Take the Destino 2045 Visioning Survey to Secure Funding for Bike Lanes!

Would you like every month to be another EP Bike Month?
If so, then please take a few minutes to take part in this Visioning Survey that will help provide crucial feedback on future transportation planning for our region, and let our transportation planners know it’s time to put walking, cycling and transit first.  And please be sure to share this survey with all your bike-minded friends!
Visioning Survey (English): https://atgplanning.typeform.com/to/VP3ZOy
Encuesta de Visualización (Español) https://atgplanning.typeform.com/to/t68Xv7

Take the Bike Month Poll- Your Feedback Matters!

Hello Friends! Please take a few minutes to take the Bike Month Poll. Your input will help the community to provide more quality events. Your participation is appreciated. Thank you!  Click on the link to access the poll. https://poll.fbapp.io/bike-month-poll

Ozomatli Ride to Music Under the Stars

Music Under the Stars 2017 Kicks off June 4th with free Sunday concerts and our favorite band (LA based) Ozomatli. We’ll ride from San Jacinto Plaza Downtown to Cohen Stadium. Bring a working bike, lights, water bottle, tools, spare tube, casco, snacks, blanket and other fun picnic essentials. Be mindful of the sun, Bring plenty of drinking water. 

12 miles Moderate, fun pace!
1 hour ride
Hilly, mostly downhill on the way back to downtown 
Concert begins at 7:30pm
https://www.facebook.com/events/185560118637413??ti=ia

Sun City Cruisers Old School Bike Ride

Shop Amazon & Support Velo Paso Bicycle Pedestrian Coalition

<span><br>Get started at&nbsp;</span><br><a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://smile.amazon.com/ch/46-3378074 ">http://smile.amazon.com/ch/46-3378074 </a>

Take Classes in Safe Cycling

Velo Paso and Velo Cruces are teaming up to host a Safe Cycling 101.

Our classes will help you develop the confidence and skills to ride for fun, fitness and transportation under various road, climate, terrain and traffic conditions. The information and skills from this class will be useful for helping others start commuting by bike to school or work. We’ll discuss what skills are most important for different age students.

Registration is required. Register at the eventbrite link https://www.eventbrite.com/e/safe-cycling-101-tickets-32234… for $30 includes study materials and 8 hours of instruction. 

Traffic Safety 101 will is designed to teach novice AND experienced adult cyclists:
• Basic safety equipment – helmets, bicycle safety check, lights
• Basic bike handling skills
• Basics of vehicular cycling including traffic and bicycle law
• Where to position yourself on the road and how to safely maneuver through intimidating intersections
• Crash avoidance techniques and maneuvers
• Minor roadside repairs such as changing a flat tire
• Practical advice for enjoyable and healthy cycling and how to find a more enjoyable bicycle route

This bike skills and safety course includes 5 hours on bike drills and riding on quiet residential streets, multi-lane and moderate speed arterials with posted speed limits no greater than 35mph.

Equipment required: multi-speed bike with brakes, helmet, water bottle.
Cost: $30
Space is limited

Successful completion of this course fulfills the prerequisite to attend the certification seminar, April 21-22-23 in Tucson Arizona. For those interested in the next level please email us at info@velopaso.org

Urban Land Institute Advises City of El Paso on Strategies for Developing a Sustainable Active Transportation Network

Photo courtesy of elpasotexas.gov

The ATS, an initiative from the El Paso Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO), looks to connect existing paths around El Paso County and the region. Through the proposal, the MPO aims to promote healthy living and carless transportation options such as biking and walking.

The panelists, convened through ULI’s advisory services program, will be visiting El Paso next week to explore how the city can best design an accessible, well-connected, and inviting active transportation network that accounts for potential climate risks such as extreme heat and flash flooding. The panel will focus on the stretch of the ATS identified as the International Beltway running between El Paso’s downtown, currently experiencing revitalization through the Chamizal, an under-invested and largely residential neighborhood up to the area known as the Medical Center of the Americas. Specifically, the panel will focus its study on two key sites along the ATS – the area surrounding the Salazar and Tays public housing developments.

The advisory panel’s recommendations will be framed in response to the newly developed City Resilience Strategy, funded by the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities program. Panelist are tasked with addressing which primary and secondary ATS routes offer the best connectivity, access, and experience for users; what key components such as bike lanes, trees, plantings, storm water infrastructure, and pedestrian infrastructure are needed; how the resilient redevelopment of key sites can leverage open space and linkages to carless transportation options; and what private and public sector funding sources can be used for resilience investments.

The assignment for El Paso is part of a series of advisory panels being supported by a generous grant from The Kresge Foundation to advance the institute’s pursuit of urban design and development practices that are more resilient and adaptable to the impacts of climate change. With Kresge’s support, ULI is leveraging the substantial expertise of its members to provide guidance on community building in a way that responds to inevitable climate change while helping to preserve the environment, boost economic prosperity, and foster a high quality of life.

