Helping Communities Achieve “Bicycle Friendly Community” Designation!
Overview
The League of American Bicyclists’ Bicycle Friendly Community (BFC) program is a tool for communities to make bicycling a real transportation and recreation option for all people. A “Bicycle Friendly Community” welcomes bicyclists by providing safe accommodations for bicycling and encouraging people to bike for transportation and recreation. Communities are assessed through a voluntary application process and recognized in one of the six categories below. All applicants receive customized feedback on their application as well as access to technical assistance to help them move to the next level. To learn more, visit www.bikeleague.org/community.
Platinum communities have a comfortable and safe bike network, excellent bike parking, great bike education programs, a supportive police force and people on bikes everywhere.
Gold communities have strong bike cultures as well, but may still need to complete their bike network or reach more children with Safe Routes to School programs.
Silver communities are somewhat welcoming to bikes and are easy to navigate for intermediate and experienced cyclists, But there is still a lot of work left to do to make bicycling safe and comfortable for everyone.
Bronze communities may only have a couple bike lanes in place and motorists may not yet be aware that they need to share the road with bicyclists. However, important steps are being taken towards creating a more bicycle-friendly community.
An Honorable Mention is given to communities that are just starting to address the needs of cyclists.
No recognition is given to communities that have yet to address the needs of cyclists.
Project Description
MAST is interested in working with the City of Keene, which was awarded a bronze BFC designation in 2011 and 2015, to increase the City’s ranking from Bronze to Silver status. The Bicycle Friendly Community subcommittee will take a lead role in this project and report back to the MAST Steering Committee on a quarterly basis. Potential work tasks include working with City of Keene staff to identify action steps the City and other actors can take to increase the community’s ranking. The sub-committee may also assist the City with filling out a new application for BFC status. In future years, the BFC subcommittee may branch out into other communities or into the Bicycle Friendly University or Bicycle Friendly Business programs.
Time Commitment & Timeframe
The expected time commitment is about three hours per month. This includes one hour per month spent in subcommittee meetings, and 2 hours per month outside of meetings.
If you are interested in volunteering for this subcommittee, please contact us.
Meeting Schedule
Next meeting: 5/1/18 (see agenda below).
2017 meetings:
| 2/21/17 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 3/21/17 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 5/16/17 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 6/20/17 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 8/15/17 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 9/19/17 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 11/12/17 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
2018 meetings:
| 3/5/18 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 4/3/18 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |
| 5/1/18 | Agenda | Meeting Summary |