scotia Rural Active Transportation Summit Active Transportation Canada URL: http://activetransportation-canada.blogspot.com A "Search" function is available on the site. You will find this at the bottom of the page. With more than 1,000 items posted on Active Transportation - Canada, there are links available to dozens of studies and hundreds of news items from communities across Canada and the world. If anyone has a problem reading this message, please let me know. I welcome suggestions for posts, so if you have news items featuring your community, please share them with the other subscribers from Canada, the US, and Australia on Active Transportation-Canada. Thank you. Michael Haynes Director TransActive Solutions

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Trails Day TOMORROW - NEW special event / invitation !
by Janice Lukes 03 Jun '11

03 Jun '11

TOMORROW is Trails Day in Winnipeg An unprecedented number of events are occurring throughout the city! - see link for details: http://www.winnipegtrails.ca/2011/05/09/june-4th-trails-day-celebration/ and end of day yesterday we just received final confirmation that a ribbon cutting ceremony will occur on the brand new Bishop Grandin Trail West with government dignitaries ( location of Bishop Grandin Trail West http://www.winnipegtrails.ca/trails-maps/bishop-grandin-trail-west/ ) JUST CONFIRMED: Ribbon Cutting Ceremony for Bishop Grandin Trail West - (also part of the Trans Canada Trail) 3:00 pm Crampton's Market - 1765 Waverly St (Corner of Bishop Grandin and Waverly) Join MP Rod Bruinooge, Honourable Kerri Irvin Ross (MLA Fort Richmond) and Mr. Phil Sheegl, CAO City of Winnipeg (TBC) in opening this new trail! The three levels of government have made significant investments in trail development over the past few years. IF you have some time on Saturday, join us at 3:00pm and congratulate / celebrate! thank you! Janice Lukes Manager, Special Projects - Winnipeg Trails Rivers West Red River Corridor Inc. 235-614 Des Meurons Street Winnipeg, MB R2H 2P9 Cell (204) 952-4222 Fax (204) 237-4618 <mailto:jlukes@riverswest.ca> jlukes(a)riverswest.ca www.WinnipegTrails.ca <http://www.winnipegtrails.ca/> Member of City of Winnipeg Active Transportation Advisory Committee Chair, Province of Manitoba Active Transportation Advisory Group

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Free Webinar: Linking Transportation, Air Quality, Climate Change and Health Impacts
by Jessie Klassen 02 Jun '11

02 Jun '11

(Apologies for cross postings) Hello All! * Green Action Centre will host a local viewing of the following PHAC webinar on Linking Transportation, Air Quality, Climate Change and Health Impacts on Wednesday, June 8th, from 1-2pm in the Eco-Centre Boardroom (303 Portage Ave, 3rd Floor, enter via the MEC elevator). We'd love it if you would join us! Please let me know at jessie(a)greenactioncentre.ca. Hope to see you then! Jessie Klassen | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/>| Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Avenue | (204) 925-3772 Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/> * * * *The Public Health Agency of Canada is hosting this Fireside Chat to mark 'Clean Air Day' Join one of Canada’s leading environmental health scientists for a presentation describing the current status of air pollution effects on the health of Canadians and opportunities to reduce these impacts through healthy urban design. * Air quality management strategies have resulted in significant improvements in urban air quality in Canadian cities, yet there remains clear evidence of substantial public health impacts amongst Canadians. Linkages between climate change and air pollution through common emission sources and health impacts will require increased application of traditional health protection measures and climate mitigation approaches that do not compromise air quality. These interactions also suggest novel opportunities for climate, air quality and health co-benefits. Healthy urban design, in which active transportation is facilitated, can lead to emission reductions while providing further potential health benefits through increased physical activity. *Advisor on Tap: [image: image001]Dr. Michael Brauer Professor, * School of Population and Public Health The University of British Columbia *Michael Brauer* is a Professor in the School of Population and Public Health at The University of British Columbia. He also directs the Bridge Program – a strategic training program linking public health, engineering and policy. He is recognized internationally for his research on air pollution exposure and health impacts. He has participated in studies throughout the world and served on advisory committees to the World Health Organization, the US National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society of Canada, the International Joint Commission and governments in North America and Asia. * *

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FW: Science Matters | Burn calories, not gas: Ride a bike
by Kevin Miller 27 May '11

27 May '11

There's probably nothing here that most of us don't know, but it's nice to see cycling as the topic of David Suzuki's weekly column (which appears in many newspapers). Kevin Miller <k.a.miller(a)mts.net> _____ From: David Suzuki Foundation [mailto:subscribers@davidsuzuki.org] Sent: Friday, May 27, 2011 11:39 AM http://tinyurl.com/43ytvhy Having trouble reading this email? View it online <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd12cc612feadcd1b7a63f488a0612cc98 d649e7c36b86a320> . David Suzuki Foundation header <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/20thhead-04.jpg> Burn calories, not gas: Ride a bike dtsbike <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/dtsbike.jpg> By David Suzuki A U.K. man recently built a bicycle entirely out of wood, with no plastic or metal parts. Everything, including the wheels, gears, and seat, are wood. Inventor Michael Thompson, who made the "SplinterBike <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdce389bca770edb6752f7f6a1bdc41d9f 35e16c218553dfda> " on a bet with a friend, says it can travel up to 50 kilometres an hour. What's amazing is that, almost 200 years after the first two-wheeler was made, people are still able to come up with innovative ideas for one of the simplest and most practical and efficient transportation devices ever invented. Even though I'm impressed by Thompson's wooden bike, and by those with bamboo or wood frames, I'll stick with my old metal-frame bike. I'm just happy that cycling is becoming more popular all the time, and that the city where I live, Vancouver, is making life easier for cyclists. After all, riding a bike is good for your health and the environment. As the Vancouver Area Cycling Coalition points out in its promotion of Bike to Work Week (May 30 - June 5 in several Canadian cities), cycling to work is enjoyable, helps you get and stay in shape, and burns off stress. And when you consider gridlock and traffic, it's often as fast as or faster than driving. It's also way more efficient than car travel. According to the WorldWatch <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd7a725db2b7c0035cc5e8568a547e9fb3 e87e53732ceb4e0e> Institute, a bicycle needs 35 calories per passenger mile, while a car uses 1,860. Reducing your need to stop at the gas pump is both good for the environment and for your pocketbook, especially as gas prices continue to rise. Private automobiles create about 12 per cent of Canada's greenhouse gas emissions, and road transportation in general creates as much as one quarter. Riding a bike doesn't create any emissions. And it's not just gas that costs money. Buying, insuring, and maintaining a car, not to mention paying for parking, costs thousands of dollars a year. Of course, cycling isn't practical for everyone, and it's not always possible to ride - although I've seen my share of die-hard cyclists even on rare Vancouver snow days. But with proper clothing and gear, many people can ride for most of the year in urban centres. And the money saved from not driving is often enough to pay for public transit or taxis on days when cycling isn't possible. Our cities will become more livable and our environment cleaner when more people get out of their cars and onto their bikes. But we still have a long way to go in Canada. Only about one per cent of trips are made by bike here (although Vancouver <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd26820283112d7780b1893af92005aeb0 0d3b140b853dd3af> is higher, at about four per cent), whereas in many parts of Europe, the number is more than 30 per cent. In Amsterdam, 38 per cent of trips are made by bike, thanks to pro-cycling policies adopted since the 1970s. Resistance to change is inevitable, and in Vancouver we've seen some backlash against the expanding network of bike lanes. Many people still believe we should be shelling out loads of money for pavement and parking lots so that individual people can propel themselves to work and shopping in a two-tonne emissions-spewing machine. Others have complained that, because the bike lanes were not immediately crammed with cyclists, they're a waste of money and get in the way of cars and business. But as Amsterdam shows, investing in cycling and pedestrian infrastructure eventually pays off in many ways. As more people take up cycling, it also becomes safer. Although, those who worry about the safety of cycling might be interested in a British Medical Association study that found the health risks of inactivity are 20 times greater than the risks from cycling. For employers <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd18962cc79cbfb44edd6629d4f4e47aac b0ab2a9f240d68dd> , the benefits of encouraging cycling are numerous. A Dutch study found that people who cycle to work take fewer sick days, and research has shown they are generally happier and less stressed. Cyclists can also avoid traffic jams and are not as likely to be late for work. And bike lock-ups cost far less than car-parking facilities. Whether your bike has a state-of-the-art bamboo frame or is a clunky old off-roader, why not try riding it to work, and not just during Bike to Work week? You'll be happy you did. Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation editorial and communications specialist Ian Hanington share on: <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/share.gif> <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdfeeebf715c7180e2c4d72a8b17c14837 c1d3bf92d9cde3f9> facebook logo <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd0596e0525fb80fdba85550434272265b 565a620db72b6f15> twitter logo This email was sent to k.a.miller(a)mts.net Take <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd0753c23ff3e558a4b65865dbc3001936 669cfce2bc7fe7d9> Action | Donate <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd2f5e93a01523dcb6ee5e50f9f064ea68 507e3f7c6d0978ed> | Unsubscribe <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdb929c68e2ac708f820387bfee6deea15 1d862d4825a00e40> | Privacy <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd596b49828cbc680e758e630ea3e1747b f5cedf19ce9e178a> Policy David <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdc6237878403c8494ad6a4a2c265b10c5 d45d12a057533c3e> Suzuki Foundation 219-2211 West 4th Ave., Vancouver, BC, V6K 4S2 604-732-4228 | contact(a)davidsuzuki.org <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/tagline.gif>

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FW: Science Matters | Burn calories, not gas: Ride a bike
by Kevin Miller 27 May '11

27 May '11

There's probably nothing here that most of us don't know, but it's nice to see cycling as the topic of David Suzuki's weekly column (which appears in many newspapers). Kevin Miller <k.a.miller(a)mts.net> _____ From: David Suzuki Foundation [mailto:subscribers@davidsuzuki.org] Sent: Friday, May 27, 2011 11:39 AM http://tinyurl.com/43ytvhy Having trouble reading this email? View it online <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd12cc612feadcd1b7a63f488a0612cc98 d649e7c36b86a320> . David Suzuki Foundation header <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/20thhead-04.jpg> Burn calories, not gas: Ride a bike dtsbike <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/dtsbike.jpg> By David Suzuki A U.K. man recently built a bicycle entirely out of wood, with no plastic or metal parts. Everything, including the wheels, gears, and seat, are wood. Inventor Michael Thompson, who made the "SplinterBike <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdce389bca770edb6752f7f6a1bdc41d9f 35e16c218553dfda> " on a bet with a friend, says it can travel up to 50 kilometres an hour. What's amazing is that, almost 200 years after the first two-wheeler was made, people are still able to come up with innovative ideas for one of the simplest and most practical and efficient transportation devices ever invented. Even though I'm impressed by Thompson's wooden bike, and by those with bamboo or wood frames, I'll stick with my old metal-frame bike. I'm just happy that cycling is becoming more popular all the time, and that the city where I live, Vancouver, is making life easier for cyclists. After all, riding a bike is good for your health and the environment. As the Vancouver Area Cycling Coalition points out in its promotion of Bike to Work Week (May 30 - June 5 in several Canadian cities), cycling to work is enjoyable, helps you get and stay in shape, and burns off stress. And when you consider gridlock and traffic, it's often as fast as or faster than driving. It's also way more efficient than car travel. According to the WorldWatch <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd7a725db2b7c0035cc5e8568a547e9fb3 e87e53732ceb4e0e> Institute, a bicycle needs 35 calories per passenger mile, while a car uses 1,860. Reducing your need to stop at the gas pump is both good for the environment and for your pocketbook, especially as gas prices continue to rise. Private automobiles create about 12 per cent of Canada's greenhouse gas emissions, and road transportation in general creates as much as one quarter. Riding a bike doesn't create any emissions. And it's not just gas that costs money. Buying, insuring, and maintaining a car, not to mention paying for parking, costs thousands of dollars a year. Of course, cycling isn't practical for everyone, and it's not always possible to ride - although I've seen my share of die-hard cyclists even on rare Vancouver snow days. But with proper clothing and gear, many people can ride for most of the year in urban centres. And the money saved from not driving is often enough to pay for public transit or taxis on days when cycling isn't possible. Our cities will become more livable and our environment cleaner when more people get out of their cars and onto their bikes. But we still have a long way to go in Canada. Only about one per cent of trips are made by bike here (although Vancouver <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd26820283112d7780b1893af92005aeb0 0d3b140b853dd3af> is higher, at about four per cent), whereas in many parts of Europe, the number is more than 30 per cent. In Amsterdam, 38 per cent of trips are made by bike, thanks to pro-cycling policies adopted since the 1970s. Resistance to change is inevitable, and in Vancouver we've seen some backlash against the expanding network of bike lanes. Many people still believe we should be shelling out loads of money for pavement and parking lots so that individual people can propel themselves to work and shopping in a two-tonne emissions-spewing machine. Others have complained that, because the bike lanes were not immediately crammed with cyclists, they're a waste of money and get in the way of cars and business. But as Amsterdam shows, investing in cycling and pedestrian infrastructure eventually pays off in many ways. As more people take up cycling, it also becomes safer. Although, those who worry about the safety of cycling might be interested in a British Medical Association study that found the health risks of inactivity are 20 times greater than the risks from cycling. For employers <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd18962cc79cbfb44edd6629d4f4e47aac b0ab2a9f240d68dd> , the benefits of encouraging cycling are numerous. A Dutch study found that people who cycle to work take fewer sick days, and research has shown they are generally happier and less stressed. Cyclists can also avoid traffic jams and are not as likely to be late for work. And bike lock-ups cost far less than car-parking facilities. Whether your bike has a state-of-the-art bamboo frame or is a clunky old off-roader, why not try riding it to work, and not just during Bike to Work week? You'll be happy you did. Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation editorial and communications specialist Ian Hanington share on: <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/share.gif> <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdfeeebf715c7180e2c4d72a8b17c14837 c1d3bf92d9cde3f9> facebook logo <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd0596e0525fb80fdba85550434272265b 565a620db72b6f15> twitter logo This email was sent to k.a.miller(a)mts.net Take <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd0753c23ff3e558a4b65865dbc3001936 669cfce2bc7fe7d9> Action | Donate <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd2f5e93a01523dcb6ee5e50f9f064ea68 507e3f7c6d0978ed> | Unsubscribe <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdb929c68e2ac708f820387bfee6deea15 1d862d4825a00e40> | Privacy <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cd596b49828cbc680e758e630ea3e1747b f5cedf19ce9e178a> Policy David <http://cl.exct.net/?qs=5cea98a99a0e97cdc6237878403c8494ad6a4a2c265b10c5 d45d12a057533c3e> Suzuki Foundation 219-2211 West 4th Ave., Vancouver, BC, V6K 4S2 604-732-4228 | contact(a)davidsuzuki.org <http://image.exct.net/lib/fe5c1570746c0d7a741c/m/1/tagline.gif>

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WFP: Teen cyclist killed
by Beth McKechnie 27 May '11

27 May '11

Teen cyclist killed AN 18-year-old cyclist has died after being hit by a semi-trailer in Steinbach Thursday afternoon. The crash happened at 2.45 p.m. at the junction of highways 12 and 52. The semi was hauling hogs and was travelling west on Highway 52 when the male driver hit the cyclist. The cyclist, a woman, was pronounced dead at the scene. RCMP continue to investigate. Alcohol was not a factor. *Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 27, 2011 A11*

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In some cities, not walking is as dangerous as walking
by Beth McKechnie 27 May '11

27 May '11

In Some Cities, Not Walking is as Dangerous as Walking<http://alttransport.com/2011/05/in-some-cities-not-walking-is-as-dangerous-…> by Joseph Cutrufo <http://alttransport.com/author/jcutrufo/> on Thursday, May 26, 2011 http://alttransport.com/2011/05/in-some-cities-not-walking-is-as-dangerous-… What’s more dangerous in your community? Walking or not walking? If walking isn’t a safe way to travel in your city, *not walking* may be just as dangerous. The American Colleges of Sports Medicine’s American Fitness Index<http://www.americanfitnessindex.org/quickview.htm>(AFI) and Transportaton for America’s Pedestrian Danger Index<http://t4america.org/resources/dangerousbydesign2011/states/worst-metros/>(PDI) may not at first blush appear to have much in common with one another, except for the fact that they were both released this week. The American Fitness Index is a “scientific snapshot of the state of health and fitness at the metropolitan level,” while the Pedestrian Danger Index is a “measure of the relative risk of walking, adjusted for exposure.” So where’s the connection? The metropolitan areas that the AFI ranks among the healthiest and fittest, are by and large among the safest places for walking, while many of the unhealthiest, least fit metro areas are also some of the most dangerous for pedestrians. In other words, if you manage not to be killed trying to cross the street, you’re still at increased risk for heart disease, diabetes, asthma and obesity. Minneapolis, which got the top spot<http://health.usnews.com/health-news/diet-fitness/fitness/articles/2011/05/…>on the AFI’s list of 50 metro areas, was ranked the 48th most dangerous metro area out of 52 in the Pedestrian Danger Index. Boston<http://articles.boston.com/2011-05-25/news/29582658_1_pedestrian-danger-ind…>was named the least dangerous metro for pedestrians in the PDI, and was ranked third fittest in the AFI. The Pacific Northwest also had strong correlations between fitness and safety: Portland<http://www.oregon.statenews.net/story.php?rid=45627572>, San Francisco<http://www.californiahealthline.org/articles/2011/5/25/san-francisco-sacram…>and Seattle<http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2011/05/23/seattle-falls-in-healthy…>were all, not surprisingly, ranked in the top quintile for fitness and in the bottom quintile for danger. On the flipside, Tampa was ranked the second most dangerous metro for pedestrians, and was 40th in terms of fitness. While the PDI’s four most dangerous metros are in Florida<http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/25/us-florida-pedestrians-idUSTRE74O…>, many of the strongest correlations between fitness and pedestrian safety were more spread out geographically: The Inland Empire<http://www.scpr.org/news/2011/05/25/study-finds-inland-empire-region-among-…>region of Riverside and San Bernardino, California (5th most dangerous, 44th fittest), Las Vegas<http://www.8newsnow.com/story/14715691/las-vegas-6th-most-dangerous-for-ped…>(6th most dangerous, 43rd fittest), Memphis<http://www.memphisflyer.com/NewsBlog/archives/2011/05/24/memphis-bad-for-pe…>(7th most dangerous, 48th fittest) and Houston<http://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2011/05/24/houston-in-top-10-on-ped…>(9th most dangerous, 42nd fittest). We’re quick to point the finger at the American diet and the US health care system for obesity and other chronic diseases, but these reports suggest the physical layout of our metro areas and how we move about within them are also to blame. Because of infrastructure that favors automobile travel over active transportation, the odds are stacked doubly high against people living in the least fit, least walkable places. Even those who want to start walking for health or transportation purposes struggle to do so because there’s nowhere safe to walk. The full American Fitness Index report and the Pedestrian Danger Index — part of T4America’s *Dangerous by Design 2011* — are available here<http://www.americanfitnessindex.org/docs/reports/2011_afi_report_final.pdf>and here <http://t4america.org/docs/dangerousbydesign/dangerous_by_design.pdf>.

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Walking on sunshine - 10 am today kick-off Commuter Challenge
by Beth McKechnie 26 May '11

26 May '11

*Looking for an excuse to get outside and enjoy some sunshine this morning? Walk, pedal, bus over to the official kick-off of the 2011 Commuter Challenge! * *When?* 10 a.m., TODAY *Where?* Manitoba Hydro Place outdoor plaza (corner of Edmonton and Graham) *What?* The Commuter Challenge, which takes place from June 5-11, is an annual friendly competition that encourages Manitobans to choose active and green commuting options. Individuals who bus, walk, cycle, carpool, telecommute or use any form of green commuting during that week are eligible to win great prizes! Manitobans can visit www.GreenActionCentre.ca<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/>to register as an employee with their workplace or as an individual, and log their green km during the week of the Commuter Challenge.

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City of Winnipeg Job Posting: Community Climate Change Coordinator (2 year term)
by Beth McKechnie 25 May '11

25 May '11

http://www.winnipeg.ca/resumeol/peoplesoft/job_req.asp?req=107422 Community Climate Change Coordinator (Planner 3) - Temporary 2 year Term *Posting NO.107422 *COMMUNITY CLIMATE CHANGE COORDINATOR (PLANNER 3) TEMPORARY 2 YEAR TERM PLANNING, PROPERTY AND DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT POSTING NO. 107422 The City of Winnipeg is currently accepting resumes to fill a temporary 2 year term Community Climate Change Coordinator (Planner 3) position for the Planning Property and Development Department. Under the direction of the Environmental Coordinator, the Climate Change Planner leads and facilitates the development of climate change action plans and coordinates corporate climate change actions across the organization. Engages and fosters relationships and partnerships with the community, various government departments, local agencies, community-based organizations and the private sector to achieve action on climate change priorities. Qualifications: 1. Bachelor's Degree in Planning, Public Administration, Environmental Studies/Science, Geography, Natural Resource Management OR Master¿s Degree in City Planning, Natural Resource Management, Environmental Studies/Science, Geography, Public Administration is desirable. 2. A minimum of three (3) years experience in planning/implementing environmental initiatives. 3. Demonstrated organizational, analytical and decision-making abilities. 4. Proven ability to build consensus, to inspire confidence and to lead. 5. Demonstrated ability to analyze complex issues and develop practical solutions. 6. Strong interpersonal skills, including communication (both oral and written), facilitation and collaboration skills. 7. Public presentation and formal report preparation skills. 8. Demonstrated ability to establish and maintain effective professional and working relationships with a wide variety of people (including elected and senior appointed officials). 9. Demonstrated political astuteness and sound judgment. 10. Positive, team oriented, confident attitude. 11. Ability to operate a personal computer and associated software (word processing, spreadsheet applications). 12. Demonstrated knowledge of local government issues and working knowledge of organizational change, theory and practice. 13. Knowledge of economic development issues as related to sustainable development at the community and neighbourhood level. 14. Knowledge of climate change. A Criminal Record Check will be required for the successful candidate, at their expense. A comprehensive salary and benefits package is offered. Interested applicants should submit a resume indicating Posting Number 107422 to: Competition Coordinator, Planning, Property and Development Department, Mezzanine, Unit 78 - 30 Fort Street, Winnipeg, Manitoba, R3C 4X7 or apply online at www.winnipeg.ca/hr on or before 4:30 p.m. Friday, June 3, 2011. Only candidates selected for interviews will be contacted. City of Winnipeg on-line: http://www.winnipeg.ca Online Application Form<http://www.winnipeg.ca/resumeol/peoplesoft/apply.asp> *THE CITY OF WINNIPEG IS AN EMPLOYMENT EQUITY EMPLOYER ABORIGINAL PERSONS, WOMEN, VISIBLE MINORITIES AND INDIVIDUALS WITH DISABILITIES ARE ENCOURAGED TO SELF-DECLARE IN THEIR COVERING LETTER *

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Nova Scotia success: Province will lower speeds in school zones
by Beth McKechnie 25 May '11

25 May '11

Yesterday the Province of Nova Scotia announced that it will reduce speeds in school zones from 50 km/h to 30 km/h. The Ecology Action Centre’s Active & Safe Routes to School program has been asking for this change since last fall. Find the news release here: http://www.gov.ns.ca/news/details.asp?id=20110524004. Ecology Action Centre congratulates the Nova Scotia government for making this change. It will contribute to making streets in our school communities safer, especially for children and youth who walk or wheel to school. Here are two short media clips on the announcement: http://www.metronews.ca/halifax/local/article/869412--school-zone-speeds-to… http://thechronicleherald.ca/NovaScotia/1245137.html (scroll down to the third item). Janet Barlow, Coordinator Active & Safe Routes to School Ecology Action Centre 2705 Fern Lane, Halifax, NS B3K 4L3 asrts(a)ecologyaction.ca (902) 442-5055 www.saferoutesns.ca Follow ASRTS on Twitter: www.twitter.com/asrts Help us celebrate our birthday with 40 days of action! www.ecologyaction.ca/40days

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E-Bulletin - Recreation Connections Manitoba
by Beth McKechnie 25 May '11

25 May '11

FYI... ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Cory Jackson <recconnections(a)sportmanitoba.ca> Date: Tue, May 24, 2011 at 12:50 PM Subject: [Physical-activity-coalition-mb] E-Bulletin - Recreation Connections Manitoba *After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project * *Call for Applications Reminder* Applications for pilot program funding for After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project are being accepted until Friday, *May 27, 2011*. The pilot programs will focus on increasing physical activity, healthy eating and active transportation in existing after school programs. If you are interested in having your after school program involved please visit our website at www.afterschoolmanitoba.ca for more information and an application form. I would also like to point out an error in the Information Package – Appendix B – Blended Program Framework. On the chart there are two boxes with the heading “Recreation 30%”. The heading for the lower box (left hand side) should read “Learning 20%”. There are also two boxes with the heading “Health 20%”. The heading for the lower box (right hand side) should read “Local Content 30%” For more information, please contact Roy Mulligan, Project Coordinator at (204) 925-5751 or via email at recconnections.pro(a)sportmanitoba.ca . ** *RCM Provincial Conference 2012* *Call for Presenters* *February 29 - March 2, 2012* *Winnipeg, Manitoba* Recreation Connections Manitoba (RCM) is seeking qualified workshop and keynote presenters for the 2012 Recreation Connections Manitoba Annual Provincial Conference. The conference will be held at the Victoria Inn, Winnipeg, Manitoba February 29 - March 2, 2012. Those interested in presenting at the event are asked to fill out the Call for Presenters 2012 online form. Deadline to receive proposals is June 15, 2011. *Please click on the Call for Presenters button on the RCM home page.* For more information, please contact Jackie Onagi, Training and Event Coordinator at (204) 925-5747 or via email at recconnections.events(a)sportmanitoba.ca *Sogo Active*** The Sogo Active Program is a for youth by youth program executed by ParticipACTION Canada along with provincial and territorial partners to motivate young Canadian/Manitobans to get active. Sogo Active puts power in the hands of youth to take charge of their own lives, and to inspire their peers to get moving. It’s a national network that connects youth with their peers and with community organizations. Is your organization looking for funding to run, enhance, or initiate a physical activity initiative that would include or target youth between the age of 13 and 19? Register as a community host at www.sogoactive.com to get started and access funding grants for up to $500. For more information, please contact Jackie Onagi, Provincial Coordinator – Sogo Active at (204) 925-5747 or via email at recconnections.events(a)sportmanitoba.ca *Aquatic Facility Operators Course*** Recreation Connections Manitoba, together with Manitoba Healthy Living, Youth and Seniors is hosting a 3 day course for Aquatic Facility Operators, June 21st - 23rd in Dauphin. Only a few seats left. Register today. To register, visit the RCM website at www.recconnections.com and click on the Online Event Manager button on the home page. For more information, please contact Jackie Onagi, Training and Event Coordinator at (204) 925-5747 or visit the website at www.recconnections.com…then click on Training and Development….then Aquatics.

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Trails Day Celebrations - Saturday June 4th - 6 GREAT PARTIES !
by Janice Lukes 25 May '11

25 May '11

Good morning on a sunny day in Winnipeg! Here is your invitation to party! Pass this on to your friends / family and co workers! This is our 5th year of celebrating International Trails Day and wow we have lots to celebrate this year ! There are six great & unique parties occurring on six different trail systems in Winnipeg - full details can be found here: http://www.winnipegtrails.ca/2011/05/09/june-4th-trails-day-celebration/ Trails Day Poster is attached. Detailed trail maps can be found here (and more are being posted daily!): http://www.winnipegtrails.ca/trails-maps/ There will be all kinds of FREEBIES at the parties! - bike bells to alert pedestrian - brand new Winnipeg cycling maps, - local food samplings and refreshments, - in motion water bottles, - CBC Live Right now goodies, - massages for feet, bodies and more! The celebrations will occur on some of Winnipeg's classic trails - the Harte Trail, Bishop Grandin Greenway Trail, the Seine River Trail system AND on two of our newest stellar trail systems, the Yellow Ribbon Greenway Trail (be sure to stand under the incoming planes as this trail is right alongside a busy flight path) and the Bishop Grandin Trail West (part of Winnipeg's longest and BEST connected trail system)! See this great article in today's community newspaper (also posted below): http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/our-communities/souwester/Trails-Day-set-to -connect-communities--122526619.html Check out Crampton's Market (http://cramptonsmarket.blogspot.com/). Crampton's is located on the Bishop Grandin West Trail and is proving to be an ideal Winnipeg case study on the economic benefits of trails - Crampton's was only accessible by motorized vehicle before the Bishop Grandin Trail West was built. People walking / cycling from even the closest communities of Waverly Heights and Waverly West had to take a vehicle. Today, Crampton's is fully embracing the trail and promoting it - and reaping the economic benefits of being located beside Bishop Grandin West Trail, the east - west connecting AT spine in south Winnipeg! happy trails! Janice Lukes * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * CANSTAR Community News article: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/our-communities/souwester/Trails-Day-set-to -connect-communities--122526619.html Trails Day set to connect communities by simon.fuller(a)canstarnews.com ( CANSTAR Community News, May 25, 2011) Winnipeggers will soon get the chance to become even more connected. June 4 is Trails Day, when there will be six multi-use trail events for individuals to explore across the city throughout the day. One brand new trail will be Bishop Grandin Trail West - a five-kilometre route that runs west from the Red River at Bishop Grandin Boulevard to McGillivray Boulevard.It was funded by all three levels of government under the banner of the Manitoba Rural Infrastructure Fund. A key event organizer says the new trail - which is also part of the Trans Canada Trail system - will help bring communities in southwest Winnipeg together. "This new trail is a stellar example of community connectivity," said Janice Lukes, manager of special projects for Winnipeg Trails. "It also enables access to the University of Manitoba on the east end and the Kenaston big box shopping centers and FortWhyte Alive on the west end." Lukes, who lives in St. Norbert, said the trail links the communities of University Heights, Waverley Heights, Waverley West, Linden Ridge and Whyte Ridge. On Trails Day, the new route will be showcased by the four-kilometre Cycle Tour - FortWhyte Alive to Crampton's Market, during which participants will get a guided tour of FWA before continuing on the trail for a trip to the market. Erin Crampton, who co-owns and operates Crampton's Market with her partner, Marc DeGagne, is excited about the new trail - not least because she hopes it will improve safety for local cyclists and pedestrians. "I've seen our customers, including mothers with young kids, dodging traffic when they cross the intersection at Bishop and Waverley," said Crampton, who lives in Waverley Heights. "I'm too scared to cycle on these routes. So, for me, the new pathway is absolutely necessary. There are the road warriors, who will nudge their way through traffic on their bikes. But for the rest of us, the new trail will make it safe and easy, which is lovely." When event participants arrive at Crampton's Market, they can expect to find a selection of locally grown produce, dry goods and baked goods, as well as the chance to score goody bags and receive bicycle and sports therapy advice from various organizations. "There will be a whole bunch of local food producers and we'll also be giving out swag bags. People will get a rewards card and receive a sticker at every station they visit. When they get five, they can collect a bag," Crampton said. Other Trail Day events will include Harte Trail's Paw Trek and Dog Show, which starts at Oakdale Street and Ridgewood Avenue in Charleswood and Discover Transcona's Many New Trails, which begins at the Transcona Historical Museum on Regent Avenue West. Crampton's Market is located at 1765 Waverley St. For more information, and downloadable maps, visit www.winnipegtrails.com. Janice Lukes Manager, Special Projects - Winnipeg Trails Rivers West Red River Corridor Inc. 235-614 Des Meurons Street Winnipeg, MB R2H 2P9 Cell (204) 952-4222 Fax (204) 237-4618 <mailto:jlukes@riverswest.ca> jlukes(a)riverswest.ca <http://www.winnipegtrails.ca/> www.WinnipegTrails.ca Member of City of Winnipeg Active Transportation Advisory Committee Chair, Province of Manitoba Active Transportation Advisory Group

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Kick off the Commuter Challenge with us - May 26th, 10am
by Jessie Klassen 24 May '11

