What's Next for Our Team

On June 15, this year's Bicycle Transit Planning Team will be crossing the stage at UC Santa Cruz's East Field during the Stevenson College Commencement Ceremony. Both of us are Stevenson College affiliates, so we will be graduating the same day and sharing tears of joy and gratitude for our four years at UC Santa Cruz.

The project and our team name Bicycle Transit Planning Team will hopefully continue in some form or another in the fall, and there are already a number of ideas for projects for next year's bike team in IDEASS. If you have other ideas, visit the IDEASS website and submit them here! We'll also be sure to send out the final report for our project through a special issue of the Pedaling Periodical in July.

Here's what we'll be doing after we graduate!

Aly will be taking a break from the sciences in order to be working at Yelp in San Francisco in the field of sales. Although Aly already accepts that she’s going to incredibly miss all the beautiful bike paths in Santa Cruz, she vows to continue bike riding in San Francisco and her hometown. For instance, her mother at first wanted to drop her off to work in the early morning; however, Aly negotiated with her mom to let her bike to BART in order for Aly to continue using alternative modes of transportation and get the best wake-up possible! Aly wants to continue working in public policy either by volunteering or staying involved with the new and upcoming IDEASS team of next year! Last but not least, Aly hopes to collaborate with her dad, who is a mechanic, to build her own bicycle that she will rep with the ultimate pride. Alright, alright, alright!

Melissa will be sticking around Santa Cruz for at least the next year, bicycling everywhere as usual and continuing to work on environmental issues. She'll be re-joining the UCSC Sustainability Office for the summer after a quarter-long break. Melissa worked in this office for the past three years as a student, so she's excited to be able to return as a part-time member of the Office for awhile. She'll also be the Santa Cruz Sierra Club's new Outreach Coordinator, helping to promote the events, campaigns, and work of our local chapter. At the end of next week, she will be graduating with a BA in Literature, which will feature in her new positions primarily through the writing skills and analytic thinking skills she has gained in the past four years. Certainly she'll be reading literature when she isn't working and possibly keeping her eye on a future of graduate school to become a professor... but who knows where her path may lead?? She hopes to stay connected to the IDEASS bike project next year in whatever ways possible, as well as continue to volunteer with People Power, Ecology Action, and other organizations doing really important work to support bicycling in Santa Cruz!

Thank you to everyone who has supported our project this year, and to all of the professors, mentors, instructors, family, and friends who have been there throughout our four years as banana slugs at UCSC! We are so grateful for the opportunity to complete this fantastic project this year, and we could not have done it without the support of so many awesome people. Of all these fabulous folks, though, we have to give the biggest thanks to Tiffany Wise-West and Amelia Conlen, our project mentors for the year. It's been so awesome to work with such inspiring, dedicated women who have provided so much guidance and support to us all year! 

Spring Fest Celebration

The UCSC Sustainability Office hosts an annual Spring Fest celebration to honor outstanding projects students have worked on for the year. Melissa and I were invited to this year’s Spring Fest to honor our work on our IDEASS Bike Transit Planning Project. The day started with the MC’s introducing all the different organizations and project teams who have been working on incredible projects this past year. After a delicious lunch, all project teams went alongside their project posters to describe to attendees about the work they’ve done and their future projections of their project. Melissa and I had just created our poster for the Wharf Sanctuary and could not wait to show it off at this celebration! Talking to people about our project with our poster behind us summarizing the amazing work Melissa and I have done was an incredible experience. It allowed us to both feel so recognized and accomplished. We are so proud of all the other project teams that were recognized at this event and we give a big thank you to the Sustainability Office for creating an event like this! 

Branciforte Creek Bicycle and Pedestrian Counts

Throughout our project, Melissa and I remained connected to not only our community, but also the City of Santa Cruz. Our first experience was working with our mentor Tiffany Wise-West, the Climate Action Analyst of the City of Santa Cruz, to construct a grant requesting funding for two bicycle counters to be installed at specific locations in Santa Cruz. Since then, we’ve been working with the City of Santa Cruz on other projects in preparation for their Bike Plan Update of 2015. 

