Month: August 2026

Did you stop by our free ice cream stop at Bernie’s Beach last week? We had perfect weather, and it was great to see how many people biked by or stopped for some ice cream!

School Streets future unclear

What is a school street? Streets in front of schools are often chaotic during school pickup and drop-off. One solution to this that has become increasingly popular in other cities is to keep cars off the street that is right in front of a school. It creates a safe space, encourages biking and walking, and distributes car traffic more widely. In Madison, the city and school district tested the concept at Marquette Elementary. How did it go? Apparently parents, kids, and neighbors gave positive feedback–but the program required city staff time to an extent that made it seem unsustainable. For now, the program is on hold and the cars will be back. Read this news article for more detail:

https://www.channel3000.com/news/efforts-to-make-madison-streets-safer-for-students-hit-roadblocks/article_90abc7e7-5461-4330-ac94-f50d41f966c6.html

Stoughton Road alder meeting

The reconstruction of South Stoughton Road provides a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform the road into a more urban boulevard, with safer crossings, bike and pedestrian connections, and the potential for development. The two alders for the area, Derek Field and Sean O’Brien are holding an in-person public meeting on Thursday (9/3). The meeting will be in the cafeteria of La Follette High School (702 Pflaum Rd). Light refreshments will be provided. Please register in advance in Eventbrite.

During this meeting, staff from the City Planning and Transportation departments will provide information about the project, followed by a question-and-answer session.

Also check out the website for Better Streets Madison, a coalition of local advocacy groups that want to make sure Stoughton Road will be a human-centered project: https://betterstreetsmadison.com/

Ride for Your Life: Sign up and volunteer

It’s a little over a month until the Ride For Your Life, honoring Sasha Rosen, who was killed by a speeding driver, and other victims of traffic violence. The ride relies on a lot of volunteers, and so if you’re available to help, please sign up here: https://events.hakuapp.com/173ba995d4a37d68d05a

If you just want to participate in the ride or walk on October 4, you can sign up here.

PSA: September can be dangerous

If you look at the statistics, the number of bike crashes peaks in September. The weather is usually still good, school is back on, and a lot of new people will be out there on the roads and path. So drive carefully and watch out for people on bikes.

RoundTrip Smart Trips Challenge starts tomorrow

As we mentioned last week: Tomorrow is the first day of September and the start of the Smart Trips Challenge! You can still sign up.

RoundTrip Greater Madison’s fourth annual Smart Trips Challenge, September 1-30, celebrates sustainable, affordable, and healthy transportation choices. Replace as many drive-alone trips as you can with carpooling, bicycling, riding the bus, and walking or rolling for
chances to win weekly and grand prize drawings.

The Smart Trips Challenge is free and open to everyone ages 18+ in Dane County. To participate, register with RoundTrip and log your eligible trips all month for chances to win. There will be 20+ prize drawings and the first 50 to log a trip receive $10 to Ian’s Pizza.

MTB demo

Want to try out various mountain bike models on actual trails? ERIK’s is hosting a demo event at Quarry Ridge on Tuesday (9/1) from 3 to 7 PM (if the trails are rideable).

Come out to Quarry Ridge in Madison to spend the day demoing mountain bikes from Specialized, Transition and Aventon on the trails they’re actually built for. This is a free, open-to-everyone event. Whether you’re a seasoned rider or you’ve never touched a trail, our crew will get you set up on the right bike and help you find what fits. No showroom, no pressure. Just you, some of the best bikes we carry, and a great stretch of singletrack.

Wright Stuff Century

Our friends from Bombay Bicycle Club is running the 49th edition of the Wright Stuff Century on September 6. Route options range from 35 to 65 miles. It covers some beautiful roads west of Madison, and for a century ride it’s very affordable. Just make sure to bring your climbing legs.

More area plans: Near West

The process for creating an area plan for the Near West area is starting to rev up. No public meetings yet, but the city released a cool set of maps about the area: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/9274538dbd844111acdf48c4129bd2b6

Book Club

The City of Madison’s director of transportation is also a book author. His latest book, Transportation and the Shape of Cities, co-authored with David Copeland Loredo and Mandi Chapa, will be the topic of Alder Bill Tishler’s September book club on September 23 (i.e. not this week).

Drawing from the book, Spieler will discuss how transportation shapes cities, with a focus on Madison’s evolving transportation network. The book examines the five major nodes of U. S. transportation, from walking and bicycling to automobiles, trains, and transit, and explores how they influence urban design and community development.