24 May '11

*Come and kick-off the 2011 Commuter Challenge!* *When?* 10 a.m., Thursday, May 26 *Where?* Manitoba Hydro Place outdoor plaza Corner of Edmonton and Graham (Rain location: Manitoba Hydro Place foyer) *What?* The Commuter Challenge, which takes place from June 5-11, is an annual friendly competition that encourages Manitobans to choose active and green commuting options. Individuals who bus, walk, cycle, carpool, telecommute or use any form of green commuting during that week are eligible to win great prizes! Manitobans can visit www.GreenActionCentre.ca to register as an employee with their workplace or as an individual, and log their green km during the week of the Commuter Challenge. Last year, over 8,100 employees at 197 workplaces participated, helping Winnipeg snag first place over other cities in our population category, including Calgary, Edmonton and Ottawa. Join the Honourable Jim Rondeau, Minister of Healthy Living, Deputy Mayor Justin Swandel, Mr. Lloyd Kuczek, Vice President, Manitoba Hydro, and Green Action Centre to kick-off the 12th annual Commuter Challenge! The Commuter Challenge in Manitoba is organized by Green Action Centre, a non-profit, non-governmental hub for greener living based in Winnipeg. Sponsors of the 2011 Commuter Challenge include: the Government of Manitoba, The City of Winnipeg, Winnipeg Transit, MTS, Winnipeg Free Press, Manitoba Hydro, Investor’s Group, Great West Life, Manitoba Public Insurance, and Assiniboine Credit Union. For more information, please contact: Francine Carrier, Commuter Challenge Coordinator Green Action Centre Tel: (204) 925-3779 E: challenge(a)greenactioncentre.ca W: www.GreenActionCentre.ca **

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WFP: Floodway rec plan unveiled - Province reveals pedestrian-centred overpass, trail (May21'11)
by Beth McKechnie 21 May '11

21 May '11

Floodway rec plan unveiled Province reveals pedestrian-centred overpass, trail By: Bill Redekop BIRDS HILL PROVINCIAL PARK -- Former premier Duff Roblin dreamed not just of building a floodway but of developing the floodway corridor for recreational use for all Manitobans. The first one he got built in short order. The latter took 50 years. On Friday, the province gave a glimpse of the first phase of that floodway development that includes construction of a $3-million pedestrian overpass bridge spanning Highway 59, across from the Birds Hill Provincial Park entrance. The bridge is a key component in a 48-kilometre recreational trail for non-motorized travel being built along the west side of the floodway here. The bridge will also connect cyclists and others with Birds Hill Park, which has over 100 kilometres of additional trails, starting at the Cedar Bog Trail. The pedestrian bridge and a portion of the trail -- from about Garven Road to Lockport -- is expected to be completed possibly as early as August. Finishing touches are likely to continue until fall when a grand opening is scheduled. The entire trail, extending as far south as Duff Roblin Provincial Park, at a cost of $6 million in addition to the bridge's cost, will be completed by next summer. It will be open for four-season use including walking, jogging, cycling, in-line skating, cross-country skiing, even dogsledding. There will be a dedicated toboggan hill close to Kirkness Road, north of the Birds Hill Park entrance. There will be up to six staging areas where people can park and load their bikes. Janice Lukes, a director with the Winnipeg Trails Association, expects some people will be skeptical. "It's pretty hard for the average Joe to get the picture," she said. But Lukes has no doubt the trail system, once built, will attract hordes of users. "Just look at the usage that old rail line (the former CPR rail line between Gateway Road and Raleigh Street the city converted into a biking/hiking trail) gets. People are really getting into this," she said. The floodway project is just the north extension of the trail system being built through Winnipeg. You could soon be able to travel on a dedicated recreational trail from the University of Manitoba (following the Rapid Transit Corridor), through The Forks, along the old CPR line that divides Gateway and Raleigh, all the way to Birds Hill Park and beyond to Lockport. "Cycle tourism is a massive industry in Quebec, in Minnesota. We're flat here. We're perfect," Lukes said. The project -- which will also include landscaping and beautification, with the planting of thousands of trees and natural flowers and prairie -- is being undertaken by the Manitoba Floodway Authority. The steel bridge is necessary to hook up with the extensive trail system in Birds Hill Park, and because people are already crossing the highway there. "This is a major safety concern," said Ronuk Modha, floodway authority communications director. The bridge is 4.2 metres wide, from curb to curb. It will have an enclosure similar to wire fencing so people can't fall out or throw things down on traffic. There will also be a viewing area in the centre. About a six-kilometre stretch of trail between Dunning Road and Garven Road is asphalt and already completed. The rest of the trail will be crushed limestone. The floodway authority is also building a three-kilometre trail into Birds Hill Park to hook up to the Cedar Bog Trail. People can't cross the floodway from Birds Hill Park to the floodway's west side when it's full with flood water but that is only one to two months of the year, said Modha. Otherwise, people can cross at Dunning Road, west of the 59er Restaurant. This is just the floodway authority's first phase of development. The second phase will take place on the southern portion of the floodway near St. Mary's Road, Modha said. bill.redekop(a)freepress.mb.ca -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Bixi hits the streets in Ottawa
by Beth McKechnie 18 May '11

18 May '11

CAPITAL BIXI HITS THE STREETS IN CANADA'S CAPITAL http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/capital-bixi-hits-the-streets-in-ca… OTTAWA, May 18 /PRNewswire/ - The* *Capital* *BIXI bike share service officially kicked off today. Residents and visitors in the core of Canada'sCapital will have 24/7 access to 100 bikes located at 10 stations in downtown Ottawa and Gatineau. "The National Capital Commission (NCC) is proud to add another important building block to the cycling infrastructure in the core of Canada'sCapital," said Marie Lemay, Chief Executive Officer at the NCC. "The NCC has been in the cycling business for over 40 years. We've come a long way since the early 1970s and we want to go even further. The Capital BIXI service not only represents a means of active transportation but also a means to build a greener Capital for all to enjoy." "The purpose of the program is to provide immediate access to public bikes as an alternative mode of transportation," said Alain Ayotte, President at the Public Bike System Company. "The BIXI bikes are designed to complement public transit, and as such, they are intended for one-way trips of less than 30 minutes. At the end of the trip, the bike can be dropped off at any of the 10 docking stations. We're convinced local residents and tourists will quickly embrace Capital BIXI." *PARTNERSHIPS* The NCC and the Public Bike System Company are proud to welcome TELUS as the major sponsor of the Capital BIXI bike share service. "TELUS is thrilled to help bring easy, accessible and economical bike sharing to Canada's Capital Region with Capital BIXI," said Michael Sangster, Vice-President at TELUS. "Support for healthier cities is an important part of TELUS' 'give where we live' philosophy, which our team members live every day. Initiatives like the Capital BIXI bike share further our mission by giving Canadians an opportunity to be good stewards of the environment while staying active in our day to day lives." The NCC is pleased to announce that Public Works and Government Services Canada will be adding a station to the Capital BIXI network. The NCC is also in discussion with Environment Canada for stations at their buildings. The NCC looks forward to the participation of public and private organizations who are interested in providing the bike share service to their employees and their partners. The NCC, the City of Ottawa and Ville de Gatineau continue to partner on significant cycling initiatives in Canada's Capital. *CAPITAL BIXI EXPERIENCE* Regular users can purchase a monthly ($28) or yearly ($78) Capital BIXI subscription which entitles them to a BIXI-key. Members then use their BIXI-key to take out a bike at any station in the network. Non-members can purchase a 24-hour pass ($5) or a 72-hour pass ($12) directly at the station. Users can take out a bike as often as they like for 30 minutes or less. Fees apply to longer trips, the second half-hour will cost $1.50 and the third half-hour will cost $3. General information and subscription details can be found at capital.bixi.com. The first 100 annual subscribers will receive founding member status and a distinctive dark purple BIXI-key to access the service. Subscribers can also take advantage of a $10 discount on a monthly pass, until June 30, 2011. *About the National Capital Commission (NCC) * The NCC is a federal Crown corporation whose mandate is to create pride and unity through Canada's Capital Region by making the Capital a meeting place that communicates Canada to Canadians. As the steward of federal lands, national landmarks, parks, transportation infrastructures and buildings, the NCC takes great pride in developing and planning a Capital that today's visitors will enjoy and that future generations will treasure. *About BIXI and the Public Bike System Company (PBSC) * PBSC is responsible for the implementation of the Capital BIXI service in Canada's Capital Region. PBSC offers a highly advanced bike sharing system on three continents, to private campuses and cities, such as London (UK), Melbourne (AU), Minneapolis, Washington and Arlington (USA). *About TELUS * TELUS is a leading national telecommunications company in Canada, with $9.9 billion of annual revenue and 12.3 million customer connections including 7 million wireless subscribers, 3.7 million wireline network access lines and 1.2 million Internet subscribers and more than 350,000 TELUS TV customers. Led since 2000 by President and CEO, Darren Entwistle, TELUS provides a wide range of communications products and services including data, Internet protocol (IP), voice, entertainment and video. For more information about TELUS, please visit TELUS.com<http://www.telus.com/>. To learn more about TELUS' commitment to the community, please visit TELUS.com/community <http://www.telus.com/community>. For more information regarding the bike share service Capital BIXI, please contact the Public Bike System Company at 1-855-CAP-BIXI or 1-855-227-2494 (toll free), or visit the website at capital.bixi.com. SOURCE BIXI - PUBLIC BIKE SYSTEM COMPANY -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Active & Green Spring 2011 E-Newsletter
by Jessie Klassen 17 May '11

17 May '11

Email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser.<http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f55cc&id=32490864f8…> Let us help! *Looking to improve commuter options at your workplace?* Request resources<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…> on cycling, carpooling, commuting surveys and tracking progress, among others. Book a presentation<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>on the various commuting options, as well as fuel-efficient driving, creating a commuter friendly workplace, and greening the workplace. Talk to us about implementing a Smart Trips<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>program at your workplace. ------------------------------ Upcoming Events: *Winnipeg Transit Bus Tutorial<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…> May 24th <http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>Trails Day Celebration<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…> June 4th Commuter Challenge<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…> June 5-11th Clean Air Day<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…> June 8th Bike to Work Day<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…> June 24th Ciclovia<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…> September 11th* ------------------------------ Green Action Centre staff whip up a bike blender smoothie on a sunny afternoon! Like what you read? Become a member<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>of Green Action Centre (membership is free!), visit our website at greenactioncentre.ca<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>, or make a donation<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>. Commuter Challenge It’s that time of year again – time to sign up your workplace<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>for the Commuter Challenge! Take part in this friendly competition to explore greener transportation options for personal, environmental, and community health, and for a chance to win great prizes<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>! If you are already signed up and looking to spread the word to other workplaces, send new recruits here<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>and you will both be entered to win a $75 gift certificate to the store of your choice. Motivate your coworkers with our list<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>of fun ideas compiled by past workplace coordinators. ------------------------------ *FREE transit to Folk Fest* (and sing this retro transit song along the way) Take the Festival Express<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>bus to the Winnipeg Folk Festival this year. It’s free and you won’t need to worry about parking or idling in a long line at the end of the night. Wagons, strollers and gear are welcome on all buses leaving from the Downtown area every 30 minutes and the McPhillips Station Casino every 60 minutes. Stay right to the end of the night and catch the last bus home before drivers even leave the parking lot. Before you catch the bus, watch this hidden gem of a video<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>encouraging Winnipegers to try transit in the 1980s. This might make a good song for the trip out to Birds Hill! ------------------------------ *All things bike-worthy!* Find your ride to work (and other destinations) with the 2011 Winnipeg Bike Map! Update your route to take advantage of the $20.4 million worth of new cycling and pedestrian infrastructure built last year. The bike map will be available at the end of May for FREE at bike stores and other retailers along with places like Green Action Centre. Not comfortable riding in traffic? Register for a Commuter Cycling Skills course through the City's Leisure Guide<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>(see page 81). Taught by CAN-BIKE certified instructors from Bike to the Future<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>, the next half-day course takes place Sunday, May 29. We could all learn a tip or two! Whether you're a seasoned commuting cyclist or new to the seat, join hundreds of other Winnipeggers biking to work during the Commuter Challenge<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>(June 5-11) and on Bike to Work Day<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>(Friday, June 24). Even CAA is joining the bike-olution with their new Bike Assist<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>program that offers roadside assistance 24/7 for cyclists. CAA is also attempting to broker some increased respect and safety amongst road users with their Watch for Bikes<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>campaign. ------------------------------ *Bus, walk, bike, carshare?* Need a car but only sometimes? Carsharing could be the answer and it's now in Winnipeg! Peg City Car Co-op<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>gives you easy and affordable access to zippy little cars without the hassle and cost of owning your own vehicle. With gas prices soaring, this is one solution that is easy on the pocketbook and can fit nicely into your life if you mostly get around by bus, walking or cycling. Peg City Car Co-op's first vehicles will be located in Osborne Village with plans to expand into neighbouring areas as the number of members and cars in the fleet grow. ------------------------------ *Commuting takes its toll* A recent U.S. survey<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>found that 4% of employees – a whopping 5 million people – called in sick because they couldn't face their commute to work. Almost half of respondents noted that the valuable time spent commuting has a significant impact on their job satisfaction, with a third saying it played a role in their decision of where to work. So how can employers help? The good folks at Grist magazine <http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…>have a few suggestions. For the local perspective, check out Green Action Centre's Workplace Commuter Options<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>program and ideas, including 7 steps<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>to get you started and making the business case<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…>for improving commuting options. You are receiving this email because you are an Active & Green subscriber. Unsubscribe<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage2.com/unsubscribe?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a…> jessie_klassen(a)hotmail.com from this list. Our mailing address is: Green Action Centre 3-303 Portage Ave. Winnipeg, Manitoba R3B 2B4 Add us to your address book<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/vcard?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f5…> Copyright (C) 2011 Green Action Centre All rights reserved. Forward<http://us2.forward-to-friend.com/forward?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f55cc&id=324…>this email to a friend Update your profile<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/profile?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3…> [image: Email Marketing Powered by MailChimp]<http://www.mailchimp.com/monkey-rewards/?aid=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f55cc&afl=1>

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Please vote for Green Action Centre's WOW project
by Beth McKechnie 16 May '11

16 May '11

Hello friends and colleagues, Green Action Centre's WOW (We Often Walk to School and Play) program was selected by the Keg Foundation as a potential winner of $25,000 towards expanding/developing this project! We hope you will consider supporting us by voting for our project! Details on "We Often Walk to School and Play" can be found by clicking on the project picture on the link below. If you are so inclined, you can VOTE for our project ONCE PER DAY up till June 14 at : http://www.thekegthanksamillion.com/en/phase2/projects/show/r/19 Please share this link widely with others who might be willing to help. thanks! Beth -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Montreal: City cycling network 'to keep getting better'
by Beth McKechnie 16 May '11

16 May '11

City cycling network 'to keep getting better' *Another $10M invested to expand, improve routes* By MICHELLE LALONDE, The Gazette May 13, 2011 Montreal cyclists will be cruising along 70 new kilometres of bicycle routes by next fall if the city follows through on a promise to invest another $10 million in its cycling network this summer. Michel Bissonnet, the city official responsible for bike paths, on Thursday unveiled the city's 2011-12 plan for expanding and improving the cycling network, which already offers 530 kilometres of lanes and paths. "We want our network of bike routes to keep getting better, more accessible and better-integrated, so that the bicycle becomes a real alternative to car use," Bissonnet said. The city has pledged the network will measure 800 km by 2015, but achievements over the last two years have fallen short because of bad weather and a change in the contracting process. Last year, the city completed 23.4 km of the 50 km that had been planned. In 2009, it was 42 km of 60. Nonetheless, cycling advocates welcomed Thursday's blueprint for summer, noting it includes many small extensions that connect gaps in the network, and a couple of promising pilot projects to improve safety at busy intersections. "Improvements can't always be measured in kilometres," said Jean-François Pronovost, who heads Vélo Québec. The city will try the "bike box" concept, popular in many European cities, at the corner of Milton and University Sts. A painted green box across the width of the road in front of the white line where cars must stop will allow cyclists to wait in front of cars and proceed through the intersection first. Also, new concrete medians will separate bike lanes from car traffic at three intersections along the busy St. Urbain St. bike lane (at Pine Ave., St. Cuthbert St. and Duluth Ave.) Other highlights: --The de Maisonneuve Blvd. bike path will be extended east from Berri St. to Dorion St. to give cyclists safer access to the Jacques Cartier Bridge. --Bicycle commuters from Laval will be able to take advantage of new bike lanes that link to the downtown bike path network, from the Viau Bridge down along Berri, Lajeunesse, Émile Journault, Henri-Julien, De Castelnau and St. Dominique Sts. --In LaSalle, cyclists will be able get from the Lachine Canal bike path to the path along the river by taking a new route down Senkus St. to Cordner St., then west along Cordner, Hardy, and Bédard Sts. to 90th Ave. ner St., then west along Cordner, Hardy, and Bédard Sts. to 90th Ave. An updated map of the bike path network, including Bixi stops, will be available by the end of May at Accès Montréal offices, libraries, and bike shops. Information on the new projects, as well as the bike network map, are posted on the city's website: www. ville.montreal.qc.ca mlalonde@ montrealgazette.com © Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette

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Positive results for Walkable Edmonton's communities on foot map series
by Beth McKechnie 12 May '11

12 May '11

*Walkable Edmonton - Taking Steps E-News* http://www.industrymailout.com/Industry/View.aspx?id=252445&q=312226532&qz=… While Walkable Edmonton has had lots of positive feedback around our Communities on Foot Map Series, we now are fortunate to have a study undertaken by the School of Public Health at the University of Alberta looking at the Avenue Communities Walking Map that was released this past summer. The study showed some really positive indicators around the maps encouraging people to get out walking and connect with their communities. * Executive Summary*: http://www.industrymailout.com/Industry/Home/2656/3801/link252445/FINAL%20E… -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Analysis of Bicycling Trends and Policies in Large N.A. Cities (Pucher, 2011)
by Beth McKechnie 11 May '11

11 May '11

Analysis of Bicycling Trends and Policies in Large North American Cities: Lessons for New York*Source: University Transportation Research Center (Region 2)* *Download*: http://fulltextreports.com/2011/04/11/analysis-of-bicycling-trends-and-poli… [Note: this is an extension of the "Bicycling Renaissance in North America" journal article that was distributed previously. -Beth] This research report reviews trends in cycling levels, safety, and policies in large North American cities over the past two decades. We analyze aggregate national data as well as city- specific case study data for nine large cities (Chicago, Minneapolis, Montréal, New York, Portland, San Francisco, Toronto, Vancouver, and Washington, DC). Cycling levels have increased in both the USA and Canada, while cyclist fatalities have fallen. The number of bike commuters in the USA rose by 64% from 1990 to 2009, and the bike share of commuters rose from 0.4% to 0.6%. Over the shorter period from 1996 to 2006, the number of bike commuters in Canada rose by 42%, and the bike share of commuters rose from 1.1% to 1.3%. >From 1988 to 2008, cycling fatalities fell by 66% in Canada and by 21% in the USA; serious injuries fell by 40% in Canada and by 31% in the USA. There is much spatial variation and socioeconomic inequality in cycling rates. The bike share of work commuters is more than twice as high in Canada as in the USA, and is higher in the western parts of both countries. Cycling is concentrated in central cities, especially near universities and in gentrified neighborhoods near the city center. Almost all the growth in cycling in the USA has been among men between 25-64 years old, while cycling rates have remained steady among women and fallen sharply for children. -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Webinar: Using Social Media to Improve Bicycle & Ped Facilities, Wed, May 18, 2-3 pm, EcoCentre
by Beth McKechnie 10 May '11

10 May '11

* Green Action Centre will host a Winnipeg viewing of the following APBP (Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals) webinar on Using Social Media to Improve Bicycle and Pedestrian Facilities on Wednesday, May 18. If you would like to join us for a group viewing of this webinar, please let me know at beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca. See you then! cheers, Beth 925-3772 ------------------------------ Using Social Media to Improve Bicycle and Pedestrian Facilities Wednesday, May 18 • 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. CDT * *Location: EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, 3rd floor (enter via elevator inside Mountain Equipment Co-op)* Recent current events have demonstrated that social media offer serious and effective tools for change. Join this APBP webinar on May 18 at 2:00 p.m. CDT to explore different types of social media and their potential for helping bicycle and pedestrian professionals and advocates build powerful coalitions, foster community, and reach new audiences. A trio of presenters from three areas of practice—consulting, advocacy, and government—who are using social media and Web 2.0 tools creatively and successfully will share their insights and experience. The session will include a brief explanation of different tools and their uses, a discussion of policies and best practices for managing content, and case studies that showcase different real world examples of social media helping to improve bike/ped facilities and conditions: Bike|Walk|Idaho, the NE 125th Street road diet project in Seattle, and Cascade Bicycle Club's BikeWise.org project. Presenters are Brice Maryman, ASLA, SvR Design; Maureen Gresham, Bicycle and Pedestrian Coordinator, Idaho Transportation Department; and Chris Rule, Political Program Manager, Cascade Bicycle Club.

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Changing Lanes: Improving the Bike-Car Relationship on Canada's Roads (CAA)
by Beth McKechnie 10 May '11

10 May '11

*PLEASE NOTE*: The organizers have advised that there will be more details available by next Wednesday regarding the webcast, plus they are intending to record the conference for later viewing. We at Green Action Centre are interested in hearing some of the excellent speakers lined up for this conference, so will keep you informed as to a potential group viewing for those who are interested. [image: CAA_Changing_Lanes_503x384web-EN.jpg] CAA has always advocated on issues of concern to its members, and today that includes how bikes and vehicles can better co-exist on Canada’s roads. Millions of our members are both drivers and cyclists, and they see the debate from both sides. Our goal is to provide neutral information, tips and best practices so members can drive and cycle safely. CAA is putting its commitment to the bike-car relationship into action through the services we offer. For example, several CAA clubs offer Emergency Roadside Assistance to bicyclists year round as part of the CAA membership. As part of our commitment to further the bike-car discussion, CAA is hosting a national conference on the topic. Changing Lanes: Improving the Bike-Car Relationship on Canada’s Roads will be hosted on May 25th, 2011, in Vancouver, B.C. The conference will bring together leading international and domestic experts to discuss the latest thinking on bike/car safety, infrastructure, and the business opportunities and costs of increasing the presence of bicycles in our cities. *Conference topics include:* - “Building a Better Connection” – How can we build infrastructure that supports a smoother relationship for drivers and cyclists? - “A Safer Way Forward” - A discussion about strategies and actions that both drivers and cyclists can adopt to help make the road ahead a bit safer for us all. - “The Business Cycle” - Engaging proponents and opponents in the ongoing debate about the real costs and opportunities for business of more biking in Canadian cities. *Confirmed speakers include:* - Gil Penalosa, Executive Director, 8-80 cities, Toronto - Margaret Mahan, Executive Director, Better Environmentally Sound Transportation (B.E.S.T), Vancouver - Jean-François Pronovost, Vice-President, Development and Public Affairs, Vélo Québec, Montreal - Eleanor McMahon, Founder and C.E.O., Share the Road Cycling Coalition, Burlington, Ontario - Hans-Jurgen Becker, Velocities 2012, Vancouver - Jennifer Dill, Oregon Transportation Consortium , Portland … and many more! Email: For further information, please contact us at 613-247-0117 ext. 2006 or via email at changinglanes(a)national.caa.ca. Webcasting: Please join us on May 25th for simultaneous coverage of Changing Lanes. Please feel free to submit any questions you may have for our panellists to changinglanes(a)national.caa.ca or participate in our live chat on the day of the conference.

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After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project News
by Beth McKechnie 10 May '11

10 May '11

Recreation Connections Manitoba and Green Action Centre are pleased to announce the latest exciting developments in the After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project. *Website* We invite you to visit the new After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project website at www.afterschoolmanitoba.ca Officially launched as of May 6, 2011, the website includes information on the project; resources related to after school programs, physical activity, nutrition, and active transportation and will be used to keep stakeholders informed on the project and related topics. Interactive features to encourage information sharing and communication among after school program providers will be developed over the next while. *Call for Applications* The After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project has released a Call for Applications for after school providers interested in participating as a pilot site during the 2011 – 2012 school year. Funding of up to $10,000 will be provided to assist after school programs, for children ages 6 – 12 years, increase physical activity, healthy eating and active transportation within their program. A minimum of *6* sites from across the province will be selected to participate. The deadline for applications is *May 27, 2011*. For more information and to download the application form and an information package with background information, application process and eligibility criteria please visit www.afterschoolmanitoba.ca Roy Mulligan Project Coordinator After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project Recreation Connections Manitoba 317-145 Pacific Ave. Winnipeg, MB R3B 2Z6 Phone: (204)925-5751 Email: recconnections.pro(a)sportmanitoba.ca

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CAA Launches Bike Assist Road Side Assistance Program
by Shoni Litinsky 10 May '11

10 May '11

May 10/11 10:24 am - CAA Manitoba Launches Road Side Assistance & Awareness Programs Posted by *Editoress* on *05/10/11* CAA Manitoba is being proactive with bicycles; launching two new programs: *Bike Assist* CAA Manitoba members can now call for road side assistance 24 hours a day, seven days a week when their bike chain breaks or a tire tube pops. Available beginning today, Bike Assist is an innovative new benefit that allows CAA members to use any of their four annually allotted service calls to receive road side assistance if their bike breaks down. Members can use the service to be transported home or to the bike repair shop of their choice. Mike Mager, President and CEO of CAA Manitoba, says with more than 198,000 members, it is important to recognize the changing transportation needs of all members - no matter how they chose to go. "For the first time in Manitoba, our always reliable roadside assistance is now available for bikes, too," Mager said. "Whether you're an avid cyclist who commutes to work to save money on gas, or a casual biker that runs into trouble on the trail, CAA now has all of your wheels covered." Jean-Francios Ravenelle, Owner and operator of Gord's Ski and Bike, says his customers are excited about the Bike Assist service. "It's a fact. Commuters are increasingly looking at alternative options for getting to work," said Ravenelle. "Our Donald location is especially busy most mornings in the summer when bikers and cyclists pop in for a quick tune up on their way into Downtown." A Fact Sheet on Bike Assist can be read Here<http://www.canadiancyclist.com/races11/Bike_Assist_CAA_Manitoba.pdf> . *Watch for Bikes* In an effort to increase awareness about how easy it is for cyclists and motorists to have accidents, CAA Manitoba is launching an awareness campaign that provides motorists with small plastic decals that say "Watch for Bikes" - specifically designed to be placed on their driver's side rear-view mirror. According to police-reported data, in 2009 there were 239 bicyclists involved in collisions with a motor vehicle in Manitoba. (Source: 2009 Traffic Collisions Statistics, published by MPI, Table 7-3, page 124). It's a statistic President and CEO of CAA Manitoba Mike Mager says could be lower if cyclists and motorists knew how to safely share the road. "A cyclist can be virtually invisible from inside a car," said Mager. "When motorists place this sticker on their mirror, it provides a constant reminder to check for cyclists and other traffic." Cam Lundgren, an avid cyclist who enjoys commuting to work, has had several close calls with cars. "When a driver opens their door without checking, it's what cyclists call the 'door prize'," said Lundgren. "Last summer I came within inches of getting this 'gift'. I'm an experienced cyclist - so I know it can happen to anyone!" Dan Vandal, City Councilor responsible for Infrastructure Renewal and Public Works, says the city is working hard to continually develop and improve the alternative infrastructure networks. He says education about how to safely share the road will always be important. "No matter how many kilometres of bike lanes and trails are built in Winnipeg, cars and bikes still need to respect each other and safely share the road," Vandal said. "With more bikes on the road during the summer - and even more on the road once school is out at the end of June, Watch for Bikes is a simple way to remind motorists to look twice before they change lanes or open their car door." -- *Shoni Litinsky* | Active and Safe Routes to School Green Action Centre <http://greenactioncentre.ca/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Avenue* | *(204) 925-3773 Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/> Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/>

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Free bus service to 2011 Winnipeg Folk Festival
by Beth McKechnie 06 May '11

06 May '11

MEET YOUR FRIENDS ON THE* FESTIVAL EXPRESS – * THE FREE BUS SERVICE TO THE 2011 FESTIVAL [image: Old Ladies] We have some really exciting news to share with you today! As you may know, we've been working hard to reduce the carbon footprint of the festival over the years – with everything from compostable cups at our taverns to our organized *Bike Ride to Site<http://smr.mm.ticketmaster.com/track?type=click&enid=bWFpbGluZ2lkPTEyNTI1OD…> *. And now, we're making it even easier for you to join us in our efforts to green the festival with our new and improved Winnipeg Transit service – the *Festival Express<http://smr.mm.ticketmaster.com/track?type=click&enid=bWFpbGluZ2lkPTEyNTI1OD…> *. *The Festival Express is... The QUICKEST, EASIEST way to get to and from the festival – even with your gear! And it's FREE with your festival ticket, wristband or pass. * - Downtown departures every 30 minutes; - Park & Ride departures every 60 minutes; - Wagons, strollers, all your gear – welcome! - Accessible buses for everyone’s use; - More buses than ever – enjoy Main Stage until the end! - FREE! with your festival ticket, wristband or pass. *For more information about the *Winnipeg Transit / Winnipeg Folk Festival Expres*s *visit our website*<http://smr.mm.ticketmaster.com/track?type=click&enid=bWFpbGluZ2lkPTEyNTI1OD…> .

