Category: Events

ATA calls for bill to boost transit funds by indexing the gas tax to inflation

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Active Transportation Alliance director Ron Burke at this morning’s event in Pritzker Park. Participants are holding Riders for Better Transit signs.

This morning Active Transportation Alliance held a press conference to announce that the advocacy group and its partners are introducing legislation in Springfield that would raise the state gas tax and index it to inflation. Under this initiative, called Transit Fast Forward, the tax hike would apply only in the six-county Chicago region, and the extra revenue would be used solely to increase funding to the CTA, Metra and Pace.

The new legislation, Senate Bill 3236, is sponsored by State Senator Martin Sandoval, a Democrat from Chicago. Active Trans estimates the hike in state gas taxes in Chicagoland would only be .4 cents per gallon in 2013, costing an average family an extra $4 for the year. But the result would be an estimated $11.6 million in new transit funding next year, and a whopping $168 million increase in funds over the next five years. Continue reading ATA calls for bill to boost transit funds by indexing the gas tax to inflation

Active Trans proposes a ciclovía on Milwaukee Ave. Will City Hall help out?

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Active Trans’ Open Streets Manager Julia Kim

Last week bike-friendly 1st Ward Alderman Proco “Joe” Moreno hosted an Active Transportation Alliance member social at the Fifty/50 bar in Ukrainian Village. In addition to presentations by other Active Trans staffers about the city’s Streets for Cycling initiative and bus rapid transit pilot, Julia Kim gave an update on this year’s plans for staging “ciclovia” car-free events.

As Grid Chicago readers know, the ciclovia (Spanish for “bike path”) movement started in Bogotá, Colombia, decades ago, with that city shutting down a network of roads to car traffic to allow citizens to stroll, jog, bike, dance and hang out, encouraging healthy recreation, social interaction and commerce. Nowadays Bogotá holds a ciclovia every weekend on a 70-mile network, drawing millions of participants. Continue reading Active Trans proposes a ciclovía on Milwaukee Ave. Will City Hall help out?

Grid Shots: Bike Winter Art Show edition

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Photo booth at the art show
The first three photos in this post are by John

Can you believe it’s 51°F right now? The snow from Thursday is still sitting in the shadowy places of alleys, but the sun and temperature is downright joyous.

The 15th annual Bike Winter Art Show kicked off at Gala Gallery (1000 N Milwaukee) on Friday night. Here’s my curated gallery of photos from the art show by John. I was busy that night at the UIC Urban Innovation Symposium, giving an “adapted” Pecha Kucha presentation about my Crash Browser project. There will be a party with a bike fashion show on March 9, 2012. Continue reading Grid Shots: Bike Winter Art Show edition

Bingo fundraiser for messenger championships is tonight

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Flyer for tonight’s event. 

The soon-to-be opened Comrade Cycles at 1908 W Chicago Ave is hosting a Bingo Night fundraiser tonight, Saturday, February 25, 2012, at 7 PM.

This event will feature bingo calling, prizes of all kinds, good music, Old Style beer, Upton’s tamales and a rousing good time. Additionally, all the money will benefit throwing the 20th annual CMWC. This year, Chicago will host the 20th cycle messenger world championship, a celebration of messengers and urban cyclists, coming to you August 3 – 5 at Soldier Field for both racing and spectating. Check out chicagocmwc.com for more information. Continue reading Bingo fundraiser for messenger championships is tonight

Local transit authorities Tracy Swartz and Greg Borzo celebrate the CTA

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Note Greg’s CTA map necktie. See more photos from the event.

Tuesday night I dropped by a meet-up for Active Transportation Alliance’s Riders for Better Transit campaign featuring Chicago writers Greg Borzo and Tracy Swartz at the Blue Frog, 22 E. Hubbard. Greg wrote the book The Chicago “L,” a very thorough history with lots of great archival photos. Greg also wrote the book Where to Bike Chicago, and contributed a chapter to the new anthology On Bicycles by Momentum magazine cofounder Amy Walker. Tracy writes the CTA-centric weekly column “Going Public” for RedEye. Since April 2009 she’s been riding a different CTA bus line every week, and in December she completed the last route, an impressive accomplishment.

Continue reading Local transit authorities Tracy Swartz and Greg Borzo celebrate the CTA

The Gapers Block Criterium Series encourages women to try bike racing

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Competitors in last year’s series race at Calumet Park. Photo by Amy Dykema.

As I’ve written before, racing is the aspect of bike culture that I know the least about, but I’m always up for leaning more. So when I heard that Half Acre Cycling (sponsored by one of my favorite local brews) and Gapers Block (one of my favorite local websites) are putting on the 2012 Gapers Block Criterium Series at Calumet Park, my ears pricked up. I was also interested to hear that this series of “crit” races (laps around a short course) is geared towards novices, especially women.

The series takes place Monday, March 26, through Thursday, March 29, starting at 6 pm each evening, with 30-minute men’s and women’s competitions. Calumet Park, a lovely lakeside green space at 9501 S. Ewing, is 12 miles south of the Loop, and the organizers are encouraging racers to pedal to the event – pretty cool, since most bike races tend to be roof-rack affairs. If you sign up in advance, you can compete on all four nights for only $50 for men, or a mere $25 for women.

To further entice the ladies to participate, there’s a special prize for the top Category 4 (beginner) female racer, a prize drawing for women who show up for all four nights, and a special post-race discussion for women on the first two nights. At these Q & A sessions, new racers can get advice and encouragement from seasoned female competitors. I called up Half Acre Cycling’s Vanessa Buccella yesterday to find out more about the female-friendly aspects of the series, and I also learned about Vanessa’s own path from commuter to messenger to racer.

Continue reading The Gapers Block Criterium Series encourages women to try bike racing