This free event is co-sponsored by 1000 Friends of Wisconsin(external). All are welcome to attend, and prior reading of the book is not required. A few copies of the book and printouts of the book’s introduction(external) are available for loan at the Ask Desk at Sequoya Library, first-come first-served. 

As always, you can find an overview of all bike events on our Community Bike Calendar. Email us at info@madisonbikes.org to add your events. And if you value our newsletter and other work, consider donating to Madison Bikes. For construction updates, check out the city’s Bike Madison page.

Thanks to our sponsors who make our events possible!

It’s still summertime! Away we go on a ride around bicycling in Madison …

Lumping all e-bikes together?

Discerning e-bikes from e-motos may feel easiest based on the speed at which they zip by on a bike path, but that doesn’t help a big chunk of the public and policy-makers tackle the nuance of the growing range of (relatively) small and electric vehicles moving people around on and off infrastructure designed for cars and bikes and pedestrians — but not so much movers that fall between categories.

WMTV managed to dig in and produce a clear and interesting story on the subject — the trouble with telling them apart and regulating their safe use, among other issues — including Madison-area transportation planner Ben Lyman and Madison Bikes board member Harald Kliems.

It’s worth watching and reading and, especially, sharing with people who express interest in and/or frustration with new electric rides.

Downtown traffic safety meeting

Will Ochowicz, who represents District 2 on Madison’s Common Council, will host a discussion of traffic safety in downtown Madison from 6 to 8 p.m. on Aug. 25, in Room 215 of the Madison Municipal Building, 215 Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard.

“Everyone who lives, works, or cares about downtown is invited to join,” says the invite. “Whether you’re a local commuter, a cyclist, or simply curious about traffic updates, your voice matters! Join us, ask questions, and help shape the future of traffic safety in our city.”

City transportation and planning staff will be present to hear from the public on pedestrian, bicycle, and traffic safety issues as they begin work on the Downtown Area Plan.

Attendees are asked to register in advance.

Know your routes

A few quick updates on changes to well used bikeways …

• Beginning today, untility work and construction of a shared-use path connecting the Cannonball Path at Fish Hatchery Road to the Wingra Creek Path will close lanes on Fish Hatchery Road between Wingra Drive and Catalpa Road.

• West Lakeside Street — part of the bike detour around John Nolen Drive construction — now frames a nice painted crossing where a section of its off-street path transitions to Gilson Street with a new four-way stop.

• Always rolling camera, Harald also posted a video bike-through before-and-after comparison of the Lakeshore Path’s new bicycle bypass of the Hasler Laboratory of Limnology, 680 N. Park St.

Save the date for a big ride

Ride for You Life Madison‘s 2026 event is on the calendar for Oct. 4.

The ride began in remembrance of Sarah Debbink Langenkamp, a diplomat with Wisconsin roots who was killed by a driver in 2022 in Bethesda, Maryland, and has continued to honor anyone lost to traffic violence.

Madison’s event will be held in memory of Sasha Rosen, a 17-year-old killed in February while crossing South Park Street.

As always, you can find an overview of all bike events on our Community Bike Calendar. Email us at info@madisonbikes.org to add your events. And if you value our newsletter and other work, consider donating to Madison Bikes. For construction updates, check out the city’s Bike Madison page.

Thanks to our sponsors who make our events possible!

The first few dry leaves have fallen off my birch tree. My daughter has a dorm move-in date. My son is wrapping up his summer internship in Boston. NO! NO! NO! It can’t be fall yet! It’s still summer, right!? Let’s all make a pledge to have a few more Chocolate Shoppe Bicycle Benefits Waffle Cones, a few more lazy evenings at the terrace, and a few more sublime, aimless miles on our bikes. September can wait.

N. Sherman Ave Railroad Crossing closure

The rough railroad crossing on N. Sherman Avenue will be closed for two weeks beginning Monday, August 17. See the City notice for details https://www.cityofmadison.com/news/2026-08-07/n-sherman-avenue-closure-for-railroad-crossing-replacement

The official signed detour on Packers Ave is only for cars. Luckily, a brand new road by the ice arena should make for a groovy, low-stress detour. The northern half has a multi-use path. The entire length has a sidewalk. If you’re a regular rider on N. Sherman, can you give the Roth / Huxley / Commercial detour a try this week to see if there are any hiccups?

In other N. Sherman Ave news, the planned reconstruction near McGuire has been re-scoped and pushed to 2027. See the project page for details.

