Global Gutz 2008

Boston will be participating in the 8th annual Global Gutz alleycatthis year. Our race is starting at 10PM SHARP at St. Stephens church on Hanover St. 10PM means 10PM, so don’t be late, and please don’t get there before 9:45. No registration, racing for bragging rights. Top global time for male and female contestants wins a ticket to the CMWC in Toronto! The format and race rules are available at the Global Gutz site. Party to follow with the BBMA’s favorite host DJ Ghostdad, with all refreshment sales benefiting the BBMA.

(be sure to check out the BBMA for more awesome events)

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Geekhouse Bikes Open House

Geekhouse Bikes is having an open house! Go check em out and support local bike industry.

So, I’m doing an ‘Open House’ on SUNDAY May 18th from 2pm-8pm at my new shop:

Geekhouse Bikes
15 West Sorrento St
Allston, Ma. 02134

This is the last day of the Baystate Bike week that will happen in May. So we’re basically going to celebrate cycling, and the new shop with BBQ, Beer, and possible Bold Sprints… I’m still working out all the details, but I wanted to at least put that date on the calender. Everyone’s invited!

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Boston Greenways: Eight Missing Links

You are cordially invited to the final presentations for the senior design projects (capstone projects) in transportation engineering, Tuesday April 22, 6:30 pm, in 108 Snell Engineering Center. The presentations, entitled “Boston Greenways: Eight Missing Links” are co-sponsored by the Emerald Necklace Conservancy, MassBike, WalkBoston, the Fenway Alliance, and the Solomon Fund, as well as the projects’ client, the City of Boston.

In case you missed it, the students’ work was featured in last Sunday’s Globe

The final presentation is open to the public, so please feel free to invite interested people. It will consist of a plenary session lasting about 1.5 hours in which the projects are all presented, and will be followed by a time for participants to view the designs in more detail and discuss them with students teams, who will be stationed around the lobby of the Snell Engineering Center.

PROJECT LIST
1. Charlesgate path: multiuse path along and under the Bowker overpass connecting the Back Bay Fens with both the Charles River bike path and the Mass Ave bridge.

2. Arborway: new traffic circulation scheme for Arborway between Jamaica Pond (Kelly Circle) and the Arboretum (Murray Circle), with the goal of concentrating through traffic in the inner roadway and restoring the park / path function of the medians between the inner and outer roadways, allowing the Emerald Necklace paths to extend from Jamaica Pond to the Arboretum.

3. Route 9 Crossing for Muddy River path: building on last year’s project, a more detailed design
of improvements to bring the Muddy River path across Route 9 and across Brookline Ave to Netherlands Road. Includes bridge alternatives, embankment modifications, and traffic circulation changes with associated traffic signal studies.

4. World Series path: multiuse path between Ruggles Station and Fenway, including a modified Huntington Ave crossing. This path has same function, but a different alignment, as the Linking the Corridors Path.

5. Bike lanes on Commonwealth Ave. from the Public Garden to Kenmore Square.

6. Bike lanes on Commonwealth Ave. from the BU Bridge to Warren Street via Packard’s Corner.

7. Bike lanes on Dartmouth Street (Back Bay)

8. Bike lanes on Summer Street / L Street from the Fort Point Channel to the L Street Beach in South Boston

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Emmanuel’s Gift – Film Showing

EMMANUEL’S GIFT – film showing
Thursday April 10th
7pm

Bikes Not Bombs’ newest international project gets underway in April, to setting up an entire bicycle workshop within wheelchair reach, to employ a full staff of disabled mechanics in Ghana. The project is a partnership between Bikes Not Bombs and a foundation in Ghana created by an extraordinary man, Emmanuel Yeboah. The documentary Emmanuel’s Gift is narrated by Oprah Winfrey and by following Emmanuel’s struggles and achievements, it gives a background for this new project. In late April Bikes Not Bombs will send a shipment of nearly 500 donated bicycles to get the project started. The 40 foot shipping container will be put on the ground, with doors and windows cut in the metal sides so that it becomes part of the structure of the new workshop.

Both introducing and following the film, we’ll have a discussion with David Branigan and Carl Kurz. David is a BNB shop mechanic who has 3 years previous experience in Ghana in the Peace Corps, and he’ll spend the first five months as technical trainer for this project. Carl is BNB’s founder and International Programs Director.

Emmanuel Yeboah was born with a severely deformed leg. The stigma of disability is strong in Ghana, and his father abandoned the family. Emmanuel’s mother enrolled him in school and taught him that he deserved the same opportunities as everyone else, but when she fell ill he left school and took up shining shoes on the street to support the family. After his mother’s death left Emmanuel an orphan he began a personal campaign to spread the empowering philosophy he learned from her. From foreign aid workers he heard of a foundation to help disabled athletes and he wrote a letter requesting a bicycle, with a dream of cycling across Ghana to raise awareness and respect for the disabled. Emmanuel received the bike and made the cross-country trip, which led to more opportunities: a trip to the US to compete in paralympics, a prosthetic leg, a second cross-Ghana bicycle trip, recognition from government officials, a new law in Ghana mandating improved access for disabled people, and lastly the EEFSA foundation to create employment and sports opportunities for disabled Ghanaians. It is this foundation which has partnered with Bikes Not Bombs. We’re excited to show this film on the big screen here at BNB, and discuss the upcoming project launch!

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North American Cycle Messenger Championships: Help It Come To Boston

The Boston Bicycle Messenger Association is putting in a bid to host the 2009 North American Cycle Messenger Championships. This event is not for messengers only. It’s all about the community, not the race, and the community is not an exclusive type of thing.

If you’re at all interested in helping out with this event, in any way, please come out to the first NACCC09 organizers meeting. This meeting will be happening immediately following the monthly BBMA (Boston Bicycle Messenger Association) meeting, this Thursday, April 3rd, with the NACCC discussion commencing around 9pm. Get there a bit early if you’d like, the BBMA meetings are not an exclusive party either. Anyone interested in helping the messengers of Boston will be welcomed with open tattooed arms!

The meetings take place at:

17 Edinboro St. #4
Chinatown

For more info contact the BBMA

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