NE Alberta.
(Photo © J. Maus)
The northeast Portland-based Community Cycling Center has won a grant for a project to help them “understand cultural and economic barriers to bicycling.”
According to a statement from the CCC, the project will help them perform a needs assessment to better understand the “unique cultural and economic barriers to bicycling encountered by minority and low-income community members.”
The nearly $80,000 grant from Metro also comes with the expertise of Kristin Lensen, a consultant with Alta Planning + Design and Portland State University’s Initiative for Bicycle and Pedestrian Innovation.
Metro Councilor Rex Burkholder lauded the goals of the project. “In my work here, it’s the first grant project that I can recall that has specifically been aimed at addressing social justice issues related to transportation.”
Susan Remmers, executive director of the CCC, says this type of effort is needed now more than ever. “The need for the bicycle as an affordable, reliable, clean, and healthy transportation option,” she said, “will continue to grow as the economy sputters, the obesity epidemic grows, the global climate changes, and traffic gets more congested.”
The project is slated to begin this spring and continue through 2011.