Recently, we were asked by Cheryl Schmidt, Transportation Coordinator for the City of Santa Cruz, to help conduct bicycle and pedestrian counts to collect relevant data of the volume of pedestrians and people biking near the intersection closest to where Branciforte Creek meets the San Lorenzo River. Currently, the River Levee path does not connect at this location, but a project is underway to build a bridge across the creek and connect the levee path. Melissa and I conducted counts for one hour at the Soquel/Riverside/Dakota intersection in downtown Santa Cruz. We marked down the direction the pedestrian and people biking were coming from in order for the City of Santa Cruz to see if this projected installation would have a high volume of people using it. 

The results for people walking were: Eastbound 35, Southbound 24, Westbound 32, and Northbound 18. 
The results for people on bikes were: Eastbound 34, Southbound 23, Westbound 29, and Northbound 19. 

We found it interesting to note that the frequency of people biking and pedestrians were similar in amounts, with the Eastbound being the highest for both, Westbound being the second highest for both, Southbound being the third highest for both, and Northbound being lowest for both. Likely the high traffic numbers heading east reflect commute patterns of people heading home in the afternoon since we did the count from 4 - 5 PM on a weekday. It wasn't clear from our count how many of the people heading north and south were connecting with the levee path on either side, but this data will be used by Cheryl Schmidt in a grant application for the completion of this project. 

Arana Gulch Multi-Use Trail Site Visit

During fall quarter and winter break, our team did research on automated bicycle counter technology, brands, and models to identify which kind of counter technology would be best suited to Santa Cruz. Ultimately, the one location we identified as feasible to pursue during this academic year was the new Arana Gulch Multi-Use Trail that is being built. Although we did not receive any funding to purchase a counter, we have been in communication with the project manager Chris Schneiter, who works with City of Santa Cruz Public Works, about the eventual possibility of installing a bicycle/pedestrian counter near one of the entrances to the path, which will connect Frederick Street to Agnes Street to the Harbor to Brommer Street through a few paved paths. Two bridges are being constructed to span the gulches near this open space area.

Our team met with Chris Schneiter to learn more about the project and visit the in-progress construction of the paths and bridges. Below are some photos from our site visit, and you can learn more about the project on the project's blog here.

We walked out to the anchor point for one side of the new suspension bridge. It will be the first bridge of its kind in Central California, and it allows construction of the bridge without interfering with the ecosystems below. No support columns or access roads are necessary in the riverbed. The giant cables will be strung across and tightened on either side.

Here's the view of the future suspension bridge. You can see that cables have been strung across already in preparation for the bridge.

The light pink path visible on this side of the chain-link fence is part of the new multi-use trail! It's porous concrete, so water seeps into the material and into the ground below. It's smooth enough for bicycles to ride on. 

Here's a closer view of the trail material. This part of the trail leads to the Harbor and a bridge connecting to Brommer Street.

A bridge is being built from Brommer Street to the new trail, crossing Arana Creek.

The beautiful setting of the new trail beside Arana Creek.

Here's a better view of Arana Creek and the location of the new bridge from Brommer Street to the multi-use trail.

It was exciting to see the progress that has been made on this trail! If you want to learn more about the project, please visit http://aranatrailproject.blogspot.com/ and keep your eye out for updates about the bicycle counter that will hopefully be installed at the trail in the near future!

UCSC slugs combat social & environmental injustices with bicycles in San Jose

There’s no doubt that the work that UC Santa Cruz students accomplish during their time at the University can serve as a training ground and experimental space for future work in communities beyond Santa Cruz. The latest example of this in the bicycle and social justice realm is the creation of a new bicycle cooperative over the hill by two UCSC bicycling banana slugs, Adrian Baker-Kang and Cassidy Kakin, who are pedal driven to make a difference for youth and bicycle riders in San Jose.

At a recent Bikes & Food Justice Festival at UCSC on May 3, I had the opportunity to hear Adrian, a UCSC senior and UCSCBike Coop co-owner, speak about his thesis work on the role bicycles can play in supporting communities who don’t have access to healthy, fresh foods nearby. In his words, 

“I looked at the obstacles facing low-income individuals when it comes to accessing sustainable, low-cost, transportation. Due to a lack of infrastructure and education, bicycles are simply not a viable method of travel in many cities still, where car users are reluctant to share roads that were not designed with bicycles in mind. The option of public transportation in busy cities can be a massive time investment for many individuals, with short trips across town taking two to three times as long compared to cars or even bikes, as buses become stuck in traffic between picking up and dropping off passengers.” 

