TheThinkTank May 2008

thethinktank@lists.bikecollectives.org

48 participants
33 discussions

setting a 3-speed in #2 without cables
by Bob Giordano 27 May '08

27 May '08

quick comment- if you are stuck without a cable/shifter set for the shimano style 3-speeds, you can slip a thick washer under the spring-activated gear shifter located on the hub (a small rock works too). This will keep the hub in second speed (or 1st if you'd like), instead of the harder gear 3. -Bob, Free cycles missoula reno bikes wrote: > actually the sturmey archer ones are a bit more common. they are usually > steel so they last longer. > i was thinking shimano.

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REI- know them.
by Tom Emm 23 May '08

23 May '08

www.rei.com/reigives

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organizational meetings: structure, facilitation, etc?
by rachael spiewak 17 May '08

17 May '08

Hiya, Bike Collectives. I'm wondering.. what kinds of meetings do you have? How are they structured and facilitated? Thanks! rachael -- Sopo Bicycle Cooperative 404-425-9989 www.sopobikes.org * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Hours of operation: Tues/Thurs 7 pm - 10 pm Sat/Sun 2 pm - 6 pm

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Bike Collective Link Pages on our sites - Revisited
by Rich Points 14 May '08

14 May '08

Hey All, About six months ago I wrote to this list about having a links page to all the collectives in the U.S. and Canada. Since then a bunch of collectives have posted this link list on their sites. I wanted to revisit this and encourage more collectives to post this link list to their sites. It shows that we are part of an international effort to get people on bikes. And it's a great resource for people traveling or moving. http://www.communitycycles.org/links.html Please contact me if you have updates or revisions. Peace -- Rich Points Community Cycles Director http://CommunityCycles.org Rich(a)CommunityCycles.org 720-565-6019

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Re: [TheThinkTank] A wikiHow article on How to Start a Not For Profit Organization in Ontario, Canada
by Tom Emm 14 May '08

14 May '08

tom48236(a)yahoo.com wrote: ---------------- Your friend just sent you the following article from wikiHow.com: How to Start a Not For Profit Organization in Ontario, Canada Incorporating a not-for-profit in the province of Ontario, Canada? Heres how... You can view the rest of this page at: http://www.wikihow.com/Start-a-Not-For-Profit-Organization-in-Ontario%2C-Ca… wikiHow is a collaborative writing project aiming to build the world's largest how-to manual. Our mission is to provide free and useful instructions to help people solve the problems of everyday life. wikiHow is a wiki, which is a website that anyone can write or edit. You can help us, by editing any page on wikiHow which needs improvement. http://www.wikiHow.com - The How-to manual that anyone can write or edit

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honoring earn-a-bike hours from other co-ops / collectives?
by Durham Bike Co-op 13 May '08

13 May '08

Hey all, Maybe there's been another thread on this in the past, but I'll go ahead anyways. Fairly regularly we get e-mails from people who are moving to / staying in town for a while about getting a bike, and I had the thought that sometimes a nice way to deal with this would be to honor earn-a-bike volunteer hours worked at the other programs out there, particularly as transporation is definately a first priority when moving some place new, and in our program (being volunteer run and only open 1-2 days a week) it can take a couple weeks to complete the earn-a-bike. What do other peeps think about this? A good idea, or too much work dropping other programs a line to say what's what? peace, Colin - shop coordinator, DBC. -- Durham Bike Co-op 723 N. Mangum St. Durham, NC 27701 www.durhambikecoop.org

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how do you know when too many is too many?
by veganboyjosh＠gmail.com 13 May '08

13 May '08

i know community cycles is not the only shop on this list that has space issues, nor shortness of volunteer hours.... i'm wondering if any shops out there have some kind of "we're all filled up, we can't take any more bikes" policy. we've got connections with our local police department, so when they sweep through the public bike racks and clean up abandoned bikes, we get them. this brings us several loads of 100-300 bikes per year. we've also got a similar hookup with the university of colorado at boulder, which is 30,000 students strong. this yeilds about the same number of bikes, but in fewer loads. these are in addition to all our other donated bikes from individuals, smaller groups, etc. we're already using cheaper, department store bikes, or those who are beyond repair specifically as stripper bikes, for parts, or for lessons. we don't have a problem getting bikes to use/turnaround, as i'm guessing most of you also don't have this problem. my question is, when do we say "sorry, we're all filled up, we can't take your bike right now"? do any of you have some creative ways that you've solved the "we've got too many bikes and not enough space to keep them while they're waiting for a home"? we have done some work with a couple of different groups that have sent bikes abroad, but we don't want to make this a regular part of our program, for various reasons. to date, we don't have a set policy, but we tend to only participate in those kinds of programs when we're busting at the seams, and getting rid of 300-500 bikes would help tremendously. we've gotten in touch with our local recycling yard, who pretty much takes everything that can be recycled. i personally know that they see several bikes per week in their dumpsters, but they don't have any way to pull those out once they're in, once people dump washing machines, fridges, etc, on top of them. i'd like to see a seperate "bike dumpster" for people to drop them off, and we go and reuse them. the problem is we're gonna need some better way to sort them and keep them until someone can get to them... thanks for reading this far. josh.

