My apologies... I have a ton of emails regarding a variety of subjects that say, "This is blog worthy!" And yet, no blog entries to match. :( So..... here goes the rapid fire summary!
MAT becomes Metro!This is mostly old news by now. The vague, secretive request we got from our friends at MAT to "rally the cycling troops" for a big press conference featuring Senator Nelson had us guessing what the big announcement might be ... and it was the rebranding of MAT to Metro, revamping the website, the additon of some new cleaner fuel burning busses to their fleet. We had a nice turn out, complete with a pre-ride cup 'o joe at Blue Line, that rolled over to the annoucement.
Curt Simon, Metro Executive Director, made a point of thanking the cycling community for attending and supporting them, saying that they can always count on the cyclists for support, and that they appreciated the partnership (or something to that affect). Senator Nelson remarked about the importance of various modes of transportation ... which gives cyclists a perfect opening when sending letters to him asking for support of cycling. After the event, I thanked Curt for his kind words, and he told me that he has been blown away by the usage of the bike racks on the busses, and could not be more pleased with how that is going.
Advocacy Alert!
Speaking of asking our congressional representatives to support cycling, we received an alert from the League of American Bicyclists this week, asking us to contact Lee Terry and ask him to support H.R. 4722, the Active Community Transportation Act. This would "provide long term concentrated funding to assist communities in implementing active transportation networks." The League website makes it really easy to send a customizable letter via email to our reps - check it out for yourself and send a note to Lee Terry!
Let's see, what else?? Oh! Under the category of "Stay tuned for big news," there will be an official annoucement coming very soon about the much anticipated arrival of the City's new Bicycle/Pedestrian Coordinator!! There will be a press conference involved, and clearly we would like as many cyclists as possible to attend. Count on a blog update/email blast when we know the details. We would also like to welcome our BPC to town with some Omaha Bikes hospitatlity by scheduling a meet and greet and doing anything else we can (some have even volunteered to help them move into their new house) to make them feel at home in their new city.
...and speaking of hospitality, the crew that showed up for the last Handlebar Happy Hour created a master schedule of dates and locations for the rest of the year. There will be a standing HHH on the 4th Tuesday of the month, and potentially other more spontaneous outings announced via the Facebook/Twitter route. We'll post the schedule next week. (We need a HHH logo! Someone take a stab at it and send it to us!)
Last but not least, there are a lot of other cool cycling-related things going on behind the scenes with Activate Omaha's participation with the Communities Putting Prevention to Work grant, a record-shattering season turned in for the Bike Omaha Commuter Challenge, Walk & Roll to School activities, LCI training, and so much more. It is an exciting time to get plugged into bike advocacy - join us!!
Let's see, what else?? Oh! Under the category of "Stay tuned for big news," there will be an official annoucement coming very soon about the much anticipated arrival of the City's new Bicycle/Pedestrian Coordinator!! There will be a press conference involved, and clearly we would like as many cyclists as possible to attend. Count on a blog update/email blast when we know the details. We would also like to welcome our BPC to town with some Omaha Bikes hospitatlity by scheduling a meet and greet and doing anything else we can (some have even volunteered to help them move into their new house) to make them feel at home in their new city.
...and speaking of hospitality, the crew that showed up for the last Handlebar Happy Hour created a master schedule of dates and locations for the rest of the year. There will be a standing HHH on the 4th Tuesday of the month, and potentially other more spontaneous outings announced via the Facebook/Twitter route. We'll post the schedule next week. (We need a HHH logo! Someone take a stab at it and send it to us!)
Last but not least, there are a lot of other cool cycling-related things going on behind the scenes with Activate Omaha's participation with the Communities Putting Prevention to Work grant, a record-shattering season turned in for the Bike Omaha Commuter Challenge, Walk & Roll to School activities, LCI training, and so much more. It is an exciting time to get plugged into bike advocacy - join us!!
1 comment:
This post mentions that AOJules has a bunch of blog-worthy stories from readers. As a reader, how might I submit a blog-worthy story? I ask because there seems to be no way to do so on the blog itself.
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