Commonwheels Bicycle Co-Op

CommonWheels is throwing a FAMILY BIKES PARTY at the Joseph M. Smith Community Health Center in N. Allston! It will be a family-themed day, with rides from the health center to the Charles River park (only a few blocks away!). Bring your own bikes, but we’ll have bikes to borrow for adults and kids, helmets to give away, an obstacle course (to test your bike skillz!), and group rides out to the river.

So come by, bring your kids and families. We’ll be in the back parking lot having a blast!

Happy Father’s Day — CW

Come join us at the Taste of Allston this coming Saturday. You’ll be able to try some of the greatest american and international cuisine Boston has to offer!  We’ll be hosting Free Bike Valet so don’t worry about riding over.  Info below:

Yum!

-CW

come one, come all, bring your kids, to…

this Sunday May 20, from 10am to 2pm, at the D-14 station in Brighton.  We’ll have a bike rodeo, on-street ride, and bikes giveaways!

Happy Bike Week to all the little ones too.  Yeah, even kids deserve bikes…

It’s Bike Week!  We’ve got a TON of stuff on the calendar:

Saturday May 12th: Allston Village Farmer’s Market, 11am – 3pm, it’s Allston’s first farmer’s market of the season, on the corner of Brighton Ave and Cambridge St (Union Sq in Allston, right outside Jackson Mann Community Center).  Come by to grab some fresh produce — and CW will be there with tools and stands and free helmets for folks in the community!

Sunday May 13th: The Christina Clarke Genco Memorial Ride , 8am to 3pm, a fantastic ride around Newtown. Funds raised on this ride will benefit Habitat for Humanity and and Bike & Build.

Monday May 14th: Rush Hour Race!  7:45am to 10am.  What’s the fastest way to get from Davis Square to Kendall Square? Join local celebrities as they “race to work” using three modes of transportation (bike, car, and the T).  Hosted by LivableStreets and Somerville and Cambridge Bicycle Committees

Wednesday May 15th: CW Open Shop,  5:30pm until dusk, on the corner of Union Sq in Allston (in case of rain event will be TBD).  We’ll be there with stands, tools, and know-how to help you get your wheels rolling!

Thursday May 17th: Bike and Bowl! 6pm – 8pm, until 11pm. CW is leading a ride around the city out to Castle Island and ending up at Kings Bowling Alley in the Back Bay. We’re meeting at Copley Sq at 6 (leaving at 6:30), riding along the river, harbor, and through the South End before making it to Kings at 8pm for bowling and beverages.  Plus there’s Karaoke!

Friday May 18th: Bike Friday at City Hall Plaza, 7am -10am, join your fellow local bike commuters as they ride from destinations all around the region converging at Boston’s City Hall for free breakfast and tons of smiles.

Sunday May 20th: Allston/Brighton’s D-14 Child Safety Day, 10am – 2pm, at 301 Washington Street.  It’ll be featuring a CW-hosted Bike Rodeo and Obstacle Course, with free helmets and a few kids bikes to give away, and free ice cream and hot dogs  and a moon bounce and tons of prizes!  Bring your kid, or your inner-kid, out to a great day in Allston.

 

SO MUCH BIKES!  These are great opportunities to get out and ride with others. In our opinion, there’s nothing quite as fun as a good group ride.

and of course every week is bike week for CommonWheels, so keep up with us and we hope to see you at all our happenings all season long.

-CW

 

We wanted to spread the word about this great ride for a great cause! please consider joining CW and the hundreds of other riders on mother’s day for the Christina Clarke Genco Foundation ride.

here’s a bit of info: ”The mission of the Christina Clarke Genco Foundation is to inspire youth to find their passion and make a difference in their communities. We seek to encourage youth to channel their energies towards the development of skills and personal qualities that will enhance their life and the well being of their family and communities. We believe in empowering youth to find their passion through athletic activities, community service, and pedal power.

Christina was on her second service trip with Bike & Build, a non-profit group dedicated to cross-country bicycle trips to benefit affordable housing when a tragic accident took her life at the age of 22. Christina’s short journey through life was driven by her passion for helping others.  She was an inspiration to hundreds of youth, nurturing, mentoring, and coaching them. She will always be remembered for her gentle spirit, athleticism, creativity, and commitment to making a difference in the world at such a young age.

The Foundation was created to continue Christina’s legacy.”

you can check out more info here: https://www.facebook.com/ccgfoundation

and at: http://ccgfoundation.org/

and read a bit about Christina’s personal bicycle connections in Boston, on Bike and Build, and at BU on The Humble Cyclist’s great post.

If you can’t join the ride, please consider donating to the cause.

Sincerely, in memory and solidarity,

CW

 

Hey CW,

In case you haven’t heard, this Sunday night is the 2012 Midnight Marathon Bike Ride, but before you head out on a 26.2 mile ride you should stop by CW in the afternoon to tune up your ride. You’re going to want working brakes, inflated tires, and tight cables, so starting in the afternoon we’ll have all our tools and stands on hand at the Penniman Park in Allston (right near our old space on Rugg Rd).  You can stop by and do some free maintenance, using our brand new set of tools!  Sunday, from 2pm until dark.

