Events

Last Saturday’s Slow Roll Chicago End-of-Season Benefit Celebration, co-hosted by Streetsblog Chicago, has to go down as one of the best local bike parties of all time. Over 100 people packed Ancien Cycles in River West to support SRC, a group that is helping lead the movement for a more diverse, inclusive, and equitable Chicago bike culture. Thanks to generous support from those who showed up, the group netted $2,831 to fuel their important work, making this their most successful fundraiser ever.

Here's one more great reason to attend Slow Roll Chicago’s End-of-Season Benefit Celebration, co-hosted by Streetsblog Chicago. Earlier this week, SRC members installed an exhibit of cool bike images by international photographers at the event space.

If you’re interested in learning more about Slow Roll Chicago’s movement to create a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive local bike culture, join us for their End-of-Season Benefit Celebration, co-hosted by Streetsblog Chicago. The party takes place this Saturday, November 7, from 7-10 p.m. at Ancien Cycles, 688 N. Milwaukee Avenue, and it doubles as a meet-up for Streetsblog readers.

When it comes to making Chicago a truly bike-friendly city, equity is the elephant in the room. Whoever you are, and wherever you live in the city, you should have the opportunity to reap the benefits of cycling, including increased mobility, better health, and cost savings.

On Tuesday, one of Chicago’s leaders in the fight for transportation equity was recognized on a national level. Slow Roll Chicago cofounder Oboi Reed was one of 11 transportation innovators who received the 2015 White House Transportation Champions of Change awards.

Millennium Park’s bike station opened in 2004, with indoor parking for 300 bikes, plus showers and lockers. When the city of Chicago released the Bike 2015 Plan two years later, it recommended establishing another bike station, and mentioned the Ogilvie Transportation Center in the West Loop as a possible location. Not long after that, there was some discussion of including the facility in the OTC’s new Chicago French Market, but that idea never materialized.

First, let’s get one thing straight. Despite what was stated today in the Chicago Department of Transportation’s press release, and local news reports based on it, the city has not achieved Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s goal of installing 100 miles of protected bike lanes in four years.

The popular car-free happenings that pedestrianized a Lakeview street on several Sundays last year are returning this month, albeit in a somewhat scaled-down format. But the Lakeview Chamber of Commerce hopes that moving the events from a one-block stretch of Lincoln Avenue to a half-block, narrower stretch of Paulina Street will make these celebrations of art, music and play more intimate, as well as more vibrant.

This week, civic leaders, entrepreneurs, and academics from around the country gathered in Chicago for the “Move Together” conference, hosted by the locally based think tank the Shared-Use Mobility Center. The organization was launched one year ago to brainstorm ways that bike-share, car-share, ride-share, and other new mobility tools can become a major force for increasing transportation access, fighting congestion, and improving air quality. On Monday, SUMC announced a new goal of taking one million cars off the road in the U.S. by scaling up shared mobility and transit in 15 regions, including ours.