The communities chosen for advisory panel assistance through ULI’s community resilience work are being selected on the basis of 1) the community’s long-range resilience challenges and vulnerabilities to severe weather-related events, and 2) the opportunity for the results to be applied to other communities with similar vulnerabilities. The assistance is part of Institute’s overall efforts to help communities prepare for increased climate risk in ways that foster a quicker, safer return to normalcy after an event and an ability to thrive going forward. ULI has advised several communities across the United States on resilience strategies, including Miami-Dade County, Florida; Norfolk, Virginia; Portland, Maine, Duluth, Minnesota; St Tammany Parish, Louisiana and Seattle.

During the visit, panelists will tour the ATS route and meet with stakeholders within the study area. After carefully analyzing the area and completing the interviews, the panel will then spend two days framing their recommendations and drafting a presentation that will be made to the public at the conclusion of the visit.

NOTE TO REPORTERS AND EDITORS: The ULI panel’s recommendations will be presented at 10 a.m. on Friday, November 18, at the El Paso Community Foundation, 123 W Mills Avenue in El Paso, Texas. The event is open to the public. 
                                                                                                                       About the Urban Land Institute
The Urban Land Institute is a nonprofit education and research institute supported by its members. Its mission is to provide leadership in the responsible use of land and in creating and sustaining thriving communities worldwide. Established in 1936, the institute has nearly 40,000 members worldwide representing all aspects of land use and development disciplines. For more information, please visit uli.org  or follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram. 

Explorer Wednesdays - Social Rides

The Guardian- On the Verge of Carmageddon

Our Roads are Choked On the Verge of Carmageddon by George Monbiot Car use takes a huge toll on our health and on the planet. We need to kick our addiction to driving.

Traffic at a standstill in both directions on the M25 motorway. ‘Cars for everyone was one of the most stupid promises that politicians ever made.’ Photograph: robertharding/Rex Shutterstock

How to reduce the risks of carmageddon

Letters: Those who want to use bikes simply as transport are largely still forced on to the highway – nearly always shared with heavy traffic

Step back from this mess and ask yourself this. If you controlled the billions that are spent every year – privately and publicly – on the transport system, and your aim was to smooth the passage of those who use it, is this what you would do? Only if your imagination had been surgically excised.

Three-quarters of people living in cities want clean air zones, poll finds

Even in a small, economically mature, densely populated nation like the UK, where change is easy, we’re still driving in the wrong direction. The government boasts that car use is rising again, after being knocked back by the recession. It is spending £9bn of our scarce money on roads every year, 70% of which is on new capacity. Thanks to the cuts, bus services supported by local authorities reduced their mileage by 10% last year.Over half the car journeys people make in this country are less than five miles: this is what policy failure looks like. Why don’t people cycle instead? Perhaps because, though the number of motorists killed or seriously injured has fallen sharply, the number of cyclists killed or hurt on the roads has climbed since 2003. This now accounts for 14% of all casualties, though cycling amounts to only 1% of the distance we travel.The simplest, cheapest and healthiest solution to congestion is blocked by the failure to provide safe transit. Last year the transport department crowed that it could cut £23m from its budget as a result of an “underspend on the Cycle Cities Ambition budget”. Instead of handing this money back to the Treasury, it should have discovered why it wasn’t spent, and ensured that it doesn’t happen again.The undercapacity of the roads arises from the overcapacity of the vehicles that use them. Average occupancy of cars in the UK is 1.6; and it seems to me that the bigger the car, the fewer people it tends to contain. With a few exceptions (such as Mayor Sadiq Khan’s plans for London), almost nothing is done to change or challenge this.When a major feeder road was resurfaced in my home city, I heard people complaining that it took them an hour and a half to travel two miles to work. They could have walked in half the time, or cycled in one-tenth. The council had a perfect opportunity to intervene, with notices beside the road urging people to switch to two wheels or two feet. But it sat and watched, as trapped in its mindset as people were in their cars.Our problems are dwarfed by what is happening elsewhere. Global car production has almost doubled in 10 years. The number of cars on the planet is expected to rise from 1.2bn to 2bn by 2035. Carmageddon beckons: a disaster for the climate, public health and our quality of life. Yet it is still treated as an indicator of economic success.We are told that this is about choice. But surely there should be a hierarchy of choice: the choice of whether or not to suffer a premature death should take precedence over our choice of transport mode.Our brains are filled with metal particles, our children’s lungs and mental development are stunted, and an epidemic of heart and lung disease is catalysed – all to grant people the choice of stewing in a traffic jam rather than getting there by other means.In a recent YouGov poll in Britain, 76% of respondents opted for clean air zones in their cities, enforced by taxes and charges. Sorry, wrong kind of choice.

