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Parkland students may want to consider biking, as it affords them an opportunity to exercise and is an ecofriendly way of getting around. There are dangers associated with cycling though, and there are laws that must be followed to ensure your safety while cycling.
Link to the article: http://www.prospectusnews.com/2017/09/06/cyclists-have-same-rights-as-cars/
All, last week was a blur! According to our sign-in data, we had 277 visitors. That seems high but numbers don’t lie. We were pretty much all-stands-full within the first half an hour. Unfortunately that means some members have had to wait for stands to work on their build-a-bikes. Nothing we can do about that, unfortunately.
The numbers:
Sales (overall): $1,867.60
Bikes (refurbished): 1 for $180
Bikes (B-a-B): 1 for $46
Memberships: 26 for $780
Tires/tubes: 47 for $244
This week sees the beginning of the fix-a-flat class that Lily has shepherded into existence (Thanks, Lily!). I already have told people about that to much positive interest. There also is a community ride happening in the middle of the week that I will attend. I will also help with LTN preparations this week. A couple new student workers are starting this week, too, which will be good.
All, last week was—according to the visitor numbers—an unprecedentedly busy week. According to our tracker for visitors we had 239 people into the shop last week. I pored over the list of visitors and cut down two duplicate sign-ins from the original 241, but other than that the numbers bear out: we averaged about 50 sign-ins per day. Most must have been those looking for bikes and since we’re sold out, moved on quickly, because the shop never felt unbearably busy.
Sales: Overall: $1,865.70; refurbished bikes: 3 for $440; B-a-Bs: 3 for $199; memberships: 17 for $510; tires/tubes: for 31 for $147.
Yesterday was Quad Day. I think it went very well. We handed out bike registration flyers and successfully registered a few people’s bikes thanks to the iPad Lily brought. I will be interested to see how many people show up for registration stickers this week (hopefully a lot). Most people did not realize it was required to register your bike on campus.
On Friday, Lily, Scott (from Parking), Officer Briggs from UIPD and I had a meeting to discuss theft and removal of abandoned bikes on campus. We will have a follow up meeting at a TBD date to discuss ways to streamline removal of abandoned bikes without advertising that fact to thieves and the like as well as how to better educate students about bike registration and locking technique.
This week I will build bikes, have volunteers count and sort all the Light The Night light sets, and attend the TBP member meeting. I will brainstorm ways to expedite the registration sticker procurement process here at CBC, as last week we had a long line of people who didn’t understand (despite many announcements) that they could do the majority of the registration process on their phones beforehand.
Sincerely,
All, most notable thing last week: Everyone was very good about leaving in a timely manner. Two or three times the stands were empty and staff were cleaning up with a solid 10 minutes left for open hours. That was a pleasant surprise.
The bulk of the LTN lights arrived last week. I will have a volunteer this week get a tally on total units received. Todd, TBP volunteer, came and picked up scrap on short notice, which was very helpful.
Sales were good. Overall: $1,163.50; 2 refurbished bikes for $310; 3 B-a-Bs for $174; 6 memberships for $180; and 12 tires/tubes (used and new) for $131.
This week I will build bikes, work on organization, and did I mention building bikes? There has been a strong demand for them. And while I love selling bikes, the retention rate on B-a-Bs is getting better, I think. The majority still abandon them but there have been a considerable number of people who stick with it and express an enjoyment and interest in working on bikes because of it. That’s a win in my book.
This week I will also meet with Parking and UIPD about abandoned bikes on campus.
Sincerely,
Welcome to MTD's Fall 2017 Service Year
MTD’s 2017-18 service year began yesterday and new Maps & Schedules books are now available on our buses and at Illinois Terminal. Pick up yours today & let us know if you have any questions-just call 217.384.8188 or email us.
In addition to a few timetable and routing adjustments, our passengers and the public should be aware of several larger changes this year: MTD has moved to a Designated Stops system, Round Barn Road in Champaign is now the main transfer point for routes in west Champaign, and MCORE project work will continue to cause reroutes in and around Campustown.
School trips for Unit 4 and District 116 middle and high schoolers will begin this Wednesday, August 16, and just prior to University of Illinois classes beginning Monday, August 28, all summer service reductions will end on Friday, August 25.
See you soon on the bus, trail, sidewalk or at Illinois Terminal!
