The Campus Tree Advisory Committee is working on updating the Tree Care Plan, in preparation for the Tree Campus USA designation renewal this year.  There are five standards to be met in order to receive the Tree Campus USA designation: an advisory committee, a tree care plan, an Arbor Day event, a service learning project, and a dedicated tree care budget.

The past couple weeks have been productive and busy. Follow up emails were sent to those people who filled out our enrollment form but did not reply back after the initial email and already some good responses have come of that. A couple people said they misunderstood and didn't realize that their department would have to purchase the bicycles so they said they weren't interested. A couple said they received the info and were talking to the appropriate people within their departments. A couple others had meetings setup with myself due to the follow up emails. 

This week I met with Illini Emergency Medical Services who have a bicycle fleet that they use during University events to ensure rapid medical response times. We discussed what was going well for them and what could be improved. They said they would like more publicity so I said that they should absolutely try and get the word out more about their efforts. 

This week I also met with the Student Planning Organization, the RSO that manages Urban Planning department bicycle fleet. They have 3 bikes that I got to see. We discussed the potential of encouraging more faculty and visiting people's use of the bikes as well as branding for their bikes in an attempt to differentiate them from private bikes. 

I have also been working on an infographic on "Why Bikes" that details the benefits of cycling on campus. I am hoping this can be passed around with other bicycle fleet documentation we send out. There are a couple drafts still and they are attached to this update as a private file. 

see file

see file

All, this past week was comfortably  slow. We totaled 49 visitors and were closed on Tuesday due to staff illness. We grossed $319; sold one membership for $30; sold zero build-a-bikes and zero for-sale bikes. Of note is the sale of winter biking gloves: I sold 3 pairs already and it hasn’t even gotten that  cold.

With the shop closed on Tuesday I made about six trips back and forth to the warehouse on the trailer bike, filling up the shop with as many bikes as I can comfortably stuff in here. On Friday afternoon I noticed a slow leak in a water pipe and alerted the service office. They assessed it before I arrived this morning and will return later, according to an employee in the adjacent garage.

This week I will be coordinating with Working Bikes to deal with the scrap bikes from the warehouse that were deemed untenable for that specific shipment. I will continue to build bikes and strategize for streamlining some more of the organization and layout of the space, specifically the accessibility of the tool wall. As is, it is very difficult to find things if you are unfamiliar with what the tools look like or what they are used for.

Regards,

• Jake Benjamin
  Campus Bike Center Manager

The Retrocommissioning (RCx) team has completed nine years of operation on campus in more than 60 campus buildings covering over 8 million square ft. of campus space, having begun our work in Aug. 2007. We have avoided utility costs of over $47M considering the campus fully loaded utility rate or $39M considering the campus variable utility rate. We have also secured millions of dollars in DCEO grants in the past years, including $1.5 million in FY16. We continue to accrue and maintain significant energy usage reductions (average of 27%) on our retrocommissioned buildings. This rate of energy reductions has been generally maintained for 8+ years. More investment in larger projects will be needed going forward to achieve larger energy conservation results.

The EGEN SWATeam held their fourth meeting for the Fall 2016 semester. Topics covered include:

• Guest presentation by Yu-Feng Forrest Lin to discuss his work on investigating campus geothermal properties
• View draft recommendation for Petascale offsets
• Review draft recommendation for on-campus solar

"As the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign considers installing more solar photovoltaic modules on the roofs of buildings, the discussion turns to the type of mounting systems to consider. This discussion often elicits the tale of the modules that were originally installed on the roof of the Business Instructional Facility (BIF) using a ballast-mounted system, that is, a mounting system held down using heavy weights such as concrete blocks. The story goes that a few of the PV modules blew off the roof of the building, and this subsequently led to the modules being installed with a racking system attached to the roof of the building.

This story is an urban legend..."

Read file for more information and photos.

All, last week was a big one! We had the shipping event on Friday wherein we loaded 363 bikes and a whole bunch of spare parts, wheels, cables, etc. into a giant steel box to be shipping off to  Tanzania to help doctors get to remote villages and students get to class. Very good stuff, indeed!

Due to the event on Friday the shop was closed, limiting our visitors to 68 for the week. We grossed a mere $362.50. We sold 5 memberships for $150; not a single bike nor any build-a-bikes. We did sell $62 in tubes, so we’re helping keep people on the road, even as visits dwindle.

This week I will finish clearing out the bike warehouse of the remaining bikes. Working Bikes is coming down to take 40 or so of the bikes we have no need for as well as to help move the bikes we do want back to the CBC, which will be tremendously helpful. I will also coordinate with a new TBP member who has interest in leading a basic maintenance class. And of course building bikes and the Sisyphean task of organizing inventory and parts.

• Jake Benjamin
  Campus Bike Center Manager