Beach bikes get new life in farm country

Kudos to the Sanibel Bicycle Club for implementing, for the second year in a row, a community-wide bicycle collection drive for families and children in the Immokalee community. Below is the March 2nd press release from the recipient organization, Redlands Christian Migrant Association. The story was also broadcast on NBC-2 News.

IMMOKALEE – Guadalupe Gonzalez, 4, steered her bicycle in circle after circle on the driveway of the Redlands Christian Migrant Association complex. And why not?

The pint-sized red and black Trek wasn’t new, but it was Guadalupe’s first bicycle. It even sported training wheels. Her mother smiled. “She’s happy,” she said in Spanish.

Guadalupe was among 130 people who benefited Wednesday from a unique community-to-community act of charity. Bicyclists from the affluent beach town of Sanibel Island brought a two-month collection of restored bicycles to the low-income farming hub of Immokalee. There, all bikes quickly dispersed.

RCMA, which operates childcare centers and a charter school in Immokalee, distributed many bicycles to families of the children it serves, and the rest to other local charities.

“This was really neat,” said Leslie Moguil, RCMA’s Associate Executive Director. “In Sanibel, people ride bikes for pleasure and fitness. But here, they’re an important tool of life. For people who can’t afford any form of transportation, a bicycle can be their car.”

The bicycle drive has become an annual event for the Sanibel Bicycle Club. This year, the club upgraded its preparations to include a temporary bicycle repair shop at Sanibel Congregational United Church of Christ. Billy Kirkland of Billy’s Bike Shop loaned one of his professional repair techs to the effort. Consequently, all bicycles arrived ready to ride.

Bicycle club members, most sporting yellow T-shirts, came to Immokalee with their truckloads of bicycles.

“We were just thrilled to see the faces,” said club member Patti Sousa, who coordinated the effort. “It’s just a warm feeling. We felt all our efforts were worth it.”

NBC-2 News: Tracking Tax Dollars: Making roads safe for bikes

While this story was posted on NBC-2 News on Jan 31, 2011, we just now discovered it.

LEE COUNTY: Florida ranks number one in the country for fatal bicycle crashes. The problem is so bad, communities are spending hundreds of thousands of tax dollars on plans to make the roads safe, but the NBC2 Investigators found little to nothing has been done. NBC2 Investigator Andy Pierrotti literally hit the road to get answers.

We share the same road, but when you're a cyclist pounding the pavement in Southwest Florida, don't expect to be respected by all drivers.

"I don't remember the actual impact itself," says Craig Hersch, who knows the risk first hand.

The Ft. Myers attorney and triathlon competitor nearly died after a driver hit him on Summerlin Road a few years ago.

"The problem is, is that a lot of our motorists unfortunately don't consider bicyclists to able to share the road, and some of them are outright hostile," Hersch said.

Florida has consistently ranked one of the top three deadliest states to ride a bicycle.

Southwest Florida saw 644 accidents from 2008 to June 2010. That's one accident every 34 hours. Seventeen bicyclists died.

To make it safer, the city of ft Myers purchased a design plan in 2006 to restructure the city's roads by adding more bike lanes and sidewalks. That plan cost taxpayers $278,742.

NBC2 discovered that as of 2011, only 13-percent of the plan has been implemented.

So, what's taking so long?

"It's funding. Funding is the issue," says Saaed Kazemi, the city's chief engineer.

He says the city planned to immediately start construction, but the recession hit, and it lost money.

Florida Bike Association's Dan Moser says the city's isn't the only one dragging its feet. He blames local counties and the state too.

"We have to get the Florida Department of Transportation to acknowledge that there's a problem, and they don't just dismiss it [by saying] oh, there's more people biking because the weather is nice," Moser said.

According to a January report by The News Service of Florida, Lauren Hallam, executive director of the Florida Bicycle Association, told a state senate transportation committee it should take a serious look at penalties for drivers who strike bicycle riders.

"Usually you like to be number one, but Florida unfortunately generally is number one in bicycle and pedestrian fatalities," she said. "When people get killed, we get very, very angry and we want to do something about it."

Hallam seemed to draw some sympathy from the committee chairman, Senator. Jack Latvala, though he later did not include any of her proposals in the list of bills likely to be taken up by his committee.

Last year, Lee County's Metropolitan Planning Organization spent $188,000 on a design plan to make streets safer for bikers. They hope to get grants to fund the projects.

Is your bike route safe? We've put together interactive maps of nearly all bicycle accidents in Southwest Florida over the past three years, broken down by county.

HOW BICYCLING WILL SAVE THE ECONOMY (IF WE LET IT)

Grist — A Beacon in the Smog
by Elly Blue
28 Feb 2011

"Imagine getting a $3,000 to $12,000 tax rebate this year. Now imagine it coming again and again. Every year it grows by around a thousand dollars. Imagine how this would change your daily life. Sounds like a teabagger's wet dream, but it's actually a conservative estimate of how much you'd save by ditching your car, or even just one of your cars -- and getting on a bicycle instead. Car-centric conditions don't always make it easy to choose the bicycle. Communities designed exclusively for motor vehicles impose a major financial penalty on those who are compelled to take on the expense of driving."

"But if you're one of those who lives in a bike-friendlier place, you'll be doing your local business community a good turn and padding Uncle Sam's pockets as well as your own if you trade four wheels for two. In the many North American cities where two-wheeled transportation is taking off, a new bicycle economy is emerging. It's amazing how much money can stay in your community when it isn't being pumped into the gas tank, big insurance, and the auto market. What will this new bicycle economy look like?..." To continue reading the article, click here.



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