Friends of the Circle-Heights
Bike Network meeting 7

Minutes for Meeting 7
Friends of the Circle-Heights Bike Network
January 22, 2004
At Mac's Bacs Bookstore
Attendees: Sheldon Auerbach, John Reebel, Ryan McKenzie, Rip Ruhlman, Greg Donley, Ian DeGalan, Lee Chilcote, Sally Hanley, Marc Lefkowitz

We started the meeting by passing around the preliminary designs of the Community Graphics class at Cleveland Institute of Art for a Circle-Heights wayfinding sign program. We came to some collective decisions and also heard the input from Shaker Heights planning department.

Major points:

The group felt it was important that the symbolic representation of the bicycle be very clear--perhaps even derived from the "official" international symbol.

The two designs that rose to the top were the oval "emblem" and the triangular green sign. The group wondered of the class might to be able to explore a hybrid of both, with the graphic simplicity of the green triangles combined with the more literal reference to the bicycle/cyclist in the emblem.

The red "b" in the oval emblem didn't work for peopleit was redundant as a reference to "bicycle" since the image already did that.

The group felt it's important to incorporate into the graphic treatment the words "Circle-Heights" (with or without hyphen) to reinforce the concept of this district as cycling community. It also occured to us that, with the help of this graphic program, the term could eventually become a "brand" for the area beyond just the cycling community.

In the next iteration, it would be good to see prototype 18 x 18 signs that incorporated the graphic and some distances, such as:

(for a hypothetical sign in the westbound lane of Fairmount at Coventry)
Coventry 1 mile >
< Shaker Square 1. 5 miles
University Circle 2 miles ^

Also, we'd explore a larger sign to be posted at major destination/bike parking areas that would include a schematic of the whole district and have the other major destinations marked and routes suggested.

Finally, we wondered if the students might be willing to let us post some of their designs on the EcoCity web site, to illustrate our process in developing this program. If so, we'd need to have all their names spelled correctly and maybe a sentence about each person.

Tasks: Ryan is working on setting up a meeting with Cleveland Heights sign shop and Greg is communicating with the class and setting up another meeting for the next round of designs.

Next, the group collected the results of the bike parking survey which was conducted in December. Volunteers visited commercial districts throughout the Circle-Heights area and, using a form, recorded how many bike racks were present, while also identifying where bike parking might go. Six sets of results were collected, which means that there are a few still out there to be collected.

The goal with the bike parking inventory is to provide the cities with a network-wide bike parking plan that includes a table and a map of where bike parking exists currently and suggests where opportunities to put new bike parking exist. Also, included in the package will be information for the cities on bike parking guidelines, including costs on bike parking, and information on model bike ordinances.

Tasks:
Ryan will have an outline of what information should go into the packet at the next meeting.

Mike McGraw has generously volunteered to begin to pull the data from the inventory into a matrix.

Marc will determine which districts don't have reports and contact those who volunteered to cover those districts to (please) complete their survey

Sally asked if we could transfer the bike parking map onto an inexpensive flier for public distribution.

The group revisited an idea to explore opportunities for bike lanes in the Circle-Heights. The group recalled the discussion about the first place might be the uphill on Edgehill Road (which is on the Circle-Heights map as a preferred route). It was mentioned that John McGovern volunteered to write a letter that would be used to introduce the idea to the cities.

Tasks: Finish and submit for review the draft letter on bike lanes

After a discussion of the Rolling Block Party, the ride to identify road hazards which occurred last summer, Lee suggested that the group invite city maintenance officials to a meeting in February or March in order to have them explain what they do and how they might address the group's concerns about road conditions within the six feet of the curb through routine road maintenance.

Lee also suggested that the group really push to have some fun rides for the community once the weather warms to expose new people to the joys of riding in the Circle-Heights. Ryan recalled that Neil and Arline at B&K Bikes expressed a desire to help organize some fun rides.

Tasks: Marc will contact Neil and Arline at B&K Bikes about starting to organize a Spring fun ride

Ryan said he has a volunteer opportunity to distribute a new Bicycle/Car Share the Road information campaign brochure.

Another idea floated was to find a way to reproduce the Circle-Heights map cheaply to give it wider distribution (placemats at local restaurants?)

The next meeting will be Monday, February 16 at 6:30 p.m. (tentatively at Mac's Bacs Bookstore. Thanks to Suzanne at Macs Bacs for providing space for our meetings!)

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