Become a Cycling Booster: Join Biking Clubs in Toronto & Vancouver

Toronto and Vancouver have dozens of great cycling groups to inspire you to take up biking, give you great cycling tips to navigate around your city, and link you to activities, group rides & events with biking & ebiking at the fore-front.

TORONTO

Cycle Toronto is the pre-eminent one-stop organisation for all things biking! It is a member-supported charity whose aim is to make Toronto a healthy, safe and exciting cycling city for everyone. Cycle Toronto has three areas of focus: advocacy, education and encouragement. Their core group of directors and public members work together to shape policy and infrastructure in order to build community and elevate our city’s cycling culture moving forward. There are also Cycle Toronto Neighbourhood Groups who are geared for that region’s specific needs.

There are many ways to participate: Volunteer, Make a Donation, Join a Club or Become a Member for monthly, yearly plans, complete with Business, Student & Senior discounts!

Follow Cycle Toronto on social media for news and events in your area.

Check Out These Other Terrific TO Cycling Groups:

• Women’s Cycling Network

• Dark Horse Flyers Cycling Club

• Gateway Bike Club

• BikePOC

• Bike Party Toronto

VANCOUVER

HUB Cycling works tirelessly to promote safe cycling in Metro Vancouver by motivating people of all ages and backgrounds to embrace cycling as a fun, economical, and green mode of exploring one’s city. Their superb events, workshops and resources are a must companion to your commute or pleasure ride in the Lower Mainland. Their “Intro To Ebiking” feature is an excellent primer for those considering buying or renting an e-bike (like from Zygg Vancouver!) 

Make sure to check-out this interactive map of the Infrastructure Successes HUB Cycling and HUB Cycling members rallied hard to bring into reality. 

Here Are More Fabulous Groups To Join in Vancity:

• Vancouver Bike Tag

• Glotman Simpson Cycling Club

• West Coast Cycling

• Vancouver Bicycle Club

• BC Cycling Coalition Kids On Wheels

An EU Cycling Strategy on the Horizon - Ebikes Are A Big Focus

This past February, The European Parliament adopted its first resolution dedicated exclusively to cycling. Calling on the Commission to develop a dedicated European Cycling Strategy, the resolution also urged the Commission to recognize cycling as a fully-fledged transport mode, on equal footing with the other modes. “Cycling should be integrated into urban mobility – with cycle highways between suburban areas and city centres, secured bike parking facilities close to urban transport nodes, and affordable e-bike and bike-sharing schemes. Cycling is a valuable alternative for travel over short distances in urban and rural areas, and for tourism, but this potential has to be unlocked,” according to the text approved by the TRAN Committee.

The resolution asked for more investment in cycling-related training and awareness, encouraging more people to get (back) on a bike. According to the resolution, cycling also has the potential to create 1 million new jobs by 2030 by absorbing and reskilling workers. To achieve this, it is crucial to enhance the production of bikes and e-bikes within the EU.

Cycling can offer an affordable transport alternative for vulnerable social groups who may be exposed to transport poverty. The resolution therefore encourages Member States to develop support systems to facilitate the purchase of bicycles and ebikes along with incentives for participation in bike-sharing systems. 

The European Cycling Federation expertly summarized what the European Parliament’s new resolution means for cycling on the whole.

The EU Commission is now primed to endorse a comprehensive EU cycling declaration that will set out strategic support by the EU institutions and Member States for cycling up to 2030. This will not only fortify cycling’s contribution to the EU Green Deal, it will also include the needs of business and industry to achieve the ambitious goals of the plan. A noted change in citizens’ day-to-day behaviour & mobility routine will follow with greatly improved cycling infrastructure and economic input.

An in depth communique of the Details of the EU Cycling Strategy, includes increases in each of the following sectors :

1. Economic Benefits In Cycling from 513 Euros (2017) to 760 Euros (2030)

2. Jobs In The Cycling Economy from 650,000 (2017) to 875,000 (2030)

3. Number of Cycling Trips Per Day from 160 million (2017) to 240 million (2030)

4. Number of Electric Power-Assisted Ebikes (pedal assist) in use from 6.5 million (2015) to 62 million

The European Cycling Federation’s “Euro Velo” network also recently released its vision for ramping up e-bike production and use, and more specifically, ebikes’ impact on tourism. 

In tandem with this, France has just announced an expansion in their training of school children - especially those in challenged neighbourhoods with limiting financial backgrounds - in cycle readiness and inclusion. The program aims to train approximately 800,000 kids per year by 2027. This scheme will also include a French government investment of €250 million in cycling in 2023.

The European Union cycling culture has much to celebrate. The North American bike & ebike community applauds these advances, with the hope of echoing these aims, on the home-front.

Good News in Cycling: April 2023 Edition

A monthly round up in back for a recap of the month of April and this month we see a lot of bike shares in North America adding bikes (and ebikes) to their fleets for the upcoming season!

• We’re celebrating the Barcelona invention, the bike bus! It’s brought us so much joy to see more and more of these pop up around the world. Many have come together in Barcelona to learn from each other and come up with strategies to make them grow!

• Cyclists are now outnumbering cars at peak times in London! The only mode of transportation to beat them is walking.

• In an effort to reduce cyclist deaths, federal funding is made available in the US to eliminate gaps in the cycling network.

• Bike Share Updates: The Pittsburgh bike share program is adding 220 bikes, 154 of which are electric. The all-electric bike share designed for mountains in Vail is expanding this year, to include 155 bikes and 33 stations proving that bike shares aren’t just for big cities. Finally, Portland’s bike share adds another 500 bikes to their fleet, doubling their size in three years.

• France has implemented cycling classes at the school, making sure as many people as possible are comfortable on a bike.

• NYC will begin testing local delivery hubs to reduce truck traffic and switch to more sustainable last mile deliveries.

• The Dutch have integrated trains and cycling thanks to their beautiful bike parking lots.

• The longest bike tunnel in the world has been built in Norway to reduce travel time for cyclists.

Did we miss any good news? Let us know!