So here’s a novel idea: how about a 21st-century transport system for the 21st century? Helsinki is making public transport as convenient and flexible as private transport. For example, by aggregating people’s requests via a smartphone app, minibus services can collect people from their homes and deliver them close to their destinations while minimising their routes. Hamburg is building a networkof cycling and walking paths so safe, pleasant and convenient that no one with the ability to do otherwise would want to take a car.Let’s set a date by which no new car is manufactured unless it’s electric. Let’s set up household charging points, allowing people to plug in without having to take their car off the road. Let’s introduce a scrappage payment, not to replace old cars with new ones but to replace old cars with no car at all. It would take the form of public transport tokens.

How about facilitating “walking buses” to school, with parents taking turns to lead a crocodile of children? How about local drop-off points, so that parcel companies don’t clog our streets and we never miss deliveries? How about providing bikes for hire at stations, and – yes, I believe in miracles – synchronising bus and train timetables?Let’s reopen old rail lines closed in the mistaken belief that train travel was on the way out (it has grown 74% since 1995) and build new lines to bridge the gaps. Let’s bring train services under public control and use the money now spent on road-building to make tickets affordable for everyone.Let’s implement the brilliant plan proposed by Dr Alan Storkey for an intercity bus network faster and more convenient than car travel, using dedicated lanes on the motorways and interchanges at the motorway junctions. Let’s build new settlements around public transport hubs – light rail, tram and electric bus systems – rather than around the car.What is difficult about any of this? What technological barriers stand in the way? None. Transport is among the simplest of our problems to solve. Yet our governments are stuck in a 20th-century gridlock, still committed to their great mistake.

Published by the Guardian Tuesday 20 September 2016 14.18 EDT Last modified on Friday 23 September 2016 13.48 EDT

Reasons I ride

Reasons I ride a bicycle By Gabriel Slape The inevitable was coming and there was nothing either of us could do about it. No matter how we tried we would not be able to resist. We would have to let go of our 30s. Not too long ago both my wife and I were faced with the prospect of turning 40. Milestone birthdays can make you stop and think. The more I thought, the more I knew that I needed to get out and get more exercise. We already had some decent bikes hanging around in the garage, nothing fancy. They were still in good shape despite the fact that they had not seen much use in the last few years. We had always enjoyed riding and decided that this might be a way for us to get more active. That’s when the doubts start: Am in good enough shape to ride? Where can I ride a bike? Is it even safe to ride on the streets of El Paso, TX? They say that “a journey of a thousand miles begins with one step”. We have easily racked up more than a thousand miles since taking the small step of loading the bikes in the car and riding a few loops around Ascarate Park for the first time in December 2014. At first, just a few laps around the park at a very leisurely pace was challenging enough for us. Eventually we decided to expand to some longer rides on a “few” local bike paths that serve mainly as recreation. As time went by we gained the stamina and confidence to extend our rides. We found a weekly ride hosted by Chuck’s Bicycle Repair, a local bike shop and considered giving it a try. Then the doubts started up again: Are we good enough to ride with a group? Are these guys way more serious about biking than us? We once again ignored the doubts and joined the group ride where we found riders of all types and abilities. We had a great time and still make sure that we join the ride every week. This group ride helped us to gain the confidence and skills to go out and ride the streets and even after dark. Since last December we have progressed to riding 3-4 or more times a week. Aside from the obvious health benefits, we have realized many other perks from riding our bikes. We have met so many wonderful people while riding. We have also been able to explore our city and see it from a different perspective. The bicycle is the perfect speed to see the world. You can see so much more from a bicycle than you can from a car and you can cover more ground than can by walking. Riding together, my wife and I spend more quality time and work together as a team as we navigate our way through this great city. We enjoy riding so much that we have started using our car less, thus reducing congestion and air pollution and try using our bikes to take care of errands and shopping trips. The best thing about biking is that it does not require a lot of expensive accessories or complicated equipment. If you have the desire, a bike that is in good condition, properly fitting helmet, repair kit and pump for flat tires, and water bottle or camel back, you have nearly everything you need to enjoy endless miles bike riding fun. It doesn’t take any special skills and we learned to ride a bike when we were young children. All it takes is a minimal but conscious amount of preparation to have a fun and easy cross-town bicycle adventure. Riding is something that you can do solo, with your loved ones, or join one of the many weekly group rides. Biking can be more than just a hobby and there many people in El Paso that choose the bike as their main mode of transportation. If you a looking for a way to get active, explore the city, or simply want an alternative to driving, get on a bike and ride. Maybe you will take a weekly ride around your neighborhood or maybe, like us, you will keep finding new reasons to ride more often. I work in an office but do a small amount of physical work during the day. Biking is my primary form of exercise. Before biking I did very little exercise at all and now, aside from riding we try to walk more often instead of driving in instances where it’s more convenient to walk than bike. On a progressive 1-10 scale of activity, 10 being the highest, I was at level 0 activity before biking and at level 7 activity now.