Bikes Outside: It's Lonely at the Summit

This morning, Bikes Outside takes a field trip to a near-flung corner of hard hittin' New Britain. There, on the grounds of CCSU, Bike Walk Connecticut held their first Bike Walk Summit this past Saturday. When I arrived a little early to help with check-in, mine was one of only two bikes in front of the already-buzzing Memorial Hall. I braced for another embarrassingly sparse bike turnout at a bike event, but a few more bikes did arrive in time for the official start of the event. By the time the first break rolled around, there were eight bikes locked up outside including mine. Two more attendees rode their bikes and parked them inside on the stairway landing. While this disqualified their pampered rides from Bikes Outside immortality, it did bring the observed ride-in total to 10. While this is an improvement over last March's rainy annual meeting, it's still pretty underwhelming for an event with an estimated attendance of 160, and no, I don't think (m)any of the other people walked there. The weather was really beautiful this time, too.


The bikes that were representing were of the practical sort. Fenders and racks were the norm rather than the exception. The Kettler Elegance had internal gearing, dynohub lighting, a Trinity College decal and was made from alurad, a lightweight alloy of aluminum and radness (comparable, but not identical to the "aluminawesome" and "alubitchin' "alloys) A Breezer Uptown 8 rocked similar specs. A couple of Trek hybrids that I know well from years of CCBA Bike To Work breakfasts were there, along with a few more bikes, a tadpole recumbent trike and my own cargo bike (not pictured). The summit itself was a success. There was still plenty of bike bonding and policy discussion, etc to be had inside (which warrants another post when time allows), but not enough bikes outside.