Hi Everyone - Joe Metal Cowboy Kurmaskie, founder and brain trust
behind onemillionbicycles.org. I'm a lifelong pedal pusher,
journalist, activist, "bestselling" author of the bicycling travel
memoirs Metal Cowboy, Riding Outside The Lines and Momentum Is Your
Friend (Mud, Sweat and Gears will be released in October) The best
description of my writing came from USA Today - "David Sedaris
trapped in the body of Lance Armstrong" Ha. I responded with "Either
David got himself a trainer or Lance has let himself go to hell."
But I drew the line when called "A modern day Mark Twain on two
wheels" Cleveland Plain Deal. Come on now, if that's the case them
somewhere a riverboat captain weeps.
Enough about me, to the issue at hand, onemillionbicycles.org Yes, we
are throwing the woodstock of bicycles, a one day 300 coast to coast
of rallies at which 1,000,000 riders create 1,000,000 new ones. We
are trying to create a national movement, help get more bicycles out
of those garages, especially from folks that wouldn't normally know
about or connect with bike collectives etc otherwise. Glad to find
and connect with this list serv.
We are going to kick some two wheeled butt with this project. I'm
happy to answer specific questions and logistics especially how it
covers tune ups of these bikes, safety checks and education, but in a
nutshell, on August 9th 2009 one million of us who currently ride
bicycles will ask for a massive increase in state and federal funding
for bicycle education infrastructure, and enforcement. that's the
rally goal. The bike giveaway goal is very one to one - each person
pledges either to get a bike from their garage, collection, etc and
pledge it to a specific person in their community That, or get a
friend, family member, coworker, who doesn't currently ride or has
not pedaled in many moons to come join the rally and bring a bike for
themselves. The idea is to keep all the bikes local - philly riders
give bikes to philly pledgers etc. the $5 registration fee and 75
percent of all funds we raise from other sources go to safety check
and rehab bikes in their communities at collectives, bike shops etc.
We are hiring national rally and bike giveaway coordinators to help
coordinate. And an army of intern, volunteers awesome folks like
yourselves
That's where many of you guys come in - please email us, join the
revolution by registering, let us answer any questions and then get
involved as a participating collective and let us send you pledgers
and pledges to check bikes in your zip-code. We also need groups to
join up and sponsor local rallies.
The rallies are a new model compared to things like the million man
march and washington rallies to stop vietnam and Iraq war etc. That
model puts all these resources into play to bring one million people
to DC - we wanted a low carbon footprint but big media exposure and
we wanted to put riders in the backyards of every congressmen in
america - this way they can't pretend that those people at a DC rally
aren't their constituents. It also allows for total media market
saturation on one weekend, local, regional and national. These
rallies will have music, speakers, booths, the big pledge moment,
performances, rides, photo contests, etc.
more info at these links:
http://bikeportland.org/2008/04/17/a-national-movement-for-a-million- new-riders-begins-in-portland/#more-7044
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wCz68vaNJw
Thanks Joe Kurmaskie onemillionbicycles.org metalcowboy.com