Southern California - The CicLAvia Traffic Free Bike Event In Los Angeles

Go to my thread on this free first ever bike event in the City Of Los Angeles:
http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?682561-A-Special-Free-Huge-The-CicLAvia-Traffic-Free-Bike-Ride-In-Los-Angeles (http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?682561-A-Special-Free-Huge-The-CicLAvia-Traffic-Free-Bike-Ride-In-Los-Angeles)

I'm really looking forward to this event...

Welcome to the first-ever CicLAvia in Los Angeles - www.ciclavia.org !

This Sunday, October 10, 2010 (that's 10-10-10, folks), at 10 AM, our city will be opening streets from Boyle Heights to Hollywood for everyone - people on foot, bike, skates, youth, elderly, and everyone between to enjoy our streets as public spaces, free from automobile traffic.

The LA County Bicycle Coalition (LACBC) will be kicking off CicLAvia with a leisurely 7-mile ride, starting at Hollenbeck Park in Boyle Heights to the Bicycle Kitchen in East Hollywood. The ride will last about one hour, and other CicLAvia events will take place throughout the day until 3 P.M.

Tour with us, help us spread the word about LACBC, and enjoy refreshments at the end!

LACBC helped initiate the movement to create CicLAvia and has served as a partner throughout planning for CicLAvia over the past two years.

Our friends with the *Eastside Bike Club* and the *San Gabriel Valley Bike Coalition* will lead also a ride, from the Alhambra / El Sereno / South Pasadena area to Hollenbeck Park. Meet at Walgreens, corner of Main St. and Fremont Ave. in Alhambra at 8:30 AM; the ride will leave at 9 AM. The ride will go through El Sereno and Lincoln Heights to Boyle Heights.

After the ribbon cutting festivities at Hollenbeck Park, the ride will meet with the *Eastside Riders*, *South Central Bike Club*, and the *Midday Ridazz* at 11 AM at the intersection of Figueroa and 7th streets. This ride will then proceed to Macarthur Park for a pitstop, travel to East Hollywood, then return to Hollenbeck Park.

The Eastside Bike Club will be pulling a *GHOST BIKE* as a reminder to all motorists to SHARE THE ROAD! The Ghost Bike w/Rider is a tribute to all cyclists that have been killed by motorists.

For updates on the ride and to rsvp contact erica@la-bike.org

Wide open spaces! : (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ciclavia-20101007,0,3285831.story))

We're taking the Blue Line from Long Beach to CicLAvia. I'm buying a kid trailer so we can take our two kids with the bikes as well.

Everyone who can go tomorrow should go; if this event is a big success we may be able to see streets opened for bikes and walking, every weekend. And it will be amazingly fun to ride your bike thru Downtown LA, Koreatown, E Hollywood, Little Tokyo, and Boyle Heights, with no traffic!

I will be at Union Station tomorrow morning at 9AM if anybody wants to join me for the ride over to the start...:)

Hi,

I'll be up there but not sure exactly what time. I'll be taking the Blue Line up from LB. If I can get my act together early enough I'll be catching an 8:30a train with LB Cyclists to meet up with LA County Bike Coalition.

coming up from san diego with the kids and will be riding for at least a couple of hours and proly doing a museum or two
on wilshire later in the day. will be interested to see the turnout/support and hopefully we can get this turned into a regular
occurrence; not only in la but also in san diego...and elsewhere. should be fun.

So good!!!

Hi,

CicLAvia was definitely fun. It was not really an event for serious cyclists if you wanted to do serious riding. If you wanted to have fun on your bike and if you wanted to see some major streets in LA without cars then it was a great ride.

it was packed! I think our streets were busier than those in Bogota on the videos. We need to do this every month, and expand the length of the route to provide more space. There was an amazing amount of demand for room to ride bike and walk.

The folks counting bikes on 6th, just north-west of Westlake park, told me they had counted 700 bikes passing in 15 minutes from 12:30 to 12:45 pm.

Photos on 7th street: http://www.flickr.com/photos/23849806@N00/sets/72157625136883490/with/5069974178/

I went downtown hoping for something good, turns out it was truely amazing. Hopefully with the turnout they can convince city officals to do it again and potentially expand it in the future. Photos from all along the route on my blog link below.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_vtqDd5oxLXU/TLJcguQyslI/AAAAAAAABaE/8OnCnpa7oJc/s1600/IMG_3425_2.JPG

I, too, came up from San Diego to take part in this (well I was in town for other reasons but made this part of the trip) and had so much fun I can hardly stand it. Like the poster above said, not a day to get a 'serious' training ride in (whatever that is) but it was just amazing to be able to amble along on streets like that without having to worry about getting run down. Everybody was in such a great mood, it was amazing.

The L.A. Times Monday edition says an estimated 100,000 turnout.

Link (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ciclavia-20101011,0,3023682.story)

100,000 is amazing. In my opinion, things like this are great for getting the idea of cycling (in any form) on the radar of the average resident. Here's hoping that this becomes a weekly tradition.

This summer I was in New York City Manhattan and just happened to be there when NYC had their version of the same. It was their 3rd year in a row and its done on 3 consecutive Saturdays in August. The route is on Park Avenue for about 6.9 miles. Starts at 7 am to 1 pm. They call it "Summer Streets".

In the Regional Discussions for the east coast, you will find some good pictures that were posted.