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[At-network] Ticketing blitz seeks rapport between cyclists, drivers
by Beth McKechnie 29 Apr '11

29 Apr '11

Ticketing blitz seeks rapport between cyclists, drivers CORBETT HANCEY From Saturday's Globe and Mail Published Friday, Apr. 29, 2011 10:27PM EDT http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/toronto/ticketing-blitz-seeks-… As warmer weather brings out more cyclists, Toronto police have started a ticketing blitz in a bid to persuade downtown cyclists and drivers to respect each others’ rights on the road. Police say most cycle-related accidents in the downtown core happen when drivers open car doors without first looking for cyclists. They also said residents have complained about cyclists driving on the sidewalk and not obeying traffic signals. Urban cycling consultant Yvonne Bambrick agrees that it’s the job of the police to enforce cycling-related traffic laws, but thinks police should focus more on public education for cyclists. “Not everybody knows the rules or how they apply to cyclists. People do need to know,” she said, adding, “and ideally they would be wearing lights on their bike at night and obeying the stop signs and giving right of way to pedestrians.” As the ticketing began on Friday, cycling advocates from across Canada and the world met at a downtown cafe to talk about strategies for promoting cycling to municipal politicians. It was part of the Complete Streets Forum, a conference organized by the Toronto Coalition for Active Transportation. The group’s website says the goal of the conference was to “embrace and protect cyclists and pedestrians while accommodating all road users, including transit and cars.” “The most important issue is creating excellent bikeways and encouraging people to bike, to get out there and do it, enjoy it, take it seriously and smile while you're doing it,” said Mia Birk, a speaker at the conference, and president of Alta Planning and Design, a Portland, Ore.-based firm that works with cities across North America to promote biking, walking and mass transit. “That’s far more important than focusing on enforcement,” she added. She said less attention should be paid to the negative aspects of cycling like ticketing for violations and more on the positives, such as the city-wide bike-sharing program that launches next week. The program starts May 3 and will put 1,000 bikes at the disposal of Torontonians. “Having all these bikes is going to be a big moment for Toronto,” she said. But not everyone at the event shared Ms. Birk’s enthusiasm. The police campaign comes after council voted to stop work on the Fort York pedestrian and cycle bridge, and Mayor Rob Ford’s executive committee voted to dissolve the cycling advisory panel, along with 20 other citizen advisory groups. Toronto Councillor Mike Layton said he worries that eliminating the advisory committee shuts down an important line of communication between Torontonians and their municipal government. He said he hopes it’s not a sign of things to come under Mr. Ford. “The cycling committee is made up of people who actually bike and are dedicated bike activists,” he said, adding, “We need to have their opinion when we’re making decisions.” The advisory committees will be shut down after the next council meeting unless something is done to save them, Mr. Layton said. More related to this story - Rob Ford could become a champion of cycling<http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/toronto/marcus-gee/rob-ford-co…> - Ford’s committee criticized for vote to cancel citizen panels<http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/toronto/fords-committee-critic…> - Ford pedalling away from downtown bike-lane network <http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/toronto/ford-pedalling-away-fr…>

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Shine your walking shoes - Jane's Walk Festival May 7 & 8
by Beth McKechnie 29 Apr '11

29 Apr '11

** please share widely - thanks! ** Shine your walking shoes Winnipeg: The fifth annual Jane's Walk festival is coming up May 7 & 8 ! On Saturday May 7 & Sunday May 8, join a walking tour in your community led by your neighbours. Explore Winnipeg's diverse and vibrant neighbourhoods while walking, talking and sharing ideas. What is Jane's Walk? Jane's Walk is an annual celebration of sustainable cities, walkable neighbourhoods, and vibrant communities. Named in honour of Jane Jacobs<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Jacobs>--an urbanist and activist whose writings championed a fresh, community-based approach to city building--the first Jane's Walk was organized in Toronto five years ago and has since spread to more than 30 cities across Canada and 70 cities worldwide. Jane's Walk is now in it's fifth year in Winnipeg and includes walks on a range of themes and topics, including local history, urban biodiversity, city planning, design and transportation issues, social experiences of the city, and more. Jane's Walks are intended to create a space for citizens to talk about what matters to them in the places they live, work and play. How do I join a Jane's Walk? Participating in Jane's Walk is simple: local community members with a passion for urban issues and local history have organized walking tours in their neighbourhood; a list of confirmed walks is published on the Jane's Walk website <http://janeswalk.net/cities/landing/category/winnipeg/> and the public is invited to join any walk of their choosing—no registration or RSVP required. Simply meet your walk leader at the time and place indicated in the online listing. Remember, Jane's Walk is a "walking conversation" and we encourage walk leaders and participants alike to contribute to the conversation by asking questions and sharing their knowledge and passion for cities. What walks are being offered this year? Some of the walks confirmed for this year's Jane's Walk include: - *History Lives In North Point Douglas* with Robert Galston - *Winnipeg Modern: Explore Winnipeg's Modernist Architectural Heritage*with Serena Keshavjee - *The Rapid Tranist Walk* with Paul Hesse - *So You Thought You Knew the West End: Murals and More* with Gloria Cardwell-Hoeppner - *Discover Public Art in Downtown Winnipeg* with Tricia Wasney - *Echoes of Our Past: Walk the Historic Seine & Red Rivers in St. Boniface and visit of Fort Gibraltar* with Jean-Pierre Brunet - *New Central Park* with Designers from: Scatliff Miller + Murray Inc. Landscape Architects, David Penner Architect, Cohlmeyer Architecture Ltd. - *West Broadway* with Robert Shaw - *The Heart of Fort Rouge Tour: Riverview a Place with it all* with Jino Destasio - *Sharing Cars and Gardens: An educational walk through Osborne Village *with Melissa Dupuis and Shauna Carmichael - *Urban Wildlife in Winnipeg *with Laurel McDonald - *Transcona Remembers with ** Transcona Historical Museum* - Matthew Komus - *Winnipeg Modern: Explore Winnipeg’s Modern Architectural Heritage* with Serena Keshavjee New walks are being confirmed everyday. For a complete listing of Jane's Walks check out our website: www.janeswalk.net Contact Facebook: http://on.fb.me/janeswalkwinnipeg Matt Koop-Pearce, volunteer organizer mgcarreau(a)gmail.com (204) 421-2903

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Join the Commuter Challenge!
by Jessie Klassen 28 Apr '11

28 Apr '11

*Join the Commuter Challenge!* Sign up to bike, bus, carpool or walk to work for the Commuter Challenge running June 5-11! Sign up by stopping in at one of Downtown Biz's conveniently located kiosks or register online! Wednesday, May 4 from 11:30 to 1:30 in the walkway by the Millennium Library stairs, Thursday, May 5 from 11:30 to 1:30 in Portage Place, Edmonton Court, or on Friday, May 6 from 11:30 to 1:30 in Portage Place, Edmonton Court. Free mini muffins and cinnamon buns from Tall Grass Prairie Bakery will be available for those who stop by. Also, enter to win a $100 gift certificate to Sydney's and a $50 gift certificate to Mountain Equipment Co-op. This is an initiative of the Green Action Centre and Downtown Winnipeg BIZ. For more information, please contact Francine at 204-925-3779 or challenge(a)greenactioncentre.ca. **For more information on the Commuter Challenge, go to: http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/commuter-challenge/

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Postdoctoral Research Fellowship - Active Transport lab UBC
by Beth McKechnie 28 Apr '11

28 Apr '11

Postdoctoral position in Health and Community Design - *Employer:* Bombardier Active Transportation Lab, University of British Columbia<http://jobs.phds.org/employer/jobs/5376/university-of-british-columbia> - *Location:* Vancouver, BC, Canada<http://jobs.phds.org/in-vancouver-bc-canada?location=Vancouver,%20BC,%20Can…> - *Posted:* Apr 26, 2011 *Expires:* May 31, 2011 Description: *Full Time Postdoctoral Research Fellowship(s) in Health and Community Design Research* *Active Transport lab -- University of British Columbia (UBC)* The Active Transportation Lab (ATL) at the University of British Columbia, directed by Dr. Lawrence Frank, invites applications from accomplished researchers in the fields of environmental health, epidemiology, health promotion, urban planning, geography, engineering, and others. The Lab’s mission is: *assessing and conveying how community design, including the location and form of transportation investments and land development actions, impacts travel, time use, and activity patterns; air quality; climate change; energy consumption; and public health*. The lab is positioned between the Schools of Environmental Health and Community and Regional Planning at UBC. Postdoctoral fellow(s) will be encouraged to traverse health and environmental impacts of community design with a direct focus on comparative work across socio-demographic sub-groups. This is an excellent opportunity for a candidate with strong quantitative skills to play a leadership role in cutting-edge research that has societal implications for health, environmental and economic sustainability, and overall quality of life. The Vancouver region is a wonderful setting for this work with several very progressive and supportive organizational partners at the municipal, regional, and provincial level along with a growing transit system. Canada is making several advances in promoting healthy communities that offer unique research opportunities. Postdoctoral Fellow(s) will participate in recently funded longitudinal studies and conduct original research and publishing drawing upon several recently completed large scale observation studies (4 NIH funded Neighborhood Quality of Life Studies see www.nqls.org – Sallis, Saelens, Frank, King and others); the King County (Seattle) Healthscape Study; and the NEWPATH Study which integrates travel diary, dietary, and objectively measured physical activity and built environment data including pedestrian infrastructure. Data include objectively measured physical activity, sedentary time, and features of the built environment in GIS at the parcel level, transit and roadway accessibility, and most have in field collected micro scale features of the pedestrian environment. We have also audited parks and food establishments and collected dietary data. Applicants should have a sound theoretical and practical understanding of the linkages between the built environment and travel behavior, including relationships with secondary outcomes such as physical activity, obesity, air pollution, and access to food. Strong research design skills are desired. Applicants are requested to provide a cover letter detailing their research interests and expertise. The application should also include a current CV, representative publications, and contact information for three references. Please submit these documents as pdf files to andrea.procyk(a)ubc.ca by May 31, 2011. Source: http://jobs.phds.org/job/28492/university-of-british-columbia/postdoctoral-…

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New report on Complete Streets
by Beth McKechnie 27 Apr '11

27 Apr '11

*Complete Streets - New Report* The National Complete Streets Coalition in the U.S. has just released a new report updating and comparing the skyrocketing number of Complete Streets policies that have been implemented in the past couple of years. Waterloo, ON became Canada's first community to implement a Complete Streets policy last week. The report can be downloaded from: http://www.completestreets.org/news-blog/blog/ If you're not sure what this is all about, here's a quick explanation from the report: "Complete Streets policies formalize a community’s intent to plan, design, and maintain streets so they are safe for all users of all ages and abilities. Policies direct transportation planners and engineers to consistently design and construct the right-of-way to accommodate all anticipated users, including pedestrians, bicyclists, public transportation users, motorists, and freight vehicles. Complete streets can be achieved through a variety of policies: ordinances and resolutions; rewrites of design manuals; inclusion in comprehensive plans; internal policies developed by transportation agencies; executive orders from elected officials, such as Mayors or Governors; and policies developed by stakeholders from the community and agency staff that are formally adopted by an elected board of officials..." The report identifies the strongest policies existing today and provides guidance on the key elements that should be included. cheers, Beth -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Canada gets a failing grade for childhood fitness
by Beth McKechnie 27 Apr '11

27 Apr '11

Canada gets a failing grade for childhood fitness ANDRÉ PICARD, PUBLIC HEALTH REPORTER— From Tuesday's Globe and Mail Published Tuesday, Apr. 26, 2011 6:00AM EDT Canadian children spend a mere 14 minutes of their after-school hours being physically active, a new study shows. “The days of biking home from school and putting the nets out for a game of road hockey are long gone,” said Mark Tremblay, chief scientific officer with Active Healthy Kids Canada. In its annual report card on physical activity, published Tuesday, AHKC identifies a number of factors that contribute to the sedentary behaviour of kids in the key 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. time period, including: * After-school programs do not see activity as a priority; * Lack of supervised programs, particularly for older children; * Schoolyards that are devoid of play structures; * Transportation policies that result in kids being whisked away as soon as the bell rings; * Latch-key children who come home and plunk themselves down in front of the TV; * Parental fears about community safety that keep children inside. “We need a fundamental rethink of how we deliver after-school programs,” said Elio Antunes, chief operating officer of ParticipACTION. “Getting kids outside needs to become a priority.” While it is often argued that modern children are overwhelmed by homework and that the pressure to succeed takes precedence over activity, Mr. Antunes does not buy that argument. “If they can find hours a day to watch screens for entertainment, they can find time to be active,” he said. “Besides, we know that kids who are physically active do much better in school.” Canadian research shows that young people aged 5 to 19 who spend time outside after school take about 2,000 additional steps a day – the equivalent of walking two kilometres. The new data reveal that that 72 per cent of children do not have access to after-school programs, which are geared principally to young kids. Further, less than half the after-school programs focus on physical activity. “Essentially, it’s babysitting – sedentary babysitting,” Dr. Tremblay said. The children who are on their own after class is dismissed seem to fair even worse. “Screen-time is replacing after-school activity. We have to find a way to turn that around,” Dr. Tremblay said. Active Healthy Kids Canada is a charitable organization that advocates the importance of physical activity for children and youth where they live, learn and play. It has published an annual report card for the past five years. The group now assigns 23 grades related to childhood physical activity. This year’s grades include: * F for overall physical activity: Only 9 per cent of boys and 4 per cent of girls meet guideline recommendations of 60 minutes daily of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity; * F for active play: Only one in eight children engage in play every day after school; * F for screen-related behaviour: Canadian kids spend, on average six hours daily in front of TV, computer and game screens; * D for active transportation: One in four children get to and from school under their own steam, such as walking or biking; * C- for physical education: One in four children get no gym classes; half get one to two gym periods a week and; one in four gets three to four periods; * C for organized sport: 75 per cent of parents say their children participate in organized sport in the past year; * A- for proximity and availability: 95 per cent of parents polled say that parks and outdoor spaces are available locally. Dr. Tremblay noted that the grades have remained fairly consistent over the years - “consistently and uniformly grim” - but that will not change until there is a concerted effort to improve the situation. “We talk a lot about all this stuff, about childhood obesity and lack of physical activity, but we don’t seem to do anything about it,” he said.

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Japan: Out of disaster, a burst of enthusiasm for bicycling
by Beth McKechnie 26 Apr '11

26 Apr '11

Out of Disaster, a Burst of Enthusiasm for Bicycling By MIKI TANIKAWA Published: April 18, 2011 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/18/business/global/18iht-rbog-bicycle-18.htm… TOKYO — Whenever Shigeki Kobayashi spots a salaryman on a bicycle with his bag in the front basket, he knows that he is watching a novice bike commuter: putting the heavy load up front makes steering harder, an elementary mistake. Mr. Kobayashi also realizes that someone is new to street cycling when the rider is on the sidewalk. “Some people mistakenly think it is safer on the sidewalk,” he said. “That’s wrong, because on the sidewalk there is greater chance you’d bump into someone or something.” Mr.Kobayashi is director of the Bicycle Usage Promotion Study Group, a nonprofit organization that promotes usage of bicycles in Tokyo. Since March 11, when an earthquake devastated northern Japan and rattled the Tokyo metropolitan area, the streets of Suginami ward, where he lives, have teemed with wobbly bikers pedaling their way to work. “The increase was sudden and visible,” he said during an interview. Over the past 20 years, more commuters in urban areas like Tokyo have been switching gears and choosing to bicycle to work instead of using trains and cars, citing concerns for health, environment, costs and an escape from packed trains. The catastrophe last month has now converted some of the holdouts by proving one more benefit to cycling: you have a means to go home when the trains stop moving. On that fateful day, millions of workers were stranded in the middle of the city when virtually the whole Tokyo train and subway system — which together shuttle nine million people in and out of the megalopolis daily — ground to a halt. Railways stopped trains for fear of aftershocks. While most of the trains and subways resumed service toward midnight, hundreds of thousands walked home or took shelter in their offices or public halls. Amid worried colleagues wondering how to get home, Masataka Isashiki, 32, a government worker in downtown Chiyoda ward, wowed his colleagues when he announced he was going like he always did: He put on his helmet and headed for his bike. The street was jammed with traffic, “but I simply found my way between cars which were stuck,” he said. “My colleagues were impressed.” That night, hordes of workers trailing home, sometimes as far as 20 kilometers, or 12 miles, on foot, swarmed any bicycle shops they found on their route. “There were many, many people who bought a bike on their way home,” said Kenji Tanaka, secretary general of a bicycle retailers’ association in Tokyo. “Many stores went empty that night.” Since then, “sales have been steadily growing and orders have been pouring in,” he added. Reflecting that, “there are more people on a bike on the road in the morning” now than a month ago, Mr. Isashiki said. “I also see more bicycles parked in the premise of the building I work in.” Mr. Kobayashi, director of the bicycle advocacy group, regularly counts the number of bikers passing by a busy boulevard that leads to downtown Tokyo. On a day last November, he counted 105 bicycles from 7 a.m. to 8 a.m. That rose to 243 on March 14, three days after the earthquake and to 330 on March 30. “The quake has clearly changed the number of bike commuters,” he said. “It resembles the sudden spike in bike commuters in London after the 2005 bombings when public transportation was suspended for a while.” People who try biking to work quickly discover that finding their way on the meandering Tokyo streets is neither as daunting nor as exhausting as they expected. “With smartphones and Google<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/google_inc/index.html…>map, the task is made easy,” Mr. Kobayashi said. “They also notice it is quite a pleasant experience cycling. All together, the earthquake may have triggered a change in lifestyle for many.” Mr. Isashiki, the government worker, rides 10 kilometers each way — a 40 minute trip — on his silver Bianchi, an Italian-made bike for which he paid 80,000 yen, or $960. “It just feels good on the bike, generally,” rather than being squeezed into a train, he said. Riding lowers stress, said Takayuki Maruyama, 51, an executive with an information technology company in downtown Tokyo, who cycles to work once or twice a week. “Some people say you might get exhausted on the bike,” he said. “But I feel refreshed. The only snag is parking. There is no dedicated bicycle park, so I leave it on the sidewalk.” For most metropolitan riders, the mental and cardiovascular benefits outweigh the perceived environmental gain, since most have switched from train commutes rather than cars. “Since around 2002, people began talking about the metabolic syndrome and so forth for middle-aged people, which gave birth to the initial boom in bicycling,” Mr. Kobayashi said. According to the Japan Bicycle Promotion Institute, a government affiliated agency, bike ownership in Tokyo rose to 8.99 million in 2008, the most recent available yearly figure, from 7.07 million in 2000. Recently, electric-powered bicycles have also seen something of a boom in demand, particularly in the aftermath of the March temblor. Tooru Miyake, manager of the sales planning team at Panasonic<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/matsushita-electric-i…>Cycle Technology, based in Osaka, said that, probably as a result of the earthquake, the company’s sales of electric bicycles rose about 30 percent in March from that month last year. In February, the increase was just 10 percent, he said. The company would not say how many bikes it had sold, but it said total electric bike sales in Japan were running at about 380,000 a year, of which Panasonic holds a 40 percent market share. *This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:* *Correction: April 19, 2011* * An earlier version of this article stated that bicycle ownership in Tokyo rose to nearly nine million in 2008 from 7.07 million in 1990. The 7.07 million figure was for 2000, not 1990. *

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Research shows biking, walking can thrive in suburbia
by Beth McKechnie 26 Apr '11

26 Apr '11

Research shows biking, walking can thrive in suburbia<http://bikeportland.org/2011/04/26/research-shows-biking-walking-can-thrive…> Posted by Jonathan Maus (Publisher/Editor)<http://bikeportland.org/author/jonathan-maus/>on April 26th, 2011 at 8:47 am http://bikeportland.org/2011/04/26/research-shows-biking-walking-can-thrive… It's a somewhat generally accepted concept in urban planning circles that there's no hope for suburbia. Cinderblock walls, cul-de-sacs, and wide arterials all make for a car-centric lifestyle. But new reseach shows that among suburban multifamily housing — the fast growing housing type in the U.S. — biking and walking can thrive. In *Overlooked Density: Re-Thinking Transportation Options in Suburbia<http://otrec.us/project/216> * Nico Larco <http://otrec.us/research/researcher/larco/>, an assistant professor of architecture at the University of Oregon, focuses on suburban multifamily housing, which he calls a "widespread and overlooked example of density." "Dispelling commonly held beliefs about the amount of walking and biking occurring in suburbia, our study shows that more than a third of all trips to the LCA [local commercial area]... are active travel trips." His findings show that, not surprisingly, site design and connectivity to commercial areas are major factors in whether or not residents choose to walk or bike. Among developments in the study that were well-connected to commercial areas, more than 44% of residents choose to walk or bike to them — a rate that's nearly twice as high as multifamily developments that lack connectivity. But what is surprising is that, contrary to our popular perception of suburbia, "Across *all* studied developments, more than a third of all trips to nearby commercial strips are taken on foot, with a total of 38.7 percent taken on foot or by bicycle." Nico Larco, AIA Larco writes that there may be, "additional latent active transport in suburbia," but it will only be realized if developers and planners make connectivity and "pass through" between their units and commercial areas a top priority. For those that get it right, here's what they have to look forward to (taken from chapter 2 of the study): "The latent potential in proximity of residences and commercial areas can reduce residents’ reliance on automobiles and increase active modes of travel such as walking and biking, especially for short trips under a half mile. Increasing active travel might reduce vehicle miles traveled, which has positive impacts on the environment as it reduces carbon emissions. In addition, walking and biking can have a positive effect on residents’ physical and mental health and can provide economic savings." Especially significant in Larco's field of study are the health, economics, and equity implications. As he notes in the study, the typical demographic of suburban multifamily housing includes the elderly and lower-income individuals. "Increasing active travel for these populations," Larco writes, "can have an economic effect as residents do not need to have access to automobiles or pay for additional fuel for these short trips." Larco's study was funded by the Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium (OTREC). Learn more and download the final report at the OTREC website<http://otrec.us/news/entry/suburban_developments_can_build_in_walking_and_c…> .

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Active Transportation - Canada: April 26, 2011
by Beth McKechnie 26 Apr '11

26 Apr '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Haynes <activetransportation(a)rogers.com> Date: Tue, Apr 26, 2011 at 10:26 AM Subject: Active Transportation - Canada: April 26, 2011 Active Transportation - Canada features a regular posting of news articles, studies, reports, and other items that have relevance in this field, with previous postings available in an archive. In addition, pictures of existing Active Transportation infrastructure from communities across Canada will be profiled each week. Twenty new items have recently been posted to the Active Transportation - Canada Blog. To view in more detail, go to: http://activetransportation-canada.blogspot.com **************************************************************************************************** 1. A dreadful accident, a wake-up call on street safety 2. City of Waterloo Adopts Canada's First Complete Streets Policy 3. The Federal Election and Cycling 4. Toronto - 2011 Complete Streets Forum 5. Guerilla Urbanism: North Oak Cliff residents create their own Complete Street ************************************************************************************* A reminder e-mail of new postings will be sent no more often than once per week. To continue to receive these updates, you need take no action. Should you not wish to receive updates, please return this e-mail with "Unsubscribe" in the Subject area. Interested in an AT workshop in your community? For more information, please contact: Michael Haynes Director TransActive Solutions **activetransportation(a)rogers.com<http://ca.mc883.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=activetransportation@rogers.com> 613.424.2803

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WFP: Pedestrians risk life and limb - Dodge traffic after pathway submerged (Apr.26'11)
by Beth McKechnie 26 Apr '11

26 Apr '11

Pedestrians risk life and limb Dodge traffic after pathway submerged By: Melissa Martin High water and heavy construction have choked off key walkways through one of Winnipeg's busiest downtown routes, triggering a jaywalking jam many fear is a disaster waiting to happen. On Monday afternoon, as the first waves of southbound rush-hour traffic started to flow south down Osborne Street from downtown, dozens of pedestrians and cyclists gingerly picked their way between oncoming cars to make it to Osborne Bridge's single open sidewalk. "This is what passes for planning in this city," said Paul Hesse, who walks or bikes every day from his Osborne Village home to his downtown law office. "It's terrible. Something has to be done." The problem: Since Monday morning, the east side of the Osborne Bridge sidewalk has been closed to accommodate the bridge's year-long rehabilitation. The city expected pedestrians and cyclists crossing the bridge from Osborne Village to use a path underneath the bridge's north side to get to the legislature grounds or the Assiniboine Avenue bikeway. But with that walkway deep under the swollen Assiniboine River and no temporary crossing from Mostyn Place to the legislature grounds, pedestrians walking downtown are forced to either walk north to Broadway -- or, as hundreds of people did on Monday, nip across three lanes of bustling Osborne Street traffic. Until the underpass reopens, Hesse worries, a scheme that pushes dozens of people an hour across Osborne Street traffic risks tragedy. "People haven't been warned about this," he said, minutes after a construction worker in a bright orange vest helped escort an elderly woman through the traffic. "Will people have to risk lives crossing illegally through Osborne's traffic?" Monday was a holiday for city employees, who were not available to discuss the issue in-depth. But in an email to Hesse on April 21, a city bridge engineer acknowledged the concern and said the city had "considered installing a temporary crossing at street level but determined that it is not safe to do so." The letter also noted that once the Assiniboine River water level retreats, the city will raise the walking path so it isn't impacted by future flooding. The bridge-level sidewalk will not re-open until October. The bridge project will also add a permanent pedestrian crosswalk between Assiniboine Avenue and Mostyn Place, the city said, but that will not be open until October 2012. At the impromptu crossing on Monday, some pedestrians scooting between cars were taken aback by the city's decision. "It's too dangerous (to put a temporary crossing)? Oh, that's good," said Kendall Hinds, an Osborne Village resident, on his way to toss a Frisbee on the legislature grounds. "They really thought this one through -- this is the major access point into the village." On the flip side, drivers seemed to understand that too, as they slowed down and stopped on Monday to let pedestrians and bikers cross. "It's a little inconvenient, but for the most part motorists have been really considerate," said bike commuter Bonnie Van Steelandt, waiting for an opening in traffic to pedal across to the west side of Osborne Street. "But it would be nice to have a crosswalk here. I don't know the right answer -- I just hope it doesn't last long." melissa.martin(a)freepress.mb.ca -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Employment opportunity: Bike to the Future Office Administrator / Bicycle Valet Winnipeg Project Coordinator
by Beth McKechnie 25 Apr '11

25 Apr '11

The Bike to the Future Office Administrator / Bicycle Valet Winnipeg Project Coordinator will report to Bike to the Future's Board of Directors and provide administrative support to the organization. This person will also be the primary leader and executive director of Bicycle Valet Winnipeg, a project of Bike to the Future. Find the job posting and more details here: http://biketothefuture.org/news/archives/2011/04/23/employment-opportunity-… For more info, or to submit a resume, please email contact(a)biketothefuture.org.

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AASHTO withdraws objection to stronger bike-ped rules
by Beth McKechnie 25 Apr '11

25 Apr '11

http://dc.streetsblog.org/2011/04/25/under-pressure-aashto-withdraws-object… Under Pressure, AASHTO Withdraws Objection to Stronger Bike-Ped Rules by Angie Schmitt <http://dc.streetsblog.org/author/angie-schmitt/> on April 25, 2011 The Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials is withdrawing its opposition to an important federal policy change that puts cyclists and pedestrians on a more equal footing with motorists. Active transportation groups were outraged earlier this month when AASHTO requested<http://dc.streetsblog.org/2011/04/12/aashto-new-rule-makes-it-too-hard-to-i…>that the FHWA revert to an old standard that required state DOTs show only that “due consideration” had been given to the needs of cyclists and pedestrians in federally financed transportation projects. *A newer requirement increased the standard to “due accommodation,” shifting the burden on transportation agencies to demonstrate that extreme circumstances prevent the inclusion of bike and pedestrian infrastructure.* In his statement Friday, AASHTO Executive Director John Horsley said the agency’s request was meant “to streamline the effort and paperwork required to justify why bicycle or pedestrian facilities may or may not be appropriate on a given federal aid project.” But he added that the group would withdraw the request in light of opposition that emerged after the League of American Bicyclists<http://www.bikeleague.org/blog/2011/04/aashto-wants-to-weaken-us-dot-bicycl…>, this blog<http://dc.streetsblog.org/2011/04/12/aashto-new-rule-makes-it-too-hard-to-i…>and other bike advocates<http://bikeportland.org/2011/04/19/odot-expresses-disappointment-in-aashto-…>took up the issue. Horsley said that since that time several state DOT chiefs also came out against the request, including Matthew Garrett of the Oregon DOT<http://bikeportland.org/2011/04/19/odot-expresses-disappointment-in-aashto-…> . “In response to the concerns expressed by several members of AASHTO’s Board of Directors, President [Susan] Martinovich has directed AASHTO for the time being to withdraw its request that FHWA rescind its guidance on the meaning of ‘due consideration’ of bicycle and pedestrian needs,” said Horsley. “This will give AASHTO an opportunity to meet with bicycle and pedestrian advocacy groups on May 19 to discuss this issue.” Andy Clarke of the League of American Bicyclists is planning to attend the meeting. He says he’s glad AASHTO is warming to the idea that all transportation projects should begin with the idea of including bicycles and pedestrians in the plan “rather than ‘we’re not going to include bike stuff unless someone makes us.’” Clarke said AASHTO’s backpedaling is an important demonstration of the collective power of bicycle and pedestrian advocates. “I’m glad we called them on it,” he said. “I’m glad they heard a good deal of dissent.” -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Illinois tracking 'dooring' crashes involving cyclists
by Beth McKechnie 25 Apr '11

25 Apr '11

State begins tracking ‘dooring’ crashes involving cyclists SUN-TIMES MEDIA WIRE Apr 25, 2011 11:50AM Gov. Pat Quinn on Monday announced the state will begin tracking “dooring” crashes — accidents involving bicyclists struck by opened doors from parked cars. The change will help determine locations where road improvements and public outreach efforts may be necessary to protect cyclists, a release from the Active Transportation Alliance said. The new policy is the result of a collaboration between the Illinois Dept. of Transportation and the Active Transportation Alliance. Before the change, dooring collisions went unrecognized in IDOT’s annual reporting of traffic statistics because a moving vehicle was not involved. The data will be used to plan for improved roadway designs and additional communication with motorists in areas with high concentrations of cyclists, the release said. IDOT’s Division of Traffic Safety is also reaching out to law enforcement agencies with instructions on how to begin recording dooring crashes. Police departments that have already begun tracking them, including Chicago, will have their data included in the state’s statistics retroactive to May 2010. http://www.suntimes.com/5014213-417/state-begins-tracking-dooring-crashes-i… -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Jane's Walk strolling into town!
by Beth McKechnie 25 Apr '11

25 Apr '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Matt <mgcarreau(a)gmail.com> Date: Fri, Apr 22, 2011 at 5:36 PM Subject: Jane's Walk strolling into town! Hi there, my name is Matt Koop-Pearce and I am a volunteer organizer for this year's edition of Jane's Walk. The organizing committee is making a big push to promote the fast approaching Jane's Walk on May 7 & 8 and we would appreciate your help. I am contacting you because you or your organization either has a community member leading a walk or because Jane's Walk is an event that yourself and folks in your community would most certainly be interested in hearing about and participating in. Can you please help us get the word out by forwarding the message below through your personal, professional, and community networks and email list serves? I have also attached a PDF of our media release and a poster that you are welcome to forward along with this message. Of course, word of mouth promotion is always the most powerful, so we hope you will take a moment to check out some of exciting walks planned for this year and convince your friends and neighbours to participate in Jane's Walk on May 7 & 8! Thank you sincerely, Matt Koop-Pearce ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shine your walking shoes Winnipeg: The fifth annual Jane's Walk festival is coming up May 7 & 8 ! On Saturday May 7 & Sunday May 8, join a walking tour in your community lead by your neighbours. Explore Winnipeg's diverse and vibrant neighbourhoods while walking, talking and sharing ideas. What is Jane's Walk? Jane's Walk is an annual celebration of sustainable cities, walkable neighbourhoods, and vibrant communities. Named in honour of Jane Jacobs<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Jacobs>--an urbanist and activist whose writings championed a fresh, community-based approach to city building--the first Jane's Walk was organized in Toronto five years ago and has since spread to more than 30 cities across Canada and 70 cities worldwide. Jane's Walk is now in it's fifth year in Winnipeg and includes walks on a range of themes and topics, including local history, urban biodiversity, city planning, design and transportation issues, social experiences of the city, and more. Jane's Walks are intended to create a space for citizens to talk about what matters to them in the places they live, work and play. How do I join a Jane's Walk? Participating in Jane's Walk is simple: local community members with a passion for urban issues and local history have organized walking tours in their neighbourhood; a list of confirmed walks is published on the Jane's Walk website <http://janeswalk.net/cities/landing/category/winnipeg/> and the public is invited to join any walk of their choosing—no registration or RSVP required. Simply meet your walk leader at the time and place indicated in the online listing. Remember, Jane's Walk is a "walking conversation" and we encourage walk leaders and participants alike to contribute to the conversation by asking questions and sharing their knowledge and passion for cities. What walks are being offered this year? Some of the walks confirmed for this year's Jane's Walk include: - *History Lives In North Point Douglas* with Robert Galston - *Winnipeg Modern: Explore Winnipeg's Modernist Architectural Heritage*with Serena Keshavjee - *The Rapid Tranist Walk* with Paul Hesse - *So You Thought You Knew the West End: Murals and More* with Gloria Cardwell-Hoeppner - *Discover Public Art in Downtown Winnipeg* with Tricia Wasney - *Sharing Cars and Gardens: An educational walk through Osborne Village *with Melissa Dupuis and Shauna Carmichael - Walks in *West Broadway, Selkirk Avenue, and Central Park* neighbourhoods are also planned! New walks are being confirmed everyday. For a complete listing of Jane's Walks check out our website: www.janeswalk.net I want to organize a Jane's Walk in my community! Awesome! Jane's Walk is presently accepting submissions from individuals or groups interested in organizing a walking tour in their community. To propose a walk, visit our website and send an email to our coordinator Matt Koop-Pearce at mgcarreau(a)gmail.com The deadline to submit a walk is May 6th. Contact Facebook: http://on.fb.me/janeswalkwinnipeg Matt Koop-Pearce, volunteer organizer mgcarreau(a)gmail.com (204) 421-2903

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Bicycling Renaissance in North America?
by Beth McKechnie 20 Apr '11

20 Apr '11

[*Transportation Research A, Vol. 45, 2011*, in press] *Bicycling Renaissance in North America? An Update and Re-Appraisal of Cycling Trends and Policies *by John Pucher, Ralph Buehler and Mark Seinen http://www.8-80cities.org/Articles/Bicycling%20Renaissance%20in%20North%20A… *Abstract* This paper reviews trends in cycling levels, safety, and policies in Canada and the USA over the past two decades. we analyze aggregate data for the two countries as well as city-specific case study data for nine large cities (Chicago, Minneapolos, Montreal, New York, Portland, San Francisco, Toronto, Vancouver, and Washington). Cycling levels have increased in both the USA and Canada, while cyclist fatalities have fallen... The bike share of work commuters is more than twice as high in Canada as the USA, and is higher int he western parts of both countries. Cycling is concentrated in central cities, especially near universities and in gentrified neighborhoods near the city center. Almost all the growth in cycling in the USA has been among men between 25-64 years old, while cycling rates have remained steady among women and fallen sharply for children. Cycling rates have risen much faster in the nine case study cities than in their countries as a whole, at least doubling in all the cities since 1990. They have implemented a wide range of infrastructure and programs to promote cycling and increase cycling safety: expanded and improved bike lanes and paths, traffic calming, parking, bike-transit integration, bike sharing, training programs, and promotional events. Portland's comprehensive package of cycling policies has succeeded in raising cycling levels 6-fold and provides an example that other North American cities can follow. -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Bike to Work Day - call for Volunteers
by Beth McKechnie 18 Apr '11

18 Apr '11

Hi everyone, *Bike to Work Day Winnipeg 2011* needs volunteers to help with tasks right away as well as on June 24th. It would be great if you could share the attached volunteer application form with your various professional networks, family and friends. many thanks! Beth

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Link to new literature review on policies to improve health through active transportation
by Beth McKechnie 16 Apr '11