Milwaukee Street

At this week’s Transportation Commission, the one topic of high interest is Milwaukee St between the Garver Path and Woodman’s. This is the area that is seeing heavy Voit Farms development just to the north.

The files are in Legistar #94298. In a nutshell, the City is proposing a north-side multi-use path coupled with a south-side, eastbound bike lane.

I really like the asymmetric layout. Side paths are nice for all ages & abilities, but they’re often “meh” when they’re on the opposite side of the street from where you are or want to be. This design solves that.

And we all must celebrate that the City is keeping Milwaukee St traffic to one lane in each direction. That’s all the current traffic volume demands, and it will establish Milwaukee St as a “Community Main Street” that will much better serve the new neighborhoods being built up there.

John Nolen Drive

The City plans to re-open North Shore Drive to cars on Wed, Aug 12 with some traffic flows allowed at the intersection with JND. There will be no bike or pedestrian crossings allowed there. The return of traffic to North Shore Drive will make the current detour crossings of that street more hazardous.

See the Latest Project Update (and sign up!) for more details.

This Week

On Monday Aug 10, you ought to take 15 minutes to listen to WORT’s Moving Beyond Bikes: Youth Advocacy and the Transportation Ambassador Program, where Colleen Hayes speaks with high-school Bike Fed Transportation Ambassador Maggie Benton about knuckleheads, RRFBs, and youth advocacy.

On Tuesday Aug 11 at noon, come to the University Bicycle Resource Center (just west of the Memorial Union) for a free session on Getting to Campus Without a Car. This is just the first of a series of fall clinics on fixing flat tires, brakes, and winter biking.

On Tuesday Aug 11 at 6:00pm, the Women’s Cycling Club meets at the Olbrich Biergarten for a Taco Tuesday ride. See their instagram page for details.

Also on Tuesday, Vote.

On Wednesday Aug 12 at 5pm is the Madison Transportation Commission, mentioned in Milwaukee Ave above. The agenda has details and sign up info. But, why attend a dry City Zoom meeting when the Capital Brewery E-bike ride meets at 5:30pm and the Motorless Motion Taco Ride meets at 6:00pm?

On Thursday Aug 13*, your job is to review the Downtown Area Plan so far. The City will soon release draft recommendations but, with so many downtown stakeholders vying for ink, bicycling risks taking a backseat. If you have ideas about how to make bicycling better downtown — practical (two-way cycletrack the length of Broom St), lofty (Capitol Square pump track), or specific (close Gilman St where it crosses State Street) — now’s a good time to put your ideas into words and make the case. * You don’t have to wait until Thursday!

On Friday Aug 14 at 11am is the Machinery Row Lunch Bunch e-bike ride. Where will they eat this week? Come and find out! (and don’t forget Machinery Row’s Sunday 8am Century Training ride. AKA long-distance riding for the rest of us)

For more detail on any of these, visit the Madison Bikes Community Calendar.

SW Commuter Path notes

The City flipped the stop signs at the Commonwealth Ave crossing! This is a most welcome and sensible change. Commonwealth sees a roughly equal number of cars and bikes each day (about 2000 of each), yet for bikers it’s the equivalent of the beltline highway.

The City will reduce the Odana Rd speed limit to 25 mph between Whitney Way and Monroe Street. The SW Path crossing of Odana Rd has poor visibility and a stubbornly high number of crashes (five since 2021, compared to zero at Glenway St which handles a similar number of vehicles). Let’s hope the speed reduction helps.

Construction is underway on the Zook Park Connector (ruminated about last December).

Moovapalooza, Hippy Christmas, …

Madison’s annual celebration of U-Haul and out-of-state license plates is upon us. As always, let’s welcome our new neighbors. Yes, they will block bike lanes, they will drive the wrong way, and they will signal right while turning left. Please be tolerant, give them space, and maybe offer a helping hand.

Teejop Community Art Project

Finally, the Madison Art Commission just innagurated the Teejop Community Art Project, a series of indigenous artworks placed at parks around Madison. The displays will stay out until November. What does that have to do with biking? Well, nothing except that bicycle is the best way to see them!

I put together this 26-mile ridewithgps route that visits them all and has links and descriptions of the artists taken from this guide. The artworks intentionally don’t have information signs, so keep the links handy to learn about what you’re seeing.

As always, you can find an overview of all bike events on our Community Bike Calendar. Email us at info@madisonbikes.org to add your events. And if you value our newsletter and other work, consider donating to Madison Bikes. For construction updates, check out the city’s Bike Madison page.

Thanks to our sponsors who make our events possible!