Adrian’s solution is pro-bicycle, but with infrastructure issues also comes the costly matter of purchasing a bicycle and then maintaining it.

Adrian speaking at the Bikes & Food Justice Fest.

Both Adrian and his best friend Cassidy studied Politics and “focused [their] efforts and inquiries on the position of marginalized populations in low income communities.” Cassidy Kakin, who graduated last year, explains that “Adrian studied public transportation and bike infrastructure, and I worked on the intersectionality of poverty, race, and education in modern urban society.” Their grassroots approach to these complex issues comes in the form of a bicycle cooperative in East San Jose, called the East San Jose Bicycle Cooperative.

Intrigued by their vision and purpose, as well as their studies on social justice and accessibility issues in communities like East San Jose, I asked them for an interview. Here’s what they had to share:

Melissa Ott: How did this bike co-op idea come about?

Cassidy Kakin: I’ve spent the past year serving a Year of Service with City Year, an Americorps Partner, in a low income school in the suburban ghetto of East San Jose, and I’ve seen the many social pressures and economic struggles placed upon the massive population of marginalized youth in the Alum Rock School District. 

The East San Jose Bicycle Cooperative is the combination of the two efforts, studies, and experiences of two best friends and UCSC alumni.  Its exact origin is shrouded in cold IPA's and hot Sunday afternoons spent together day dreaming about changing the world and starting something big, and in some sense evolved organically from an idea I had to come back to East Side San Jose in a different and more ambitious capacity, and Adrian's divine inspiration to change the world and promote social justice from the seat of a bike.

Adrian Baker-Kang: As a community bike mechanic for two and a half years, I have worked closely with low-income and poverty-level individuals who relied on their bicycles as a critical method of transportation due to the low cost and ease of owning and operating a bicycle. I never considered its potential for social change until I spent a year working at the Bike Church in Santa Cruz. The Bike Church is a non-profit community bike shop that promotes personal empowerment through teaching individuals how to do basic mechanical work on their own bikes. One thing that struck me while working there was how much worth these individuals placed upon their bike, valuing them oftentimes more highly than shelter or a hot meal due to the transportation needs they fulfilled.

Melissa: What is your vision for the East San Jose Bicycle Coop?

Adrian: Our vision is to help make the city of San Jose one of the most bike friendly cities in the nation, and a model for sustainable transportation world-wide. Our model will be one of building strong relationships with the community to foster lasting bonds in promoting bicycles as a viable method of transportation. We will be working directly with San Jose’s youth and their parents to address the safety and educational needs unique to this city, such as how to effectively navigate between downtown and East San Jose.

See more photos and videos of youth supporting ESJBC here.

Cassidy: We’re still in the process of evolving from an idea into a sustainable and successful project. All our goals now and in the future involve means of promoting a positive bike culture in East San Jose's youth community, in order to fight the injustices imposed upon young people by restrictive socio-economic realities.

As of now, we are hoping to promote a positive bicycle culture as an alternative to the often illegal and illicit or gang related activities that some of East San Jose's most vulnerable youth fall victim to. We hope to work during existing afterschool programs in middle schools and elementary spaces in Alum Rock schools, which have successfully situated themselves to address the issues facing San Jose's youth. 

Melissa: What might your work in these schools look like?

Cassidy: With elementary school students, we hope to fan the flames of the developing hobby of young riders in a safe way.  We have seen students with bright futures riding dangerously and recklessly and want to provide education so that their increased access to bicycle infrastructure will not come with negative side effects. In addition, the multifaceted benefits and goals of the bicycle world like environmentalism, social justice, and invigorated cities will be promoted.

In middle schools, we hope to take a long term and holistic approach in the after school space, giving us the ability to form and develop meaningful relationships with students. We intend to have fully functional, mobile bicycle repair clinics to teach students how to maintain and service their bikes, while continuing bicycle safety education.

Image from the ESJBC website.

Melissa: Why are bicycle co-ops important and valuable to communities? Why does East San Jose need one?

