Friday, September 28, 2007

Hope for America's Future

I just did the League of American Bicyclists League Certified Instructor training last weekend in Des Moines, something I'll write up this evening or tomorrow. Once the paperwork goes through, I'll be the fourth currently-active LCI in Minnesota. I'm not sure what exactly I'm going to do with this, to tell you the truth, but have been thinking about bicycle education these past few days.

Imagine my delight when, while riding in this morning, I overtook a pack of maybe 40 cyclists going north on the west Lexington sidepath. It looked like kids of various ages and I wondered if it was a school outing. Intrigued, I pulled off in the parking lot for the Smooth Grind coffeeshop and Network Liquors. The cyclists were pulling into here as well, and, the liquor store not being open yet, were going into the Smooth Grind. I asked one of the kids if it was a school outing. Yep, he said, we've done a few days on bicycles and this is an outing to show how you can use them to actually go places. Cool, I said, and asked the teacher's name. She was inside already and with a horde of kids descending I figured this wasn't the time to go talk to her, but it was good to see that someone's at least talking about bicycles as transportation in school.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am quite surprised at this. I think it is great but, what school would risk this liability of taking a group ride down Lexington Ave.?

Matt said...

They were on the sidewalk on the west side, which is in some spots considered a bike path. Having said that, some kids were not slowing and checking before crossing the side street intersections (one good place to get clobbered) and another attractive young lady with long lovely hair had her helmet hanging off her handlebars, to keep her locks neat I guess. Finally, even on-street, Lexington in Roseville (north of about Ol' Mexico) is actually a great cycling street until County E.