16 Apr '11

*Environment International*<http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/01604120> Volume 37, Issue 4<http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=PublicationURL&_tockey=%23TOC%2358…>, May 2011, Pages 766-777 * Improving Health through Policies that Promote Active Travel: A Review of Evidence to Support Integrated Health Impact Assessment* Abstract Background Substantial policy changes to control obesity, limit chronic disease, and reduce air pollution emissions, including greenhouse gasses, have been recommended. Transportation and planning policies that promote active travel by walking and cycling can contribute to these goals, potentially yielding further co-benefits. Little is known, however, about the interconnections among effects of policies considered, including potential unintended consequences. Objectives and methods We review available literature regarding health impacts from policies that encourage active travel in the context of developing health impact assessment (HIA) models to help decision-makers propose better solutions for healthy environments. We identify important components of HIA models of modal shifts in active travel in response to transport policies and interventions. Results and discussion Policies that increase active travel are likely to generate large individual health benefits through increases in physical activity for active travelers. Smaller, but population-wide benefits could accrue through reductions in air and noise pollution. Depending on conditions of policy implementations, risk tradeoffs are possible for some individuals who shift to active travel and consequently increase inhalation of air pollutants and exposure to traffic injuries. Well-designed policies may enhance health benefits through indirect outcomes such as improved social capital and diet, but these synergies are not sufficiently well understood to allow quantification at this time. Conclusion Evaluating impacts of active travel policies is highly complex; however, many associations can be quantified. Identifying health-maximizing policies and conditions requires integrated HIAs. Research highlights ► Active travel policies are growing in popularity worldwide. ► We review multiple benefits and potential risks associated with policies. ► Quantitative relationships for health impact assessments are discussed. ► Major health benefits are especially expected from physical activity outcomes. ► Well designed policies may enhance co-benefits and mitigate risks. LINK: http://bb4md8jw9n.search.serialssolutions.com//?url_ver=Z39.88-2003&ctx_ver…<http://bb4md8jw9n.search.serialssolutions.com/?url_ver=Z39.88-2003&ctx_ver=…>

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Interesting series from Grist
by Stacy Matwick 12 Apr '11

12 Apr '11

Bikeonomics by Elle Blue. http://www.grist.org/article/series/bikenomics "The economic case for on-street bike parking" This is the fourth column in a series focusing on the economics of bicycling. http://www.grist.org/biking/2011-04-11-the-economic-case-for-on-street-bike… cheers Stacy Matwick Information Centre International Institute for Sustainable Development 161 Portage Ave. E., 6th floor Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada R3B 0Y4 Voice: (204)958-7755 Fax: (204)958-7710 Email: smatwick(a)iisd.ca<mailto:smatwick@iisd.ca> IISD Research Library web page: http://www.iisd.org/ic SD-Cite: IISD Research Library database: http://sd-cite.iisd.org<http://sd-cite.iisd.org/> GENERata web-magazine: http://www.iisd.org/generata/ "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read" Groucho Marx

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A donkey cart without the cart - where you do the work of the donkey
by Erik Dickson 07 Apr '11

07 Apr '11

Hopefully the author's tongue is firmly planted in their cheek! Have a great day and happy cycling! Erik Dickson Scatliff+Miller+Murray Emailed to me today from the other side! By P.J. O'ROURKE Getty Images Cyclists ride over the Brooklyn Bridge. 'Although the technology necessary to build a bicycle has been around since ancient Egypt, bikes didn't appear until the 19th century. The reason it took mankind 5,000 years to get the idea for the bicycle is that it was a bad idea.' A fibrosis of bicycle lanes is spreading through the cities of the world. The well-being of innocent motorists is threatened as traffic passageways are choked by the spread of dull whirs, sharp whistles and sanctimonious pedal-pushing. Bike lanes have appeared in all the predictable placesAmsterdam, Copenhagen, Berkeley and Palo Alto. But the incidence of bike lanes is also on the rise in unlikely locales such as slush-covered Boston, rain-drenched Vancouver, frozen Montreal and Bogotá, Colombia (where, perhaps, bicycles have been given the traffic lanes previously reserved for drug mules). Even Dublin, Ireland, has had portions of its streets set aside for bicycles onlysurely unnecessary in a country where everyone's car has been repossessed. Then there is the notorious case of New York City. Not long ago the only people who braved New York on bicycles were maniacal bike messengers and children heeding an abusive parent's command to "go play in traffic." Now New York has 670 miles of bike lanesrather more than it has miles of decently paved streets. The proliferation of New York's bike lanes is the work of the city's indomitable transportation commissioner, Janette Sadik-(Genghis)-Khan. Her department has a horde of 4,500 employees and a budget nearing a billion dollars. The transportation commissioner's job isjudging by rush-hour cab and subway rides and last December's blizzardto prevent the transportation of anybody or anything to anywhere in New York. Bicycles are the perfect way to go nowhere while carrying nothing. The bicycle is a parody of a wheeled vehiclea donkey cart without the cart, where you do the work of the donkey. Although the technology necessary to build a bicycle has been around since ancient Egypt, bikes didn't appear until the 19th century. The reason it took mankind 5,000 years to get the idea for the bicycle is that it was a bad idea. The bicycle is the only method of conveyance worse than feet. You can walk up three flights of stairs carrying one end of a sofa. Try that on a bicycle. View Full Image The Image Works A French racing cyclist, in 1912 Almost everything that travels on a city street, including some of the larger people in the crosswalks, can crush a bicycle. Everything that protrudes from or into a city streetpot holes, pavement cracks, manhole coverscan send a bicycle flying into the air. When the president of the United States goes somewhere in Washington, does he ride an armored bicycle? Given that riding a bike in a city is insane and that very few cities need more insane people on their streets, why the profusion of urban bike lanes? One excuse for bike lanes is that an increase in bicycle riding means a decrease in traffic congestion. A visit to New Yorkor Bogotágives the lie to this notion. You can't decrease traffic congestion by putting things in the way of traffic. Also, only a few bicycles are needed to take up as much space as my Chevrolet Suburbanjust one if its rider is wobbling all over the place while trying to Tweet. And my Suburban seats eight. The answer to traffic congestion is lower taxes so that legions of baby boomers my age can afford to retire and stay home. Bike lane advocates also claim that bicycles are environmentally friendly, producing less pollution and fewer carbon emissions than automobiles. But bicycle riders do a lot of huffing and puffing, exhaling large amounts of CO2. And whether a bicycle rider, after a long bicycle ride, is cleaner than the exhaust of a modern automobile is open to question. If drops in pollution and traffic congestion are wanted and if discomfort and inconvenience are the trade-offs, we should be packed into tiny circus clown cars. These fit neatly into bike lanes and provide more amusement to bystanders than bicycle wrecks. In fact, bike lanes don't necessarily lessen car travel. A study by the U.K. Department for Transport found that the installation of "cycle facilities" in eight towns and cities resulted in no change in the number of people driving cars. Bike lanes don't even necessarily increase bike riding. In the late 1980s and early 1990s the Dutch government spent $945 million on bicycle routes without any discernible effect on how many Dutch rode bicycles. The bicycle is a parody of a wheeled vehiclea donkey cart without the cart, where you do the work of the donkey. But maybe there's a darker side to bike-lane advocacy. Political activists of a certain ideological stripe want citizens to have a child-like dependence on government. And it's impossible to feel like a grown-up when you're on a bicycle if you aren't in the Tour de France. All but the most athletic among us get on and off a bicycle the way a toddler goes up and down stairs. Wearing bicycle shorts in public is more embarrassing than wearing Depends. Exchanging briefcases for backpacks takes us from the boardroom to the schoolyard. And it's hard to keep a straight face when talking to anyone in a Skittles-colored, Wiffle ball-slotted bike helmet that makes you look like Woody Woodpecker. Bike lanes must be intended to foster immaturity or New York would have chosen instead to create 670 miles of bridle paths. Being on horseback has adult gravitas. Search plazas, parks and city squares the world over and you won't fine a single statue of a national hero riding a bike. This promotion of childishness in the electorate means that bike lanes are just the beginning. Soon we'll be making room on our city streets for scooter and skateboard lanes, Soapbox Derby lanes, pogo-stick lanes, lanes for Radio Flyer wagons (actually more practical than bicycles since you can carry a case of beerif we're still allowed to drink beer), stilt lanes, three-legged-race lanes, lanes for skipping while playing the comb and wax paper, hopscotch lanes and Mother-May-I lanes with Mayor Bloomberg at the top of Lenox Hill shouting to the people on Park Avenue, "Take three baby steps!" A good, hard-played game of Mother-May-I will make us all more physically fit. Fitness being another reason given for cluttering our cities with bike lanes. But why is it so important that the public be fit? Fit for what? Are they planning to draft us into forced labor battalions? Bike lanes violate a fundamental principle of democracy. We, the majority who do not ride bicycles, are being forced to sacrifice our left turns, parking places and chances to squeeze by delivery trucks so that an affluent elite can feel good about itself for getting wet, cold, tired and run-over. Our tax dollars are being used to subsidize our annoyance. Bicycle riders must be made to bear the burden of this special-interest boondoggle. Bicycle registration fees should be raised until they produce enough revenue to build and maintain new expressways so that drivers can avoid city streets clogged by bike lanes. Special rubber fittings should be made available so that bicycle riders can wear E-ZPass transponders on their noses. And riders' license qualifications should be rigorous, requiring not only written exams and road tests but also bathroom scales. No one is to be allowed on a bicycle if the view he or she presents from behind causes the kind of hysterical laughter that stops traffic. Bike lanes can become an acceptable part of the urban landscape, if bicycle riders are willing to pay their way. And if they pay enough, maybe we'll even give them a lift during the next snow storm. Mr. O'Rourke's many books include "Don't VoteIt Just Encourages the Bastards."

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After School Program Survey
by Beth McKechnie 04 Apr '11

04 Apr '11

Recreation Connections Manitoba is pleased to partner with Green Action Centre to coordinate a new two year initiative - *After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project.* The initiative, funded through the Public Health Agency of Canada Healthy Living Fund and the Province of Manitoba until March 2013, is focusing on promoting and supporting increased access and opportunities for children and youth aged 6-12 years to engage in physical activity and healthy living practices in the critical after school time period (3 – 6 p.m.). The project goals include: 1) Increasing capacity for children’s physical activity and healthy eating in the after school time period. 2) Improving access and reducing barriers to physical activity opportunities and facilities. 3) Promoting active and safe routes to and from school. One of our first steps is to collect some basic information about what is currently happening in Manitoba in regard to after school programming. If you provide programming for *children aged 6 to 12 years* during the *3 – 6 p.m.* time period, we would appreciate you taking a few minutes to complete the on-line survey by clicking on the link below, no later than *April 14, 2011*. A draw for an activity/game equipment & resource kit with a value of approximately *$200* will be made from all completed surveys meeting the deadline date. https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/After_School_Recreation_Project_SURVEY We are attempting to make this provincial survey as inclusive as possible and this request is being sent out to various organizations across the Province. However, we are aware that our mailing list does not include all after school providers. If you represent an organization/network with a number of service providing entities, we would ask that you either complete the survey on their behalf, if appropriate, or forward the request to the various members. If you are aware of additional after school programs that may have been missed, please forward the request to them as well. Please be aware that we have distributed the survey to the following groups with multiple programs/sites - Boys & Girls Clubs of Winnipeg, City of Winnipeg Community Services Department, General Council of Winnipeg Community Centres, YMCA-YWCA, Youth for Christ, Lighthouses, Coalition of Community Based Youth Serving Agencies, Manitoba Association of Friendship Centres. We apologize in advance to any service providers who receive multiple copies of this request. We are in the process of developing a web site related to the After The School Bell Rings project. It is anticipated that survey results will be posted on the web site. Thank you for your assistance in providing information on your programs and sharing the survey with other providers. Roy Mulligan Project Coordinator After The School Bell Rings: A Manitoba After School Recreation Project Recreation Connections Manitoba 317-145 Pacific Ave. Winnipeg, MB R3B 2Z6 Phone: 925-5751 Email: recconnections.pro(a)sportmanitoba.ca

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Spring tune-up time
by Stacy Matwick 30 Mar '11

30 Mar '11

Found at http://www.BoingBoing.net "It's spring! Time to watch some videos that will teach you how to tune-up and repair your own bike<http://bicycletutor.com/>. (Not that I would need a pre-spring tune-up, of course. I've totally been riding all winter. Yeah. Totally.) - Maggie<http://www.boingboing.net/author/maggie-koerth-baker/> " http://bicycletutor.com/ The purpose of this site is to help people learn how to fix their own bikes. With over 200 videos you're sure to find what you need. Cheers Stacy Matwick Information Centre International Institute for Sustainable Development 161 Portage Ave. E., 6th floor Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada R3B 0Y4 Voice: (204)958-7755 Fax: (204)958-7710 Email: smatwick(a)iisd.ca<mailto:smatwick@iisd.ca> IISD Research Library web page: http://www.iisd.org/ic SD-Cite: IISD Research Library database: http://sd-cite.iisd.org<http://sd-cite.iisd.org/> GENERata web-magazine: http://www.iisd.org/generata/ "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read" Groucho Marx

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Grist: Pedaling away from the health care crisis
by Beth McKechnie 29 Mar '11

29 Mar '11

Pedaling away from the health care crisis by Elly Blue <http://www.grist.org/people/Elly+Blue> 28 Mar 2011 11:36 AM [ http://www.grist.org/biking/2011-03-28-pedaling-away-from-the-health-care-c… ] *This is the third column in a series focusing on the economics of bicycling. Part 1 is "How bicycling will save the economy (if we let it)<http://www.grist.org/article/2011-02-28-how-bicycling-will-save-the-economy>." Part 2 is "Tearing down freeways to make room for a new bicycle economy<http://www.grist.org/article/2011-03-14-tearing-down-urban-freeways-to-make…> ."* * *In the United States, we have the most expensive health care system in the world. We collectively invest more than 15 percent of our GDP<http://www.visualeconomics.com/healthcare-costs-around-the-world_2010-03-01/>-- that's around $2 trillion, or $5,700 per person -- into health care every year. The tragedy of these enormous numbers is that they fail to stem the tide of our increasing ill health. "Most of the money we're spending on health care is going to treat preventable chronic diseases," Michael Pollan told Grist<http://www.grist.org/article/2009-11-06-michael-pollan-on-agriculture-and-h…>in 2009. Our poor diet, he added, is responsible for most of those illnesses. But it's not just about what we eat. The other part of that equation is our national and increasingly desperate need for physical activity. We need to rethink our transportation system and built environment on the same scale as Pollan and others have reconsidered our agricultural system. It has become obvious that we can't afford to keep doing things the same old autocentric way. For a fraction of the cost of the world's most expensive health care system, we could all enjoy the world's best bicycling and walking infrastructure -- and with it much, much better health than we enjoy now. Even minor investments in quality bicycle and walking transportation infrastructure, particularly at bottlenecks like bridges, leads directly to increased physical activity<http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2008/may/12/bridge_pedestrian_lane_raise>for people who live nearby. A recent analysis of the health savings resulting from the bicycle infrastructure in Portland, Ore, came up with stunning results<http://bikeportland.org/2011/02/04/research-by-2040-portlands-bikeway-inves…>. If the city builds out only the infrastructure it currently plans, the researcher found, it will break even by 2015. By 2030, Portland will have saved $800 million -- partly in fuel costs but primarily in health care and the value of reduced mortality. For every $1 we spend, $5 is saved. And that doesn't take into account a multitude of other factors. It's been shown again and again that the benefits of bicycling outweigh the risks<http://ehp03.niehs.nih.gov/article/info:doi/10.1289/ehp.0901747>, that not bicycling is more dangerous<http://www.ecovelo.info/2008/06/06/the-dangers-of-not-cycling/>in the long run, and that being sedentary is worse for your health than nearly anything else<http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2009/05/05/sitting-death-rate.html>. When kids, particularly, don't get enough physical activity and good food, they are set up for a lifetime of ill health<http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2011/March/22/Obesity-Type-2-Diabet…> . Then there's the mental health factor. People who bicycle and walk to work love their commutes<http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/11-008-x/2006004/pdf/9516-eng.pdf>[PDF], whereas everyone else is stressed <http://www.vtpi.org/traveltime.pdf> [PDF], even pathologically<http://www.grist.org/article/2011-01-20-new-report-quantifies-just-how-much…>so. * *Stress is often overlooked as an indicator and instigator<http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/archives/2011/03/stress-may-alte.html>of poor health. And bicycling isn't just good for your personal health. There's also a significant public health benefit to having fewer people driving. Air quality is a big one. Cars produce secondhand smoke that none of us can avoid. A parade of studies over the last few decades have steadily linked living near freeways to heart disease<http://www.justmeans.com/Freeway-proximity-can-put-you-on-road-heart-health…>, lung cancer <http://www.ehjournal.net/content/6/1/23>, asthma<http://www.usc.edu/uscnews/stories/11614.html>, impaired lung development<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/26/AR200701260…>, and even autism<http://articles.latimes.com/2010/dec/16/health/la-he-autism-20101217> . Even being sealed in a car doesn't protect you<http://www.velorutia.ro/blog/util/1281-road-user-exposure-to-air-pollution.…>from the perils of concentrated car exhaust <http://www.icta.org/doc/In-car%20pollution%20report.pdf> [PDF]. Car crashes cost the country $230 billion<http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=130350&page=1>in 2000 alone. Only $33 billion of that was spent on medical costs -- but to put that in perspective, that's the same amount as that year's federal highway budget. Worse, in 2009 car crashes caused nearly 34,000 deaths and 2.217 million injuries <http://www.dot.gov/affairs/2010/dot16510.html>, many of them serious enough to prevent victims from navigating our car-oriented landscape in anything *but* a car. What do we do about this? How do we address the health care crisis through reforming our transportation system? We'd be much healthier, we're always being told, if only we could get more physical activity. Bicycle transportation is uniquely suited to fill this requirement. Bicycling is uniquely suited for quickly and flexibly getting around a city designed for cars. And riding a bike for transportation is as good a workout as exercising at the gym<http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10694139>. The cost, time, stress, and inconvenience of exercise evaporates with the bicycle. If only we all could take advantage of it. We are blessed in this country with a chorus of voices urging people to exercise more and try riding a bike -- but very little is being done to make that option safe and comfortable for everyone. I know, because I grew up in suburbia, that people don't eat unhealthy food and sit on the couch all day out of laziness. They end up falling into those behaviors because the options aren't there, or the cost -- in money, time, and stress -- of living differently is simply too high. Of course we want better options<http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/05/qa-transportation-secretary-on-bi…>. As many as 60 percent of Americans would like to ride more<http://streetsblog.net/2010/12/20/wooing-the-hesitant-cyclist/>, and most of us already have bikes stashed in the basement or garage. But we don't feel safe, and often that's because there aren't safe or convenient routes for us to take. Fortunately, that doesn't stop everyone from getting on a bike. And the more people out there riding, the safer *everyone* becomes<http://bikeportland.org/2011/01/27/not-just-safer-for-bikes-fatal-car-crash…>, whether or not bicycling is an option for them individually. It would be absurd to suggest that bikes will solve our health care crisis or that they can eliminate the political and economic machinations that continue to deepen it. But bicycling, like food, is one of the few areas where people can directly and concretely address the health care crisis in the context of our community. By improving our own health and working towards healthier cities, we're also taking money from a health care system that doesn't improve our health. In this light, bicycling for transportation isn't so much a lifestyle choice as it's a form of civic action.

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Wed, Mar.30 webinar: How to increase the number of women cycling for transportation, 2-3:30 CST
by Beth McKechnie 28 Mar '11

28 Mar '11

Green Action Centre will be hosting a local group viewing of the following APBP (Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals) webinar on how to increase the number of women cycling for transportation. If you would like to join us, please let me know at *beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca*. Hope to see you then! cheers, Beth 925-3772 p.s. Sorry for the late notice -- we just heard about it this morning. ------------------------------ Webinar: * How to increase the number of women cycling for transportation *Date: *Wednesday, Mar. 30th, 2:00-3:30 p.m. CST * Location: *EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, third floor* (enter via elevator inside front doors of MEC) *Description* Learn how to increase the number of women cycling for transportation in your community. This webinar builds on last year's APBP session, "Writing Women Back into Bicycling". Five speakers offer compelling insights about cycling projects run by inspiring women, illuminate what women told APBP they want in a cycling environment, and suggest best practices to help you make a difference in your community. Don't miss the stories of some of the wonderful women leading the cycling movement, and results of APBP's 2010 survey on Women Cycling.

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Costs and Benefits of Cycling Investments in Portland, OR
by Beth McKechnie 28 Mar '11

28 Mar '11

*Journal of Physical Activity and Health 2011, 8(Suppl 1), S49-S58 Costs and Benefits of Bicycling Investments in Portland, Oregon Thomas Gotschi* http://journals.humankinetics.com/jpah-pdf-articles?DocumentScreen=Detail&c… *Background: *Promoting bicycling has great potential to increase overall physical activity; however, significant uncertainty exists with regard to the amount and effectiveness of investment needed for infrastructure. The objective of this study is to assess how costs of Portland’s past and planned investments in bicycling relate to health and other benefits. *Methods:* Costs of investment plans are compared with 2 types of monetized health benefits, health care cost savings and value of statistical life savings. Levels of bicycling are estimated using past trends, future mode share goals, and a traffic demand model.* Results:* By 2040, investments in the range of $138 to $605 million will result in health care cost savings of $388 to $594 million, fuel savings of $143 to $218 million, and savings in value of statistical lives of $7 to $12 billion. The benefit-cost ratios for health care and fuel savings are between 3.8 and 1.2 to 1, and an order of magnitude larger when value of statistical lives is used. * Conclusions: *This first of its kind cost-benefit analysis of investments in bicycling in a US city shows that such efforts are cost-effective, even when only a limited selection of benefits is considered. -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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New Yorkers support bicycle lanes, poll finds
by Beth McKechnie 21 Mar '11

21 Mar '11

Nice to see this article given some recent backlash by a select few in NYC where they are setting new standards in bike infrastructure for other cities in N.A. -Beth [ http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/18/new-yorkers-support-bicycle-la… ] * NY TIMES - City Room March 18, 2011, 4:55 pm* New Yorkers Support Bicycle Lanes, Poll Finds By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM <http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/author/michael-m-grynbaum/> Daniel Acker/Bloomberg News The Bloomberg administration’s new bicycle lanes, the subject of one of the more heated civic controversies in recent memory, are supported by a majority of New Yorkers, according to a poll released on Friday<http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x1302.xml?ReleaseID=1569>by Quinnipiac University. More than half of registered voters — 54 percent — said they believed the expansion of bicycle lanes had been a positive development for the city. The only demographic groups opposed were Republican voters and, by a smaller margin, residents of Queens. Over all, 39 percent of respondents said they were unhappy with the lanes, and 6 percent said they had no opinion on the matter (or did not answer). The survey question was fairly stark: either that the bike lanes are “a good thing because it’s greener and healthier for people to ride,” or “a bad thing because it leaves less room for cars, which increases traffic.” The poll asked which statement was closer to the respondent’s point of view. “On balance, people like it,” said Maurice Carroll<http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x2011.xml>, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute<http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x271.xml>. “It’s not overwhelming, but it’s a plus.” Support for the lanes was strongest in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Voters in Queens disapproved of the lanes, but by 48 to 45 percent. Only 35 percent of Republicans supported the lane, while 59 percent of Democrats approved. Support for the bike lanes seemed to wane with age. Voters between ages 18 and 49 supported the lanes by wide margins, but support fell below 50 percent among voters older than 50. Still, supporters outnumbered opponents in each age group. The poll, which surveyed 1,115 registered voters earlier this month, had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. Hundreds of new bicycle lanes have been installed since 2007, part of the administration’s plan to encourage environmentally friendly modes of transportation that cut down on traffic congestion. Arguments for and against the bike lanes typically go into more detail than the survey’s questions. The city’s Department of Transportation, led by its commissioner, Janette Sadik-Khan<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/06/nyregion/06sadik-khan.html>, argues that carving out street space for bicycles has resulted in slower car traffic and, in turn, fewer accidents. Critics of the lanes complain about lost parking spots, additional difficulty in driving in the city, and the risk to pedestrians from bicyclists who disobey traffic laws. Some opponents have also faulted the Transportation Department for installing the lanes without sufficient community outreach, and not disclosing all the relevant data related to the lanes. Those are among the arguments in a lawsuit filed last week<http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/08/nyregion/08bike.html>by a group of well-connected Brooklyn residents who have called on the city to remove a two-way bike lane along Prospect Park West. Biking advocates cited Friday’s poll as evidence that the city should continue expanding its bicycle network. “Whether they drive a car, ride a bike or get around by train, this poll shows that New Yorkers understand that bike lanes make our streets better for everyone,” Paul Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives, wrote in a statement. The survey also found that New Yorkers were unhappy with a plan to rename the Queensboro Bridge<http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/09/nyregion/09bandt.html>for former Mayor Edward I. Koch. Nearly two-thirds of voters opposed the plan, proposed last year by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, with opposition particularly pointed in Queens.

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Leisure Guide: Commuter Cycling Course
by Beth McKechnie 21 Mar '11

21 Mar '11

Please circulate widely. Thanks! -Beth *****active adult workshops* *****city cycling: commuter cycling skills* *****new!* Start commuting by bicycle or just feel more comfortable riding your bike. CAN-BIKE certified instructors from Bike to the Future will clarify the rules and teach you how to ride on the road with confidence. You will learn the skills you need to ride just about anywhere your bike will take you. The course includes both in-class and on-road training. Each participant will receive a free copy of the***** new* 2011 version of the Winnipeg Bike map. *****Fee:* $36.00 1 day Sport for Life Centre:145 Pacific Ave. *394547 Sat May 14 Noon–4:00pm* *394548 Sun May 29 Noon–4:00pm* You can find it on page 81 of the guide or at: * http://www.winnipeg.ca/cms/Leisure/pdfs/leisureguide.pdf*<http://www.winnipeg.ca/cms/Leisure/pdfs/leisureguide.pdf> Pass it around!

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Grist: Cyclists shouldn't 'share the road', they should have their own
by Beth McKechnie 21 Mar '11

21 Mar '11

[While reading this article, note that Winnipeg got its first cycletrack, i.e. physically separated bike lane, late last fall on Assiniboine Ave! - cheers, Beth] Cyclists shouldn’t ‘share the road,’ they should have their own by Elly Blue <http://www.grist.org/member/386213> 14 Feb 2011 1:14 PM It's long been the most controversial issue in bicycling: Should people on bikes ride in traffic with cars, using the same infrastructure and following the same procedures (a style of riding known as "Vehicular Cycling")? Should we ride on the sidewalks and off-road paths, with pedestrians? Or should we have our own place to ride that's designed specifically for bicycling? <http://www.flickr.com/photos/pwkrueger/5134415882/in/set-72157625160007617/> [image: Cycletrack-Vancouver(Paul Krueger copyright).jpg] A physically separated bike lane in Vancouver, BC. Looks nice, right? Photo: Paul Krueger<http://www.flickr.com/photos/pwkrueger/5134415882/in/set-72157625160007617/> -- Like Goldilocks, we've tried all these options. Riding with faster, heavier cars is hard on us. Riding with slower, roaming pedestrians is hard on them. Only when we have our own place in traffic are things anywhere near just right. Or so says a study released last week in Montreal<http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Separated+Montreal+bike+paths+lower+ris…>, which shows that not only does dedicated bicycle infrastructure work in North America, it borders on negligence for cities *not** *to build such infrastructure. (You can download the entire study here<http://gobiking.ca/risk-of-injury-study.pdf>[PDF].) We're not talking about the old, familiar bike lane, marked by a line of white paint -- which so often functions more as a symbol and reminder of our right to be in the road than as actual bicycle infrastructure. Car doors, intersections, potholes, and misinterpretations by law enforcement are among the many pitfalls of the old-school bike lane. But on any road where car traffic is traveling significantly faster than a person can pedal, a bike lane, flawed compromise that it is, is better than nothing at all. Cities across North America have in the last two years been discovering a better way to build a bike lane -- separating it entirely from motor vehicle and pedestrian traffic alike. It's called the cycle track. Though we recently discovered it, we didn't invent it: It's been the backbone of the world's most attractive, comfortable, safe bicycling environments for decades in European cities like Utrecht<http://hembrow.blogspot.com/2010/05/cycle-rush-hour-in-spring-in-utrecht.ht…>and Groningen <http://www.camcycle.org.uk/events/visits/groningen/> (see the system in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-AbPav5E5M&feature=player_embedded). Cycle tracks, also called segregated bike lanes or separated bike paths, are basically bike lanes that use the same right of way as a major street but are set off from car traffic by a barrier more substantial than a single painted white line. They may be separated by bollards, a concrete barrier, or a curb. On many streets, parked cars provide the barrier. Some cycle tracks are one-way and others carry two directions of bike traffic. Unlike their more dangerous cousins, the off-road bike paths<http://www.grist.org/article/2010-11-07-we-need-real-bike-paths-for-real-bi…>, cycle tracks are for bikes only and are not intended to be shared with people walking or running and more than with cars. Montreal, the focus of the recent study, has an unusually large number of cycle tracks for a North American city. Still, unlike their European cousins, these are mainly two-directional and have what the study calls a "less than ideal design," particularly at intersections. Even so, the researchers found, these lanes enjoy 2.5 times more bicycle traffic than alternate bicycle routes without cycle tracks. On Montreal's cycle tracks, the risk of injury is 28 percent lower -- or to be exact, 10.5 crashes, but only 8.5 injuries -- per million kilometers bicycled. Despite strong evidence from now two continents, the Montreal researchers point out, United States federal guidelines actively discourage cities from building cycle tracks. Everywhere cycle tracks are proposed and built there is some amount of local pushback<http://www.citycaucus.com/2010/10/why-are-separated-bike-lanes-so-controver…>. We're seeing an extreme degree of this in New York City, where a powerful group that includes the city's former transportation commissioner (who just happens to be married to Sen. Chuck Schumer [D-N.Y.]) have filed a lawsuit to remove a successful two-way cycle track recently built along Brooklyn's Prospect Park. The media has embraced the campaign<http://www.streetsblog.org/2011/02/14/have-you-seen-the-latest-marcia-krame…>, with a local politician contributing the most venomous and spirited rhetoric<http://www.streetsblog.org/2011/01/24/markowitz-on-ppw-data-its-a-vast-biki…> . There is also a vociferous cadre of bicyclists who organize against bicycle infrastructure of all kinds<http://bicyclealliance.blogspot.com/2011/02/gravity-bike-lanes-and-limits-o…>, with the slogan: "bicyclists fare best when they act, and are treated in return, as drivers of vehicles." One such Vehicular Cycling organization in Ottawa, Ontario is rallying against<http://www.ottawacitizen.com/travel/Even+some+cyclists+oppose+cycling+lane/…>a high-profile cycle track planned in Canada's capital city. But as the research keeps rolling in, I suspect we'll continue to find that real bicycle infrastructure is going to be an amazing boon to bicycle transportation. For instance, we already knew that the air quality is better<http://bikeportland.org/2010/10/28/study-cycle-tracks-mean-better-air-quali…>, whether you're riding on a cycle track or walking on the sidewalk next to one. We know that, despite shopkeepers' fears, increased bicycling is good<http://therecord.blogs.com/take_the_lane/2010/06/cyclists-are-good-for-busi…>for business<http://www.vancouverobserver.com/blogs/transit/2011/02/10/businesses-see-bi…> . We know that people will ride in greater numbers<http://communities.canada.com/montrealgazette/blogs/greenlife/archive/2010/…>on dedicated, separated bicycle infrastructure, and that with numbers comes safety<http://www.grist.org/article/2010-10-11-theres-safety-in-numbers-for-cyclis…> . As long as we continue to allow our streets to be dominated by cars, we need to go the extra mile -- or thousand miles -- to ensure that everyone who isn't in a motor vehicle at any given time is still able to move freely around the city. Separated infrastructure, like sidewalks and cycle tracks, are necessary if a car-oriented city is to be navigable by unarmored humans. Some day, I hope we don't need them. Until then, I hope we build them as well as possible. Elly Blue is a writer and bicycle activist living in Portland, Oregon.