Adrian: Bicycle co-ops are an invaluable community resource socially, economically, and environmentally. Socially, they bring communities together in an engaging environment in a way that automobiles cannot. Individuals have the opportunity to slow their life down for a moment and learn new mechanical skills and make new friends without spending any money. Economically, bicycles are a cost effective method of travel that vastly expands the distance individuals can travel who do not use a car. The lack of gas, parking fees, and maintenance costs provides a valuable resource for making fun and healthy trips around town to the grocery store, school, or meeting up with friends.

Cassidy: As I’ve described, we do not intend on having a stationary “shop” space as many bike co-ops have; we instead intend to be fully mobile, giving us the ability to work in schools directly and develop meaningful relationships with students. So why brand ourselves as a “co-op” rather than an educational after school program component?  There is a certain power in the word “cooperative,” both in the bike community and more generally. We are a co-op because we intend to base all of our programming on the needs of the community we serve, evolving with and promoting the growth of the students and community members we work with, hearing their voices and responding to their ambitions and goals for our project. We hope to bring the ideology of a co-op model without replicating the typical cooperative structure. In this way, we hope to empower the voice of East Side San Jose's youth while promoting bicycle culture in a safe and productive manner.

Melissa: How are you spreading the word about this, and how can the community support your work?

Adrian: We are promoting our cooperative through a grassroots campaign, working from the ground up to directly interact with the communities we will be serving. This includes hosting free drop-in bicycle clinics, writing city council members, and promoting our organization through the parents and teachers of the students we will be assisting. We are currently seeking help in terms of volunteers for assisting with our bike clinics, a graphic designer to create a logo, and financial support from potential investors.

Gathering community support for the co-op, Cassidy (right) stands with Justin of Autonomous San Jose and RideESSJ.

Cassidy: At the same time, we are expanding our efforts, learning, and promotion beyond the East San Jose foothills and have begun the important and extensive process of reaching out to networks and people in bike enclaves around the world—from Santa Cruz, Santa Clara and the rest of the Silicon Valley, Marin County, Oregon and beyond, to online networks and social spheres. We also hope to reach out with and sit down with some big movers and shakers in the Silicon Valley bicycling community, like San Jose Bike Party and the Silicon Valley Bicycling Coalition. Hopefully, we will be able to learn from and work alongside the giants who have been working on bikes for years in San Jose and the surrounding areas.

Adrian: With the support of others in our community, we hope to further the ideals of sustainability, safety, and financial viability by promoting bicycles to a younger generation, to help promote a greener and healthier future. We are seeking support from anyone who is interested in supporting our goals, so please visit our website, blog, and social media sites and send us your ideas!

To support Cassidy and Adrian in making their vision a reality for the youth of East San Jose, please visit their Indiegogo campaign site, blog, Facebook, and Twitter to learn more. You can contribute money, ideas, resources, and volunteer support in numerous ways!

Immersing ourselves in Bike Week

Melissa and I could not wait for the first week of May. We had our calendars ready (well Google Calendars), our watches set, and our bikes all cleaned up. We were ready to start May with the big, the bold, and the wheely fun Bike Week.

This past year Melissa and I have been collaborating with the City of Santa Cruz, People Power, Ecology Action, and other related organizations. We've given our efforts in tabling at multiple events throughout the year, volunteering with Elise Ehrheart of Ecology Action in teaching elementary school children how to properly ride their bikes to school with the Bike Smart! program, and co-facilitating bike-commuting workshops with Amelia Conlen of People Power. All these events we partook in were to contribute towards our main goal: to increase bicycle ridership in Santa Cruz.

Melissa, our friend and favorite volunteer Hasti, and me at Bike Night First Friday

We started our week off last Friday (May 2nd) at the Ecology Action and People Power sponsored event "Bike Night: First Friday at the Museum of Arts & History." This event was the big kickoff of Bike Week! It was fun night filled of bike-related arts and crafts stations, a group-led bike ride downtown, live music from local artists, bike-blended ice cream, and free helmets! Melissa helped people deck out their bike with decorations for Bike Week while I helped lead the bike ride downtown. I had to to keep people to the right side of the road to ensure that we weren't impeding traffic too much! Overall it was a successful night!

