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Bike News

Weekly Update: The county giveth, and the county taketh away

Last week

On Saturday, a great group was Riding 24 Hours in Support of Immigrants and Refugees, some for a short time, some for longer. You can see the photos, on Baltazar’s Facebook page.

Cap City Trail closing, but new links might be in the works

About half of the Cap City Trail will be closed for six weeks starting Monday, so I hope everyone got one last ride in over the beautiful (and finally cooler) weekend. The county is repaving the trail from Nob Hill Road to Glacial Valley Road. In case you don’t know those cross streets, that’s more or less from just south of where the path crosses under the Beltine to just short of Fish Hatchery Road. It will be six weeks before it’s open again, but we’ll have a smoother riding experience.

One the other hand, the county also announced that they are soliciting projects from communities to connect local bike trails to the existing county system trails. This is a great program, because smaller communities otherwise may struggle to find funding for important connections. The county program will pay up to 50 percent of the cost of design, engineering, and construction.

The week ahead

Other than the inconvenience of a major bike route being unavailable, things are going to be pretty quiet this week.

Monday

The Madison Bikes Events Committee will meet at 6:00 pm at Barriques on S Park St. We would really love to have some additional volunteers help us plan our events. Right now, we are working on the annual party for September, but there are lots of events we could do with more help. So, if you are great at throwing parties, or just are a good organizer of community events, come by and check out the committee.

Tuesday

The Madison Bikes Communications Committee will meet at 5:30 pm at the Memorial Union Terrace. If you would be interested in helping us with blog posts, social media, or other outreach activities please feel free to stop by. We are usually near the outdoor beer window, but up on the level of the theater wing, but if you cant’s find us, shoot an email to Heather, the committee chair.

Also on Tuesday, the Council will be considering the Winnebago project yet again. This time the recommendation is for Option 1B. Harald sent out an action alert on Sunday, so check there for more information.

The council will also be confirming the new citizen members of the new Transportation Commission and the Transportation Policy and Planning Board. These two committees will replace the PBMVC, Transit and Parking Commission, and the Long Range Transportation Planning Committee. (There are two files, so there are two links above.)

A little Easter egg seems to be on the Council agenda, something that has been needed for a long time. It looks like an underpass of the railroad that runs parallel to Old Middleton Road is planned to connect Craig Ave to Old Middleton Rd. This would provide a pedestrian-bike route from University Ave to Old Middleton west of Whitney Way. Map/satellite image here (it takes a loooong time to load.)

Saturday

You can join the July Unity Ride at 10 am. MadTown Unity Rides are organized by local groups to celebrate the unity and diversity of Madison Southside and to connect our communities together.The target audience for these rides is Black, Brown, Indigenous people of color, LGBT+ community and other communities that have been affected by discrimination who live or work in a predominantly low-tmoderate-income community in the Madison Southside. We use these rides as a vehicle to increase social cohesion at the neighborhood level, as well as highlight the assets and inequities which exist in neighborhoods across the Madison Southside. This is a family ride, so they will be going at a very relaxed, slow pace. The distance will be between 7-10 miles. And if you don’t have a bike or helmet, The group can arrange to lend you one. For more information and a map of the ride, check out the Facebook event.

Send us your events

Remember, if you have an event that you’d like us to include on the Community Calendar, send it to us.