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Active Transportation Canada - March 18, 2001
by Beth McKechnie 21 Mar '11

21 Mar '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Haynes <activetransportation(a)rogers.com> Date: Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 1:02 PM Subject: Active Transportation Canada - March 18, 2001 Twenty (20) new items have been posted on the Active Transportation-Canada Website today. A complete list of titles may be found in the "Blog Archive" box, located on the right margin of the Website. Some sample items: 1. Cyclists shouldn’t ‘share the road,’ they should have their own 2. Video - Cycling Options for various disabilities: UK 3. Estimating the Employment Impacts of Pedestrian, Bicycle, and Road Infrastructure Active Transportation Canada URL: http://activetransportation-canada.blogspot.com A "Search" function is available on the site. You will find this at the bottom of the page. With more than 1,000 items posted on Active Transportation - Canada, there are links available to dozens of studies and hundreds of news items from communities across Canada and the world. If anyone has a problem reading this message, please let me know. I welcome suggestions for posts, so if you have news items featuring your community, please share them with the other subscribers from Canada, the US, and Australia on Active Transportation-Canada. Thank you. Michael Haynes Director TransActive Solutions

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Post on NYC bike lane backlash
by Hall, Ian 17 Mar '11

17 Mar '11

Great blog post... Street Fight: What's Behind New York City's Bike Lane Backlash? http://citiwire.net/post/2562/

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LA Times: At 103, he's a three-wheeled wonder
by Beth McKechnie 16 Mar '11

16 Mar '11

[My new role model...] <http://ad.doubleclick.net/jump/trb.latimes/news/local;;ptype=s;slug=la-me-l…> At 103, he's a three-wheeled wonder If it were up to Octavio Orduño, he'd still be cruising Long Beach on a two-wheeled bicycle. But his wife insisted he get a tricycle. The city wants to make him an ambassador for cycling: 'He's our poster boy for healthy, active living around here.' By Esmeralda Bermudez, Los Angeles Times March 14, 2011 [image: Long Beach 103 yr old tricyclist.jpg] It's time to ride, but Octavio Orduño, stubborn as ever, won't put on his glasses. His wife, Alicia, insists: "But you can't see without them." "No," he tells her. "I don't want to." Then he starts to head off, on his way. If it were up to Orduño, he would still be cruising the streets of Long Beach on a two-wheeler. But a few years back, Alicia insisted he add another wheel and get a tricycle. After all, he was 100 and beginning to lose his balance. He turns 103 on Monday, so he's probably the oldest cyclist in Long Beach. The city, which wants to make him an ambassador for biking, likes to call him "the oldest in the world." Orduño lives half a block from the beach. Nearly every day, he toddles from his third-floor condo to the garage where he keeps his red Torker tricycle. On it, he pedals around the neighborhood — to the park, the beach and the farmers market — in a ritual honed over nearly 40 years. Not long ago, the city's bike coordinator, a gregarious, gray-haired Texan named Charles Gandy, took notice. He befriended Orduño and shared his story online, posting two videos<http://acgallery.smugmug.com/Bike-Long-Beach/Octavio-Orduno/14894674_Lmmck%…>of him coasting down the bike lanes, propped up by his self-installed blue velvet backrest. And that's only the start of Gandy's plan, if the old man is game. He'd like to have him cut the ribbon at bike-friendly ceremonies and appear in television and radio ads. "He's our poster boy for healthy, active living around here," Gandy said, just what people need "to shake themselves out of a rut." Orduño loves the attention. But his riding around town isn't any sort of campaign. "It keeps me going," he said. "And it's better than sitting in the den all day watching cars go by." Alicia is right. With his glasses off, it's clear he can't see too much at all. No matter. He knows the six-block route to Bixby Park by feel. Aside from a few potholes that rock his hunched frame and make him yell "Ayyyy!," the voyage is smooth. "I can ride this bike all day long," he says as the world whizzes by in a blur: the grind of lawn mowers, the sour smell of garbage, two growling pit bulls — one black, one beige — and a pretty girl in a flowery skirt. The retired aerospace mechanic can't recall how old he was when he first started riding. He just remembers it took him a long time to persuade his father to buy him a bike. The two used to argue all the time over school, which Orduño found boring and pointless. So at 16 he ran away, hopping freight trains from Oregon to Wisconsin to Chicago. For years, he says, he labored on farms and laid railroad track, stashing his cash in an old tobacco tin. When the Great Depression struck in 1929, the trains he rode filled up with desperate men — former doctors and lawyers who had lost it all. His first marriage lasted 20 years and gave him four children — three boys, one girl. With Alicia, he had two more girls. Next year, the couple will celebrate their 60th anniversary. His kids, grandkids and great-grandkids are spread across California and as far afield as New Mexico, Indiana and Missouri. A few times a year, his son Eddie, 79, visits from his home north of Fresno. At the sight of him, Orduño lights up. "I don't know how many days he has left, how many months, how many years," Eddie said of his father. "But he's had a full life." Alicia wants him to keep having one. There are days she has to scold him. When he turned 100 and the state took away his driver's license, she thought he'd be safer. But he returns from his tricycle rides scraped up from falls. Not long ago, on his way out of the garage, his foot slipped going uphill and he flipped over. His face hit the concrete. The bike landed on his leg. He lay on the ground for half an hour before a neighbor came to his rescue. Once, he and the tricycle* *came home in a police car. "That time, I thought I was clear, so I let it roll," he says. "I think I was going about 30 miles an hour when I went over the curb and some guys came to help me." A day or two later, he was back on the street, "like nothing ever happened," Alicia said. A few minutes into his ride to Bixby Park, the grassy knolls come into view and Orduño proudly calls out: "We're here!<http://www.latimes.com/topic/economy-business-finance/media-industry/televi…> " He waits in a driveway for the light to turn green so he can cross busy Ocean Boulevard. Just then, a giant Suburban comes up behind him, waiting for him to move. But Orduño, caught uphill without momentum, can't get his ride to budge. The driver takes in the scene and laughs. "Puchenlo! Puchenlo!" he teases out the window. *Somebody push him!* At the park, Orduño speeds past the grass and the picnic benches, where seniors lounge in the sun. He goes straight to the back, to his favorite place: the skateboarding zone. There, on an open stretch of concrete, young guys with shaggy hair and saggy pants zoom around, grinding the ground with ollies and flips. Orduño hits his brakes and takes it all in. His mouth drops open in a smile. They return the favor, singing his praises. "Hey, sweet ride, man!" "Yo, check him out! He's down." Nick Tarrant, a 21-year-old with a stubbly goatee and a low-slung action bike, asks him his name, practically yelling so Orduño can hear him. "Hey, it's OK. I'm deaf too," Tarrant tells him, pointing to his own earpieces. The two talk bikes and hearing aids, and then Orduño says goodbye. He is ready to ride home, to Alicia and his usual dinner of beans, brown rice and vegetables. "Sometimes," Orduño says, as he reaches his block, "I feel stronger than the year before." With his birthday approaching, there's been talk of getting him an electric wheelchair. Alicia thinks it will make it easier for her husband to get around. But Orduño has grown attached to his three-wheeler and has no plans to give it up. "Why would I?" he said. As for the wheelchair, "I think she can use it and follow me when I ride." *esmeralda.bermudez(a)latimes.com*

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Tearing down urban freeways to make room for a new bicycle economy
by Beth McKechnie 15 Mar '11

15 Mar '11

Tearing down urban freeways to make room for a new bicycle economy by Elly Blue <http://www.grist.org/member/386213> Grist Magazine 14 Mar 2011 9:31 AM [ http://www.grist.org/article/2011-03-14-tearing-down-urban-freeways-to-make… ] *This is the second column in a series focusing on the economics of bicycling. Part 1 was "How bicycling will save the economy (if we let it)<http://www.grist.org/article/2011-02-28-how-bicycling-will-save-the-economy>." * [image: bikenomics]Here's one way to fund bicycle infrastructure: Stop building freeways in cities. Better yet, tear down the ones we already have. Cities are starting to catch on that becoming bicycle friendly is one of the best investments they can make**<http://www.grist.org/article/2010-09-27-why-an-additional-road-tax-for-bicy…> . Cities are also starting to realize that removing freeways makes more economic sense than maintaining or expanding them. In the last year, with the help of federal and state funding, cities like Baltimore and New Haven have been demolishing<http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2011/0302/Downtown-need-a-makeover-More-cities…>the "highways to nowhere" that have divided their neighborhoods, drained their populations<http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/2009/09/the-cost-of-urban-freeways/>, and damaged their economies<http://www.azdot.gov/Highways/valley_freeways/Loop_202/South_Mountain/artic…>and their children's health<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/26/AR200701260…>since the 1970s. ** Finding room for safe bicycle infrastructure in already strained and contested budgets can be difficult. That's especially true in places where bicycling has no historical place in the transportation budget, and is still seen as either a whim of the elite or last resort of the poor. But the economic benefits of freeway removal make anything seem possible. Our freeway system is crumbling. Freeways in cities are vastly expensive, disastrous for public health and safety, and destructive of community. The damages disproportionately affect the poor<http://www.baltimorebrew.com/2010/09/24/highway-to-nowhere-coming-down-not-…> . Urban freeways are also ineffective as transportation solutions. Caught in the vicious feedback loop of induced demand<http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/2011/03/puncturing-myth-more-r…>, they cannot be expanded fast enough to keep up with increasing traffic -- yet each expansion lures yet more drivers who create yet more congestion and demand more lanes, ad infinitum. The maintenance and expansion of these roadways gobble up transportation funds that could create and maintain less costly and destructive alternatives. The numbers at play are almost too large to comprehend, but comparison is enlightening. Bike lanes cost anywhere from $5,000 to $60,000 per mile<http://issuu.com/bikeleague/docs/economic_benefits_bicycle_infrastructure_r…>to add to an existing road. That includes everything from engineering and design to paint and concrete to traffic signals. Does that seem like a lot? Well, let's compare. Freeway construction in Michigan's countryside clocks in at $8 million per mile <http://www.michigan.gov/mdot/0,1607,7-151-14011-28076--F,00.html>. In the state's cities, with their need for overpasses, underpasses, exits and entrances, and mitigation of construction impacts on health and commerce, the cost jumps to an average of $39 million per mile. And that's a bargain-basement rate compared to many parts of the country. On the other end of the spectrum, Boston has the most expensive urban freeway systems in the country, costing over $1 billion per mile<http://www-pam.usc.edu/volume2/v2i1a3s2.html> . In Portland, Ore., a single mile of urban freeway costs on average $65 million per mile to build; that's about the same dollar figure as the entire amount as the city spent in 20 years on the bicycle infrastructure that made it one of the most famous bicycle cities in the world<http://www.planetizen.com/node/42773>, with a bicycle economy worth far more than that amount every year<http://bikeportland.org/2008/09/11/report-bike-related-economy-worth-90-mil…> .* *For further perspective, it was just announced that $100 million has already been spent on planning for a contentious $4 to $10 billion freeway expansion project here that may never be built<http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2011/02/a_misfire_in_design_nee…> . Those sums don't include maintenance, which can cost nearly as much as building new miles of freeway, and which, thanks to our interstate system being largely built in a short period of time, is all starting to crumble at once<http://rightdemocrat.blogspot.com/2010/05/us-pirg-report-calls-for-fixing.h…>in the last decade -- just as federal transportation funding is running out fast<http://www.landlinemag.com/todays_news/Daily/2011/Mar11/031111/031111-03.sh…> .* *(Remember that bridge in Minnesota<http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-08-02-minneapolis-bridge_N.htm> ?)* *As early as 2000, the amount of spending needed for basic, safe maintenance of our national freeways and bridges was 20 percent higher<http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policy/2002cpr/ch24.htm>than the $30 billion that was spent that year. By contrast, according to a 2009 report by the League of American Bicyclists, for the $75 million spent repaving three miles of urban interstate, California could have installed<http://issuu.com/bikeleague/docs/economic_benefits_bicycle_infrastructure_r…>1,250 miles of some of the country's most expensive bike lanes. Cities that have chosen (or been forced by citizen groups<http://www.streetfilms.org/lessons-from-portland/>) to stop building or to remove freeways have been rewarded tremendously, and not just economically<http://www.infrastructurist.com/2009/07/06/huh-4-cases-of-how-tearing-down-…> . [image: Woman on bike in SF.]<http://www.flickr.com/photos/martindavidsson/154575832/>The scene today on San Francisco's Embarcadero, where a freeway once loomed.Photo: Martin Davidsson <http://www.flickr.com/photos/martindavidsson/154575832/>Talk of removing San Francisco's Embarcadero Freeway began almost as soon as it was built. When it was taken out of commission by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, it quickly became clear that the predicted traffic snarls weren't happening; it was demolished and replaced with an arterial street and a now beloved linear park<http://www.streetfilms.org/lessons-from-san-francisco/>along the water. When the city of Milwaukee, Wisc. removed a contested, never-finished freeway spur in 2002, the estimated cost for needed safety repairs was $100 million. Removal cost $25 million, and the 26 acres of land freed up for redevelopment attracted over $300 million in investments<http://www.preservenet.com/freeways/FreewaysParkEast.html>. Mayor John Norquist, overseeing the project, famously said, "Highways don't belong in cities. Period." President Eisenhower, the father of the U.S. interstate system, agreed. He reportedly only discovered that freeways were being built in cities, rather than between them, in 1959. He wanted them to be eliminated<http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/interstate/faq.htm#question23a>, but the march of progress had already left him behind. He was right: We don't need freeways in cities. And we can't afford them. Not every city has gotten that message. Right now in Seattle, the earthquake-damaged Alaskan Way Viaduct seems destined to be replaced by a costly freeway tunnel<http://www.grist.org/article/2010-12-15-seattle-car-centric-mega-tunnel-car…>along the city's waterfront -- despite the wishes of voters. In San Diego County, the $2.6 billion proposed for spending<http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/feb/25/bicycles-big-part-future-tra…>on bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure over the next 40 years has attracted more scrutiny than the $82 billion slated for roads<http://www.kpbs.org/news/2010/dec/17/sandag-approves-40-year-transportation…>in the same plan, including at least one highly contested freeway expansion project. In Portland, planning is underway for a new, widened freeway bridge that will bring more congestion into the center of the city. The ultimate cost of that project is estimated to be between $4 and $10 billion. There's a lot of criticism of the cost of bicycle infrastructure. But look at it this way: the simple act of choosing not to build one mile of urban freeway can buy you a world-class bicycle city with a thriving local economy. We can tear down these freeways and make sure that green spaces, equitable new development, and quality walking and bicycling infrastructure take their place. Soon, we may have no other choice. *Two weeks from today, we'll take on the health care crisis. With bikes, of course. * Elly Blue is a writer and bicycle activist living in Portland, Oregon.

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Active Transportation - Canada: March 14, 2011
by Beth McKechnie 14 Mar '11

14 Mar '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Haynes <activetransportation(a)rogers.com> Date: Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 10:21 AM Subject: Active Transportation - Canada: March 14, 2011 Dear Listserv Members: Ten (10) new items have been posted on the Active Transportation-Canada Website, and for something different, all are from our neighbours to the south, the US and Mexico. There are some fascinating an surprisingly developments taking place in these countries, and as advocates of Active Transportation it might be helpful to be aware of a few of them. A complete list of titles may be found in the "Blog Archive" box, located on the right margin of the Website. some highlights in this collection include: - San Diego - Billions proposed for bike lanes, pedestrian-friendly streets - Los Angeles plans 1600 mile cycle lane network - New York - Battle of the Bike Lanes Active Transportation Canada URL: http://activetransportation-canada.blogspot.com A "Search" function is available on the site. You will find this at the bottom of the page. With more than 1,000 items posted on Active Transportation - Canada, there are links available to dozens of studies and hundreds of news items from communities across Canada and the world. If anyone has a problem reading this message, please let me know. I welcome suggestions for posts, so if you have news items featuring your community, please share them with the many subscribers to Active Transportation-Canada. Thank you. Michael Haynes Director TransActive Solutions

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Bike to Work Day Winnipeg - Event Coordinator Posting
by Beth McKechnie 11 Mar '11

11 Mar '11

Hello! Please find attached an event coordinator posting for Bike to Work Day Winnipeg, which takes place this year on Friday, June 24th. It would be greatly appreciated if you could circulate it within your networks or forward to individuals who you think might be a good fit. thanks, Beth

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Bike to Work Day Winnipeg, Event Coordinator
by Mike Tutthill 11 Mar '11

11 Mar '11

Bike to Work Day Winnipeg Event Coordinator Want to coordinate an exciting city wide event that celebrates cycling culture? The Bike to Work Day Winnipeg planning team is looking for an event coordinator to assist with Bike to Work Day Winnipeg 2011 (June 24, 2011). New ideas and approaches will be welcomed. In general, the individual will be responsible for: * Attending meetings of and reporting to the planning committee * Updating a sponsorship package and soliciting donations from previous and new sponsors * Assisting with the development and coordination of promotional materials, and liaising with the planning team, graphic designer and web developer * Assisting with overall coordination of pancake breakfast and coordinating rides from established Oases in the city, including the coordination of volunteers * Communicating with media and developing partnerships with other related community organizations * Preparing a report of the event and recommendations for events in future years * Performing other coordination duties as needed Required skills and experience * Creativity in event planning and promotion * Exceptional organizational and communication skills * Able to deliver commitments under pressure * Comfortable working with a volunteer-run planning team * Development of sponsorship packages and soliciting sponsors * Event coordination and promotion * Community engagement * Media relations * Volunteer coordination * Report writing This is approximately a 3-month contract, beginning April 4th until submission of a final report, for $7500 - $10 000 depending on experience and details of the final contract. The independent contractor will be responsible to provide their own office, office supplies and equipment. The successful applicant will be accountable to the volunteer planning committee. Interested candidates should forward a résumé, covering letter and references to relevant experience to mike.tutthill(a)biketoworkdaywinnipeg.org by March 28, 2011. Mike Tutthill Information & Access Coordinator HEALTH in COMMON 100-6 Donald Street Winnipeg, MB R3L 0K6 tel: 204.949.2002 1.800.731.1792 fax: 204.284.2404 email: <mailto:mtutthill@healthincommon.ca> mtutthill(a)healthincommon.ca web: <http://www.healthincommon.ca> www.healthincommon.ca +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ April E-Newsletter deadline is March 18. <http://www.facebook.com/pages/Health-in-Common/120069149875> Health in Common on Facebook * Please consider the environment before printing this email. Coming to Health in Common? By bicycle: Bicycle parking is located behind the building. By Winnipeg transit: Routes 62, 65, 66, 68, 70 By car: Two visitor parking spaces are available at the back of the building. Street parking (restrictions): Bell Avenue (1hr 9h00 17h30), Clarke Street (none); Lewis (none); Cauchon (none); River (none west of Clarke).

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Thank you for cycling!
by Beth McKechnie 07 Mar '11

07 Mar '11

Great story from: http://www.torontocranks.com/?p=2363<http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/03/anonymous-gifts-say-thank-you-for-c…>(can we hold out hope for a Winnipeg benefactor?) -cheers, Beth Thank you for cycling! March 2nd, 2011 I was riding along the College Street bike lane heading east and was coming up to the red light at University Ave. and an older woman stepped out to the edge of the sidewalk and handed me an envelope saying “Thank You for cycling today”! I thought it might be a flyer or something so I stuck it into my pocket and started through the now green light. On the other side of the intersection another cyclist passed me and turned to say ” how much do you think is inside” as he waved his envelope, I said I don’t know maybe its a coffee coupon. A bit further ahead I thought I’d make a U-turn and go back and see who she worked for, but she was gone. When I got home I looked at the envelope. It’s hand lettered “Thank You ($ gift inside).” I opened it and inside was a letter and a new $5.00 bill. Wow! So I took the $5.00 and bought 2 lottery tickets for tonights 6/49 draw! You don’t think she works for Rob Ford’s office?? Tom Polarbear

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Fwd: UWSA Ice Riders Bike Lab
by Beth McKechnie 03 Mar '11

03 Mar '11

Hi everyone, I’m part of a student group at the University of Winnipeg called the Ice Riders, and we are a non-profit organization there to help people have better access to the resources they need to bike all year round. We’re in the process of building a bike lab on the Downtown campus, which should be completed this spring, and it will be a base for anyone with a bike to come by for repairs, advice, or even to build a bike. Myself and close to fifty other students and non students are committed to volunteering our time to make this a success, but a real issue is funding. The link below takes you to a video which was created by a few members and friends and submitted to the TD Go Green Challenge, where the successful candidates will receive $100,000.00 to go towards implementing their project. TD is doing a people’s choice award of $2,500.00, which is where your vote counts for this. Take a look if you’d like, and if you are so inclined please vote for them. Any vote helps, and so far we’re ahead of the pack! Regards, Michael Chiasson PS please feel free to pass it on to anyone you like! http://www.tdgogreenchallenge.com/video/id/86/playid/86#

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Why do people in cars hate people on bikes so much? (Grist & Outside articles)
by Beth McKechnie 01 Mar '11