If you’re planning on coming by, shoot us a line at tools@commonwheels.org so we’ll expect you, and to be able to provide you with directions and more info.

You can look up details on the Midnight Marathon Bike Ride here:  http://www.facebook.com/events/213169195450849

and sponsored by Boston Socieites of Spontaneity:  http://www.bostonsos.org/adventure/boston-midnight-marathon/114-boston-midnight-marathon-ride-details-2.html

Great! We hope to see you before the ride to make sure your ride is equiped for the long haul.  And we’ll be organizing a ride from Allston to S. Station around 9:30pm to make sure we have a spot on the MBTA train, leaving from Union Sq in Allston (right outside Jackson Mann Community Center).

(and honestly, this is one of the best rides of the year.  Last year we packed over 200 bikes on the commuter rail out to Hopkington!)

Ride Easy,

CW

CommonWheels is rolling out the bike stands and taking over the streets of Allston Village!

On April 1st (appropriately), CommonWheels is setting up shop right in the heart of Allston, literally at the corner of Harvard and Brighton — We’ve graciously asked the City of Boston to lend us a few of their precious onstreet parking spaces so that we can offer our fine services to the folks in Allston. Just for the day, we are taking over parking spots and replacing them with bike stands, tools, tables, chairs, a few potted plants, some board games, and perhaps a few April Fools jokes.

Starting at noon, we will be offering do-it-yourself bike repair, with a few Fix-A-Flat and Wipe-And-Lube workshops throughout the day. So you can even show up and learn a thing or two about keepin’ that chain lubed and changing that stubborn flat tire! How’s that for “better than a parked car”??

The point is, basically, to show what we can do with a few parking spaces if given the chance. If you haven’t heard of Park(ing) Day before, check out some images of what folks around the world have done: http://tinyurl.com/7mb5a2h
Typically, Park(ing) Day takes place in September every year, but we thought we’d jump the gun, and what better day than April 1st?!

So stop by, hang out for a bit, and give your bike a quick tune up, fools.

Happy Biking,
CW

Come out and enjoy a fun group ride to Drumlin Farm — We’re going to check out a bunch of little baby sheep and see their moms get sheared at the WOOLAPALOOZA festival!

Woolapalooza: “It’s a sure sign of spring—time to shear the sheep! Come join the fun on March 31, 2012, from 10am to 4pm, at Woolapalooza. Bask in the beauty of Mass Audubon’s Drumlin Farm, the perfect setting to delight in all things sheep. Festival highlights include Drumlin Farm’s new spring babies, sheep shearing and sheepherding demonstrations, hands-on activities for all ages, and all natural, locally grown and harvested Drumlin Farm food. Local fiber artisans will offer demonstrations and sell their handmade products. Follow the “Sheep-to-Sweater Interpretive Trail” to learn how fleece on a sheep becomes the warm woolen sweater you wear.”

That sounds AWESOME! herding demos, “new spring babies”, wool artisans and farm fresh food!
here’s their site: http://tinyurl.com/d6suw9

And, even better, if you ride with us you can get the member rate for the day, at $9, saving just about 20% on the entrance fee — CommonWheels is signing up by the end of this week, so please let us know asap and we’ll put you on the list.
and of course traveling to the farm is FREE since we’re BIKING!

We’ll be meeting up around 11 am from Union Sq in Allston, right outside the Jackson Mann Center, and leaving promptly at 11:30ish.
Show up early to go over your bike for a quick tune-up. we’ll have the CommonWheels tools with us
(the ride goes a bit more than 10 miles each way, 1.5 hours of riding)

TO GET THERE
here’s a map of Union Sq in Allston:http://g.co/maps/d2ryc
here’s a map of Drumlin Farm: http://tinyurl.com/7o5vono

It’ll be a light and slow easy ride, following along the Charles River most of the way
we’ll have a ride map up shortly showing the exact route

this is our first ride for the CommonWheels season.
**our next ride is April 9th — to Lanes & Games in Arlington for candlepin bowling.** keep an eye out for all sorts of fun trips and events all season.
your bike looks fun, are you into group rides?

Ride Good,
CW

Hello CommonWheelers,

As we mentioned in our last entry, winter is fading away and we’re all chomping at the bit to begin an awesome season in less than a month.  But, before we hit the ground running pedaling, we want to hear your thoughts on the programs we’ll be offering this year.  Please allow us to present our 2012 user survey.

The survey won’t take more than 5 minutes of your time, and your answers will help us figure out how best to get as many folks as possible out and riding the streets of Boston safely.  We want to hear from you whether you were at every event last year, or never even made it down to Rugg Road (even though you really meant to).  And please, feel free to share this survey far and wide!  The URL is: http://bit.ly/CW2012Survey

Thanks for helping us out – we’ll see you soon,

CommonWheels