On Saturday, Melissa hosted a Bikes & Food Justice Fest on campus to promote students to become more aware of this mode of transportation and get some free strawberry bike-blended smoothies! At this event, people learned about the importance in Food Justice and how it's related to sustainable transportation. I helped table about our project to heighten the importance of bicycling! 

Bike valet by People Power at Open Streets

On Sunday, Melissa volunteered at Capitola's "Open Streets" event. It was  day filled with music performances, arts and crafts, and People Power's exhibit on the importance and safety that cycletracks or protected bike lanes can bring in our town. Since Santa Cruz has two of these protected bike ways, this exhibit was advocating the importance of them and the encouraging people to support having of more in the local communities.

Bike Week World Cafe

On Monday, Melissa and I participated in a UCSC World Cafe by having the theme be about bikes (since Monday was the official beginning of Bike Week)! We made bike-blended smoothies, talked with students about cycling and its benefits, and got people stoked about the upcoming events! On Tuesday, Melissa helped volunteer with UCSC Transportation and Parking Services to give away free helmets to ensure people who are biking remain safe!

Bike to Work Day on May 8

Celebrating Bike to Work Day with a beer at Santa Cruz Mountain Brewing with one of our mentors, Amelia Conlen.

IT WAS FINALLY THURSDAY! The reason Bike Week was so important for the both of us was it allowed us to measure if our goal of increasing bicycle ridership was being reached in Santa Cruz, specifically on Thursday when it was Bike to Work/School Day. To measure our success, Melissa and I volunteered alongside the UCSC Cycling Team in giving away free breakfast to bicyclists who biked up to school. We all had such sensational and awe-inspiring conversations with the vast amount of cyclists who stopped to chat and eat some of the food we offered. From bike cruisers, to mountain bikes, to road bikes, Melissa and I were both so proud to see so many people ditch their cars and bike that day. To end the great day, we both went to Santa Cruz Mountain Brewing to help donate $1 from our pints of beer (hehe) to Ecology Action and Bike Week programs for all their hard work this week.

Santa Cruz Bike Party takes over the Wharf!

On Friday, Melissa and I wanted to bring all this bike awareness towards some hard earned fun! We joined People Power in a massive Santa Cruz Bike Party that was themed (Bike) Empire Strikes Back with many local community members, students, and families in the streets of Santa Cruz. We all biked from downtown to the Wharf, along the San Lorenzo River, up to Mission Street, around Safeway, and back downtown. We were all motivated to bike the night away by the speakers blasting dancing music and everyone dressed in Star Wars costumes.  

Melissa and Hasti promote bike valet

We ended our Bike Week by volunteering with Amelia Conlen, director of People Power, in having free bike valet at the UCSC music festival "Edge of Eden." We wanted to promote to student and participants a cheaper alternative to driving and taking public transportation! We got to enjoy the amazing performances of several artists, soak in the sun, and give people the freedom to have fun as we took care of their bikes. 

On the "edge of Eden" waiting for people to come valet their bikes!

Overall, this week was filled with so many amazing moments, conversations, and memories. This month has only just began, but this past week sparked the passion and drive that Melissa and I have for cycling. Come join the fun! 

Portland's Bicycle Infrastructure Takes the Cake (Food is fuel)!

Portland, Oregon has been ranked as the #1 fittest city in the United States and I could not agree more. This past week my friend and I went to visit an old pal in Portland and filled our days with countless miles of walking, biking, driving, and using the TriMet. Portland's transit system is truly incredible. There were frequent MAX light rails delivering you to every thinkable location, there were unlimited TriMet buses, and of course cyclists equally numbering the amount of cars on the road. I was able to see the visual bicycle counter placed on Hawthorne Bridge displaying the amount of people who biked over the bridge that day and that year. At 10am on a Wednesday, there was already 968 people who biked on the bridge that morning! Astounding! 

My friend and I walked to most locations while enjoying the beautiful wet skies and bustling people. We went into the famous Powell's bookstore and I was amazed by the selection of bicycle-related books. There were historical books, factual books, autobiographies on famous cyclists, pictured books, and books with short stories by the average joe (photo above)! This town just loved bicycling! 

