4th Annual RVA Bike Month ends on high note!

May is our favorite time of year around Bike Walk RVA. It’s the time of year when grassroots leaders volunteer to lead community events for the whole region in celebration of riding bikes during warming spring weather. This year has been exceptionally good with record participation, and here’s why.

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• Over 50 events between April 29 and May 31 in the City of Richmond, Chesterfield County, Henrico County, Hanover County, and the Town of Ashland!
• New sponsorship of RVA Bike Month by Bon Secours Richmond Health System who see bikes as a way to bring healthy lifestyles to all Richmond residents, and a new event at their Sarah Garland Jones Center called the East End Bike Party that has been rescheduled due to thunderstorms to July 21, 2017.
• Two cohorts of graduates from our Bike Walk RVA Academy program, pushing our total number of graduates since 2014 to over 100! The academies were the year-long Blue Devils for Biking youth academy at Varina High School in Henrico County and the Hanover and Ashland Bike Walk RVA Academy, the fifth running of the tradition 8-week course for adults.
• Mayor Levar Stoney’s first Bike to Work Day with innovative new event design and ride route. During the event, Mayor Stoney announced commitment to study and complete the Missing Link Trail, a priority one project in the Riverfront Plan.
• Bike Month Proclamations in both Richmond and Henrico County.
• Estimated 3,500 event participants through the 5 weeks at events large and small, and that’s with a couple of larger postponed events still to come in June and July.
• Launched billboard and bus panel education campaign to curb driving and parking in bike lanes, supported by Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles Grant.
• Launched region’s first Vision Zero Pledge to educate and encourage all road users in order to achieve zero deaths on our roadways.
• Lots of new event themes, including kids BMX riding, Black Girls Do Bike ride, volunteer opportunities to install new bike racks, a new community bike festival at Good Shepherd Elementary, and more.
• Some recurring favorites include Amy’s Army of Cancer Warriors Pedal Through Pedals fundraiser ride, the Taco Tour, Pizza Crawl (rescheduled to June 16 due to heavy rain), Strava Art Ride, a variety of scavenger hunts/history tours/bike safety trainings, a dizzying array of women-led mountain bike rides, weekly Bryan Park races, and the ever popular Cap 2 Cap ride and Dominion Riverrock.
• Lastly, it should be said that the weather this May has been great, with a record low number of event postponements due to rain. We did have a little bit of hail, though. Whew!

We look forward to continuing to grow RVA Bike Month throughout the region and helping all residents making biking a fun and exciting part of celebrating spring, our neighborhoods, our local businesses, our river, and everything else we enjoy about living in the Richmond Region.