(Photos: Bill Griesar)
Just got a wonderful email from Kiel “Bike Train” Johnson with a photo essay from Sabin K-8 School parent Bill Griesar. Bill was named Bike Train Conductor of the Year last year and the bike train he led this morning (in the rain no less) swelled to 102 people by the time it reached the northeast Portland school.
Bill emailed Kiel a photo essay to share this morning’s bike train and I thought you’d like to see it too (text and photos below are by Bill Griesar)…
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OK, so it started small…
Then it began to grow…
And grow…
And grow…
And (I’m not kidding here) GROW!
We had 45 students on the Northern bike train alone when we finally headed down the 20th Street hill to school! After the Southern train rolled in, and we’d counted our informal bike train riders, we had a grand total of 102!!!! (and it was raining)
Many thanks to 4th grade teacher Vangie Shaw, and her able student volunteers, who offered hot drinks…
By the time the bell rang, there was no parking left – for bikes! : )
This is great to see. Nice work Bill and Kiel, and all the students and parents at Sabin who are getting on the bike train. For more local bike train news — including news that Sabin is competing in the first-ever National Bike Train Competition with a school in Temecula, California — check out BikeTrainPDX.org.
Who wants to start a child-sized pannier company with me?
I love the picture of the bike train passing the school bus. Who need those when you can ride your bike to school?
I agree! I would love to see new legislation/policy that uses some of the money state gives for buses and transfers it to bike train promotion.
Watch out. City Club is wary of too much money going to bikes (taken, you know, from electric car charging stations and mass transit)
But on a serious note this is very inspiring.
We should have a citywide inter-school competition (and then we might get some momentum behind upping the bike rack installation quotas at school)….
May is Oregon Walk & Bike to School Challenge Month – register your school! –> http://walknbike.org/
Unofficial counts from the first ever Vernon Bike Train show at least five kids participated.
This is totally awesome!!
Bill-the-Conductor for mayor! You have my vote
AWWW. Proud to live in Sabin now 🙂
9watts, there is actually an inner school competition. In the last picture, you can see the silver bike wheel? That is the trophy for having the 2nd most kids on a bike train this month. I believe that Beech has the golden bike… but probably not for long based on these numbers.
The rack at Sabin was custom built to showcase a golden (or silver) bike, so this is serious competition between schools.
Another thing that makes this so great, is that Sabin is a relatively small school compared to others in the district. Thus, the % of student riders is pretty darn high.
Shouldn’t the trophy be based on percentage of students that ride? That seems unfair if it is a straight measure of numbers give the wide array of school sizes in PDX. As far as I can tell, I am the only parent/kid rider at my daughter’s school–not much of a train.
This is FANTASTIC! Boy does it bring a BIG smile across my face. Kiel is doing an exemplary job is giving schools valued momentum.
Sabin killed it today! Here I was thinking that I would have 50 kids riding at our Temecula school and we’d take the lead…man was I wrong.
Nice job Kiel!
Love it! Great work getting the kids safely to school and have fun doing it.
Fantastic work by everyone involved! The best part is that it looks like the kids were having a blast and a half.
This story makes me feel better about our future, So Awesome!!