Ciclavia - the Valley, 3/22/2015

It's hard to believe that it's already Ciclavia time again! It has only been a bit over 2 months since the last one and I've been especially busy in those 2 months, so in some ways the time has flow and (gasp!) I still have tons of photos I haven't gone through, from Ciclavia and beyond.

Last Ciclavia was a bit different for me since it was outside of my home and it's been interesting watching the contrast in how it's been handled in Pasadena. I've been working in Pasadena for over 10 years, partially because I find it to be a pretty awesome city to work in, especially without a car. With ample public transportation (I've used a combo of trains & buses to get home over the years... I actually have options!), areas where being a pedestrian is rather encouraged (old town Pasadena, especially) and many random events going on, I really don't mind working there. Of course one of the most famous events is the Rose Parade (... I have an awesome set of photos in this area to share at some point, but there's also other plans brewing for those). Anyway, this is all a distraction in saying that I work on Colorado, on the Ciclavia route and for over a month now, I've seen Ciclavia flyers all over the place. When I wandered around my home on Ventura on the Ciclavia route just days before the Valley event, I think I saw 2 Ciclavia flyers in windows. In Pasadena my work building has had the flyer up for nearly 2 months and businesses in the general area all have signs up as well. I know of a few coworkers that are planning to go and generally I haven't heard any of the grumbling I heard in the Valley pre-Ciclavia. Of course, the excitement about it and the 3.5 mile route have me wondering if things are going to get crazy, but who knows. It will be interesting. The last few days of preparation have been building up the excitement with signs appearing for changed bus routes, no-parking signs, street closure signs and today seeing barricades being dropped along the route. Almost time!!!

Anyway, here's another batch from last Ciclavia in the San Fernando Valley!

So last Ciclavia I wanted to do something special since it was my near my home and I came up with bike decorating! I prepared some supplies in the week before and in the afternoon during the event, my friend and I headed over to the Universal Red Line parking lot with a box of supplies. A few people stopped by and decorated their bikes with some of the straws, pipe cleaners and crepe paper on hand, but by far we gave away way more flowers & bows made with some of the supplies.

Some people were confused and didn't understand why we were doing this (because it's FUN! Because it maybe makes you smile! Because we like to share and we can!) others were just super excited. At one point this little girl, maybe 4 or 5, showed up very quietly asking for a bow. I pulled one together for her and she was so excited, gave me a very sweet compliment and thanked me before disappearing. The mother of the little girl in the photo below said that they had passed us and her daughter kept asking to decorate her bike, so they decided turned around to come back and add some color to her bike. At some points we just asked random people to stop so we could decorate their bikes. A woman named Daisy stopped by and asked if we had any supplies to help her attach a flower to her bike and I had a good time talking with her for a while. It was her first Ciclavia and she and her husband ended up at it because they were retired and tried to do something new and different each weekend & Ciclavia was that week's event, but she was excited about coming back to another in the future.

I'm a little disappointed I didn't get things together to do this again for this Ciclavia because now that I'm thinking about it, it really was super fun in so many different ways.

 I'll have to look around to see if I can find out the name of this, but it's a box delivery type truck that gets painted white with little bits of event specific details and then during events, people can stop by and add their bits to it for the day. After the event, it gets repainted white and the process repeats.

 Last week I noticed a paper in front of the CBS studios in Studio City with a notice from the Studio City neighborhood council about Ciclavia and some survey results that someone carried out. I'm not sure what area they covered, but I believe it was something liek 86 businesses that participated and overall, a majority of businesses & citizens they surveyed would support another Ciclavia! Yay! The sad part was a note saying it would be another 3-4 years before another Ciclavia would happen in the same area.

 #GreenTallBike