The attached PDF contains performance metrics for Zipcar usage on campus for July and August 2025.

The Tree Campus Advisory Committee met to review the overall program and committee membership. 

• The new Campus Landscape Architect, Bridgette Moen, joined the committee. 
• Team members discussed potential additions to the committee, including students, faculty, and staff.
• Justin Vozzo shared a status update on the tree grant.
  • Picking up several trees - 90 planted total this year
  • Ryan is heading up the F&S side, Stirling is helping to manage the contracts
  • Justin is hosting some tree plantings across the state, Urbana and in Macomb
  • Two events each spring and fall for next tw o years
• The South Arboretum Woods rehab has several plants being added, and there are student employees funded by the SSC.
• The Red Oak Rain Garden (RORG) is doing another plant installation this fall, and works with volunteers. They also installed interpretive signage.
• The Urban Wood Reuse program is going well.  The new mill is here, and they are working to hire more students.
• The Committee began reviewing the goals in the 2024 Tree Care Plan.
  • The Tree Keeper Inventory is complete for F&S, and it is still in progress for the Arboretum. 
    • There is also the ARC GIS inventory - which pulls from Tree Keeper
    • Ongoing to keep it up to date
    • Tree surgeons are responsible for logging them into the system
    • Assistants are responsible for logging the stump removals - the sub-foreperson goes in to remove it and change it to open or vacant site
    • When it is removed it is no longer counted in the inventory
    • When a new tree is planted - working with the vacant sites and updating those, planning and potential planting spots and adding the new tree in there
    • We need to identify opportunities to update the existing inventory
      
      • Longer-term - should do an update - including the diameters of the trees - should update that, changes over time
      • Might need to be a tree expert - how to appropriately update it regularly - tree health - arborist or someone who knows a lot about trees
      • Potentially it could be through dendrology - students could potentially do DBH measurements and baseline health questions
      • ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Justin is working on developing an arboriculture class, could do some tree inventory as part to that class 
    • ​​​​​​​Set a goal in 2025 Tree Care Plan to develop a comprehensive plan for handling tree inventory updates: get a plan together for how to do a regular update and comprehensive update.

Email from Gabe Lewis:

Happy September!

Our team has these bike-related announcements to share with you:

#1:  Bike to Work (& Class) Day is this Wednesday, September 10

If you are not pre-registered for Bike to Work Day yet, do so now and tell a friend to do the same!  cuBikeMonth.org

16 stations will be open across Champaign County, with 8 of them being on the University of Illinois campus.  Each station will have free t-shirts (while supplies last), stickers, breakfast snacks, and bike literature!

#2:  Light the Night returns on Tuesday, September 16

Bring your bike to one of four on-campus stations to get free bike lights!  You can also sign up to be a volunteer for a partial or full shift – no experience needed!

#3:  Active Transportation Plan (ATP) survey is OPEN

Calling all bicyclists, pedestrians, and park visitors:  we want to hear your thoughts via this survey and/or comment map on your experiences – good or bad! 

Completing this survey will help the Regional Planning Commission (RPC) develop the Champaign County Active Transportation Plan (ATP).  RPC staff will also be at various events this fall – including Light the Night – with tablets for people to complete this survey.  We want to hear from everyone to work on making Champaign-Urbana a better place to walk and bike!

#4:  More Bike Month events

The cuBikeMonth.org calendar has several bike events listed for September and October, including Saturday’s FREE Moonlight Bike Ride from Meadowbrook Park to the Sidney Dairy Barn!  You can also keep up with C-U Bike Month announcements on our Facebook page.

Dear iCAP team members,

Thank you for your service in helping to make the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign a more sustainable campus. On behalf of iSEE Director Madhu Khanna, please find attached the charge letter for the 2025-2026 academic year with an outline of your campus sustainability duties as part of an iCAP team. We look forward to your positive and impactful contributions.

As a reminder, we will also hold an iCAP teams kickoff meeting tomorrow, Sept 9, from 4:30-5:30pm to talk about the contents of the charge letter and what to expect over the upcoming year. It would be great if you are able to join us in person at the National Soybean Research Center in room 337, but a Teams link is also available if you cannot make it in person. A recording will be available if you are not available during that time. Please let me know if you did not receive the calendar invite.

Thank you,

Miriam Keep

Sustainable Programs Coordinator

iSEE

Here are the assigned roles for Light the Night 2025:

Station Notes:

• Green & Lincoln will also be the MTD Bike on Bus Rack Demonstration Site
• All stations will have some Project 529 Bike Registration Forms and Stickers

Timeline & Tasks:

• Event Date:  Tuesday, September 16
  • Rain Date:  Wednesday, September 17
• U of I personnel will deliver lights, tables, chairs, lawn signs, and sandwich boards to each station.
• Station Managers should be at their stations by 3:15 PM.
• First shift volunteers will arrive at 3:30 PM, and second shift volunteers will arrive at 5:15 PM.  Make sure they have a Bike Month t-shirt and light set if they want/need them.  They will also need a brief verbal training on the following:
  • Orientation of the station (where people enter and exit)
  • How to install lights
  • Brief recap of Rules of the Road
    • Ride with traffic
    • Stop at stoplights (and stop signs)
    • USE YOUR LIGHTS AT NIGHT – that’s why we’re installing them!  It is legal and safe.
  • Sending people to take the ATP survey
  • Directing people to other resources
• Tear down at 7 PM
  • Leave tables and chairs for U of I personnel to pick up
  • Remaining lights, lawn signs, sandwich boards, and Bike Month & ATP materials need to be returned to Sarthak/F&S

This article advertises Bike to Work Day on September 10th. Between 7:00 - 10:00am, welcome stations will have free shirts, drinks, and snacks.

