CycleHack movement seeks to solve cyclist problems in Vancouver

More than 25 cities will host events as part of CycleHack 2015

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      Vancouver cyclist Matthew Lowell believes that the city would benefit from a rethink of its bike-parking facilities.

      During an interview with the Georgia Straight, the 25-year-old user-centred designer suggested that public libraries could set aside space for secure bicycle parking and that a solution might be found in adapting the Airbnb model for home rentals.

      “Sometimes I just don’t trust that my bike is going to be there when I come back,” Lowell said at a café in the Armoury District near Granville Island. “I really like my bike, and I’ve got a really nice lock. But still it’s one of those things that is a niggle for me.”

      Last fall, Lowell and his 26-year-old girlfriend, Lizzie Brotherston, moved to Vancouver from Glasgow. Now they’re organizing the inaugural CycleHack Vancouver, a three-day event taking a “bottom-up” approach to improving the overall cycling experience in the city.

      According to Lowell, who cofounded the CycleHack movement with Sarah Drummond and Johanna Holtan back in Scotland, the first CycleHack event in June 2014 saw cycling enthusiasts gather in Beirut, Glasgow, and Melbourne to build tangible solutions to problems faced by cyclists. This weekend, more than 25 cities—including Athens, Bangalore, San Francisco, and Sydney—will host events as part of CycleHack 2015.

      “CycleHack is a global movement that’s tooling up citizens to take a DIY approach to reducing the barriers to cycling,” Lowell said. “So really what we’re doing is giving ordinary citizens the space, the tools, and the community in order to come up with new ideas around cycling.”

      On Friday (June 19), CycleHack Vancouver—supported by the Vancouver Maker Foundation, which organizes the Vancouver Mini Maker Faire—kicks off with talks by speakers including City of Vancouver lead transportation planner Paul Krueger, HUB Cycling executive director Erin O’Melinn, BikeMaps.org developer Taylor Denouden, and Andrea Smith, co-owner of the women-focused bike shop Sidesaddle. Participants will discuss local barriers to cycling and decide which ones to “hack”.

      Saturday (June 20) will begin with a breakfast brainstorming session. Then it’s time for teams of CycleHackers to visualize, prototype, and test solutions at a local makerspace. Lowell noted cycle hacks fall into five categories: physical, digital, policy, event or campaign, and local plan.

      “For this year, we’re really quite keen for some CycleHackers to concentrate on really small geographical areas—for example, the intersection outside here,” Lowell said, referring to the “local plan” category. “Is there something that they could do to cycle-hack that very specific geographical area within their city to improve the experience?”

      On Sunday (June 21), CycleHackers will further test and document their prototypes. Then teams will upload information about their hacks to CycleHack’s open-source catalogue. CycleHack Vancouver will culminate in a showcase featuring two-minute pitches and judging.

      In 2014, CycleHack launched with events in Beirut, Glasgow, and Melbourne.
      Courtesy CycleHack

      O’Melinn, one of the not-for-profit event’s speakers, told the Straight she wants to get the message out that “cycling can be for everyone.” According to the bike advocate, barriers to cycling range from “simple” to “structural”.

      “Some of the cycle hacks that they might end up talking about or trying to solve are as simple as ‘How do I keep my hair dry on my ride to work?’ or ‘How can we design pants that are bike-friendly so they don’t wear away in those spots where you’re seated on your bike seat?’” O’Melinn said by phone from the HUB office in Vancouver.

      Whether the barriers to cycling in Vancouver are many or few depends on who you ask, O’Melinn noted.

      “Some of us are out there riding all the time, so they would say ‘No’ or ‘We’re doing pretty well,’ and there’s been a lot of progress in Vancouver, for sure,” O’Melinn said. “But you talk to other people and they may be really scared to get on their bike, because they haven’t had the education and they don’t see the infrastructure connecting the routes that they want to take. So, it really does depend on what level of awareness people have; it depends where they live, where they work; it really is contextual.”

      Seated next to Lowell at the café, Brotherston told the Straight she hopes CycleHack Vancouver will spur cyclists to go from “complaining” to taking action.

      “One of the most exciting things is the connections that are made,” said Brotherston, who’s also a user-centred designer. “You’ve got somebody who cycles to work or cycles with their kids, and they’ve got all these ideas about what would improve that cycle for them, but they don’t necessarily have the making skills or the digital skills or technical skills to pull that to life. So, it’s about matching them up at the event with people who can help them out there.”

      CycleHack Vancouver takes place at MakerLabs (780 East Cordova Street) and Musette Caffè (75 East Pender Street) this Friday to Sunday (June 19 to 21). Weekend tickets are $25 for adults and $15 for youths. For those who just want to see Friday’s speakers and Sunday’s showcase, “show-and-tell” tickets are $15 for adults and $5 for youths.

      Comments

      15 Comments

      Nice but...

      Jun 17, 2015 at 11:16am

      how about some effort from the cycling community/lobby to get their fellow riders off the sidewalks? I am tired of pushing riders off the curb and their absurd excuses for riding where prohibited. Especially annoying are the riders who alternate between riding on the road and then magically become pedestrians when convenient.