01 Mar '11

Share the road rage Why do people in cars hate people on bikes so much? by Sarah Goodyear <http://www.grist.org/member/376533> 24 Feb 2011 4:10 PM [ http://www.grist.org/article/2011-02-24-why-do-people-in-cars-hate-people-o… ] If you've ever been behind the wheel of a car, you've felt it: The dead certainty that everyone around you is a complete idiot who should get the hell out of your way. If you've spent much time riding a bicycle, you have been the target of that wrath. And without the protective metal-and-glass bubble that shields drivers (mostly) from each other's anger, it's easy to feel the hate. A horn honked in your ear by someone zooming past, an insult shouted out a window, the grit kicked up in your face by someone passing too close -- just to make a point. It's scary. The expression "road rage" apparently originated in America in the 1980s<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_rage>, and the concept was absorbed into our national DNA a long time ago. It's part of how we see ourselves, a danger so familiar it's become mundane, a cultural cliché. Driving a car does something strange to you. Tom Vanderbilt, author of the book *Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (And What It Says About Us<http://www.powells.com/biblio/9780307277190?&PID=25450> *), has explained it<http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/tom-vanderbilt/>this way: What happens to most of us, in most driving conditions, is that we're losing some of the key attributes that facilitate human cooperation and, in a larger sense, society. Eye contact, for example, has been shown in any number of experiments to increase the chance of gaining cooperation - that's why when drivers give you what was called on *Seinfeld* the "stare-ahead," your chances that they'll let you merge in ahead of them are greatly reduced. Then there's the anonymity in traffic - there's no one to spread rumors or gossip about you about how bad your behavior was -- not to mention the lack of consequences for acting like an idiot. It's all strikingly similar to the way we act on the internet, in what's called the "online disinhibition effect." Now Vanderbilt has written a terrific article in *Outside<http://outsideonline.com/adventure/travel-ga-201103-new-york-bike-commuting…> * about the way that people driving cars and people riding bicycles interact with each other -- and the psychology behind the "bikelash" that's taken hold as bicycles have become increasingly popular as a mode of transportation as well as recreation. People on bikes, of course, are not equal players in the battle for road space. They don't have a metal shell to protect them. Maybe that's why they are easy targets for road rage: Because they look a lot more human than people in cars do, and because they rely on eye contact and hand signals to express their intentions, rather than on blinking lights and sheer metallic muscle. Because they are more vulnerable. Vanderbilt writes about how the idea that "cyclists" are a group unto themselves, an "other," creates some of the problem: This dynamic appears on the road in all kinds of ways. "We know that merely perceiving someone as an outsider is enough to provoke a whole range of things," says Ian Walker, a researcher at the University of Bath who specializes in traffic psychology. "All the time, you hear drivers saying things like 'Cyclists, they're all running red lights, they're all riding on sidewalks,' while completely overlooking the fact that the group they identify with regularly engages in a whole host of negative behaviors as well." This social categorization is subtle but dominant, he points out. When people are given a piece of paper and asked to describe themselves, "men never write, 'I'm a man.' Whereas women will write 'woman' because being male is the 'default' status in society." And so it is with cyclists. In a country like the Netherlands, which has more bikes than people and where virtually the entire population cycles at one time or another, the word cyclist isn't meaningful. But in the U.S., the term often implies something more, in both a good and a bad sense. There's also a not-so-subtle class element in play: Yes, cultural politics are getting weird, which may also explain some of the tension, as Brian Ladd, author of the 2008 book *Autophobia*, argues. "Most Americans," he wrote in a December post on the urban-planning Web site Planetizen.com <http://www.planetizen.com/>, "know one thing about the bicyclists they see on the roads: they are losers, and you thank God you're not one of them." But wait, he says, noting the fashionability of cycling: Who's doing the sneering here? "It's harder to dismiss cyclists as beneath contempt," he says, "when you suspect that they might just be contemptuous of you." You should read Vanderbilt's article in full [note: pasted below], because it's packed with great stuff (he rides along with one guy who commutes 50 miles each way by bike twice a week, and talks with another who documents his interactions with angry drivers on video). Unlike a lot of the writing on this topic, it is well-reasoned and well-researched. In the end, Vanderbilt comes to a pretty simple conclusion: In thinking about how to improve driver-cyclist relations in America, the easiest thing is to simply get more people on bikes. Because that way, it won't be us vs. them. It'll just be us. -- [Warning: The next article is lengthy but well worth reading.] Outside Magazine, March 2011<http://outsideonline.com/travel/travel-ta-201103/table-of-contents/travel-t…> http://outsideonline.com/adventure/travel-ga-201103-new-york-bike-commuting… Rage Against Your Machine What is it about cyclists that can turn sane, law-abiding drivers into shrieking maniacs? The author ponders the eternal conflict with help from bike supercommuter Joe Simonetti, who each week survives the hostile, traffic-clogged rat race between the New York exurbs and Midtown Manhattan. By *Tom Vanderbilt * THE U.S. CENSUS BUREAU DEFINES AN "EXTREME COMMUTER" AS SOMEONE WHO SPENDS MORE THAN THREE HOURS GETTING TO AND FROM WORK. This is usually understood to be by car. It's not clear, then, how the Census would categorize Joe Simonetti, a 57-year-old psychotherapist who lives with his wife in Pound Ridge, New York. His commute takes him from the northern reaches of exurban Westchester County to his office just south of Central Park. It's about three and a half hours each way. By bike. When I heard about Simonetti's commute—some 50-odd road miles as Google Maps flies—I was vaguely stupefied. It may or may not be the longest bike commute in America, but it's certainly the most improbable. In my mind's eye, there was the dense clamor of New York City, then a netherland of train yards and traffic-clogged overpasses, then an outer belt of big-box retail, and then you were suddenly in the land of golf courses and five-acre zoning—where middle managers crowd the bar car on Metro-North and hedge-fund analysts cruise in 7 Series BMWs down I-95. The idea that this landscape could be traversed on a bike struck me as fantastic. This is America, where 65 percent of trips under one mile are made by car. But at 7 A.M. on a mid-November Thursday—among the last of the year on which Simonetti was going to ride—I packed my bike into the back of a hired minivan and headed for Pound Ridge, noting with subtle alarm the ticking off of miles as we pushed north. Simonetti obviously isn't the typical bike commuter. For one thing, he does it only twice a week, weather permitting. For another, he doesn't ride home the same day; he has a crash pad in the city where he can shower and sleep. But in following this supercommuter, I wanted to open a window into what it means to be a cyclist in a country where the bicycle struggles for the barest acceptance as a means of transportation. Over the years and the miles, Simonetti has experienced just about everything a cyclist can on the roads today: honked horns, cramped bike lanes, close calls with cars, and even a few crashes—the last one landing him in the hospital. I was curious to ride with him for the sheer novelty of it, and also to get a handle on what seemed to be an increasingly prevalent culture war between cyclists and drivers, one that was claiming actual lives. At least for one beautiful morning, I wanted to move beyond the alarming headlines and toxic chat rooms and into the real world, to get a sense of how, why—and if—things had gotten so bad. My interest isn't because I'm a cyclist, though I am, in the loose recreational sense. Rather, the issue was forced upon me by the publication of my 2008 book *Traffic*, which looked at the oft-peculiar psychology of drivers. Cyclists were among the book's most devoted readers, although I'm still not sure if it's because they found my dissection of drivers' foibles educational or cathartic. After all, the little things that drivers think are excusable—forgetting a turn signal, weaving a bit as they fumble for their Big Gulps—can range from frustrating to life-threatening for a cyclist. Simonetti's house, a cozy ranch that he jokes is the smallest in Pound Ridge, sits on a twisting country lane. The walkability-measuring Web site Walkscore.org <http://www.walkscore.org/> gives his address a rating of zero, meaning, basically, that you can't get around without a car. Tall and trim, with a professorial salt-and-pepper beard, Simonetti is waiting with his LeMond Buenos Aires, a 50th-birthday gift that, he jokes, makes him look "like a real cyclist." Clad in a helmet, gloves, and a blue cycling jacket, he fills our bikes' bottles with a mixture of juice and water, checks that his back pouch has spare tubes (I've forgotten mine), and clicks his shoes into his pedals. On a still-brisk morning—it's 8:30, and Simonetti's first appointment is at noon—we push off onto a route that Simonetti has refined over the years. It was, in fact, a bike ride that brought him here from the city. After a ride across America for charity in 1998, he returned to New York feeling "a bit midlifey." His daughter was already a teenager, and he craved nature. He and his wife, Carol Goldman, a social worker, were searching for a house that "felt country" but was still within cycling reach of Manhattan. "I never want to commute five days a week by train," he says. He is surely the only person in the history of Westchester County to arrive for a house showing by bike from Manhattan. "They thought I was pretty weird," he says of the realtors. He stresses that he is purely a "functional" cyclist: he rides when he needs to get somewhere, be it the hardware store or Midtown. Our route snakes through preternaturally quiet daytime suburbs whose streets seem plied primarily by women in SUVs and tradesmen in pickups. A Latino landscaping crew smiles at us as we ride through the leaf storm they've blown up in Greenwich, Connecticut. We don't see any other cyclists until New Rochelle, and even then it's two young girls riding on the sidewalk. In the town of Rye Brook, a little after 10 A.M., we pause at a deli for Simonetti's traditional pit-stop fare: an egg-white omelet with Swiss on a whole-wheat bagel. They all know him here, and a clipping from a local paper detailing his commute is stuck on the wall, behind a picture of the clerk's daughter. Here, Simonetti is not some "Lycra lout," some "Lance wannabe," or any of the other epithets often hurled at cyclists. He's simply Joe. He's the guy who rides his bike to work. And, thanks to me and my questions and my questionable pace, he's late. SOMEWHERE SOUTH of Pelham, Simonetti tells me of a crash last summer, in the Bronx, that left him with a broken collarbone. It was a "right hook," one of the most common crash types for cyclists: a driver, traveling in Simonetti's lane ahead of him, suddenly turned right—without signaling—directly into Simonetti's path. An ambulance responded quickly, but the police did not. The paramedics told Simonetti the police would deal with the driver when they arrived, he says. "But the guy left. I don't blame him." When the police, investigating what was now a hit-and-run, came to the hospital, they asked him if he'd gotten the license-plate number. "I was laid out on the ground," he laughs. The driver was never found. Judging by recent headlines, it's not hard to believe that riding a bike has become a little like entering a war zone. No story blew up more than that of Steven Milo, a prominent New York anesthesiologist who was struck near Vail, Colorado, last July 3 by Martin Erzinger, a Denver money manager who specializes in "ultra-high-net-worth individuals." After veering off the road and hitting Milo from behind, throwing him off his bike, Erzinger drove to a Pizza Hut parking lot and called Mercedes roadside assistance. Milo, meanwhile, sustained spinal injuries, lacerations, and, according to court documents quoted by the *Vail Daily*, "bleeding from the brain." When the district attorney, citing "job implications" for Erzinger should he be convicted of a felony, downgraded the hit-and-run charges to a misdemeanor, the cycling blogosphere went off like a supernova. Erzinger had told police that he'd never seen Milo; among the more outlandish of his lawyer's later defenses was that "new-car smell" had impaired his client. Ultimately, the judge accepted the prosecutor's misdemeanor plea deal and sentenced Erzinger to probation, a suspended jail term, and community service. Last September, in Maryland, Natasha Pettigrew, a Green Party candidate for U.S. Senate, was training at dawn for a triathlon when she was fatally struck by a Cadillac Escalade. No charges have yet been filed against the driver, who said that she thought she'd hit an animal until she got home and found Pettigrew's bike lodged under her car. In Florida, the country's deadliest state for cyclists—119 deaths in 2007, ten more than California despite having half the population—two riders participating in last year's annual Memorial Day ride were stabbed by a driver after words were exchanged on the road. In 2009, the last year for which records are available, 630 cyclists were killed by cars in the U.S. (compared with 4,092 pedestrians). That's arguably a big improvement over the 1,003 cyclist fatalities that occurred in 1975, when, as Census data hint, far fewer people were commuting by bike and still fewer wore helmets. And yet, even if things have gotten safer, at least in terms of absolute deaths (which are easier to measure than where or how much people are actually cycling), a sense of hostility—and sometimes outright violence—seems to be on the rise. When accidents do happen, they can generate as much vitriol as concern, as drivers circle their station wagons and trot out now familiar arguments: that the roads are meant for cars, or that cyclists don't pay for the roads—a particularly unwarranted charge, given that local streets are paid for primarily by sales and property taxes. There's a feeling among many drivers that cyclists, either by their ignorance of the law or by their blatant disregard for it, are asking for trouble. "If the door opens into a bicycle rider," opined Rush Limbaugh on his radio show in 2009, "I won't care." In one sense, the so-called bikelash has little to do with transportation modes. In the late 1960s, a pair of British psychologists set out to understand the ways in which we humans tend to split ourselves into opposing factions. They divided a group of teenage schoolboys, who all knew each other, into two groups and asked them to perform a number of "trivial tasks." The boys were then asked to give money to fellow subjects, who were anonymous save for their group affiliation. As it turned out, the schoolboys consistently gave more money to members of their own group, even though these groups had just formed and were essentially meaningless. "The mere division into groups," wrote the psychologists, Henri Tajfel and Michael Billig, of the University of Bristol, "might have been sufficient to have produced discriminatory behavior." Though not exactly *Lord of the Flies*, the experiment was a demonstration of the power of what's called "social categorization"—and the penalties inflicted on the "out-group." This dynamic appears on the road in all kinds of ways. "We know that merely perceiving someone as an outsider is enough to provoke a whole range of things," says Ian Walker, a researcher at the University of Bath who specializes in traffic psychology. "All the time, you hear drivers saying things like 'Cyclists, they're all running red lights, they're all riding on sidewalks,' while completely overlooking the fact that the group they identify with regularly engages in a whole host of negative behaviors as well." This social categorization is subtle but dominant, he points out. When people are given a piece of paper and asked to describe themselves, "men never write, 'I'm a man.' Whereas women will write 'woman' because being male is the 'default' status in society." And so it is with cyclists. In a country like the Netherlands, which has more bikes than people and where virtually the entire population cycles at one time or another, the word cyclist isn't meaningful. But in the U.S., the term often implies something more, in both a good and a bad sense. On the one hand, cyclists have a strong group affiliation, with clubs, group rides, and a flourishing network of bike blogs. And yet the oft-invoked idea of "bike culture" itself betrays cycling's marginal status in America, observes Eben Weiss, creator of the blog Bike Snob NYC, in his book *Bike Snob: Systematically and Mercilessly Realigning the World of Cycling*. "The truth is," he writes, "real cultures rarely call themselves cultures, just like famous things rarely call *themselves* famous." The dark side of the "cyclist" label is that it becomes a shortcut to social categorization. Suddenly, that messenger who cut in front of you becomes the face of an entire population. And the next time you have an unpleasant encounter with a cyclist, it isn't just a matter of his (or your) carelessness: it seems intentional. Simonetti sees this type of reaction all the time, on the road and in his practice. "As a couples therapist, I tell people that we take things so personally," he says as we near the Whitestone Bridge, on the first dedicated bike path we've seen in more than two hours. It's easy, when a car edges too close or cuts him off, to "go to that paranoid place where they're just trying to fuck with me. We're so worried that someone else can steal our sense of self that we fight for it at every turn." But it could have been just that the driver didn't see him. Under the spell of what's called "inattentional blindness," people have been known to miss obvious things simply because they're not looking for them. Either that or what seems inconsequential in a car—passing by within a foot or two—can be terrifying to someone on a bike. One way to find out what drivers are thinking, of course, is to actually stop and ask them, which is precisely what one Wisconsin cyclist has been doing, with interesting results, for the past few years. THE FIRST THING Jeff Frings wants you to know is that he's not out to get drivers. (He is one, after all.) The second thing is that he doesn't have a persecution complex. "The majority of drivers go out of their way to give me room, and are decent and good drivers around cyclists," says Frings, a news cameraman and avid rider who lives in the suburbs of Milwaukee. "The problem is, it only takes one mistake to end your life or put you in a wheelchair." A few years ago, Frings found out what happens when you encounter someone who isn't a good and decent driver. Out on a weekday ride, he was nearly sideswiped. Heated words followed. The driver accelerated away, then screeched on his brakes right in front of him. "I said, 'This is out of control,'" says Frings. "I called 911." This wasn't the only time. A similar incident ended not with a reprimand of the driver but with a threat by the responding officer to book Frings for disorderly conduct. Rattled by these experiences and dismayed by the lack of evidence, Frings mounted two small video cameras: one on his helmet, one rear-facing on the handlebars. Frings started filming every one of the 100 to 250 miles he rides in a week, to provide proof against the claims of drivers, who are typically the only ones left standing after a serious bike-car crash. He posts the worst encounters on his Web site, bikesafer.blogspot.com<http://www.bikesafer.blogspot.com/>, which could provide grist for a reality show: *America's Douchiest Drivers*. The incidents tend to follow a pattern: 1. Driver cuts him off or nearly runs him off the road. 2. Frings catches up to driver at red light. 3. Frings points out error of driver's ways. 4. Driver says something like "Get on the sidewalk where you belong, jag-off!" 5. Thus ensues what Frings calls "the Conversation," in which he notes (sometimes to police officers) that it's in fact illegal for him to ride on the sidewalk, and that while the law dictates that he be "as far to the right as practicable," that doesn't mean the shoulder, and so forth. Typically, this goes about as well you'd expect. "I'm trying to be less confrontational," says Frings. He's embracing politeness. "Can I just ask you one favor?" he will say. "Can you give me a little more room next time?" He takes his victories in handshakes, promises to do better, and the occasional ticket police give a driver after seeing Frings's evidence. And while he's not optimistic about converting the "haters"—those who believe bikes have no place on the road—he hopes that if he can just get one driver to be more empathetic toward cyclists, it's worth it. "Because the next time," he says, "could be my time." The confusion over the laws pertaining to cyclists unfortunately echoes throughout the entire legal system, argues Bob Mionske, a two-time Olympic cyclist and Portland, Oregon–based lawyer specializing in cases involving bikers. "Enforcement is really where it all starts," he says. "If the police don't respect your mode of transportation, don't expect the rest of society to." Laws are often unenforced. In researching a case in Tennessee where a driver hit a cyclist (who was "lit up like a Christmas tree," says Mionske) while passing, he found that the driver hadn't been given a ticket for violating the state's three-foot passing law—in fact, he couldn't find a case where a ticket had ever been given. Even worse, laws are sometimes used against cyclists. In 2008, a cyclist in Madison, Wisconsin, who'd been hospitalized after being "doored" was actually ticketed for riding less than three feet away from parked cars—even though, as most state traffic codes note, it's the driver's responsibility not to obstruct traffic of any kind when he opens his door. But the biker had only bad choices: ride too far into traffic and risk getting hit, or ride to the right and risk getting doored. Wisconsin has since changed the law. In Mionske's view, justice for cyclists is often invisible, handled with civil settlements that rarely draw public attention. And criminal justice often hangs on a knife-edge. When a 14-year-old teenager in Connecticut was fatally struck by a speeding driver, Mionske notes that it was the driver's prior convictions—including multiple DWIs—that helped land him in jail. For anything but the most egregious cases, Mionske says, a driver who strikes a cyclist—even fatally—is rarely even brought to trial. In the case of the Vail hit-and-run last July, what changed things was that the victim was a successful doctor. "He wasn't going to sit down on this," Mionske says. "Can you imagine if the guy had been collecting aluminum cans?" Like many cyclists, Mionske would like to see some version of the liability system used in the Netherlands and other European countries, in which the burden of proof in a car-cyclist crash is on the driver—the idea being to encourage the user of the far deadlier vehicle to act more cautiously around the more "vulnerable road users," as cyclists are called in road-safety parlance. Of course, if calling cyclists "vulnerable" makes it seem like they're never to blame, that's not true, either. It's not just those hipsters on fixies sealed off from the world by earbuds who give bikers an image problem. Plenty of well-meaning bike commuters aren't aware of the laws, or fail to use bright flashing lights at night, or turn without giving hand signals. Statistically, some studies show cyclists running more red lights than drivers—for a number of complicated reasons, whether to conserve momentum, to get ahead of traffic and be more visible, or, more profoundly, perhaps because their out-group status leads them to act that way. But the red lights may be a red herring. The way cyclists get hurt seems to have less to do with their own culpability and more to do with getting hit by cars—either from behind or when a car turns right, the way Simonetti was struck. Echoing research in the UK, a recent three-year study by Australia's Monash University found that in 54 recorded crashes among a sampling of cyclists, drivers were at fault nearly nine out of ten times. Regardless of fault, there's another twist here. As various studies have found, the more cyclists and cycling infrastructure a town has, the safer it becomes statistically, not just for cyclists but for drivers and pedestrians alike. When New York City put a protected bike lane on Ninth Avenue, some protested it as unsafe for people on foot. But since the lane's opening, pedestrian injuries on Ninth have dropped by 29 percent. Last year, as miles of bike lanes were added, New York had its best pedestrian-safety record ever. While Mionske is generally positive about recent initiatives like Oregon's Vulnerable Road User law, which stiffens penalties for striking a pedestrian or cyclist, and the bicyclist bills of rights passed in a number of other states, he believes that laws are not enough. "Until the public attitude changes, you're not going to change the experience everyone has out there in the world," he says, "whether it's other kinds of discrimination or modism—discriminating against people because of their mode of transportation." THERE ARE TIMES, however, when the gulf seems too wide to span. On one of his rides, Frings was hailed by a man standing in his front yard. The man announced he had passed him earlier in his car. He told Frings he had almost hit him, because he was riding too far into the road. "I tried to explain to him the concept of 'taking the lane'—that the lane's too narrow for us to be side by side, and drivers would think they could pass me even when there's oncoming traffic," Frings says. "That concept, before I talked to him about it, was completely foreign to him. He couldn't understand how it would be safer for me to ride farther out." Hence one of the major fault lines of driver-cyclist relations. While virtually every cyclist in America is also a driver, relatively few drivers are also cyclists. "People either don't know how to handle you," says Andy Clarke, president of the League of American Bicyclists, "or they don't want to handle you." There's an empathy gap that, as you know if you've spent much time on cycling blogs, can cut both ways. In one study in which drivers were asked how they feel about cyclists, one of the recurring labels was "unpredictable." When asked to elaborate, drivers often blamed the "attitudes and limited competence" of the cyclists themselves, rather than the "difficulty of the situations that cyclists are often forced to face on the road." When asked to describe their own actions or those of other drivers, however, they blamed only the situation. Psychologists call this the "fundamental attribution error." So drivers, perhaps already stressed out from being late for work or stuck in traffic, then have to negotiate their way around a vehicle they essentially don't understand, causing even more stress, which they tend to attribute to something about cyclists. It's a vicious cycle—most vicious, in terms of actual harm, for cyclists. Cyclists, too, can be as susceptible as anyone to "modal bias," thinking that one's mode of travel is the "normal," even superior, one. After researching my book, there may be no more conscientious—or paranoid—driver on the American road than me. But I am still occasionally flummoxed by some wrong-way night rider wearing black. I want to tell them, "Don't ruin it for everyone!" Then again, I wouldn't tell a rude fellow driver not to ruin the image of drivers. Yes, cultural politics are getting weird, which may also explain some of the tension, as Brian Ladd, author of the 2008 book *Autophobia*, argues. "Most Americans," he wrote in a December post on the urban-planning Web site Planetizen.com <http://www.planetizen.com/>, "know one thing about the bicyclists they see on the roads: they are losers, and you thank God you're not one of them." But wait, he says, noting the fashionability of cycling: Who's doing the sneering here? "It's harder to dismiss cyclists as beneath contempt," he says, "when you suspect that they might just be contemptuous of you." In thinking about how to improve driver-cyclist relations in America, the easiest thing is to simply get more people on bikes. Growing up in the small Wisconsin town of Twin Lakes, Mionske notes, he "didn't see more than two road bikes in my entire childhood." Now, he jokes, "you've got packs of 40 guys riding around pissing people off." But with each new cyclist, he says, it's no longer "the Other; it's us." Few American cities have done a better job of getting people on bikes than Portland, Oregon, where around 7 percent of the population bikes to work and children cycle to school in huge "bike trains." And yet, last year, like many recent years, no cyclist was killed. (By comparison, Tampa, Florida, a city where fewer than 1 percent of the population commutes by bike, had nine cyclist fatalities in four months in 2009.) Greg Raisman, a traffic-safety specialist with Portland's Bureau of Transportation, says one key to getting people biking is providing infrastructure—actual or symbolic. The city features "bicycle boulevards" and bike-only traffic signals, and it's planning new six-foot-wide bike lanes. It recently put some 2,100 "sharrows" bike symbols on 50 miles of residential streets. He says the symbols send messages to motorists and are, as many Portlanders have told him, changing "people's mental maps of the city." "We need to get people to change the way they think about transportation," Raisman says. While all road users need to step up in terms of behavior, he believes, calling for cyclists to be licensed, as some critics have lately done, isn't the right place to start. "I recently got my driver's license renewed," he says. "They just asked me if my address was the same." Among the things he was not asked was whether he was aware of traffic-code changes like the 2007 Vulnerable Road User law or a new Oregon rule that makes it legal for cyclists to pass on the right so they can filter to the front past queues of cars stopped at traffic lights. THE GREENWAYS of Portland seem very far away as Joe Simonetti and I pedal down a street in the Bronx that looks like the nightmare underbelly of America's car culture. In front of myriad body shops sit subcompacts with mashed-in crumple zones and SUVs with spidery shattered windows. A billboard urges auto-accident victims to dial 1-800-I-AM-HURT. Cars honk and weave, delivery trucks wait parked in the bicycle lane. "The Bronx is lawless," says Simonetti. "It's the Wild West, dog eat dog—or car eat car." We cross the Madison Avenue Bridge into Manhattan and a few minutes later reach the Central Park loop, one of the few car-free spaces of the day. Our ride has gone off without conflict, not that it's always so. "It's hard to ride ten years without some incident," Simonetti says. There's a crash—not always major—every season or so, not to mention logistical concerns like bathroom breaks. He says he enjoys two-thirds of the ride but admits to having to "push myself" through the final third. But the benefits are clear. For one, Simonetti, despite being nearly two decades my senior, seems ready to keep riding, whereas I'm struggling from an old knee injury that's come wriggling up like worms after rain. For another, knee notwithstanding, I feel fantastic. In a study by the University of Surrey, car commuters reported having the "most stressful" commutes, while cyclists saw their journeys as "interesting and exciting." Indeed, where driving into New York City always leaves me feeling edgy and irritable, I now feel curiously alive. To cycle in America today is to engage in an almost political act, but what's often obscured is the simple idea of pleasure. Andy Clarke notes that bike-component maker Shimano, in some research it conducted with the design firm IDEO, found that when you talk to adults and ask them about their earliest childhood memory, "it invariably involves a bike—exploring their neighborhood, careening down a hill, ditching the training wheels." We need to rediscover that, he says. "They don't want to feel like they have to be Lance. People want to be normal, and they want cycling to be a part of normal life." Returning from a visit to Cape Cod last summer, I was staggered to see a traffic jam stretching for dozens of miles, heading to the beaches. Almost every car had several bikes lashed to it. You could almost feel the collective urge to escape traffic and get on a bike. I thought: *This is the country that hates cyclists, that sees them as a road menace?* Simonetti and I draw to a stop outside his office building, two people on bikes amid Midtown gridlock. I ask him why he does it. "I have a tremendous feeling of accomplishment," he says. "No matter what else happens in the day, I can feel good about the ride. There aren't many other things that make me feel that way." How many people can say that about their commute? After saying goodbye to Simonetti, I head home myself, riding over to the Hudson River Greenway, that jewel of New York's expanding—and controversial—bicycle network, where none of the larger thoughts about cycling in America intrude. I'm just enjoying the breeze off the river and thinking about that final climb over the Brooklyn Bridge. -- And the last word goes to Goofy... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZgiVicpZGk

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Systematic Review of Interventions Promoting Active Transportation to School
by Mike Tutthill 28 Feb '11

28 Feb '11

A <http://politiquespubliques.inspq.qc.ca/url.php?i=2386&f=News&l=En> systematic review of interventions for promoting active transportation to school This first-ever systematic review of interventions designed to promote active transportation to school among young people was published in the International Journal of Behavioural Nutrition and Physical Activity. It looks at 14 intervention studies related to active school transportation undertaken in the U.S., Australia and the U.K. to identify approaches that were most successful and issues that should be addressed in future research. Mike Tutthill Information & Access Coordinator HEALTH in COMMON 100-6 Donald Street Winnipeg, MB R3L 0K6 tel: 204.949.2002 1.800.731.1792 fax: 204.284.2404 email: <mailto:mtutthill@healthincommon.ca> mtutthill(a)healthincommon.ca web: <http://www.healthincommon.ca> www.healthincommon.ca +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ April E-Newsletter deadline is March 18. <http://www.facebook.com/pages/Health-in-Common/120069149875> Health in Common on Facebook * Please consider the environment before printing this email. Coming to Health in Common? By bicycle: Bicycle parking is located behind the building. By Winnipeg transit: Routes 62, 65, 66, 68, 70 By car: Two visitor parking spaces are available at the back of the building. Street parking (restrictions): Bell Avenue (1hr 9h00 - 17h30), Clarke Street (none); Lewis (none); Cauchon (none); River (none west of Clarke).

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Active Transportation - Canada: February 17, 2011
by Beth McKechnie 22 Feb '11

22 Feb '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Haynes <activetransportation(a)rogers.com> Date: Thu, Feb 17, 2011 at 5:33 PM Subject: Active Transportation - Canada: February 17, 2011 Twenty (20) new items have been posted on the Active Transportation-Canada Website during the month of December. A complete list of titles may be found in the "Blog Archive" box, located on the right margin of the Website. some highlights include: - Measuring the Global Health Impact of Transportation Reform - Active Transportation Planning Videos - Video - Walking and Texting Woman Trips Into Mall Fountain Active Transportation Canada URL: http://activetransportation-canada.blogspot.com A "Search" function is available on the site. You will find this at the bottom of the page. With more than 1,000 items posted on Active Transportation - Canada, there are links available to dozens of studies and hundreds of news items from communities across Canada and the world. If anyone has a problem reading this message, please let me know. I welcome suggestions for posts, so if you have news items featuring your community, please share them with the many subscribers to Active Transportation-Canada. Thank you. Michael Haynes Director TransActive Solutions 613.424.2803

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Name the Greenway Ponds Contest!
by Shona Kusyk 22 Feb '11

22 Feb '11

Name the Greenway Ponds Contest If you were to explore Bishop Grandin Greenway, you may be surprised to find that hidden from the street are 3 small retention ponds. Fondly referred to as “pond 1, pond 2 and pond 3” they are teeming with aquatic/plant life, attract birds and wildlife and provide every-changing scenery to those who travel the trail. We figure the time has come to give these ponds some recognition for the part they play on the Greenway; to gain an identity that reflect their unique character and link to St.Vital. And since Bishop Grandin Greenway (BGG) is a ribbon of natural green space to be used by our community, it should be our community who gets to name the ponds. The names should be easy to remember and ideally have some association with the pond itself, its unique attributes, the environment, or St.Vital’s history. Contest closes midnight March 11th, 2011. Submissions will be presented to a panel of judges comprised of local area residents who will create a short list of their top choices/pond, which will be forwarded to City of Winnipeg Committee for approval. Winners will be published in the Lance and the pond names will be posted on the Bishop Grandin Greenway web site www.bishopgrandingreenway.com. The ponds’ new names will be officially announced at BGG International Trails Day June 4th, 2011. * * *Contest Rules:* The names could be related to natural environment surrounding the ponds, reflect active living, or recognize our local history. They should be unique and not already used in other locations in Winnipeg.(Names of individuals, family names, service organizations and businesses will not be considered.) Briefly describe your reason(s) for your submission (s), include your name, contact information (phone/email address). Please specify which pond; #1 (east of River Road); Pond #2 (west of St.Mary’s Road); Pond # 3 (west of St.Annes’ Road, near Home Depot). You can contact us through the BGG web site: www.bishopgrandingreenway.com Or mail/drop off your entry to: Name the Greenway Ponds c/o Youville 6-845 Dakota Street Winnipeg, Manitoba Fax: 255-4903 Should your submission be one of the winning pond names please indicate if you are willing to have your name mentioned in the Lance. (Please check one) _____ Yes I agree to have my name published in the Lance and on the BGG web site. ______No, I do not want to have my name published in the Lance and BGG web site. Please Print Name Sign Name * * *Contest closes midnight March 11, 2010* -- *Shona Kusyk ** Winnipeg Trails Association Coordinator * Cell (204) 479-8412 skusyk(a)riverswest.ca *winnipegtrails.com*

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Planning for Sustainable Transportation in Small and Mid-Size Communities webinar - Wed, Feb 23, Noon-1 pm, Green Action Centre
by Beth McKechnie 21 Feb '11

21 Feb '11

Green Action Centre will host a Winnipeg viewing of the following MOST (Transport Canada) webinar on *Planning for Sustainable Transportation in Small and Mid-Size Communities* on Wed, Feb. 23rd. If you would like to join us, please let me know at * beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca*. See you then! cheers, Beth 925-3772 ------------------------------ Webinar: * **Planning for Sustainable Transportation in Small and Mid-Size Communities* * *Date: *Wed, Feb. 23, Noon to 1:00 p.m. CST * Location: *EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, third floor* (enter via elevator inside MEC) **** Brenda Kelley from Bathurst Sustainable Development will present on a "How to Guide for Incorporating Sustainable and Active Transportation into Festivals and Special Events" and the use of charrettes to generate recommendations for incorporating Transportation Master Plan Recommendations. Laena Garrison from Ecology Action Centre in Halifax will present on *Municipalities for Green Mobility* – a project that aims to incorporate and advance sustainable transportation in long-term municipal planning. NOTE: Brenda Kelley has requested that a publication – Bathurst N.B. Green Guide for Festivals and Special Events – relevant to her presentation be circulated ahead of time. It is available for downloading (until Feb.28) at the following link: ** https://download.yousendit.com/eURCeVdvWlRBNkd4dnc9PQ <https://download.yousendit.com/eURCeVdrMVhubVh2Wmc9PQ> -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Building Great Communities Forum: 7-9 pm, Tues, March 1st, Canad Inns Polo Park
by Beth McKechnie 18 Feb '11

18 Feb '11

------ Forwarded Message ------ *From: *"Teranishi, Shirley" <STeranishi(a)winnipeg.ca> *Date: *Fri, 18 Feb 2011 11:05:29 -0600 ** *Subject: *FW: Building Great Communities Forum Good morning! You are invited to attend a workshop on the topic of *Building Great Communities – Working Towards Win-Win Solutions to Accommodate Growth* to be held on March 1, 2011 from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. at the Canad Inns Polo Park located at 1405 St. Matthews Avenue in Winnipeg. There is no cost associated with this event and registration is not required. Please feel free to pass this invitation on to other in your network. We look forward to seeing you on March 1! Yours truly, Deepak Joshi, Director of Planning, Property and Development -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Webinar: Talking to Decision Makers about TDM - Wed, Feb 16th, noon-1pm, EcoCentre
by Beth McKechnie 10 Feb '11

10 Feb '11

Green Action Centre will be hosting a local viewing of the following ecoMOBILITY (Transport Canada) webinar on Talking to Decision Makers about TDM (Transportation Demand Management). If you would like to join us, please let me know at *beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca*. Hope to see you then! cheers, Beth 925-3772 ------------------------------ Webinar: * Talking to Decision Makers about TDM *Date: *Wednesday, Feb. 16, Noon to 1:00 p.m. CST * Location: *EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, third floor* (enter via elevator inside front doors of MEC) ** *Description* Learn about Transport Canada’s new TDM (Transportation Demand Management) Guide, which will aid practitioners in presenting the case for TDM to decision makers, and hear how Smart Commute obtained support for their program. -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Minneapolis: As bicycle use climbs, rate of crashes with vehicles falls (Feb.6'11)
by Beth McKechnie 08 Feb '11

08 Feb '11

As bicycle use climbs, rate of crashes with vehicles falls *City data seem to bear out idea that seeing more bikers leads drivers to watch for them.* *By STEVE BRANDT<http://www.startribune.com/bios/10644486.html?elr=KArks:DCiUHc3E7_V_nDaycUi…> ,* Star Tribune Last update: February 6, 2011 - 8:42 PM The more people bike in Minneapolis, the safer they seem to be. *What's new? *Recently crunched city data show the reported cyclist-motorist accident rate dropping as the number of bike commuters grows. For 2008, the most recent year for which complete data were available, the crash rate was one-quarter that of 10 years earlier. Moreover, a trend line shows a steady decrease in the crash rate even as the number of commuting cyclists more than doubled. There are some limits to the Minneapolis data. The number of cyclists is taken from the number of people ages 16 or older who tell census takers that their main transportation to work the previous week was a bike. That figure grew from about 3,000 in the 1990s to about 8,000 in 2008. It excludes infrequent commuters and recreational bikers. Meanwhile, the number of crashes involved only those reported to the city between bikers and motorists, which remain at or below 1990s levels. That means the crash rate has fallen sharply while commuting bikers are on the rise. *Is this happening elsewhere?* It squares with a 2003 analysis on biking and walking in two California cities. "A person is less likely to collide with a person walking or biking if more people walk or bicycle," public health consultant Peter Jacobsen wrote in the journal Injury Prevention. *Why is this happening? *Familiarity breeds safety, one city bike advocate believes. "People are so used to seeing bicyclists -- love them or hate -- and they don't want to hit them," said Shaun Murphy, coordinator of the city's nonmotorized transportation program. Murphy said the map of hot spots for bike-car accidents doesn't show major issues around the University of Minnesota because drivers there are so used to watching for bikes. *Do bike lanes help?* Murphy also credits more bike lanes. Bike lanes can benefit pedestrians as well. When bike lanes were striped on Riverside Avenue, for example, the number of bikers riding on sidewalks dropped by 87 percent, said Hilary Reeves, a spokeswoman at Transit for Livable Communities, which manages a federal grant to promote biking and walking in the Twin Cities. *How many bike crashes are there?* The city records 200 to 300 bike-vehicle crashes annually. Preliminary statewide numbers show that nine bikers were killed in vehicle crashes in 2010, with 926 crashes reported. All but one of the fatalities and the preponderance of those injured last year were male, while close to half were between ages 10 and 24. Steve Brandt • 612-673-4438 http://www.startribune.com/local/115449079.html?elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O… -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Snow Trek 2011 - starts THIS Sunday! (please forward)
by Beth McKechnie 07 Feb '11

07 Feb '11

Hello, Can you please assist the Snow Trek 2011 Organizing Committees and their * many* community partners by promoting the following *FREE* event and * forwarding* this information on to your networks? Cheers, Deanna *************************************** *2011 Snow Trek – 2nd Annual winter in motion**…one more Sunday!*** There is still ONE more Sunday for you to take advantage of Snow Trek 2011 - a fun filled afternoon for the whole family (all ages) to head outdoors for some cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, tobogganing and winter walking. *No Experience, No Problem*! We are offering FREE cross-country ski instruction and guided snowshoe walks. *No Equipment, No Problem*! We will have a limited supply of FREE cross-country skis & snowshoes for you to use (ID required). *Too Young, Too Old!* No such thing...Everybody Welcome! *What*: Snow Trek – 2nd Annual winter *in motion* *When & Where*: *Sunday, February 13th, 2011* Living Prairie Museum (2795 Ness Ave.) *Time*: 12:00 - 4:00pm *Who*: All Welcome! *Cost*: FREE! *** We are also looking for a few more volunteers … if you’re interested, please contact Deanna at dbetteridge(a)wrha.mb.ca For more information and a detailed schedule, be sure to check out * www.winnipeginmotion.ca *or call Winnipeg *in motion* at 940-3648. See you on the trails! 2011 Snow Trek – 2nd Annual winter *in motion* is a community event put on by many community partners - Thank you! ********************* ** Sign-up to receive Winnipeg in motion email updates http://www.winnipeginmotion.ca/signup/ ** ------------------------------------------------------------- Deanna Betteridge, BESS, M.Sc. *in motion* Coordinator 2 - 189 Evanson St. Winnipeg, Manitoba R3G 0N9 204-940-3264 (w) 204-232-3297 (c) 204-940-8409 (f) E-mail: dbetteridge(a)wrha.mb.ca Web site: www.winnipeginmotion.ca

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Snow Trek 2011 - one more Sunday! (please forward)
by Deanna Betteridge 07 Feb '11

07 Feb '11

Hello, Can you please assist the Snow Trek 2011 Organizing Committees and their many community partners by promoting the following FREE event and forwarding this information on to your networks? Cheers, Deanna *************************************** 2011 Snow Trek - 2nd Annual winter in motion...one more Sunday! There is still ONE more Sunday for you to take advantage of Snow Trek 2011 - a fun filled afternoon for the whole family (all ages) to head outdoors for some cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, tobogganing and winter walking. No Experience, No Problem! We are offering FREE cross-country ski instruction and guided snowshoe walks. No Equipment, No Problem! We will have a limited supply of FREE cross-country skis & snowshoes for you to use (ID required). Too Young, Too Old! No such thing...Everybody Welcome! What: Snow Trek - 2nd Annual winter in motion When & Where: Sunday, February 13th, 2011 Living Prairie Museum (2795 Ness Ave.) Time: 12:00 - 4:00pm Who: All Welcome! Cost: FREE! *** We are also looking for a few more volunteers ... if you're interested, please contact Deanna at dbetteridge(a)wrha.mb.ca For more information and a detailed schedule, be sure to check out www.winnipeginmotion.ca <http://www.winnipeginmotion.ca/> or call Winnipeg in motion at 940-3648. See you on the trails! 2011 Snow Trek - 2nd Annual winter in motion is a community event put on by many community partners - Thank you! ********************* ** Sign-up to receive Winnipeg in motion email updates http://www.winnipeginmotion.ca/signup/ <http://www.winnipeginmotion.ca/signup/> ** ------------------------------------------------------------- Deanna Betteridge, BESS, M.Sc. in motion Coordinator 2 - 189 Evanson St. Winnipeg, Manitoba R3G 0N9 204-940-3264 (w) 204-232-3297 (c) 204-940-8409 (f) E-mail: dbetteridge(a)wrha.mb.ca Web site: www.winnipeginmotion.ca This email and/or any documents in this transmission is intended for the addressee(s) only and may contain legally privileged or confidential information. Any unauthorized use, disclosure, distribution, copying or dissemination is strictly prohibited. If you receive this transmission in error, please notify the sender immediately and return the original. Ce courriel et tout document dans cette transmission est destiné à la personne ou aux personnes à qui il est adressé. Il peut contenir des informations privilégiées ou confidentielles. Toute utilisation, divulgation, distribution, copie, ou diffusion non autorisée est strictement défendue. Si vous n'êtes pas le destinataire de ce message, veuillez en informer l'expéditeur immédiatement et lui remettre l'original.

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in motion @ library - Create your own boot camp - February 11, 2011
by Beth McKechnie 07 Feb '11

07 Feb '11

*Create your own boot camp – No drill sergeant required! * *Are you looking for a fun way to get fit? Why not create your own boot camp? Boot camps are no longer just for military personnel. Join Winnipeg in motion and local exercise professional Stuart Klassen of MORFit Training to learn how a boot camp workout can be a fun, new, and challenging way for people of all ages and fitness abilities to increase their strength and stamina. Attend the session and receive a free exercise band. ** When: *Friday, February 11, 2011 12:10 to 12:50 p.m. *Where: *Millennium Library, 2nd Floor, Carol Shields Auditorium Wear comfortable clothing and join in the activities, or come out and watch. Admission is *FREE* and registration is *NOT* required. *Unable to attend?* Visit our website (www.winnipeginmotion.ca) where we will post all the resources and information shared at the session! Contact Winnipeg *in motion* at 940-3648 for more information. *Create your own boot camp – No drill sergeant required *is part of *in motion* @ the Library, a series of monthly workshops that promote physical activity for better health. The *in motion* @ the Library series is sponsored by Winnipeg *in motion* and the Millennium Library. For a complete list of workshops, visit http://www.winnipeginmotion.ca/resources/in_motion_library.

