Support Greenville County trails today!

Ty Houck, the Director of Greenways, Natural and Historic Resources for Greenville County, sent out an email last week about four possible grants for the Swamp Rabbit, the Gateway Bike Swills Trail, and other trails in the county:

‘The Greenville County Recreation District is applying for 4 grants for trails. Part of the grant application includes a public meeting.  It seems responsible and fitting that we find a way to have those meetings without asking everyone to get in a car to drive to somewhere to sit and watch a PowerPoint presentation. So I am bringing the presentations to you. Please take a few minutes to view the presentations attached and send a confirmation e-mail through the link on the presentation.  Strong public support has a significant impact on winning these grants.’

All four presentations can be found online here, so please take a minute to view the powerpoint slide shows and send a confirmation email to the address provided. The deadline for your response is today (Tuesday, March 22^nd), so please take a minute to do this right now.

As Ty said, strong public support is needed to secure these grants. Let’s make a big push on this final day and bring that grant money to Greenville.

Bike Sharing in Greenville?

The Bicycle Master Plan public meeting on Tuesday night went well. About 200 people showed up, and almost everyone was there in support of the plan. John and Jean from Alta did a great job with the presentation, which should be available to view on the BMP website soon. For those of you who couldn’t make it, I’ll go into more detail when the slides are online.

One topic that seemed to generate interest Tuesday night was bike sharing. There has been talk about a bike sharing program in Greenville for a while now, and the B-Cycle system is certainly a possible option. If you are not already familiar with B-Cycle, check out the video demo on their “how it works” page. About a year ago, after an email campaign the Spinners list, a few tweets and Facebook posts, and a big push from the Urban Planet forum, Greenville moved into the #1 spot on the B-Cycle “Who wants it more?” map…for a while at least. Today, we rank #29 on that same map, but that is still a lot of support for a town this size.

Yesterday, the B-Cycle team was at CU-ICAR in Greenville demonstrating the system to city officials and members of the business community.  I got a chance to check out the solar powered station and ride one of the bikes, and I was pretty impressed. I have been a fan of B-Cycle since it was announced a couple years ago, but I am even more excited about it after the firsthand demonstration. If you are interested, you can see a few more of my photos of the bikes and the station on Flickr or the Bike Greenville Facebook page.

If Greenville is to join Denver, Chicago, San Antonio, Des Moines, and other cities that have successfully implemented the B-Cycle system, the business community needs to get involved. There are 3 different types of sponsorship opportunities- named bike-share sponsor, station sponsor, and single bicycle sponsor. At the basic level, you get your logo on a bike in the fleet and on the bike share website. You also get 25 free bike share memberships and Confident City Cycling classes for organization’s employees. At the top level (named bike-share), your logo appears on both sides of every bike in the fleet (estimated to be around 50). Your logo will be featured on the website, promotional materials, maps that will be distributed throughout the city, etc. You will get 100 free bike share memberships and Confident City Cycling classes for all employees.

That is just a quick overview of some of the sponsorship benefits. If you are interested in one of the sponsorship levels, let me know and I will put you in touch with the people at Leadership Greenville, Class 37 who are leading this effort.

I really hope to see bike sharing become a reality in Greenville soon. Hopefully as a community we can make this happen.

Update: Leadership Greenville Class 37 has set up a Facebook page for their effort to Bring Bike-Sharing to Greenville. Please ‘like’ the page to stay informed about the project and to show your support.

Bicycle Master Plan workshop tomorrow night

Don’t forget that the 2^nd public workshop for the development of Greenville’s Bicycle Master Plan takes place tomorrow night (Tuesday, March 15^th). Plan to be at the Hughes Main Library at 6:00 pm to learn more about the work that has been done so far by the City of Greenville, Alta Planning, Bikeville, and concerned citizens like you. More importantly, you will get the opportunity to share your input as a local cyclist and shape the future of Greenville as a bike friendly place.

Check out the Greenville Bicycle Master Plan website for more information, or download a pdf flyer for the workshop here. This really is a big deal for all of us who ride in Greenville, so I hope to see many of you at the library tomorrow.

Bikeville in the Charleston Post and Courier

Photo credit:

Grace Beahm

If you haven't already seen it, check out the recent Charleston Post and Courier article titled, Bikeville, S.C.: Scenic Swamp Rabbit Trail gets Greenville moving. It is really nice to see positive press about the trail, but it is even better to see that this story goes beyond the success of the greenway. As Scott McCrary, of TTR Bikes, says in the article, "greenways can be a lovely subset to a biking community, but greenways can't be the biking community.” Brian Graham goes on to explain that Greenville is building on the success of the Swamp Rabbit by “looking at inexpensive ways to get people from their front door to the trail.” The article mentions bike lanes, sharrows, bike-sensitive signal detectors, and other improvements that are already underway in the city. It goes on to mention the Bicycle Master Plan that is currently being developed in partnership with Alta Planning + Design.

Overall, this really is a great article about what is happening in Greenville right now. It is certainly true, as Andrew Meeker says, that “we still have a long ways to go." Greenville is definitely on the right track though, and it is great to see other cities recognizing that. Now lets just keep that momentum going and get beyond our “infancy stage” to become a true bike friendly town.

Volunteers Needed for Bike Month

Bike month is coming up in May, and though that seems like a long way off, Bikeville is already planning some great events for the City of Greenville. The US Pro races will take place in May this year, and Bikeville volunteers will again be staffing a booth at the races and providing free bike valet to spectators. There will also be a bike themed Moonlight Movie, group rides, and other fun bike related activities in the city throughout the month. To make it all happen though, Bikeville needs volunteers. It doesn’t have to be a huge time commitment on your part, but if you think you could volunteer for a couple of hours in May, please let us know now. As the latest Bicycling and Greenways newsletter says:

“We plan to build a database of volunteers and will communicate specific needs and opportunities as event plans solidify. Volunteers would assist with event planning, bike valet, and group rides. If you are willing to donate a few hours of your time throughout the month of May to support our various initiatives, please send an email to bikeville@greenvillesc.gov.”

Also, I want to remind you all that the second community workshop for the development of the City’s Bicycle Master Plan will take place on Tuesday, March 15 at 6pm at the Hughes Main Library. At the meeting, representatives from Alta Planning + Design will share an overview of the draft bikeway network and will detail the critical programs from the Bicycle Friendly Community Action Plan. Please mark that date on your calendar and plan to attend and participate in the planning process. If you haven’t already done so, take a minute to view a copy of the presentation that was made at the first workshop and complete the online survey. I hope to see you at the library on the 15^th!