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Community Cycles Web Forms - Joomla and RSForm
by Rich Points 13 May '08

13 May '08

Hey All, I've been wanting to write this email for some time now and I'm finally getting around to it on this rainy day. Over the winter we moved CommunityCycles.org over to a Joomla <http://www.joomla.org/>set up. Joomla is cool for many reasons but one of the most useful for us is an inexpensive component called RSForm <http://www.rsjoomla.com/index.php/Buy-RSform-Form-Management-Component.html>. RSForm allows you to create custom web forms with minimal html/php/mysql knowledge although it's good to have a strong background in these technologies. I do have this background and have knocked out large complex forms in record time. I'm using these forms to collect all kinds of data. The result has streamlined a lot of administrative tasks. RSForm functionality is easily explained. When a form is submitted an email is sent to email addresses of your choosing. This email can be in a custom html format. The data is also stored in an online database, this database can be downloaded as a csv file. And one of the coolest things is I can share the forms with others. So if your collective wanted to use our volunteer form, or a part of it, you would need to have RSForm installed on your Joomla site. I can pass you the form files for you to upload and that's it. I've read in the support forums that there are some bugs with this but it seems to work for the most part. If you'd like to give this a try let me know. Anyway have a look at the following, any feedback you may have is appreciated. *Public Forms* * Contact <http://communitycycles.org/contact.html> - The results of this are sent to the core group * Volunteer <http://communitycycles.org/get-involved/volunteer.html> - I set this up about 2 months ago and it has been very effective in finding and plugging in new volunteers. * Bike Month Volunteer <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=23> - This will be used to help plug in people to our bike month activities. * Thursday Youth EAB Sign Up <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=4> - Sign up form for Thursday Youth EAB * Lennard Zinn Workshop Sign Up <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=7> - Sign up for Lennard Zinn Workshop * Bikers Ed Workshop Sign Up <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=9> - Sign up for bikers ed workshops * Membership <http://communitycycles.org/donate.php>- This is an old hand coded form from our old site. I haven't figured out how to integrate PayPal yet. *Data Entry* * EAB Tracking <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=1> - We use this to enter completed EABers. The EABer will get an email with their photo and info. * Bike/Parts Donor <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=5> - This is how we input donations and the people who donated them. *Program Tracking* * EAB Follow up Questionnaire <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=21> - We'll start using this in June and will track how EABers use their bikes after the program. *Bike Fleet Maintenance* * City Bike Feet Maintenance <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=10> - The results of this form go directly to our fleet maintenance guy * UCAR Blue Bike Maintenance <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=13> - The results of this form go directly to our fleet maintenance guy *Online Sales* * Craigs html generator <http://www.communitycycles.org/index.php?option=com_forme&fid=14> - I created this form because we had various people posting to Craigslist. The result was all kinds of various formatting and information. When you fill out this form you get an email with the html code to paste into a new Craigs posting. The form helps streamline the posting process while maintaining a clean format. I plan on creating two versions of this, one for detailed posts and another for more general listings. -- Rich Points Community Cycles Director http://CommunityCycles.org Rich(a)CommunityCycles.org 720-565-6019

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bicycle valet
by james thompson 13 May '08

13 May '08

Riders, New to the list and wanted to share a super fun event we did at a local music venue here in Denton, TX: bicycle valet. Our community bike shop volunteers exchanged tickets for bicycles and placed everyone's ride in a safe place to be retrieved by us at their liesure. No locks or dark alleyway telephone poles required for safety, no fumbling for the right angle on that off-brand U-lock. The parking lot was pleasantly unfull until a late hour. We canvassed at our valet table. Event promoters supported the fewer-cars evening by offering free cover and beverages. The college-age crowd was quite fond of the idea, and I can fairly say we had a blast. Show up earlier than you would for a normal music venue (bar staff graciously helped our solo volunteer through the first rough half hour). Folks, this is fun, but it was work. We valeted seventy bicycles, dozens more locked up themselves, and this at a venue of probably no more than two hundred people. You need at least four people to do this: one ticketeer, one valet, and one security gaurd for the bikes, and one to keep the security gaurd company. Make sure the venue (bar or not) restricts access to the parking area. Make a "map" with ticket numbers and bike locations, no bike without a ticket or license, and ask each picker-uper to describe their bike in detail. And your valet needs to be comfortable on kamikazes (fixies w/no brakes). Remember to turn people's lights off, and take tips for your organization. Bring a good bicycle pump with presta/schraeder capabilities and a gauge. Something we didn't anticipate, the two a. m. crowd produces wobbly folk. It was frankly discussed that some of the less experienced riders might have fared better driving home. Rather than have this devil's argument, make sure you're at a venue of a size you can manage (we were) and that you can get everyone home safely (we did, but I fretted a bit near the end). I'll leave it to my colleagues to add anything else, or make corrections. In Solidarity, James Thompson Shop Manager Querencia Community Bicycle Shop Denton, TX

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Re: [TheThinkTank] KRGV News Story
by tom emm 12 May '08

12 May '08

> > <div> > > > <b>$4-a-gallon gas boosting bicycle sales, repairs</b> > > > <a href="http://www.krgv.com/Video/News/991153.wvx">Watch Video</a> > > BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) - Across the country, high gas prices are > > kicking bicycle sales into high gear. <P> > > Bike dealers say they're seeing customers dusting off their old > > two-wheelers -- or buying new ones -- to cope with rising fuel > > prices. <P> > > A spokesman for the Washington. D.C.-based League of American > > Bicyclists says there's a definite increase in people riding bikes. <P> > > He says, "it's due to a mixture of things but escalating gas > > prices is one of them." <P> > > About 18 million bicycles have been sold annually in the U.S. > > over the past few years. The National Bicycle Dealers Association > > says that adds up to about six billion dollars in annual sales. A > > spokesman says bike shops across the country are reporting strong > > sales so far this year. And more people are bringing in bikes that > > have been idling at home. <P> > > A Bismarck, North Dakota, man who opened a shop in April says he > > sold more than 50 bikes in the first month -- double his > > projections. He says everyone who walks in the store is talking > > about gas prices. <P> > > (Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.) <P> > > Comments: > ------------------------------------------ > > </div> >

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TheThinkTank May 2008