Bike Friendly Fort Worth Ride to City Hall

As we’ve noted before, this Tuesday the City Council will vote whether to adopt the ambitious Bike Fort Worth plan for creating a real on-and-off-street bicycle transportation network throughout the city of Fort Worth.

Of late, bike efforts in Dallas have been aided by the actions of a group of bike & urbanism advocates from Oak Cliff, dubbed “Bike Friendly Oak Cliff.”  Their efforts, including organized group rides to Dallas council meetings, have helped start new conversations about the importance of bicycle infrastructure in our neighbor to the east.  Now, a sister organization is starting up here in Fort Worth, and are kicking things off with a similar organized ride.

The new organization, Bike Friendly Fort Worth, unsurprisingly springs from the Near Southside area, and is being headed up by Brad Blessing and longtime Fort Worth cycling advocate Bernie Scheffler.  They’ve organized a group ride to City Hall this Tuesday to show support for the Bike Fort Worth plan.

The ride will meet at the Trinity Trails trailhead at University & Riverfront, next to the Hoffbrau steakhouse, this Tuesday at 6:00 PM.  Shortly after 6:00, the group will roll out for a leisurely 4-mile bike ride via the Trinity Trails and city streets to City Hall for the council meeting.  They are emphasizing that this is not a high-speed “spandex warrior” sort of thing – anybody can join up, nobody will be left behind.  It’s about getting together en masse and showing support for real bicycle transportation infrastructure in Fort Worth.

The route, seen above or in this interactive form here, starts out on the Trinity Trails and then transitions to a big, high-visibility statement as it heads straight down W. 7th Street into Downtown.  The ride will pause and regroup on Foch in the West 7th area before heading down 7th, to ensure a safe and visible group while riding down the street and across the 7th Street bridge.

The organizers also mention:

It would be great if we could all dress in a manner that makes it clear that we are there to support Bike Fort Worth. That said, we will be in City Council Chambers, so leave your lycra at home. But positive, pro-bike T-shirts are more than welcome. At the very least, taking your helmet into the meeting with you will mark you as a supportive cyclist. Don’t wear it (The Fort Worth P.D. will ask you to remove it– no hats!), but keep it tucked under your arm.

Finally, it would be great if the City Council heard positive and encouraging comments from area cyclists about the plan, and how much we appreciate the planning staff’s efforts. If you’re not afraid of public speaking, fill out a speaker’s card when you enter the Council Chambers. They’ll let you go on for up to 3 minutes, but 1 or 2 minutes of why you support the plan will make just as big an impact.

We hope a lot of folks get together for the first Bike Friendly Fort Worth ride to show the city government that times are changing in the Panther City, and we can’t ignore bicycle transportation any longer.  This will be a significant event as the Fort Worth City Council votes on charting the course for a Fort Worth more supportive of more and varied transportation methods.