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Attached are links about bringing bikes on Amtrak trains, Metra suburban commuter trains, and CTA "L" trains. Students don’t need a car or truck to transport their bikes to/from their homes. Other commuter rail and rapid transit systems across the country have similar programs, but these are the ones specific to Illinois.
Amtrak
Metra
CTA "L"
See attached
Work Order (WO 10994256) created for Bike to Work Day event on Wednesday, September 14, 2022 from 7 - 10 am. for Public Functions to place Tables, Chairs, Recycling bins, Trash bins, Hand Sanitizing stations at the following locations:
Please set up at all these locations by 6:30 am on September 14, 2022. You can bring everything back after the event ends at 10 am (so by 10:15 you can start removing these). I am confirming the exact location for Research Park and Vet Med locations.
Following service request was converted to Work Order 10994257:
We are organizing Light the Night - free bike lights giveaway event on Thursday, September 15, 2022 from 4 - 7 pm. I want a work order for Public Functions to place tables, chairs, recycling, trash, and hand sanitizing stations at the following locations:
Delivery expected at the following locations by 3:15 p.m. and no later than 3:30 p.m. pick up at 7 p.m. (or 6:30 p.m. in case it rains)
You do not have to set-up the tables and chairs, the volunteers present will do that. In case of rain, please cover the tables and chair with tarp or something. For more details, please reach out to Sarthak Prasad at 217-904-5954
All, The student rush looms this week. We won’t nearly be able to meet demand for sale bikes, nor for helping with DIY repairs with our current staffing levels but we’ll soldier on. I’ve got a couple interviews lined up this week to help on that front and at least one bike donated over the weekend to help with our sales.
The numbers:
Visitors: 28
Sales: $1,742.50
Bikes (refurb): 5 for $1,080
Memberships: 9 for $270
Tires/tubes: 17 for $91
Thanks!
Jacob Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Coordinator
Phase 3 of the project was to inventory all the bicycles at Round Barn. With the help of Nathaniel Nevins and Sathish Ravipatti, Sarthak Prasad finished the inventory of all the impounded bicycles by August 15, 2022.
Sarthak Prasad spent nearly 50 hours during the tagging, confirming, and inventorying phases of this project.
All, We’re quickly approaching zero stock for refurbished bikes. One particularly eager patron bought two of our more expensive road bikes back-to-back last week. Thankfully, we received 3 bikes in very-good-to-great condition that should—fingers crossed—be on the sales floor for Wednesday.
We’re in the beginning stages of clearing out abandoned bikes. Approximately 200 will go to CBC/TBP so that’ll help our inventory. The abandoned bikes at the rack in front of the bike center were cut this morning, cleaning up and clearing space for folks to lock there. We’ll be better able to see if any donations have been left, as well.
The numbers:
Visitors: 21
Sales: $1,646.75
Bikes (refurb): 3 for $1,025
B-a-B: 1 for $50
Tires/tubes: 15 for $113
Thanks!
Jacob Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Coordinator
See attached
All, Two weeks back we received three nicer bikes as donations which have proven to be quick fixes. Visit numbers were surprisingly low on Wednesday but that gave us some time to catch up on the piles of wheels and bikes we needed to strip down for parts. Sunday was the Bike Project social ride. On Monday we had a Build-a-Bike completed—a decent hybrid is a great improvement over a too-small roadmaster!—and on Friday we had another member start a Build-a-Bike.
Got an interview for a new hire this week, the Bike Project Members’ Meeting tonight, and one more of the nicer bikes to fix up.
The numbers:
Visitors: 19
Sales: $800.50
Bikes (refurb): 1 for $170
Build-a-Bike: 1 for $50
Memberships: 8 for $240
Thanks!
Jacob Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Coordinator
Please see attached the ridership overview for the month of June and July 2022.
All the abandoned bicycles were impounded and transported to the Round Barns by Parking department by July 29, 2022. Parking would send the F&S TDM department an invoice for this project.
See attached
A temporary bike rack (4-looper) was installed in the Bike Cage at ECE on July 25, 2022! A 3-loop and 2-loop bike rack will be purchased in FY23 for ECE. When the new bike racks arrive, the 4-looper will be replaced with the 3- and 2-looper.
All, I was out Mon - Thurs last week sick. My staff covered admirably but, invariably, there are things they were uncomfortable taking on. Just an opportunity for further training! We had one Build-a-Bike be completed and another almost made it out the door at the last minute on Friday.
On Friday we had a visitor from Danville who is working on an Eagle Scout program rehabbing old bikes and donating them to local charities. We were able to donate 3 bikes and a handful of parts.
We also had a new hire start on Friday, received a handful of nice bike donations earlier in the week, and will process those donations this week. We’ll also work on getting a few more bikes on the sales floor as we approach August. Or maybe more accurately: AUGUST. It’ll be a doozy of a month.
On Sunday, July 31st, The Bike Project is hosting a community bike ride, so we’ll let folks know about that.
The numbers:
Visitors: 18*
Sales: $499
Bikes: 1 for $200
Build-a-Bike: 1 for $50
Memberships: 1 for $30
*Likely higher actual #; technical difficulties in my absence.
Thanks!
Jacob Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Coordinator
Illinois Newsroom article by Sydney Wood about "University of Illinois tags students’ bicycles with stickers for campus bike clean-up." Read the article attached or read it online at: https://illinoisnewsroom.org/the-university-of-illinois-tags-students-bi...
Bike at Illinois confirmed an allocation of $5,100 for Bike to Work Day and Light the Night events. Following is the breakdown:
University Housing also agreed to donate food and refreshment at all eight or night campus BTWD welcoming stations, in the amount of $1,500.
217Today broadcasted an interview about the removal of abandoned bicycles on campus as part of the campus clean up process. You can listen to the interview at the 2:10 minute mark in this episode.
Also, check out the Illinois Public Media WILL episode for July 15, 2022 here: https://will.illinois.edu/217today/episode/217-today-to-atone-for-racial...
See attached
All, Business as usual this last week. Still can’t keep enough bikes on the sales floor to meet demand but we have had an uptick in Build-a-Bikes. One B-a-B was finished on Friday and another started the same day.
This week we are helping out with a Safe Routes to School Bike Rodeo program by providing the basketball courts for their learn to ride course.
Thanks to Todd for putting a sizeable dent in our scrap pile, as we’ve been getting a lot of non-repairable bikes donated lately (unfortunately).
The numbers:
Visitors: 29
Sales: $862
Bikes (refurb): 2 for $235
Bikes (B-a-B): 1 for $50
Memberships: 6 for $180
Tires/tubes: 14 for $136
Thanks!
Jacob Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Coordinator
Any bicycle that still had the orange tag, were confirmed to be abandoned and marked in the ArcGIS Field Maps application. This phase was completed by end of June. Parking was asked to remove all the abandoned bicycles after the July 4th weekend. Parking started removing bicycles after July 9th.
