I have been naive about the proposal to privatize parking at OSU. Until today I was thinking, "OK, well that probably sucks for all sorts of reasons, but at least it will raise parking rates and that could make people less inclined to drive to campus." Indeed, parking fees under the plan would be raised at least 7.5% each year for the next 10 years—which is good for people like me who would prefer that the cost of driving is high enough to discourage it. But then I talked to an OSU employee who told me a choice tidbit from the contract currently being developed. And yes, it is worse than you possibly could have imagined for efforts to promote active transportation on campus.

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Yay Bikes! wants to get you on a bike, so that is why we have a ton of events scheduled over the next several months. All YoY rides are FREE for Yay Bikes! members and $5 for everyone else. So become a YB! member already!

2012 Yay Bike Event Dates & Themes (click for details)

Learn more about sponsoring or supporting a Year of Yay by clicking here (pdf) and contacting Ray.

Do you organize a ride or a bicycle related event? We want to partner with YOU to promote 200 Days of Cycling in Columbus for the Bicentenial on the Yay Bikes! calendar! Submit your event to Andrew at andrew@yaybikes.com and we will post it to the calendar tagged Bicycle Culture and help promote it. In turn, we would love for you to promote 200 Days of Cycling by tweeting with #200daysofcycling whenever you promote rides!

Many conversations in the world of cycling are, frankly, just about played out: "We need bike lanes!" vs "Bike lanes are for pussies!" ... "Cyclists never follow the rules!" vs "Yeah, but motorists are trying to kill us!" ... "Bike sharing is a UN conspiracy!" vs "Um, no, we're really just riding bikes here!" ... "Spandex is a the fabric of my dreams!" vs "Spandex makes my butt look big!" And so on. It can get pretty boring, arguing the same damn thing all the time to the same people. Let alone trying to lecture people about why biking is great for you: "Saves money!" ... "Improves health!" ... "Great for the environment!" These entrenched conversations make it far too easy for people who don't care about bicycling to tune it out altogether. Something must be done to interrupt the scripts and get at this topic from new angles; it's time for new, surprising conversations about bicycling and the role of transportation in our everyday lives.

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Last week, alongside 11,000+ transportation professionals from around the world, I attended the 91st Annual Transportation Research Board (TRB) Annual Meeting in Washington D.C. I went to learn what’s happening in the world of transportation research, what the gaps are and how Yay Bikes! might contribute to the conversation. The good news: there is *lots* of exciting bicycle research being done out there, much more than ever before! But for all the inquiry into bike infrastructure, bike sharing programs, cyclists' behavior and preferences, however, I did notice that one topic continues to be overlooked—cyclist education. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think there is a single research paper devoted to the subject!

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On top of completing some top-notch community work in 2011, Yay Bikes! has also devoted considerable time to developing our organizational capacity during these past few months. And now, the spoils are ours (and yours!). Behold!

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