Bike to Work Month

[Dirt]

Cool! There seem to be a lot of commuter challenges going on each year. I am doing 4 right now.

[PrintError]

Isn’t every day Bike to Work Day?

[Dirt]

I’m on bike to work decade #4.

[PrintError]

@Dirt 3366 wrote:

I’m on bike to work decade #4.

You, sir, are my hero.

BTW: WABA’s Bike to Work Day is the third anniversary of my commuting streak. Looks like I’ll be doing it on a brand new bike too!

[Dirt]

@PrintError 3368 wrote:

WABA’s Bike to Work Day is the third anniversary of my commuting streak. Looks like I’ll be doing it on a brand new bike too!

Nice! Looking forward to seeing it.

[CCrew]

Hmm… sounds like a business plan. I can rent myself to some employer so they can get my 250 miles a week

Cuz mine sure doesn’t give a rats patootie

[JimF22003]

I did my first commute of the year today. I’m so ashamed…

I tried to look like a “regular” out there today, but I don’t think I was fooling anybody…

[consularrider]

We got the link to the Cascade Challenge above, any other links to share?

[Dirt]

This is my second favorite: http://2milechallenge.com/ Starts May 12 and runs through the end of October. I use their carbon calculator to document my carbon emissions savings for my 10,000 pounds of CO2 saved for the year.

I just started this one: http://www.plus3network.com/ I do the Pedro’s Global challenge. It takes a bit more effort to enter stuff in, but I love pretty much everything about Pedro’s, so I don’t mind a few extra clicks. If you ride with a GPS it is super easy. I don’t normally use the GPS Monday through Friday.

The 4th one I’m doing is internal to the company I work for. Employees get raffle entries each day they carpool, take public transport or ride their bike to work. Every month there is a drawing for fabulous prizes. I’ve won twice in the last year and it is actually a pretty cool program. It is administered through RideSpring.com.

[Dirt]

@JimF22003 3375 wrote:

I did my first commute of the year today. I’m so ashamed…

Extremely cool. No need to frown. Some of us have the ability and (dare I say) drive to ride all year and every day. I totally admit that this is completely over the top for someone whose lifestyle doesn’t revolve around cycling.

My goal in riding and being very vocal about it is to show people that they *CAN* leave their cars at home. It is fun, healthy and promotes real productivity. It is definitely NOT intended to demotivate.

Seriously… look at the Clif 2 Mile Challenge link I just posted. That is an awesome program that helps make it easy to leave the car at home. It motivates and shows you how easy it can be. Last year that program documented over 16,000 car trips that were avoided as a part of the program. This year it is going to be more.

Start with something you can do and build into it! That’s what I did.

Rock on!

[Joe Chapline]

@Dirt 3382 wrote:

Seriously… look at the Clif 2 Mile Challenge link I just posted.

Dirt, thanks for this link. I remember seeing Clif’s two-mile radius tool years ago, and I just found it again: http://www.2milechallenge.com/map/

This is a very simple and very effective tool for helping geographically challenged persons like myself visualize what’s within easy cycling range. This tool helped convince me I could bike to the train station as part of my commute. I’m going to put a link to it on BikeArlington.com now, and see about making a 1-mile radius tool for WalkArlington.com.

[PrintError]

@Dirt 3382 wrote:

Estremely cool. No need to frown. Some of us have the ability and (dare I say) drive to ride all year and every day. I totally admit that this is completely over the top for someone whose lifestyle doesn’t revolve around cycling.

My goal in riding and being very vocal about it is to show people that they *CAN* leave their cars at home. It is fun, healthy and promotes real productivity. It is definitely NOT intended to demotivate.

Seriously… look at the Clif 2 Mile Challenge link I just posted. That is an awesome program that helps make it easy to leave the car at home. It motivates and shows you how easy it can be. Last year that program documented over 16,000 car trips that were avoided as a part of the program. This year it is going to be more.

Start with something you can do and build into it! That’s what I did.

Rock on!

That’s awesome! I prefer to do the simple math of it.

I’ve commuted 14,000 miles over the last 3 years.

14,000 miles @ 25mpg (assuming “city” mileage in either of my rather econominical cars) @ $3/gal (average over 3 years) = 560 gallons of fuel = $1,680 in fuel savings alone.
Tack on about $100/mo worth of insurance savings (x36 = $3,600)
And 3 oil changes ($100 total maybe)
Plus 14,000 miles less wear on my cars

Etc

Etc

Etc

[eminva]

Thanks for alerting us to these. I am envious of those of you who work for employers that encourage bicycling and other methods of transportation. I am waiting to hear if my employer is moving me out to Rockville in a year. I don’t like to think about it, because it will surely doom my bicycle commute, barring the highly unlikely development of sharrows on the beltway or something. You have no idea how devastating this would be for me (well, maybe some of you do!).

I signed up for the Clif 2-Mile Challenge, so let’s see how well I do at logging my results. It raises an important point — while I do a good job with the bike commute, I often take the car to the grocery store (less than a mile away) so I don’t have to worry about how much bulky/heavy stuff to buy, etc. Also, for some reason I perceive the car to be faster. This weekend my husband and son were out with the car and I went shopping by bike. It was really no less convenient than car, and I should make it the default mode for short trips. Hopefully this challenge will encourage me.

Liz

[Dirt]

@PRINTERROR: I can’t do the simple math like that. Since I seem to spend 5-figures on bike stuff every year these days I don’t tend to save much money. I like to draw attention to the tens of thousands of pounds of CO2 that I’m not emitting.

@Liz and anyone else who is doing 2MC: The real points come from doing challenges. I didn’t give much thought to doing challenges the first half of last summer. The last half I was diligent about them. With roughly the same mileage and number of trips, I generated more than 4 times the number of points for my team. The team thing kinda makes it fun. Gold team got beat by a narrow margin last year. We’re gonna take care of those so-and-so Red team wimps this year. (I mean that in the nicest way.)

[Dirt]

Okay…. I just got the Monthly report from Pedros for the Plus3 Network Pedro’s Commuting challenge. As a result of the stuff people have done with that challenge, Pedro’s has donated over $326,000 to their charities.

That program just jumped to the top of my list of favorites.

The only thing better than letting my legs generate money for charity is my affinity for charity beer drinking. Luckily I am able to do both.

Pete

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