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Reminder: The Future of Transit in Canada webinar - Thurs, Feb 3, 11-12:30, EcoCentre
by Beth McKechnie 31 Jan '11

31 Jan '11

If you haven't already registered for this Thursday's webinar but are interested in attending, we still have seats available for the viewing in the EcoCentre boardroom. If you would like to join us, please let me know at *beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca*. thanks! Beth Green Action Centre 925-3772 ------------------------------ Webinar: * The Future of Transit in Canada *Date: *Thursday, Feb. 3, 11 to 12:30 p.m. CST * Location: *EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, third floor* (enter via elevator inside front doors of MEC) *Speakers: * - Michael Roschlau, President and Chief Executive Officer Canadian Urban Transit Association <http://www.cutaactu.ca/> (CUTA) - Don Hull, Director of Transit, City of Hamilton<http://www.hamilton.ca/index.htm>(Ontario) - Derek Bacchioni, Treasury Manager, TransLink <http://www.translink.ca/>(British Columbia) - Derek Stewart, Manager, Environmental Sustainability, Coast Mountain Bus Company, Ltd. <http://www.coastmountainbus.com/> *Session description: * How will we get around in our cities in the future? What transit options fit the size and form of my community today? How do I improve service to increase active and mobile transit tomorrow? This webinar will begin with CUTA’s Transit Vision 2040<http://www.cutaactu.ca/en/publicationsandresearch/vision_2040.asp>, which explores changes likely to take place in Canadian communities over the next generation. These changes and strategic directions can optimize public transit's contribution to our quality of life. Let’s prepare for these changes by sharing knowledge and best practices. The City of Hamilton’s revitalized B Line Bus rapid transit line<http://www.sustainablecommunities.fcm.ca/Search/PDF/GMEF9458_CS_e.pdf>combines hybrid bus technology, service improvements and social marketing to increase ridership and improve service. Learn why these steps fit Hamilton’s local context and their experiences since initial implementation in 2007<http://www.hamilton.ca/NewsandPublications/NewsReleases/2007News/April/07-0…>. The webinar will also profile several initiatives in Metro Vancouver, supported by TransLink and FCM's Green Municipal Fund. These innovative sustainable transit initiatives point the way toward this vision for 2040, including: - Jack Bell Ride-Share's Online Ride-Matching Project & Enhancements<http://online.ride-share.com/en/my/index.php> - Main Street Transit & Pedestrian Priority Project<http://www.translink.ca/en/Be-Part-of-the-Plan/Projects/Main-Street-Upgrade…> - Feasibility Study for the Metro Vancouver Public Bike System<http://www.translink.ca/en/Cycling/Public-Bicycle-System.aspx> - Bike Transit Centres - Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) Pilot Retrofit Testing for Natural Gas Buses<http://www.translink.ca/en/About-TransLink/Media/2005/September/TransLink-b…> - Diesel Oxidation Catalyst Retrofits -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Active & Green e-Newsletter Winter 2011
by Beth McKechnie 27 Jan '11

27 Jan '11

In case you did not receive our latest e-newsletter (and if so, apologies for duplicate postings!)... Email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser.<http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f55cc&id=a80e2822ac…> [image: Active & Green Winter 2011] Let us help! *Looking to improve commuter options at your workplace?* R<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/request-information-presentation-or-mee…>equest resources<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/request-information-presentation-or-mee…>on cycling, carpooling, commuting surveys and tracking progress, among others. Book a presentation<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/request-information-presentation-or-mee…>on the various commuting options, as well as fuel-efficient driving, creating a commuter friendly workplace, and greening the workplace. Talk to us about implementing a Smart Trips<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/smart-trips/?utm_source=Active+%26+Gree…>program at your workplace. Upcoming Events *Reel Green Film Festival* February 4-5 *Earth Day* April 22 *Jane's Walk* May 7-8 *International Trails Day* June 4 *Commuter Challenge* June 5-11 *Bike to Work Day* June 24 If you like what you read, become a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/?utm_source=Active+%26+Gree…>of Green Action Centre (membership is free!), visit our website at greenactioncentre.ca<http://greenactioncentre.ca?utm_source=Active+%26+Green&utm_campaign=a80e28…>or make a donation<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/make-a-donation/?utm_source=Active+%26+…>. Welcome to our new look! Hope you enjoy our new e-newsletter format. Stay warm, active & green! Don't be 'car-bound' Winter can be the perfect time of year to get around without your car. With the right gear and planning, a trip to work, school or the grocery store can turn into an opportunity for fresh air, exercise, and fun. Get to your destination satisfied and safely with our winter tips<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/don%E2%80%99t-be-%E2%80%98car-bound%E2%…> . Take a video break - Rap your way to using those bike racks on buses<http://www.activelivingbydesign.org/communities/featured-community/bike-rap…> - The bike 'helmet' of the future? Check out this collar air bag<http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/10/cyclists-airbag-helmets-bursts-forth…> - Get your daily hug with your bike to work<http://www.grist.org/article/2010-10-04-will-bike-for-hugs-video?utm_source…> - A must-see Goofy cartoon! "Motormania" (1950)<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZgiVicpZGk&utm_source=Active+%26+Green&utm_…> Get recognized! Have you heard about the *Commuter Friendly Workplace Awards*? These unique awards are given out to Manitoba workplaces offering great commuter options programs for their employees. If your workplace is making strides to improve your options for getting to work, consider applying. *Click here*<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/commuter-friendly-workplace-awards/?utm…>for more details and to apply. The WRENCH After more than a year of planning and negotiations, The Winnipeg Repair, Education and Cycling Hub (The WRENCH) will be opening it's doors to the public this spring. The organization seeks to improve access to bicycles and to teach community members bike maintenance and mechanical skills. Learn more<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/the-wrench/?utm_source=Active+%26+Green…>about this valuable service. Transportation Plan What would you like to see happen in the next 20 years in Winnipeg? More cycling infrastructure? Rapid transit? A policy for complete streets? Pedestrian-friendly neighbourhoods? Check out<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/transportation-master-plan/?utm_source=…>what Green Action Centre is recommending and how you can put in your two cents. Year-Round Challenge! Ever wonder what your daily commute can do for you? Sign up<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/year-round-commuter-challenge/?utm_sour…>to take the Commuter Challenge year-round. Track your commute and get weekly email updates on how many calories you've burned, emissions you've avoided and how much fuel you have saved by green commuting. [image: Year-round Commuter Challenge] You are receiving this email because you are an Active & Green subscriber. Unsubscribe<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a1…> beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca from this list. Our mailing address is: Green Action Centre 3-303 Portage Ave. Winnipeg, Manitoba R3C 3V6 Add us to your address book<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/vcard?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f5…> Copyright (C) 2011 Green Action Centre All rights reserved. Forward<http://us2.forward-to-friend.com/forward?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f55cc&id=a80…>this email to a friend Update your profile<http://greenactioncentre.us2.list-manage.com/profile?u=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3…> [image: Email Marketing Powered by MailChimp]<http://www.mailchimp.com/monkey-rewards/?aid=af15a2f9f91ef9a183a3f55cc&afl=1> -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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The WRENCH - Learn How to Fix Your Bike
by Beth McKechnie 21 Jan '11

21 Jan '11

*Bicycle Repair Workshop Series * at the Bike Dump 631 Main St. (use south side entrance) All workshops are from 6-8 PM unless otherwise noted. The workshops are FREE of charge and do not require pre-registration. HEADSETS - Learn how to adjust and replace the ball-bearings around your fork. Jan 19th SINGLE-SPEEDS - Learn how to convert your multi-speed to a single (ideal for Winnipeg winters). Jan 29th *@ 2 PM* BRAKES - Learn how to adjust and upkeep your brake system. Feb 23rd DERAILLEURS - Learn how to maintain and adjust your gear system. March 16th 3-SPEED HUBS - Learn how to overhaul and adjust those perplexing internal hubs. March 23rd SPRING TUNE-UP - Be nice to your bike after winter and/or get your bike ready for the spring. April 20th Workshops presented with support from the W.R.E.N.C.H (Winnipeg Repair Education and Cycling Hub) www.thewrench.ca

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Mark your calendar - upcoming webinars
by Beth McKechnie 17 Jan '11

17 Jan '11

*Mark Your Calendar! * Upcoming webinars being hosted by Green Action Centre in the EcoCentre boardroom (3rd Floor, 303 Portage, MEC building) include: *The Future of Transit in Canada* (presented by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities) Thursday, Feb. 3rd, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm CST *Talking to Decision Makers about TDM *(presented by Transport Canada / ecoMobility) Wednesday, Feb. 16th, 12:00 - 1:00 pm CST *Complete Streets* (presented by Transport Canada / ecoMobility) Wednesday, Mar. 9th, 12:00 - 1:00 pm CST Details on the Feb 3rd webinar on The Future of Transit in Canada have already been circulated. Information on the other two will be circulated closer to the dates. cheers, Beth -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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[At-network] The Future of Transit in Canada webinar - Thurs, Feb 3, 11-12:30, EcoCentre
by Beth McKechnie 17 Jan '11

17 Jan '11

Green Action Centre will be hosting the following FCM (Federation of Canadian Municipalities) webinar on "The Future of Transit in Canada" on Thurs, Feb. 3rd. If you would like to join us, please let me know at * beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca*. Hope to see you then! cheers, Beth 925-3772 ------------------------------ Webinar: * The Future of Transit in Canada *Date: *Thursday, Feb. 3, 11 to 12:30 p.m. CST * Location: *EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, third floor* (enter via elevator inside front doors of MEC) *Speakers: * - Michael Roschlau, President and Chief Executive Officer Canadian Urban Transit Association <http://www.cutaactu.ca/> (CUTA) - Don Hull, Director of Transit, City of Hamilton<http://www.hamilton.ca/index.htm>(Ontario) - Derek Bacchioni, Treasury Manager, TransLink <http://www.translink.ca/>(British Columbia) - Derek Stewart, Manager, Environmental Sustainability, Coast Mountain Bus Company, Ltd. <http://www.coastmountainbus.com/> *Session description: * How will we get around in our cities in the future? What transit options fit the size and form of my community today? How do I improve service to increase active and mobile transit tomorrow? This webinar will begin with CUTA’s Transit Vision 2040<http://www.cutaactu.ca/en/publicationsandresearch/vision_2040.asp>, which explores changes likely to take place in Canadian communities over the next generation. These changes and strategic directions can optimize public transit's contribution to our quality of life. Let’s prepare for these changes by sharing knowledge and best practices. The City of Hamilton’s revitalized B Line Bus rapid transit line<http://www.sustainablecommunities.fcm.ca/Search/PDF/GMEF9458_CS_e.pdf>combines hybrid bus technology, service improvements and social marketing to increase ridership and improve service. Learn why these steps fit Hamilton’s local context and their experiences since initial implementation in 2007<http://www.hamilton.ca/NewsandPublications/NewsReleases/2007News/April/07-0…>. The webinar will also profile several initiatives in Metro Vancouver, supported by TransLink and FCM's Green Municipal Fund. These innovative sustainable transit initiatives point the way toward this vision for 2040, including: - Jack Bell Ride-Share's Online Ride-Matching Project & Enhancements<http://online.ride-share.com/en/my/index.php> - Main Street Transit & Pedestrian Priority Project<http://www.translink.ca/en/Be-Part-of-the-Plan/Projects/Main-Street-Upgrade…> - Feasibility Study for the Metro Vancouver Public Bike System<http://www.translink.ca/en/Cycling/Public-Bicycle-System.aspx> - Bike Transit Centres - Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF) Pilot Retrofit Testing for Natural Gas Buses<http://www.translink.ca/en/About-TransLink/Media/2005/September/TransLink-b…> - Diesel Oxidation Catalyst Retrofits -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Fwd: Tuesday January 18, 7pm meeting RE: West Broadway Community Planning & AT
by Beth McKechnie 17 Jan '11

17 Jan '11

(please see below) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Shelagh Graham <s.graham(a)westbroadway.mb.ca> Date: Mon, Jan 17, 2011 at 9:48 AM Subject: Tuesday January 18, 7pm meeting RE: West Broadway Community Planning To: Shelagh Graham <s.graham(a)westbroadway.mb.ca> *Meeting re: planning for active transportation in West Broadway* Tuesday January 18, 7pm @ 608 Broadway All are welcome! Please pass this along to anyone you feel might be interested. West Broadway Development Corporation is hosting meetings with groups interested in contributing to the 5-year community plan. It was suggested that active transportation supporters and cyclists get together to share their thoughts. We’ve managed to set up a time that works for many of those who responded directly and want to spread the word to anyone else who would like to participate. If you want any more information about the community plan process, check out our website (www.westbroadway.mb.ca) or get in touch with me. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts! Thanks! Shelagh Graham *West Broadway Development Corporation* *(204) 774-7201x4* *www.westbroadway.mb.ca* ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: *Shelagh Graham* <s.graham(a)westbroadway.mb.ca> Date: Wed, Nov 17, 2010 at 9:48 AM Subject: West Broadway Community Plan Events To: s.graham(a)westbroadway.mb.ca *We want to hear from you!** *We are gathering information from residents of West Broadway to create a new five year community plan that will identify priorities and an action plan. The goal is to make West Broadway a safe, healthy and vibrant place to live, work and play. *Please reply to this email if you would like copies of the attached notice for posting. *How can you get involved?* There are at least four ways for you to get involved in this process:1. participate in the West Broadway Community Forum & Resource Fair 2. participate in the Housing West Broadway Forum 3. complete the Community Plan survey 4. become involved in Small Group Discussions For more information about the Community Plan process, please visit our website: www.westbroadway.mb.ca *1.** **West Broadway Community Forum & Resource Fair Saturday, November 27th, 2010 *Crossways in Common 222 Furby St., Second Floor Noon – 1:00 pm: Open House and lunch 1:00 – 3:30 pm: Presentations and discussions Please register at 774-7201×1 or info(a)westbroadway.mb.ca Lunch & childcare provided *2.** **Housing West Broadway Forum Tuesday, November 30th, 2010 *Crossways in Common 222 Furby St., Second Floor 6:00 – 8:30 pm Please register at 774-7201×1 or info(a)westbroadway.mb.ca Dinner & childcare provided *3.** **Community Plan Survey* Visit our website (link to be added shortly) to fill out the Community Plan Survey or drop by one of the community sites from November 22 until January 10 to fill out a paper copy: · Art City, 610 Broadway · Assiniboine Credit Union, 640 Broadway · Crossways in Common front office, 222 Furby St. · Broadway Neighbourhood Centre, 185 Young St. · Resource Assistance for Youth, 125 Sherbrook St. · Wannabes Diner, 641 Broadway · West Broadway Development Corporation, 608 Broadway · Wolseley Family Place, 691 Wolseley Ave. Surveys are confidential. Respondents can enter to win a Diamondback Extreme mountain bike from Gooch’s Bicycle & Hobby Shops! *4.** **Small Group Discussions** *If you’d like to be involved in a small group discussion, or would like to organize your neighbours or community group to participate in a discussion group for the Community Plan, please contact 774-7201×1 or info(a)westbroadway.mb.ca. *Apologies for cross-postings! Shelagh Graham *West Broadway Development Corporation* *(204) 774-7201x4* *www.westbroadway.mb.ca* ------------------------------ No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 10.0.1153 / Virus Database: 424/3264 - Release Date: 11/18/10 -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Snow Trek 2011 - starts THIS Sunday! (please forward)
by Beth McKechnie 12 Jan '11

12 Jan '11

*2011 Snow Trek – 2nd Annual winter in motion*…starts THIS SUNDAY! As the mercury plunges and the snow settles around us, your first instinct may be to hibernate until spring. But, get up off the couch, put down the remote, and discover the real potential of Winnipeg's winter by joining us at the 2nd annual "Snow Trek - winter *in motion* ". It promises to be *THREE fun-filled Sunday afternoons* for the whole family (all ages) to get outside for some cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, tobogganing, winter walking and outdoor winter play. You are encouraged to come out to *any* & *all* of the Snow Trek 2011 dates & locations. *No Experience, No Problem!* We are offering FREE cross-country ski instruction. *No Equipment, No Problem!* We will have a limited supply of FREE cross-country skis & snowshoes for you to use (ID required) at all four locations. *Too Young, Too Old!* No such thing...Everybody Welcome! *What*: Snow Trek – 2nd Annual Winter *in motion* *When & Where: * *1st Sunday - January 16, 2011* Assiniboine Park Duck Pond Fort Whyte Alive (1961 McCreary Rd) *2nd Sunday - January 23rd, 2011* Windsor Park Nordic Centre (10 Des Meurons St.) *3rd Sunday - February 13th, 2011* Living Prairie Museum (2795 Ness Ave.) *Time:* 12:00 - 4:00pm (at all four locations) *Who:* All Welcome! *Cost:* FREE! For more information and a detailed schedule, be sure to check out http://www.winnipeginmotion.ca/snow_trek_2011/ or call Winnipeg *in motion*at 940-3648. See you on the trails! 2011 Snow Trek – 2nd Annual winter *in motion* is a community event put on by many community partners - Thank you! ********************* ** Sign-up to receive Winnipeg in motion email updates http://www.winnipeginmotion.ca/signup/ ** ------------------------------------------------------------- Deanna Betteridge, BESS, M.Sc. *in motion* Coordinator 2 - 189 Evanson St. Winnipeg, Manitoba R3G 0N9 204-940-3264 (w) 204-232-3297 (c) 204-940-8409 (f) E-mail: dbetteridge(a)wrha.mb.ca Web site: www.winnipeginmotion.ca This email and/or any documents in this transmission is intended for the addressee(s) only and may contain legally privileged or confidential information. Any unauthorized use, disclosure, distribution, copying or dissemination is strictly prohibited. If you receive this transmission in error, please notify the sender immediately and return the original. Ce courriel et tout document dans cette transmission est destiné à la personne ou aux personnes à qui il est adressé. Il peut contenir des informations privilégiées ou confidentielles. Toute utilisation, divulgation, distribution, copie, ou diffusion non autorisée est strictement défendue. Si vous n'êtes pas le destinataire de ce message, veuillez en informer l'expéditeur immédiatement et lui remettre l'original. -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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[At-network] TDM & Special Events webinar: Wed., Jan 12th, Noon-1 pm, EcoCentre
by Beth McKechnie 05 Jan '11

05 Jan '11

Green Action Centre will be hosting the following ecoMOBILITY (Transport Canada) webinar on Special Events & TDM (Transportation Demand Management) on Wed, Jan. 12th. If you would like to join us, please let me know at * beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca*. Hope you can join us! cheers, Beth 925-3772 ------------------------------ Webinar: * Special Events & TDM *Date: *Wednesday, Jan. 12, Noon to 1:00 p.m. CST * Location: *EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, third floor* (enter via elevator inside front doors of MEC) Sporting events, concerts, town celebrations…they all involve a lot of people trying to get to the same place at the same time. How can you sustainably plan transportation for these types of events? How can you convince attendees to walk, cycle, or take public transit to special events instead of using their cars? In order to manage dramatically increased transportation demand during the 2010 Olympic Games, TransLink (Metro Vancouver's regional transportation authority) and its partners set the ambitious goal of reducing vehicle use by at least 30% during the Games. In this ecoMOBILITY webinar, JoAnn Woodhall from TransLink will speak about the highly successful measures put in place to not only transport Olympic spectators, volunteers, and staff, but also to provide local commuters and businesses with travel options that would keep commuters, customers, and goods moving during the Games. She will also discuss the monitoring and measurement of these initiatives, and how the quantitative data TransLink obtained is helping to prove the value of transportation demand management in Vancouver. -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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WFP: $18-M remake for Osborne Bridge - Focus on cyclists, peds, art (Dec.17'10)
by Beth McKechnie 17 Dec '10

17 Dec '10

{Winnipeg Free Press] $18-M remake for Osborne Bridge Focus on cyclists, pedestrians, art By: Geoff Kirbyson A newly rehabilitated Osborne Bridge will have separate spaces for cyclists and pedestrians, as well as an artistic component to fit in with the eclectic neighbourhood, according to plans unveiled Thursday evening. A smattering of area residents and users of one of the city's busiest bridges discovered active transportation will be the central theme of a planned $18-million renovation. Construction, which is scheduled to begin in April, will feature one three-metre-wide walkway and two two-metre-wide bike paths. [image: The Osborne Bridge, shown in artist’s conception.] Enlarge Image <http://media.winnipegfreepress.com/images/artistosborne.jpg> The Osborne Bridge, shown in artist’s conception. To accommodate these features, the bridge will be widened by about five feet by extending the overhangs and replacing the existing wide median with a narrower barrier. Matt Chislett, bridge projects engineer for the city's public works department, said the city decided against a joint pedestrian-cycling lane. "We have a high percentage of people in the area with vision impairment or who use seeing-eye dogs and we didn't want them sharing space with cyclists," he said at an information open house at Holy Rosary Church. Chislett said making the bridge safer for people on foot has been a concern since a vehicle jumped the curb and killed a pedestrian in the late 1980s. He said the renovation will prolong the lifespan of the bridge for another 75 years. The Osborne Bridge was built in 1975. Replacing the bridge would cost about $25 million, he said. Chislett said he and his team will take the most recent public feedback and potentially "tweak" bridge plans. The current schedule calls for the east side of the bridge to be closed in April, with construction finishing up in October. The following spring, the same thing will happen to the west side. During both construction periods, traffic flows in both directions will be restricted to a total of three lanes, he said. "It's going to be a snarl," he said, noting 40,000 vehicles cross the bridge every day. Most of the time, two lanes will head south, with one going north. During morning rush hours, however, it will be reconfigured with two lanes heading north. Chislett said an artist has been hired to incorporate art into the bridge's design, such as the handrails or at the end of the bridge. "We want to make it an esthetically pleasing bridge to fit the neighbourhood," he said. About 60 people came through the open house during the first three of four hours Thursday night. Gerald, whose family operates a business in the area and who asked that his last name not be published, said he appreciated the chance to voice his opinions on the project design. He said he was confident it would not result in the public relations disaster that accompanied last fall's introduction of traffic circles in several neighbourhoods. He said he believes the bigger problem is traffic flow in Osborne Village, used by people from other neighbourhoods simply passing through on their way home from downtown. "I think they should tunnel under the Osborne overpass and come up under the river by the (Legislative Building)," he said. geoff.kirbyson(a)freepress.mb.ca -- *Beth McKechnie* | Workplace Commuter Options <http://greenactioncentre.ca/>Green Action Centre<http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3772 | Find us here<http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> Green Action Centre is your non-profit hub for greener living. Support our work by becoming a member<http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/memberships/>

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Employment opportunities with Green Action Centre - December 2010
by Beth McKechnie 08 Dec '10

08 Dec '10

***PLEASE POST WIDELY - apologies for cross-posting*** * * *GREEN ACTION CENTRE* EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY; two positions available December 3, 2010 ------------------------------------------------------------- *Active and Safe Routes to School Program Intern* ------------------------------------------------------------- *Application deadline:** *Monday, December 13 2010** *Start date:** *Thursday, January 6 2011 *End date: *Friday, March 18 2011 * * These positions being funded through the YMCA’s Post-Secondary Graduate Youth Eco Internship Program (PSYEIP) with funding provided by the Government of Canada. This program places unemployed youth aged 15 to 30 from diverse backgrounds into paid internship opportunities within the private, non-profit, public, and charitable service sectors in Canada with a focus on the environment and community*. Applicants must meet ALL eligibility criteria for the program in order to be considered:* - between 15 and 30 years of age (inclusive) at the time of placement; - not receiving Employment Insurance benefit; - a graduate of a post-secondary education program; - be unemployed; or underemployed (working 20 hours or less on a regular basis); or working in a job that does not match your area of educational study; - out of school; - a Canadian citizen, permanent resident, or person on whom refugee status has been conferred; - legally entitled to work according to the relevant provincial/territorial legislation and regulations; - have a social insurance number; - be willing to complete a Police Records Check. *Note: Youth who previously participated in the Youth Eco Internship Program will not be considered* * * Green Action Centre is a non-profit, charitable community organization currently seeking *two program interns* for our Active and Safe Routes to School (ASRTS) program. The interns will actively encourage walking and cycling as healthy alternatives for getting kids to and from school by working closely with teachers, parents, school staff and students at selected Manitoba elementary schools. The interns will be involved in the lead up to Clean Air Day in June, and the coordination of a regional meeting of Active and Safe Routes to School practitioners in Manitoba. The interns will work closely with the Active and Safe Routes to School Program Team on the planning and delivery of events, and will act as supports for other areas of the program including policy development, in-class workshops and education, best routes to school mapping, report writing, fundraising and materials development. *RESPONSIBILITIES* * * · Promotes elementary school participation in the annual Clean Air Day Walk to School (June) · Assists with the administration and coordination of the poster contest linked to Clean Air Day · Communicates with schools to encourage environmentally friendly travel year-round through surveys, telephone conversations and site visits as well as ASRTS program components such as the Walking School Bus, Walking Wednesdays Club and Neighbourhood Walkabouts · Maintains a database and contact list of participating schools and community partners · Researches, prepares and distributes kit materials such as fact sheets, checklists, surveys, brochures, posters, and resources · Monitors project-related expenses · Writes reports and assists in preparing proposals and applications · Assists with website development through the Green Action Centre content-managed system – writing updates and blog posts related to Active and Safe Routes to School-related items. · Compiles, publishes and distributes the quarterly Active and Safe Routes to School newsletter *“Off on the Right Foot”* · Assists with the coordination of a regional training event for Active and Safe Routes to School practitioners in Manitoba (involving invitations, managing registrations, preparing materials, taking minutes and assisting with follow-up reporting). *QUALIFICATIONS* Must be self-motivated, reliable and able to work collaboratively and individually. *Must meet the requirements of the Post-Secondary Youth Eco-Internship Program administered through the YMCA.* *Key qualifications include:* · Self-initiator with excellent interpersonal and time management skills · Professional writing, editing, research and communication skills · Commitment to work in a collaborative setting to achieve common goals · Experience in organizing events and workshops · Background in areas such as communications / social marketing / community development / environmental or health education / urban planning, GIS, social change / non-profit project work · Familiar with Community Based Social Marketing concepts (see www.cbsm.com) · Ability to handle multiple tasks in a brisk work environment with a flexible schedule · Knowledge of internet-based communication and research tools · Experience in organizing promotional events, and creativity in developing advertising and media campaigns · Experience in proposal and report writing · Ease in giving public presentations and speaking with media · Demonstrated commitment to the goals of ecological sustainability and sustainable transportation · Understanding of urban transportation, planning and environmental issues · Experience working with teachers, parents, administration and staff in an elementary school setting an asset · Experience with GIS or other mapping software an asset *ABOUT THE POSITION* * Direct applications by Monday, December 13 2010 to:* ASRTS Hiring Committee Green Action Centre 303 Portage Avenue, 3rd Floor, Winnipeg, Manitoba R3B 2B4 E-mail: asrts(a)greenactioncentre.ca *Green Action Centre*: Green Action Centre is a non-profit, non-governmental organization directed by an elected community Board. Green Action Centre’s mission is to promote ecological sustainability through environmental education and the development of sustainable alternatives to unsustainable current practices. Further information about Green Action Centre projects and activities is available on our web site www.greenactioncentre.ca. -- *Jackie Avent* Active and Safe Routes to School Green Action Centre 204.925.3773 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a non-profit organization. Please consider making a donation. *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage Avenue at Donald Street; Take the elevator to the third floor of the MEC building) Winnipeg transit stops and bicycle racks are located in front of MEC

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Bike Boxes webinar - Wed, Dec. 15, 2-3 pm, EcoCentre
by Beth McKechnie 01 Dec '10

01 Dec '10

Green Action Centre will be hosting the following APBP (Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals) webinar on "Bike Boxes" on Wed, Dec. 15th. If you would like to join us, please let me know at * beth(a)greenactioncentre.ca*. See you then! -thanks, Beth (925-3772) ------------------------------ Webinar: * Bike Boxes *Date: *Wednesday, Dec. 15, 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. CST * Location: *EcoCentre boardroom, 303 Portage Ave, third floor* (enter via elevator inside front doors of MEC) The webinar will have two main sections: - The evolution of bike box design, citing examples in the UK and northern Europe, and including a discussion of details such as coordinating traffic signals, signal phasing, and cost/durability of different materials. - A presentation about Portland, Oregon’s, study of how bike boxes perform for motorists and bicyclists at ten locations. Although there are bike boxes in a number of U.S. cities now, Portland has probably done the most experimentation and evaluation. *Presenters: * Webinar presenters will be Christopher Monsere, Assistant Professor at Portland State University, and Tom Bertulis, formerly of the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy, and now a doctoral student at Northeastern University. Hope you can join us! -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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City of Winnipeg transportation survey
by Beth McKechnie 30 Nov '10

30 Nov '10

In case you hadn't heard, the City of Winnipeg is in the process of developing a Transportation Master Plan. You can find information presented at a recent Open House along with a link to a survey on the future of transportation in Winnipeg here: http://transportation.speakupwinnipeg.com/ If you want to go straight to the survey, see: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/winnipegtmp The feedback received from the survey will help inform the plan, so it's definitely worth taking a few minutes to complete. cheers, Beth -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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Nova Scotia looking to pass one-metre rule
by Beth McKechnie 30 Nov '10

30 Nov '10

Nova Scotia is looking to be the first in Canada to "*require drivers to leave one meter of open space between the vehicle and bicyclist when passing *". Other proposed amendments to their Motor Vehicle Act include to: - define 'cyclist' and 'bicycle lane' - prohibit vehicle parking in a bicycle lane - make it an offence to fail to yield to a cyclist in a bicycle lane - redefine cycling on the extreme right - allow drivers of vehicles to cross a centre line to pass a bicycle, if the driver can do so safely - require cyclists to ride single file and in the same direction of the traffic Full details: http://spacingatlantic.ca/2010/11/18/keep-those-wheels-turning-cycling-ackn… -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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Fwd: Active Transportation - Canada: November 30, 2010
by Beth McKechnie 30 Nov '10

30 Nov '10

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Haynes <activetransportation(a)rogers.com> Date: Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 10:49 AM Subject: Active Transportation - Canada: November 30, 2010 Dear Listserv Members: Thirty-five (35) new items have been posted on the Active Transportation-Canada Website during the month of November. A complete list of titles may be found in the "Blog Archive" box, located on the right margin of the Website. some highlights include: - 2011 World Record Walk<http://www.avivacommunityfund.org/ideas/acf9723> - Toronto Coalition for Active Transportation Papers<http://torontocat.ca/main/> - Ted Talks - James H Kunstler dissects suburbia<http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/james_howard_kunstler_dissects_suburbia.h…> - Reality vs. Myth: The "dangers" of Dutch cycle paths<http://hembrow.blogspot.com/2010/11/reality-vs-myth-dangers-of-dutch-cycle.…> - Vancouver selected as the host of the Velo-city Global 2012 conference<http://www.velo-city2012.com/> Active Transportation Canada URL: http://activetransportation-canada.blogspot.com A "Search" function is available on the site. You will find this at the bottom of the page. With nearly 1,00 items posted on Active Transportation - Canada, there are links available to dozens of studies and hundreds of news items from communities across Canada and the world. If anyone has a problem reading this message, please let me know. I welcome suggestions for posts, so if you have news items featuring your community, please share them with the more than 500 subscribers to Active Transportation-Canada. Thank you. Michael Haynes Director TransActive Solutions -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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WFP: City bike routes going on Google next week (Nov.23'10)
by Beth McKechnie 23 Nov '10

23 Nov '10

City bike routes going on Google next week By: Adam Wazny The snow and ice suggest otherwise, but life for the Winnipeg cyclist just became a little easier. In an announcement at the Sustainable Mobility Conference in Ottawa Monday, Internet search engine giant Google has added Winnipeg to its list of Canadian cities that will have bike routes available online for those looking for the best path to take on two wheels. With Google Bike Directions, scheduled to be added to Google Maps during the next week, users can pore over city-fed bike maps using the popular web atlas to chart a course for their daily commute. Comprehensive maps of various bike routes and paths are already available on the city's website, but Winnipeg Trails Association director Janice Lukes was thrilled to find out Google has added the city to its new mapping feature. "We have all this new infrastructure and many people don't know where it is," she said. "This will encourage those who are looking to get out on the weekends or do a little riding after work." What has the cycling community excited about the Google Maps addition is the reach it will have to those contemplating ditching their vehicle for a bike. Jeff Martin, owner of Alter Ego Sports, feels the undecided might finally decide to switch to a two-wheeler permanently, thanks to Google Maps. Not every trail or dedicated bike lane is visible from behind the wheel, he notes, so not everyone is up to speed with the layout of the city's active transportation framework. "For the serious cyclist, they're going to ride their bikes regardless," he said. "But for the inexperienced rider, this will show them they can get from point A to point B in a safe way, especially for winter riding." Google Bike Directions works like this: A click on the bicycle icon shows a dark green line indicating a bike-only path. A lighter green line signals a dedicated bike lane and a dotted line shows a city street that doesn't have a dedicated bike lane, but could still be suitable for riding. The city planned to spend $20.4 million dollars on 36 bike-and-pedestrian projects under a federal stimulus program this year. Cold weather cut six of those projects short, with completion scheduled for 2011. Ottawa, Toronto, Edmonton, Vancouver, Calgary, Gatineau and Waterloo are the other Canadian cities involved in Google's announcement. Bike-trail data for U.S. markets was added to Google Maps earlier this year. adam.wazny(a)freepress.mb.ca -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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G&M: Sidewalk experiments drive new ideas about urban public space
by Beth McKechnie 19 Nov '10