RailSplitter Wind Farm provided the August 2025 Buyer's Share amounts by the hour, totaling 860.60 Megawatt hours.

The August 2025 Buyer's Share Report is attached below.

Email from Jacob Benjamin:

Busy as all get out. Sold all but one small bike for sale and moving Build-a-Bikes as fast as we can. Hope to have a few more prepped this week as demand for those is always high once we sell out of the refurbs.

More staff will be available this week, which should help with the craziness.

Returning abandoned bikes and getting some business out of that, which is welcomed. Plenty of folks that are retrieving their bikes are unaware of our space/offerings.

The numbers:

Visitors: 234
Sales: $1882.45

Bikes (refurb): 1 for $250

Bikes (B-a-B): 2 for $100
Memberships: 23 for $690
Tires/tubes: 48 for $351

Bike to Work Day Newsletter Link 

Attended By - Aaron Lewis, Matt Brown, Jessica Hauseman, Shawn Patterson, Sarthak

• Base line for the initial cost -
  
  • What we have been spending
  • Idling times
  • Fueling
• Who needs vehicles and why?
  
  • Evaluating what type of vehicles
  • Want to have 15 year replacement - age of bicycle - overall body condition starts to be an issue
    
    • Current replacement cycle is about 20 years
• Where we can, we buy smaller vehicles than bigger trucks
• Have you identified - who is going to be the primary contact
  
  • Matt will be the primary contact
  • Aaron and Jess are very highly involved

• How many vehicles -
  
  • Dining
  • IT shared services
  • BSWs
  • Maintenance
    
    • Subdivision of trade groups
• Spreadsheet includes - all vehicles
  
  • Jess will send it to me
• Sarthak will draft a plan for Housing based on previous meetings.

Pngs of the digital signs are attached below. Departmental screens will post the Bike to Work Day sign until Wednesday, September 10, 2025 and the Light the Night sign until Tuesday, September 16, 2025.

August 2025 photos of the Florida Orchard Prairie have been added to the box folder.

Email from Phillip Krein:

I wanted to update you on our EV charge infrastructure project. Tim Abrahamson supported us today from about 12:30pm to 2pm to gather circuit information in parking structures C10, C7, and B4. I owe Mike Brown an updated design report for our next-generation boxes, and of course we will not mount any new units until all is approved and Dave can inspect the setups. In the meantime, we learned the following:

In lot C10, four of our boxes can be supported without changes. The most likely plans place one each at the east and west columns on Level 2 and one each on those columns on Level 3.

In lot C7, it appears that five boxes can be supported.

In lot B4, we have chosen about all that are available (six units are in place).

For Krannert, there is one signed space where a unit can be mounted.

In F29 (the fire station and parking), it appears that four units can be supported, including three existing signed spaces.

In lot E15, there are NO receptacles that do not interfere with a walking path or equipment access path, so no units can be mounted there.

The total, including those in place, is 20 units. We are preparing 30 new units. I do have some plans for a few of them.

Philip Krein

We did observe that nearly all of these structures have potential for additional receptacle circuits, but this would require a project with wire pulls and infrastructure changes. Since we are talking about 120 V receptacles, such a project is routine, but obviously not trivial to set up and fund.

Registration for CU Bike to Work Day 2025

The results of the Campus Transportation Survey conducted earlier this spring have been analyzed to find the mode share of students and faculty/staff on their commute from residence to campus. The findings are detailed below:

• Of the 272 student respondents:
  • 35% take the bus
  • 8% drive alone
  • 21% bike
  • 33% walk/roll
  • 1% carpool/vanpool
  • 1% use other micromobility devices
• Of the 524 faculty/staff respondents:
  • 10% take the bus
  • 71% drive alone
  • 2% are dropped off
  • 9% bike
  • 5% walk/roll
  • 3% carpool/vanpool

Today, Sarthak met with a technical support staff from Eco-Counter to diagnose and address several malfunctioning counters around campus. They found the following:

• Wright St and Healey St East Side
  • Problem: Flashing red light, counter could not detect sensors, corrosion on one of the connections between logger and sensors
  • Analysis: Corrosion caused a short circuit that depleted external battery and impacted logger's internal battery
  • Recommendation: Replace system with MULTI Evo post
• First and Windsor
  • Problem: pedestrian counter counting randomly
  • Analysis: Electromagnetic interference or issue with sensor
  • Recommendation: Wrap sensor in aluminium foil to mitigate interference. Inspect sensor and replace if needed
• Illini Uninon North Side
  • Problem: bicycle counter not counting
  • Solution: Adjusted settings of bicycle counter to resolve this issue
• Main Quad East - Bevier Hall
  • Problem: pedestrian counter was counting erratically and counting ghosts
  • Analysis: Nearby vegetation and spiderweb inside counter was moving in front of sensor and causing false counts
  • Recommendation: monitor counts to see if they have returned to normal

Phase 4, bicycle retrieval, of the abandoned bicycles project will begin soon. Individuals whose bicycle has been impounded during the summer round-up and who wish to retrieve their bike will be able to do so at the Campus Bike Center. In order to do so, information identifying your bicycle (e.g. where it was parked, color, registration number) must be provided to bike@illinois.edu and a $40 impound fee must be paid upon pick up.

Attached is Veo bike share data for July 2025.

Attached is the link to an email from Geothermal Urbana-Champaign:

Geo Power Hour Tomorrow