Introducing Designated Stops
MTD's Fall 2017 Service Year began on Sunday, August 13, 2017, the same day our new Maps & Schedules book went into effect.
One major change this fall is the introduction of system-wide designated stops. Several Open Houses were held to solicit input from the public, and MTD staff compiled and incorporated the comments into our planning process. A full list of designated stops locations and maps are available at cumtd.com in our "Documents" section under Designated Stops Fall 2017.
We're here to help you with this new system. To find or verify your nearest designated stop, give us a call at 217.384.8188 or send us an email.
State of the (Illini) Union
MCORE Project work in front of the Illini Union is progressing and reroutes are ongoing. Follow MTD on Facebook or Twitter for reroute information & updates, like this drone footage from Overhead Ag.
Illinois Terminal Expansion Announced
Developer Hans Grotelueschen’s major downtown Champaign project once sited at Washington and Walnut streets will move several blocks south and east to merge with a planned expansion of Illinois Terminal by the Champaign-Urbana Mass Transit District (MTD).
As part of a new vision for this development, Grotelueschen and MTD officials are also evaluating a hockey arena and athletics event center for approximately 5000 spectators. In so doing, they hope to partner with the University of Illinois Division of Intercollegiate Athletics (DIA), which recently announced that it was studying the feasibility of adding Division I ice hockey. Read More>
In the News
Did you happen to catch MTD Grant Manager Jane Sullivan's Getting Personal piece in yesterday's News-Gazette or WCIA's recent story on Operator Goodrich? We're proud of our people! Take a few minutes to learn more about who drives MTD.
With UIUC Fall Semester looming ahead, the MCORE Project Partners are sharing the following updated construction map
All, last week was fairly busy. We had a few days wherein there was extended waiting times for free stands. We had been averaging about 100 people in the space per week but this week we were at 117, and I’m sure there were half a dozen who we missed. As it nears the Great Student Migration we’ll see more and more visitors.
Sales: Overall: $1,661.20; refurbished bikes: 6 for $860; Build-a-Bikes: 2 for $220; memberships: 4 for $120; tire/tubes (new and used): 20 for $117.
On Friday a Bike Project volunteer and I went to the warehouse and picked up about 20 bikes for refurbishment, 3 of which were Neutral Cycle rental bikes that were mistakenly confiscated. I coordinated with their manager to return them. As I was leaving the warehouse two college-aged kids walked up asking if they could “get a bike for $10”. It was a little suspicious.
This week I will process and hopefully build up a lot of the bikes we pulled from the warehouse. With more and more people returning to campus, demand for bikes is ramping up. On the one hand, when we are low on for-sale bikes, it curbs the entitled customer corporate/retail space idea that a lot of people have when they come here. On the other hand, less bikes available for people who want to ride is definitely a bad thing.
I plan to deactivate our “One Free Visit For One Small Repair” policy this week, as demand for stands and space is approaching its yearly zenith. This was successful last year and was agreed upon at the last Bike Project meeting. I’ll reinstate One Free Visit sometime in October when we are no longer operating beyond capacity.
Sincerely,
- Jake Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Manager
All, last week was pretty relaxed. We only had 87 visitors into the space. Our sales were: $1,072 (overall); refurbed bikes: 5 for $640; memberships: 5 for $150; tires/tubes (new & used): 9 for $38.
This week I have a meeting with a prospective student employee. I will also scrap the deluge of bikes that have been donated. Last week we received at least a dozen junk frames/broken bikes. A rare few of these bikes are salvageable, unfortunately. I will build bikes and continue to organize, clean, and otherwise prepare for the deluge of returning students in the coming weeks.
Sincerely,
All, last week was slow at the beginning every day of the week but by around 4pm things would pick up drastically and we’d be “All Stands Full” for the last hour or so. I used to blame the uptick around 4pm on class schedules but it’s summer so now I have no idea why we get busier then.
Visitors count was at 100 even (for the second week in a row, I believe).
Total sales: $1,363.10; refurbished bike sales: 3 for $430; Build-a-Bikes: 3 for $250; memberships: 11 for $330; consumables (cables/housing, tires/tubes): 27 between the four of those, totaling $85.10.
Last week was the conclusion of having Kameron, the high school student, helping here at the CBC. He really warmed up to being here, I think (or so I tell myself) and was much more comfortable organizing and sorting small esoteric bike parts than doing anything bigger like stripping or building up bicycles.