19 Nov '10

[Great article in the Globe & Mail about sidewalks and a whole "new era of sidewalk sociology". -cheers, Beth] *Full article with photos & videos:* http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/americas/lane-storming-cities-dri… Sidewalk experiments drive new ideas about urban public space SIRI AGRELL From Thursday's Globe and Mail Published Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2010 8:10PM EST A line has been drawn in the battle over city streets. On a busy Manhattan morning this spring, a comedy troupe drew a chalk divide down the edge of Fifth Avenue, creating one lane for “tourists” and another for “New Yorkers.” It was just a joke, but the news quickly spread around the world and inspired copycat initiatives. The changing look of city sidewalks >From Lebanon to Calgary, the humble pavement has recently emerged as new frontier in urban warfare. It is a way for cities to demonstrate their personality and environmental cred, and take sides in the war between driver and pedestrian. But it is not, as San Francisco has forcefully pointed out with a ballot initiative approved earlier this month, a place to sit down. “We’re truly at the launch of a new science of creating walkways,” said Dan Burden, an urban planner and the creator of the non-profit group Walkable Communities. “They do a lot more work than just move people from place to place. We’re starting to see the sidewalk as a system that drives the successful social life of a street.” The popularity of the New York experiment was a signal that citizens are ready for bold thinking when it comes to urban design, he said, no longer content to cede the sidewalk to municipal authorities. In London and Toronto, business owners have paid out of pocket to make their sidewalks more attractive and easier to navigate by funding a sidewalk redesign and enforcing an invisible “shopper’s lane.” In a response to citizen complaints, Montreal is taking steps to make sure sidewalks are quickly cleared of snow while Lebanon is trying to keep them free of cars. Concrete, too, is losing favour, being replaced with recycled tiers, tamped earth and fine grain materials that come in a variety of colours. In the future, Mr. Burden predicts the “hardscape” of city sidewalks will be softened with materials like grasscrete, porous blocks that allow natural vegetation to work its way through. The sidewalk may end, but innovation has just begun. *MANHATTAN* *What:* In May, the comedy group Improv Everywhere spray painted a line down the middle of Fifth Avenue, demarcating lanes for “New Yorkers” and “tourists.” Fake department of transportation “employees” directed tourists to the left, telling them, “You can take pictures and go as slow as you want.” *Pros:* Pedestrians were also asked for their feedback on the initiative, and the response was overwhelmingly positive. Even Mayor Michael Bloomberg thought the idea was “cute.” *Cons:* For busy New Yorkers, the idea didn’t go far enough. As the Web site Gothamist suggested, “Now we just need a lane for strollers and people who text while walking, and we'll be all set.” *Lessons for other cities:* Anger over sidewalk slowpokes is no joke. *LONDON* *What*: Inspired by the New York experiment, a group of business owners in the city’s Oxford Street district introduced a “shoppers lane” along store fronts this fall, with employees encouraging tourists to stay out of the way of locals. They plan to lobby to have the lane officially incorporated into city tourist maps next year. *Pros:* With more than 200 million visitors a year, nearby residents “absolutely love the idea” of a shoppers lane, according to Jace Tyrell, spokesperson for the New West End Company, which represents 600 local business owners. *Cons:* The lane is not actually marked on the sidewalk, and is not officially sanctioned or enforced by city council. Instead, New West End is advertising the rogue idea on tourist maps and enforcing it with the help of Red Caps, a group of employees who provide information and directions on the street. *Lessons for other cities*: You don’t need a bylaw to change the way cities work. Even without official enforcement, Mr. Tyrell said the system is embedding itself in the public consciousness. “It’s like the escalator, where people stand to one side or the other depending on whether or not they’re walking,” he said. “We hope over time, this will become a behavioural thing and people will just do it naturally.” *PORTLAND, ORE.* *What: *Under the direction of the Office of Transportation, 13th Avenue was redesigned as a curbless street, where the sidewalk and roadway are one level but paved with different coloured materials. *Pros:* Popular in Scandinavia, curbless streets have been shown to actually change the way people drive through “psychological traffic slowing” making neighbourhoods more pedestrian friendly. *Cons:* Short vertical posts called bollards that mark the line between street and sidewalk have been blamed for damaging cars. *Lessons for other cities:* Studies have shown curbless streets slow traffic by an average of nine kilometres an hour. An analysis of five years of traffic statistics in one California town found that the only pedestrian injuries occurred on streets that did have curbs. *CALGARY* *What: *In October, the city started replacing asphalt sidewalks with recycled rubber tires, as part of a one-year pilot program. *Pros:* The material won’t crack, reduces storm runoff, absorbs sound and is more comfortable for runners. City transportation engineer Blanka Bracic said public feedback on the city’s blog and 311 line has been overwhelmingly positive. *Cons: *Some residents are worried that the product’s uneven surface will make snow removal difficult. *Lessons for other cities:* Unlike traditional asphalt, the rubber sidewalk does not require the roots of nearby trees to be excavated. Ms. Bracic said that cutting down trees to lay new sidewalk is a major source of citizen complaints. The material costs the same as concrete, but is also cheaper to maintain. *TORONTO* *What: *The recently completed Bloor Street Transformation Project. *Pros: *The project has widened and beautified the sidewalks using Quebec granite, mature trees, improved street furniture and manicured flowerbeds. *Cons:* The project took more than three years to complete, snarling traffic on a major city street. *Lessons for other cities:* Inspired by Chicago’s Magnificent Mile, the project was championed by the Bloor Street BIA, who contributed $20-million to the project. *LEBANON* *What: *Last month, various municipalities launched a crackdown on vehicles parked on sidewalks. *Pros: *The move is a response to growing chorus of complaints, many from the disabled and mothers with young children, noting that pedestrians are forced to walk on the road because of the popular practice of parking on sidewalks. *Cons:* Street vendors who deal food and other goods from their parking spots complain that their business is being ruined. *Lessons for other cities:* Previous efforts by Lebanese authorities to clear sidewalks of cars have failed due to the objections of merchants, who were given no alternative location from which to vend their wares. *SAN FRANCISCO* *What: *Proposition L, a city wide ordinance passed on Nov. 2 that bans people from sitting of lying on sidewalks between the hours of 7 a.m. and 11 p.m. Those caught breaking the law face fines, community-service sentences and even jail time. *Pros:* Dubbed the Sit/Lie ordinance, the idea was a response to a recent escalation of aggressive panhandling in the iconic Haight-Ashbury neighbourhood. Police can now take action against an individual without having to wait for a complaint from the public, according to Ted Loewenberg, president of the Haight Ashbury Improvement Association. “This gives police the ability to pay attention the kind of behaviours we’re worried about,” he said. *Cons: *Those opposed to Prop L say it unfairly targets the homeless. *Lessons for other cities: *The measure was passed through a ballot initiative included in the Nov. 2 election, and garnered the support of 55 per cent of voters. Mr. Loewenberg said city council had originally opposed the idea, which was proposed by chief of police. *MONTREAL* *What:* The city announced in early November that it will deploy quick reaction snow clearing brigades to specific pedestrian-packed sidewalks this year to keep downtown businesses moving. *Pros:* Main sidewalks in the busy downtown area of Ville Marie and the Plateau district will be completely cleared within 12 hours of a snowfall, with the city setting aside $262,000 for trucks and $150,000 for salaries to fund the rapid deployment teams. Michael Applebaum, the city executive committee member responsible for snow clearing, said the cost of leaving the sidewalks clogged is much higher, as it puts a freeze on tourism, restaurants and the retail business. “We’re a winter city. Our priority has to be to make sure people can get around,” he said. “We can’t stall the economy.” *Cons: *The city wants to have a strict 24-hour deadline for snow removal in place throughout the city by 2014, but they can’t enforce the deadlines until their contracts with private snow removal companies come up for renegotiation. *Lessons for other cities: *Mr. Applebaum, who is also borough mayor of Côte des Neiges-Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, says technology has dramatically shortened citizen’s patience with city services.**Because they can report city issues on cellphones and via e-mail, they expect an immediate response, even when it comes to fighting Mother Nature.

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Planning, transport and health inequalities
by Mike Tutthill 15 Nov '10

15 Nov '10

Planning, transport and health inequalities This British website presents case studies of what can be achieved when places utilise planning and transport to tackle the social determinants of health. But they also highlight the limits of what these environment-focused professions can do. The website is regularly updated as shown by the two most recent cases studies presented: The London Borough of Waltham Forest and the Stoke-on-Trent City Council http://www.idea.gov.uk/idk/core/page.do?pageId=23261408 Mike Tutthill Information & Access Coordinator HEALTH in COMMON 100-6 Donald Street Winnipeg, MB R3L 0K6 tel: 204.949.2002 1.800.731.1792 fax: 204.284.2404 email: <mailto:mtutthill@healthincommon.ca> mtutthill(a)healthincommon.ca web: <http://www.healthincommon.ca> www.healthincommon.ca +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ December E-Newsletter deadline is November 19. <http://www.facebook.com/pages/Health-in-Common/120069149875> Health in Common on Facebook * Please consider the environment before printing this email. Coming to Health in Common? By bicycle: Bicycle parking is located behind the building. By Winnipeg transit: Routes 62, 65, 66, 68, 70 By car: Two visitor parking spaces are available at the back of the building. Street parking (restrictions): Bell Avenue (1hr 9h00 - 17h30), Clarke Street (none); Lewis (none); Cauchon (none); River (none west of Clarke).

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Women Cycling Survey report
by Beth McKechnie 09 Nov '10

09 Nov '10

The Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals (APBP) is a non-profit organization committed to increasing bicycling and walking as modes of transportation in the U.S. In the spring of 2010, APBP conducted an online questionnaire to investigate the factors that would induce women to bicycle more for transportation. The final report can be downloaded at: http://www.trb.org/PedestriansAndBicyclists/Blurbs/Womens_Cycling_Survey_An… Here's the summary: Cycling behavior appears to be influenced by size of community. While women from the suburbs and rural areas were less likely to use their bicycles for daily trips, they cycled longer distances (over 60 miles) than women from other communities. Rural and suburban women also constituted the highest percentage of respondents to report “always” wearing a helmet. Finally, *women from large cities were most receptive to the addition of bike lanes as a means to start/increase their cycling*. As a result, interventions to increase women’s cycling must take into account the areas in which women live. Despite the difference in cycling behaviors due to community size, safety and infrastructure concerns were prevalent in nearly all subgroups. The operation of motorized vehicles, (especially distracted driving) dominate women’s safety concerns about cycling. Furthermore, infrastructure change, particularly the addition of more bike lanes, appears to be a primary factor for increasing women’s cycling. Though these findings warrant additional qualitative research, it is likely that intervention planning to promote cycling as a form of daily transportation needs to address the issues of distracted driving and the addition of more bike lanes. -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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Open House - Winnipeg Transportation Master Plan, Nov 13, 10-3
by Beth McKechnie 08 Nov '10

08 Nov '10

*Please note the upcoming Open House taking place Saturday, November 13, at the Convention Centre:* Source: http://www.speakupwinnipeg.com/ Winnipeggers are invited to meet with City of Winnipeg Staff and share their ideas and views regarding three important City initiatives: - *The City of Winnipeg’s Transportation Master Plan* - The City’s Parks, Places and Open Spaces Strategy - A Sustainable Winnipeg: Measurement and Accountability - Call to Action update Whether you are stopping by as part of your attendance at the concurrent SpeakUp on Garbage Expo, or just taking a few minutes in your day to stop by, we would be pleased to meet you and continue the conversation about the future of our city. - *10:00 am – 3:00 pm* - *Millennium Suite, Second Floor Winnipeg Convention Centre* cheers, Beth -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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Friendly reminder: Get Your Green On - Sat, Nov. 6 at The Academy
by Beth McKechnie 02 Nov '10

02 Nov '10

Come out and "Get Your Green On" this Saturday at The Academy in Osborne Village! When:* Saturday, November 6th, 8:00 pm *Venue:* The Academy (437 Stradbrook Ave** at Osborne)* * Tickets are only $10, available at:* - Mountain Equipment Co-op, 303 Portage Avenue. - Music Trader, 97 Osborne Street - McNally Robinson, 1120 Grant Avenue. - Green Action Centre, 303 Portage Ave - 3rd Floor Hope to see you there! (plus apologies for duplicate postings) Beth 925-3772 [image: Poster Nov 6'2010.jpg] -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation. *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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Grist: Are cyclists really a lawless bunch?
by Beth McKechnie 28 Oct '10

28 Oct '10

Interesting posting on how a NYC study is recommending the use of bike boxes to address a problem with cyclists and red light compliance. There's a link in the posting to the study and I've highlighted the particularly relevant paragraphs below. -cheers, Beth * * * * * In New York’s bike lanes, who are the real scofflaws?by Elly Blue October 25, 2010 http://www.grist.org/article/2010-10-25-in-new-yorks-bike-lanes-who-are-the… Those scofflaw bicyclists!" You hear that phrase a lot, or a version of it. It's true that, at least in New York City, there's probably a scofflaw in any given bike lane at any given time. But chances are high it's not the person on the bicycle. So observed the staff of Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer when he sent them out to 11 bike lanes <http://www.mbpo.org/release_details.asp?id=1681>in Manhattan to record every single traffic infraction occurring in the lanes. The unscientific results (download them here<http://www.mbpo.org/free_details.asp?id=225>) evoke a vivid, chaotic, and very New York streetscape. While reading it, you can almost hear the honking in the background. The report shows that 741 of the 1,700 total infractions recorded -- more than a third -- involved people walking or standing in a bike lane. On one block where this type of thing was particularly rampant, a collision was observed between a person on a bike and a person stepping into the bike lane. Of the infractions, 353 involved the bike lane being blocked outright. Most of these impediments were motor vehicles, some parked and others moving, fast. Of these, 18 percent were taxis and limos and 13 percent were publicly owned vehicles. Particularly of note in the report were a school bus that idled in one bike lane for seven minutes and examples of "unmarked Police vehicles in apparent non-emergency situations cutting through protected bike lanes." Additionally, there were 77 instances of someone opening a car door into the bike lane, causing a bicyclist to swerve into car traffic. Cyclists were observed riding in violation as well. Some 242 were seen going the wrong way in the lane (including one two-hour period at one block where there was more wrong-way than right-way traffic), and 237 were seen proceeding against a red light. None of this is surprising, given Manhattan's thriving pedestrian culture, high population, and density. People were spilling off of sidewalks and into car traffic long before bike lanes were a gleam in the city's eye, and likewise people were looking for creative places to park and shortcuts around traffic since traffic congestion was invented. People on bicycles, meanwhile, have simply been trying to get where they're going in one piece. There's a tendency to talk about people who ride bikes as though they're a lawless bunch of yahoos. This study is a breath of fresh air in showing that no, they are simply, like all other people, responding to an environment that doesn't always serve their needs. When you're driving, the extra space a bike lane offers is a matter of mobility and convenience; if you're riding a bike, it's a matter of being seen and staying alive. People run red lights on bikes not out of wanton disrespect for the world's moral order, but because when you're riding in a sea of cars occupied by people who probably don't notice or care about your existence, you're much safer getting as far ahead as possible. *So it's a relief to hear that the study's policy recommendation to address red-light compliance is not enforcement or even education but installing more bike boxes<http://www.streetsblog.org/2008/06/27/streetfilms-return-of-bike-box/>. A bike box -- basically a space between the stop line for cars and the crosswalk where someone on a bike can wait for the light to change in a more visible position -- provides a safer and more comfortable alternative to running the light, rather than penalizing or reforming behavior that's already motivated by safety.* *(In the meantime, the New York Police Department has announced a campaign to crack down <http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/22/nyregion/22bike.html?_r=1>on cyclists who run lights and ride on the sidewalk.) * *Other recommendations in the study are worth reading. They include dedicating an enforcement patrol to keep the bike lanes free for bikes to use (currently this is done by clowns<http://www.streetfilms.org/clowns-liberate-bike-lanes/>); better parking management so that delivery vehicles always have reserved spaces; more signage; an awareness campaign for taxi users; and more bike lanes that are physically separated from traffic.* New York City's push for bicycle infrastructure in the last two years is bold, comparatively speaking. But New York, and other cities with similar ambitions to increase cycling mode share, need to think beyond bike lanes. Narrow strips of pavement wedged in as an afterthought onto streets that are still very much designed and operated for the convenience of motor vehicle traffic will never do anything but continue to marginalize (and, in the eyes of the public, criminalize) people who use them. Imagine what might happen if people riding bikes and walking were extended the same engineering courtesies that have created an environment where anyone can drive a car through the city and expect to survive. The equation needs to be reversed. Only when people have enough space to walk and bike around the city in safety and comfort should consideration be given to the free flow of private automobiles driven in from wealthy suburbs<http://www.streetsblog.org/2006/12/08/where-do-manhattan-auto-commuters-com…> . The Manhattan Borough president's call to "respect the lane, clear the path" is a compelling one that needs to be heard by every person idling, driving, walking, or riding the wrong way in the bike lane. But most of all, it needs to be heard by people at work deciding the future of the city's streets. Elly Blue is a bicycle activist living in Portland, Oregon. -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation <https://www.canadahelps.org/DonationDetails.aspx?cookieCheck=true> . *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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Get Your Green On - Sat, Nov. 6 at The Academy
by Beth McKechnie 22 Oct '10

22 Oct '10

[Apologies for duplicate postings] * "Get your Green On" at Green Action Centre's fundraiser/party! * Enjoy great music, hands-on activities, and lots of green fun! (You may have met us before as Resource Conservation Manitoba.) Take in performances by the melodic Keri Latimer of Juno Award winning group Nathan, and Winnipeg’s latest dance-floor sensation LeBeato and DJ Cyclist. Mix your own green cleaning or personal care products, and pick from crafty and experiential packages in our locally-focused silent auction. Come out and bring your friends! *When: Saturday, November 6th, 8:00 pm Venue: The Academy (437 Stradbrook Ave** at Osborne)* * Tickets are only $10, available at:* - Mountain Equipment Co-op, 303 Portage Avenue. - Music Trader, 97 Osborne Street - McNally Robinson, 1120 Grant Avenue. - Green Action Centre, 303 Portage Ave - 3rd Floor Hope to see you there! [image: Poster Nov 6'2010.jpg] -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca

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Vancouver selected for major international cycling conference
by Beth McKechnie 21 Oct '10

21 Oct '10

City of Vancouver News Release Oct. 19, 2010 *Vancouver selected for major international cycling conference* Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson today thanked European Cycling Federation President Manfred Neun for selecting Vancouver as the host of the prestigious Velo-city Global 2012 conference, the first time the event has been held outside of Europe since 1996. “Velo-city will bring together hundreds of planners, transportation experts and cycling specialists from around the world to discuss the fast-growing role of cycling in urban transportation,” said Mayor Robertson. “We are very excited that the European Cycling Federation has selected Vancouver for its global conference in 2012. “Hosting a major international conference like Velo-city is a good boost for our local economy, and it’s a great opportunity to showcase Vancouver’s bike infrastructure to the world's leading transportation experts.” An estimated 1,000 conference delegates and their guests will attend the conference, which will be held in June 2012 at a Vancouver location yet to be selected. The Vancouver bid for the conference was prepared by the City of Vancouver, Tourism Vancouver, TransLink and the VeloWorks Cycling Society. “Cycling is already an important travel mode in Metro Vancouver, and TransLink has partnered with the City, the province and the federal government in major infrastructure upgrades to make it an even better option for more people,” said TransLink’s vice president of Customer and Public Engagement, Bob Paddon. “TransLink is pleased to support the 2012 Velo-city conference.’ “Bravo to the City of Vancouver, TransLink and VeloWorks for their efforts in bringing the 2010 Velo-City conference to Vancouver,” said Rick Antonson, president and CEO of Tourism Vancouver. “Not only will Velo-City generate business for the local tourism industry, it reinforces Vancouver’s reputation as a clean and green travel destination with exceptional offerings for cyclists.” *Media Contact* Corporate Communications 604.871.6336 media(a)vancouver.ca >From Jack Hans-Jurgen (Jack) E.H. Becker Velo-city Global 2012 Director President - VeloWorks Cycling Society 3303-1033 Marinaside Cr. Vancouver, B.C., V6Z 3A3 604-681-5744 becker(a)thirdwavecycling.com www.thirdwavecycling.com thirdwavecyclingblog.wordpress.com Skype: hjeh.becker

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Bicycle parking guide for Cdn municipalities and employers
by Beth McKechnie 20 Oct '10

20 Oct '10

In case you haven't seen it, Transport Canada's "Bicycle end-of-trip facilities guide for Canadian municipalities and employers" (April 2010) is available at: http://www.tc.gc.ca/media/documents/programs/betf.pdf -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation. *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Bike parking: Bike racks are located in front of MEC Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation. *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building Find your bus route with Winnipeg Transit's online trip planner Navigo<http://www.winnipegtransit.com/en/navigo>

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FW: News Release: Manitoba Helps Launch First-in-Canada, Year-Round Commuter Challenge
by Mike Tutthill 15 Oct '10

15 Oct '10

-----Original Message----- From: News Media Services [mailto:nmservices@leg.gov.mb.ca] Sent: Friday, October 15, 2010 12:19 PM To: mtutthill(a)healthincommon.ca Subject: News Release: Manitoba Helps Launch First-in-Canada, Year-Round Commuter Challenge Manitoba News Release ............................................................ October 15, 2010 MANITOBA HELPS LAUNCH FIRST-IN-CANADA, YEAR-ROUND COMMUTER CHALLENGE - - - Program Encourages Climate-friendly Transportation Every Day: Blaikie Manitobans demonstrated an outstanding commitment to environmentally friendly transportation, finishing at the top of this year's national Commuter Challenge, and now the program is being expanded to operate year-round in the province, Conservation Minister Bill Blaikie announced today. "Congratulations to all who participated in Commuter Challenge 2010," said Blaikie. "More than 8,000 Manitobans showed they can make a big difference by using active and sustainable transportation, resulting in cleaner air, healthier citizens and communities, and moving us another step toward reducing our collective carbon footprint." Manitobans logged more than 700,000 green kilometres earlier this year during the national Commuter Challenge. This action reduced greenhouse-gas emissions by about 200 tonnes, the equivalent of burning more than 60,000 litres of motor vehicle fuel. In addition, more than 9,000 students from 62 schools across Manitoba participated in the event. To encourage Manitobans to continue choosing active and climate-friendly transportation, the province is providing the Green Action Centre (formerly Resource Conservation Manitoba) with support to operate the Commuter Challenge year-round. The new program will provide participants with ongoing feedback on the benefits of climate-friendly commuting choices through the Green Action Centre's made-in-Manitoba, online tracking tool located at www.greenactioncentre.ca. A $100,000 contribution from the Manitoba Climate Change Action Fund, a component of the Sustainable Development Innovations Fund, will support a number of sustainable transportation programs including the year-round Commuter Challenge. "We invite all Manitobans to take part in the new Manitoba Year-round Commuter Challenge," said Randall McQuaker, executive director of the Green Action Centre. "We are pleased to partner with the province to expand the week-long national challenge to a year-round initiative here at home, a first in Canada." The year-round commuter challenge will encourage Manitobans to leave their vehicles at home and walk, cycle, take public transit, carpool or share rides instead of driving to work alone. - 30 - ==== UNSUBSCRIBE Instructions ==== You received this e-mail as a result of your voluntary subscription to the Government of Manitoba News Release List. You are currently subscribed to "Manitoba News" as: mtutthill(a)healthincommon.ca. To unsubscribe, go to http://www.gov.mb.ca/cgi-bin/press/release.pl click "here" and follow the directions or send a blank email to: mailto:leave-60500-68011.8ccad65256e5ab831f9181cccd08ab11@mailmanager.leg.go v.mb.ca

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Active Transportation - Canada: October 7, 2010
by Beth McKechnie 12 Oct '10

12 Oct '10

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Haynes <activetransportation(a)rogers.com> Date: Thu, Oct 7, 2010 at 7:57 PM Subject: Active Transportation - Canada: October 7, 2010 Twenty-five (25) new items have been posted on the Active Transportation-Canada Website today. A complete list of titles may be found in the "Blog Archive" box, located on the right margin of the Website. There are new studies, videos and Active Transportation news items from communities across Canada. Active Transportation Canada URL: http://activetransportation-canada.blogspot.com A "Search" function is available on the site. You will find this at the bottom of the page. With more than 900 items posted on Active Transportation - Canada, there are links available to dozens of studies and hundreds of news items from communities across Canada and the world. If anyone has a problem reading this message, please let me know. I welcome suggestions for posts, so if you have news items featuring your community, please share them with the more than 500 subscribers to Active Transportation-Canada. Thank you. Michael Haynes Director TransActive Solutions 613.424.2803 -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation. *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of MEC

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Grist: There's safety in numbers for cyclists
by Beth McKechnie 12 Oct '10

12 Oct '10

[Of course, reduced crash rates with increased numbers of cyclists would hold true here, too. You can find this article online at: http://www.grist.org/article/2010-10-11-theres-safety-in-numbers-for-cyclis…, Beth] How we roll There’s safety in numbers for cyclistsby Elly Blue In U.S. cities, there are a lot more people out bicycling than just a few years ago. You might reasonably think that the bicycle crash rate would skyrocket as more people, from wobbly new riders to the outright safety-averse, take to the streets on two wheels. It's a fine, common-sense assumption -- that happens to be wrong. Research has been steadily showing, actually, that the more people are out there riding bicycles, the safer bicycling becomes. As ridership goes up, crash rates stay flat. It's happening in Portland (see page 11 of this report<http://bikeportland.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/bikecount2009reportfinal…>[PDF]). It's happening in New York City<http://www.streetsblog.org/2009/06/05/safety-in-numbers-its-happening-in-ny…> . Much of the ridership increase is due to cities' investments in bicycle-specific infrastructure. But the efficacy of that infrastructure for safety is often questioned. And there's one theory -- based on a growing body of data -- that suggests that a few painted lines on the road, bike racks, and traffic lights form only part of the safety equation. And maybe a smaller part than we tend to assume. The phenomenon, dubbed "safety in numbers," was first identified in 2003, in an academic paper <http://www.cycle-helmets.com/safety_in_numbers2.pdf> by public health researcher Peter Jacobsen [PDF]. After being asked by officials in Pasadena, Calif., if their city "was a dangerous place to bicycle," Jacobsen began looking at crash data from various communities where bicycle ridership had fluctuated over time. What he found surprised him: The number of crashes involving bikes correlated with the number of riders in a community. As ridership fluctuated, so did the crash rate. More riders, fewer crashes; fewer riders, more crashes. This happened too abruptly, Jacobsen decided, to be caused by slow-moving factors like infrastructure development and cultural change. Bicycling becomes safer *when* the number of riders increases, he concluded, at least in part *because* the number of riders increases. The inverse happens, as well. One data set Jacobsen looked at covered 49 years of biking history in the United Kingdom. Those numbers showed that cycling became safer during the oil crisis of the 1970s, caused by the OPEC oil embargo. Once the crisis ended, both ridership and safety dropped. This all must sound terribly wonky. Actually, it's been revolutionary. The idea of Safety in Numbers has slowly built up steam in traffic safety circles since Jacobsen introduced it. Supporting data<http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/09/080903112034.htm>continues to quietly (and sometimes dramatically<http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=46B9E06D-FC8E-9007…>) roll in from around the world, influencing mainly traffic engineers and planners who are trying to figure out how to improve bicycle safety. Bicycle safety is often seen in a sort of vacuum. Helmets tend to dominate the conversation, with visibility -- lights and bright clothing -- taking a close second. More sophisticated conversations get deep into infrastructure: Which is better, sharrows, bike lanes, or separated cycle tracks? We discuss educating cyclists in defensive riding techniques and the rules of the road. These are all good and important efforts. The problem is what's missing. Here's the core of Jacobsen's analysis, from the 2003 "Safety in Numbers" report: Whose behavior changes, the motorist's or that of the people walking and bicycling? It seems unlikely that people walking or bicycling obey traffic laws more or defer to motorists more in societies or time periods with greater walking and bicycling. Indeed it seems less likely. ... Adaptation in motorist behavior seems more plausible. So why might this be the case? When there is a serious bicycle crash, it almost always involves someone driving a car. There are any number of ways drivers become involved in these crashes, primarily involving speed, turning, and the myriad distractions that are common behind the wheel. But when there are a lot of bicyclists on the road, according to this theory, drivers take notice. They become more attentive, slow down, pass more cautiously, double-check their blind spots, expect the unexpected. They sense that the road has become a more complicated place, and adjust their behavior accordingly. As a result, the road becomes safer, presumably for everyone. Safety in numbers is an important idea that has shifted the way planners and engineers think about bicycle safety. But it won't be the final word. We will doubtless see this idea bandied back and forth for some time, especially as academic interest in bicycling and walking increases. As data improves we'll likely see a more complex relationship emerge among ridership, safety, infrastructure, laws, and culture. Whatever the variables, as Jacobsen told me in a requisitely wonky email, "The bigger SIN story is that those cities /countries that have encouraged bicycling have been rewarded with more trips by bike, and not just a non-linear increase in injuries, but a decrease in injuries." That's huge. Safety in numbers will prove over time, I suspect, to be the first major theory based on objective data that can break down the double standard we all pedal under. Jacobsen's research calls into question the foundation of a system in which the convenience of driving is exalted above the basic safety and mobility of people walking and bicycling.

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ecoMOBILITY Webinar: Implementing Social Marketing
by Beth McKechnie 08 Oct '10

08 Oct '10

** Hello everyone: In case you are interested, the following FREE webinar on "Changing Transportation Behaviours: A Social Marketing Guide" takes place this coming Wednesday, October 13 from Noon-1pm CST. I'm hoping it will be of particular interest to Manitoba folks, as I will be presenting on the WinSmart Community-Based Travel Marketing pilot project that we ran in the Riverview/Lord Roberts/River Heights neighbourhoods from 2007-2009. That project resulted in increased numbers of trips made by cycling, walking and carpooling, and reduced numbers of trips made by driving alone for participating households. Hope you can join us (from the comfort of your own computer) next week. Details follow below -- please share with anyone else you think might be interested. cheers, Beth * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Transport Canada's ecoMOBILITY Program is pleased to invite you to a free bilingual webinar entitled "Implementing Social Marketing" to be held on Wednesday, October 13, 2010, from 1-2pm EST. This webinar will present "Changing Transportation Behaviours: A Social Marketing Planning Guide", a new guide designed to help TDM planners and other transportation practitioners implement effective social marketing campaigns. Please note that the presentation will not focus on the theory behind community-based social marketing (CBSM) but will rather address the practical application of CBSM. Following the presentation on the new guide, Beth McKechnie, Workplace TDM Coordinator from Resource Conservation Manitoba, will present the results from the social marketing aspects of Winnipeg's WinSmart Showcase, one of the projects funded by Transport Canada's Urban Transportation Showcase Program (UTSP). This project included a social marketing pilot, which was remarkably successful in bringing about modal shifts despite Winnipeg's harsh winter weather and entrenched car culture. Follow this link http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/tce to sign up for the webinar. Please feel free to forward this invitation to your colleagues. Best regards, The ecoMOBILITY team http://www.tc.gc.ca/ecomobility *************** Le programme écoMOBILITÉ de Transports Canada a le plaisir de vous inviter à un Webinaire (séminaire en ligne) gratuit et bilingue, intitulé «Mise en œuvre de marketing social» qui se tiendra le mercredi 13 Octobre 2010 de 13 à 14 h HNE. Ce webinaire présentera «Modification des habitudes de transport: guide de planification de marketing social», un nouveau guide conçu pour aider les planificateurs de la GDT et autres intervenants du milieu des transports à mettre en œuvre des campagnes efficaces de marketing social. Veuillez noter que la présentation ne sera pas axée sur la théorie du marketing social communautaire (MSC) mais plutôt sur l'application pratique du MSC. Suite à la présentation sur ce nouveau guide, Beth McKechnie, coordonnatrice de la GDT en milieu de travail chez «Resource Conservation Manitoba», présentera les résultats des aspects du marketing social de «WinSmart: la ville de Winnipeg», l'un des projets financés par le Programme de Démonstration en Transport Urbain (PDTU) de Transports Canada. Ce projet a inclu un projet pilote de marketing social, qui a été un succès remarquable dans la réalisation de transferts modaux, malgré les hivers peu cléments de Winnipeg et la culture bien établie d'usage des voitures. Suivez ce lien http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/tcf pour vous inscrire au webinaire. N'hésitez pas à transmettre cette invitation à vos collègues. Salutations, L'équipe écoMOBILITÉ http://www.tc.gc.ca/ecomobilite -- Beth McKechnie Workplace Commuter Options Green Action Centre 204.925.3772 www.greenactioncentre.ca Green Action Centre is a registered charity. Please consider making a donation. *Coming to the EcoCentre?* (3rd floor, 303 Portage at Donald, MEC bldg) Enter via the elevator just inside MEC's front doors Bike racks are located in front of the building

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