December Meeting Minutes

We had an awesome Omaha Bikes meeting yesterday.  Great turnout, great ideas, great things coming in 2011! 

Omaha Bikes

December Meeting Minutes

Tammie presented the “I Ride” campaign that EmSpace has put together for Douglas County/Live Well Omaha CPPW grant. The goals are to increase bike ridership and to educate on share the road issues. Local cyclists will be used as the “face” of the campaign, and it will begin rolling out soon. The campaign will feature messages in various form: posters, give aways, website, messages at the DMV, Safety Council traffic classes, etc., and will last for 18 months.

Committee Updates

Mark S: Holiday Handlebar Happy Hour will be held on December 28 at the Nebraska Brewing Company in Papillion. We have some space reserved, and all are welcome. The committee has decided to cancel HHH events until March. Cyclists will be surveyed to determine preferred locations/format; our Bike Friendly Destination locations will be featured when possible.

Sarah J: We are up to 19 Bike Friendly Destination locations with more on the radar screen! Sarah will work with Bob to get blog BFD info updated. The Road to Roubaix movie night fundraiser raised $109 for OB. The next Ladies & Gentlemen’s Cycling Club tweed ride will be December 19 around Lake Zorinsky. Mark & Becky Siepker are hosting; see the blog for details.

Bike DeLights was a huge success – perfect weather, and approximately 65 festive cyclists attended. (About double from last year!)

Tammie: The bike education committee has been meeting and honing a strategy to begin offering classes in 2011 that will be taught by our new LCI’s! The group is currently researching best practices from other communities (Columbia, MO, etc.) and will report more at the next meeting.

Matt: Advocacy…. Just got back from a personal trip to Washington DC, but took time to visit the LAB offices and some other folks on the Hill. Andy Clarke, Exec Director for the LAB will be in the Lincoln/Omaha area in February, and we’ll do what we can to get a meeting with him and OB.

Julie: Bike to the Ballpark planning for the CWS is coming along. The goal is to get a basic plan in place by January so that the info can be included in the publications & website. The group is working with Metro Transit, the city’s special events traffic consultant, OPD and others. We will need volunteers to help with bike corral duty during that time.

Sean Licari: A new kids mountain bike development club is being formed. There will be an opportunity for kids to just learn skills and ride for fun and also a track for more formal coaching/racing for those who would like to go that route. Sean will be the liaison between the group and Omaha Bikes. The next organizational meeting for this group will be January 7 at 6:30 at the Panera Bread at 132nd/West Maple.

Mike D.: The OPD pawn shop division is revamping their webpage to include information on stolen bikes: how to report, where to report, what to do, how to keep your bike safe. The Omaha Bikes website, OPD pawn division and Activate Omaha will now all point to each other for this so that there is a consistent source of information. The idea of registering bike serial numbers for people was also discussed. (Excellent work, Mike! Thank you!!)

Bob:  Discussions are in the process regarding the potential “merger” of Omaha Bikes and the Community Bike Project. The goal is to look at all of the cycling initiatives going on and see how we can best use our resources and funding opportunities to be as efficient as possible. Any thoughts/ideas/concerns about this idea can be sent to Bob.

The website committee has been meeting and is looking at a couple of options. More work coming in 2011.