On Friday I made a bike run to the warehouse and picked up 10 bikes. I saw a great number of decent and capable commuter bikes, dotted amongst the majority of WalMart-level junk. It was good to get an injection of new bike blood into the crop of bikes available here.
I also put the final touches on the ECS bike share bikes and outfitted them with baskets.
This week I will process and build some of the new bikes as demand for for-sale bikes is increasing. I have begun to hear back from returning student staffers about possible scheduling, which is helpful, so I will continue to plan for that.
Sincerely,
All, last week was abbreviated: first by the weather on Wednesday (95° was the afternoon high, so I did not have open hours for safety reasons); and then on Friday as I was out of town for my grandmother’s funeral. We only totaled 62 visitors for the week. Sales were $368 net for the week. We didn’t sell any refurbished bikes. We sold one build-a-bike for $43; four memberships for $120; 10 tires/tubes (used/new) for $41.
This week I plan to build more bikes, organize parts with Kameron (the high school student), and work on scheduling for the Fall semester. It projects to be very hot the tail end of the week so I will explore options and ways of trying to keep the Bike Center from being dangerously hot so we don’t have to shutter the doors again.
Sincerely,
All, last week felt on the slow side but I suspect that is a false memory, as our visitor numbers were at 102. That’s about on par for this time of year.
Sales for the week were: $795.50 overall; one refurbed bike ($210); one B-a-B ($41); one family and three standard memberships ($155); and 21 tires/tubes ($136). Also of note: $94 in lock sales.
Last week I had Kameron, the high schooler, come in again. He has really taken to organizing and his efforts are paying off. The shop is overall still a mess, but the small parts are being meticulously organized which helps everyone find what they’re looking for—used parts-wise—that much faster. He will be joining me a couple days this week in the mornings as well.
We had another Friday Community Ride organized by the student staffers. It went well; we rode to the Urbana First Friday event.
This week I plan to process the donations we received over the weekend here, work with Kameron in the mornings on organizing and scrapping some of the junk that is cluttering up the space, and build more bikes.
Sincerely,
This project funds an opt-in bike tracking system for all registered campus bikes working toward two goals: 1) Collecting useful data on where cyclists are biking on campus for more accurate and timely information than the perennial bike census; and 2) Providing incentives for people who bike to campus, in the form of points toward or drawings for gift certificates for local dining options near campus. When students and faculty of the University register their bikes, they will each receive a tag for their bike with a personal ID number. With the data collected about their individual biking habits, students and faculty will be able to track how often they bike and earn rewards through an online interface and incentive system. The interface will show the number of times biked, the rewards an individual can earn, and offer the ability to submit reports since bikers often see needed improvements before planners and engineers. This system is being developed entirely in-house by a team of women engineers. This proposal directly funds: 1) Supplies for creating the system 2) Two interns to assist with logistics 3) Mounting equipment and RFID tags.
Since 2010, The Bike Project has been collaborating with the University of Illinois to provide an educational space on campus. Bicycle education taught through that space encourages the campus community to ride bicycles for transportation because the bicycles sold and worked on at the Campus Bike Center are reliable and safe. While some people are willing to volunteer to teach advanced level bicycle repair classes at the Bike Center, few are willing to teach very basic entry-level classes addressing such issues as adjusting brakes, lubricating chains, and fixing flat tires. This project funds two semesters of stipend for an instructor to teach classes at the Bike Center covering these topics. Combined class capacity over the two semesters would exceed 200 new cyclists. This proposal directly funds: 1) Two semesters of labor for a beginner-level bicycle class.
Funding was approved for the Regional Planning Commission to proceed with a study of policies that could reduce transportation emissions on campus. See attached funding request for details.
All, last week was uneventful—in a good way. People came, worked on their bikes and/or purchased one, and then left. We had 123 visitors. We netted $1,226.60. We sold: 5 bikes for $640; 1 Build-a-Bike for $84; 6 memberships for $180; 16 tires/tubes/wheels for $111.
Last week we had what felt like a surplus of volunteers—and inexperienced ones at that. I think at one point there were 8 people in the shop, all staff/volunteers. I will have to do a better job of creating manageable tasks for unskilled labor.
One longtime member of the Bike Project came by last week to bid farewell, as he got a job in Washington state. He was very thankful for what we do at CBC/TBP and expressed concern over finding a place in Washington as nice and helpful as we are. In parting, he donated some nice studded winter tires since, as he said, it doesn’t snow in the pacific northwest.
