Yesterday afternoon, I got to volunteer in one of the City of Orlando's award winning bicycle programs. Cristina Cruz and Charles Brown developed an innovative approach to community education to attract children and new riders to bicycling through a power point presentation entitled, "Got Bikes..Ride 'em," which covered the history of bicycling, famous riders, safety and places to ride. The presentation will be offered in all six Orlando City Commission Districts during Florida Bike Month (March). Children, commissioners, citizens and communities will together benefit from this great program.
This first community workshop was held at the Citrus Center and we were joined by Commissioner Phil Diamond. I spoke about famous professional cyclists and will be helping in the future during the safety demonstrations. We had about 35-40 kids present and several parents were there to learn about bicycle safety and to enter to win free bikes and helmets. We distributed 5 donated bikes to the lucky winners and everyone was given free literature about safety and bicycle laws, water bottles, and red warning lights.
We have another presentation on Tuesday night. If you are interested in donating a used bike, please let me know and we can get it in one of the giveaways.