      Dave M

      Jun 17, 2015 at 11:32am

      My biggest issue is that there should be a separate bike lane along the Sea-to-Sky. I shudder a bit when I pass the cyclists while driving, and as cyclist I'll not do it.

      Martin Kent

      Jun 17, 2015 at 12:21pm

      The freewheeling phenomenon is solved by selling t-shirts that say LAW ABIDING CYCLIST. Hiring teenagers to sell these to adults will result in a social conscience instead of mass disobedience. Adults enjoy freewheeling because they are stupid. Teenagers know this-it isn't a secret!

      not the library's job

      Jun 17, 2015 at 2:29pm

      Rather than asking the public libraries to supply him with bicycle parking, why doesn't Mr Lowell just contact the operators of public parkades to encourage them to provide secure bicycle parking, for a fee? There's probably a viable business model here. It's a valuable service and cyclists who want it should not expect to get it for free. They might start with Metro Parking, which has the contract from the City to operate the large parkade underneath the Queen Elizabeth theatre, a nice central downtown location, or whomever operates the Central Branch library parkade. The libraries have more than enough to do already, and little enough in the way of budget or space, so it's unreasonable to ask them to do this. And yes, please, let's see some evidence of a culture developing among cyclists where those who clip pedestrians, run red lights, and ride on the sidewalk receive rebukes from others.

      Clement

      Jun 17, 2015 at 2:48pm

      How about repealing the bike helmet law? It's outdated and doesn't work!

      Pete McMartin had an excellent article in the Sun about this last year. Poorly thought-out nanny state intrusion!

      SuperCycle

      Jun 17, 2015 at 4:15pm

      Easy -
      Ban all cars, trucks, buses, taxis, delivery vans, ambulance, police, firetrucks from the downtown core, then shortly after all of Vancouver.
      That will solve it.

      Richard Campbell

      Jun 17, 2015 at 9:34pm

      @Nice But...

      That is what we are doing by strongly encouraging the city to build protected bike lanes along main streets. On Hornby and Dunsmuir, sidewalk cycling was reduced by 80% after the protected lanes were installed. On Burrard Bridge, sidewalk cycling was pretty much eliminated after the protected lane was installed.

      People are getting frustrated. The City really needs to pick up the pace on building protected bike lanes. They are 2 or 3 years behind on several projects from the last transportation plan.

      So if you want bikes off the sidewalk, tell the city to build protected bike lanes along the streets where it is a problem.

      And you should know that it is really dangerous to cycle on busy roads with parked cars. If people cycle far enough away to avoid hitting car doors, there are a few drivers that are aggressive and will illegally intimidate people forcing them to ride too close to the car doors. Get the police to crack down on that too and the drivers that don't look before opening their car doors.

      And stop pushing cyclist off the curb. That is likely assault as well as being really dangerous. That is a far more serious offence than riding on the sidewalk and you should be charged. Only the police have the power to enforce laws.

      And if someone cycling on a sidewalk hits a pedestrian, they should be charged as well.

      DMD

      Jun 18, 2015 at 9:08am

      Irony is our lungs are going black

      ursa minor

      Jun 18, 2015 at 10:10am

      @ Richard Campbell

      The city's priority for cycling should be establishing a direct, protected lane route to UBC, instead of relying on the farce that is the Off-Broadway Bikeway. West Side idiots and their oversized SUVs parked on both sides of the street make it extremely unsafe, as well as the fact that almost none of them know how to negotiate what's supposed to be a traffic-calming roundabout.

      As for the comments from Nice, but... you have to agree that the effort to make Vancouver a bike-friendly city takes a hit every time someone:
      -rides on the sidewalk
      -passes on the right
      -passes without ringing a bell
      -bitches about having to wear a helmet
      -rides in a cluster rather than single file
      -rolls through an intersection without stopping
      -rides with earphones or is talking on a cellphone
      -turns without signalling, or uses the wrong signal

      and despite being on HUB's mailing list and gone to some of their classes, I have yet to see any serious effort from them or other groups to insist that people stop engaging in these stupid, selfish, and dangerous behaviors. Everyone bristles at the idea of licensing, but how else do we get to a level of zero tolerance that's expected of other people (ie. motorists) who use the roads?

      Hornby & Dunsmuir

      Jun 18, 2015 at 12:56pm

      Richard Campbell -- so you think that if I don't like getting clipped by cyclists on the sidewalk, it's up to me to beg the City to instal more bike lanes? Evidently you think it's okay for cyclists to ride on the sidewalk as freely as they like until that utopian day eventually dawns. I work at Hornby and Dunsmuir and frequently walk along the sidewal of both streets, with their separated cycling lanes. And you know what? It's still very commonplace to see cyclists riding on the sidewalk on either street, often quite fast, weaving in and out of pedestrian traffic, within a metre of the often-unoccupied cycle lane. It's also very common to see those who do use the cycling lane blowing through red lights at speed, aiming for the gap between pedestrians crossing with the signal across their path. The bike lane is entirely optional to these people, and there are plenty of them. Now I suppose you're going to respond that, hey, they're saving the planet, so they have a right to ride wherever they like, and pedestrians -- by definition, it's uncool to be a pedestrian -- should just get out of the way, man.