This week I will tackle establishing a manageable system for organizing the pile of bikes in the back. I think sorting by “Starting Price” would be useful, since that is always the first question asked. It would speed up the process and save me some of the anxiety of people pawing around in a potentially dangerous pile of bikes. This week, I will also create more zero-bike-knowledge tasks that volunteers can accomplish without me having to explain the esoterica of bike “standards”. And, of course, bikes will be built.
Sincerely,
Jake Benjamin
Campus Bike Center Manage
All, last week was the first steadily and surely busy week we’ve had this summer. Within the first hour or so we were at capacity stand-wise all five days last week. We had 119 visitors and there were probably a dozen or so more people that we missed.
Our sales for the week: Grossed $799.50; sold 10 memberships for $300; one refurbished bike for $50; 21 tires/tubes (new and used) for $113. While those numbers belie the visitors count, we did have a good amount of used cables/parts sales, indicating a healthy usage of the space that simply doesn’t translate into high dollar amounts. It probably didn’t help that most of our medium-sized stock of refurbished bikes has already sold out, leaving our small and large bikes only. That will be a focus for the coming week as far as shop builds are concerned.
Last Friday we had the Full Moon Bicycle Ride, a community social ride that I heavily advertised and promoted—so much so that a few people thought the Bike Project/University was sponsoring it. Rough conservative estimates tallied 160 or so people, so it was probably closer to 200. It was an affirming experience to see so many people coming out for such an event and really speaks to the strong presence of cycling in Champaign-Urbana. I lost count of how many people I recognized as visitors to the Campus Bike Center. Impressive, too, was how many folks were not decked out in full-on cycling gear but instead riding commuter-level bikes in the same clothes in which you’d walk your dog. That speaks strongly to the normalization of riding a bicycle and a good sign for the growth of the mode share.
The temperature is projected to be in the 90s all week and so I will bring out the big water cooler, fill it with ice and be diligent in telling all visitors to stay hydrated while here. I will build more medium-sized bikes this week as well as continue to free up space by scrapping more old and abused-beyond-repair bikes and parts.
Sincerely,
Hello all,
Last week was reasonably busy. We had 112 visitors. We totaled $638.10 in sales. We sold six memberships for $180; one refurbished bike for $80; one Build-a-Bike for $48; and $101 in both new and used tires/tubes.
New student hire Dennis started working last week. As a longtime member, he is familiar enough with everything that he’s been able to help right out the gate, which has been great. Additionally, Friday was Logan’s last day.
This week I will work on student worker scheduling for the summer, strip more old junk bikes that are taking up valuable space, stock all the new parts that arrived last week, attend the Bike Project meeting, and of course, build more bikes.
Sincerely,
All,
Last week was steady and manageable. We had one or two days of almost no one coming in and days of the summer average of 20 or so people through the human door. Our visitor total for the week was 92.
We grossed $1,243.81. We sold seven memberships for $210; two refurbished bikes for $385; one build-a-bike for $89; 16 tires and tubes for $73.
The Bike Project has decided to add a weekday open hours shift on Wednesday evenings for their Urbana location, which was mentioned at the Monthly Members’ Meeting on Wednesday. This will in turn allow those who utilize the CBC an additional resource for working on bikes. On Friday I met Parking out at the warehouse and picked up 16 or so bikes--of which half were worth the effort to rehab or store for B-a-Bs. The rest were promptly taken to the scrap yard on Friday afternoon.
This week Evan, a new student hire, is going to start working (albeit not daily, due to school conflicts). While it hasn’t been too busy for just Leah and me to handle, having another person around and the chance to train a new staffer when it is slow is definitely a plus.
This week I will also be working on creating some more wheel storage in the back garage bays. Bike builds and organization will occur per usual. One of the main tables that are home to our truing stands and our vice is falling apart. I will look into procuring a new one from Surplus this week as well.
Sincerely,
The Unviersity purchased an additional 16 3-loop, 20 4-loop, and 50 5-loop rail-mounted bicycle racks from RJ Thomas Manufacturing Co. Inc. in FY17. These bike racks were received in Spring 2017.
This prezi was shared by Rick Langlois, showing a short timeline for the bicycle advocacy that has grown in town over the last decade.
https://prezi.com/qszytau2k2j8/bronze-age-of-champaign-county-bikes/