So after observing the volume of people bike riding around the city, my friend and I had to join the hype! We went to Waterfront Bicycles to rent a bike for the day. At first we tried out a tandem bike, but due to the rain and slippery streets we opted for two separate bikes. With the purchase of the bike we were given a bike map listing which streets had designated bike lanes called "Greenways", which streets had shared roads, and which streets to avoid. In addition, we were given helmets, u-locks, cable locks, and a carrying packs to put on the racks on our bikes. With all these essentials we felt prepared to embark on this enlightening adventure. We started on the designated Greenways which were a real sweet treat because of instead being the normal narrow right side bike lanes, these Greenways were placed in the middle of the road or if on the right side were incredibly spacious allowing a handful of cyclist to ride past each other (photo above). While bike riding we were observing the positive attitudes of cyclists and their graceful interaction with traffic. It was astounding to see cars obeying the cyclist's right of way and working with them to communicate effectively. It was a phenomenal and unbelievable sight. We both were awarded the ability to bike freely and not be a part of the bad stigmatism that has been given to cyclists over time. Honestly, I can not stop talking about the refreshing attitudes Portlandians have towards public transit and alternative modes of transportation; such as, bicycling.

I can not wait to go back and experience the lifestyle of Portlandians and their positive approach towards commuting!

Promoting People Power through Media & Interactive Activities

At the beginning of the quarter, I promoted and participated in the Sneak Routes and Secret Places Bike Ride. This 10 mile group bike throughout the lesser-known routes on the Westside of Santa Cruz took place on a beautiful sunny day and drew in a cool crowd of all ages.

A week before the sneak bike ride event, I was inspired to make my own laser cut version of a bike route sign for a secret bike route.

This is the digital design I created in Adobe Illustrator. The thickness of the lines instruct the laser machine where to cut and where to engrave.

The smaller squares from the digital designs were cut into dozens of People Power key chains!

Before the Sneak Routes and Secret Places Bike Ride, we reviewed saftey guidelines and helpful riding tips.

Instead of using the main street, we took the sneaky route!

We stopped by the railroad near Wilder Ranch to talk about the Rail Trail, a recently funded project to build a bike path along the rail road that will connect San Mateo County to Watsonville. You can read more about it on People Power's website.

The MAH organized a Pop Up Museum event at hub where People Power coexists with other organizations like the Bike Church, Computer Kitchen, and Sub Rosa. A Pop Up Museum is an open event for all community members to set up related exhibits and workshops in one space.

People Power set up a fun an interactive spin art station where participants could pour paint or pedal the stationary bike to create a cool splatter effect.

We also set up a helmet decorating and spoke care making workshops. We had reflective stickers participants could cut out to make their gear unique and visible!

Some sample spoke cards.

After adding reflective stickers of my initials "HA" on both sides of my helmet, I went for a bike ride along West Cliff. It was definitely noticeable! HAHA

Here's a glimpse from the Santa Cruz Bike Party on Valentines Day. We had a gang of over 50 people biking around town under the full moon. It was so roll-mantic!

An awesome glowing tandem bike with speakers and a couch trailer!

Some sisterly love!

Dancing in San Lorenzo Park!

We set up some spin art again for the "What the Cruz?" event at the MAH.

Here are some submissions for the Bike Week poster from high school students across Santa Cruz County. Instead of hiring a graphic designer to create the poster, there was a contest among local teenagers and the entrees were impressive! 

We met at the pirate themed bike party a few months ago. We were laughing because we both arrived at the meet up spot late with our pirate buddies and couldn't find the official group so we ended up forming our own bike party like true pirates!

We also set up a station for helmet decorating and spoke card making workshops. This time we had a legitimate laminating machine!

Crafters creating spoke cards with reflective stickers.

I made this spoke card using one of the unclaimed splatter paint papers from the previous event we held with spin art. People Power!

Currently, I've been helping promote upcoming free Bike Commuting Workshops that will be held at the People Power headquarters on Pacific Avenue. I walked around downtown  Santa Cruz with my classmate Maryam talking with local businesses about posting these eye-catching posters in their window for the next few months. The majority of businesses we spoke to were very supportive!

I look forward to continuing my work with People Power in the Spring and participating in more informative workshops and interactive events!

*A big thanks to Tawn Kennedy and volunteer photographers from the MAH for capturing many of the photos included in this post*