Monday, November 3, 2014

Roosevelt Island Resident Yawa Rides The Most Miles For Bike NY Learn To Ride Team, Wins A Free Mongoose Bike - Is Ridge Riding Next?

Bike NY Learn To Ride Team Winner Yawa Image From Caitlin Goodspeed

Bike New York's Roosevelt Island Community Outreach Manager Caitlin Goodspeed reports:
Every year the League of American Bicyclists organizes the National Bike Challenge,

a nationwide event that encourages people to get on their bikes and RIDE! People compete on local, state, and national levels to see who can bike the most miles from the beginning May (Bike Month) through the end of September.

This year Bike New York


created a team for new cyclists in the city called the 'Learn to Ride Team'. As an incentive to join the team, we decided to giveaway a free bicycle to the person who brought in the most miles over the course of the summer. Participants were required to log in all of their miles on the National Bike Challenge website. You could even down an app that logged everything in for you!

This year the winner was a Roosevelt Island resident! Her name is Yawa

Image Of Yawa Riding Her New Bike From Caitlin Goodspeed

and she's been very involved with our program here on the island. After taking our free education classes in the spring and throughout the summer, she continued to ride around the island using her husband's old folding bike. She racked up the miles and earned the top spot on Bike New York's Learn to Ride Team.

She received her new hybrid bike last Thursday!

Image Of Yawa's New Bike From Caitlin Goodspeed

I am very proud of Yawa. She's come a long way and is completely deserving of a new bike. I know that she'll continue to ride throughout the year!

The National Bike Challenge happens every year so we'll be doing another giveaway next season!
With a little bit more practice, maybe Yawa can try some mountain biking


HT To Erika

but maybe not so extreme.

2 comments :

OldRossie said...

Here are a few more quotes from Helen Chirivas, written on this blog using her name CheshireKitty:

Regarding her perspective of RIRA:
"I don't wind you up to get the WIRE or RIRA to take me seriously. That would assume I take the WIRE/RIRA seriously to begin with."

Regarding motions she filed with RIRA:
"Those that took them seriously are the ones that need to have their heads examined."

Not sure what this statement is... but she made it:
"RIRA (almost) = WIRE = orthodoxy"

Another questionable statement of hers..:
"Instead, there should be a RIRA-organized conference on quick and easy ways to "take the money and run" i.e. how to cash in on rising property values, how to flip and flee…"

Her approach to tax planning...:
"There will be "punitive" taxes on the 1% - as they deserve. They will be singled out - and there will be no-where for them to run..."



There are many many more of these buried in the rants she's posted on blogs, sent in emails to the wire, yada yada... is this the kind of talk that gets votes on roosevelt island?

CheshireKitty said...

Answer: Yes - It certainly does get votes.

A lot of people dislike what is going on in society these days, for example, with the persistent institutionalized racism that led to the Michael Brown and Eric Garner killings. Another example of what people abhor is the unprecedented income inequality, unfairness of the "poor doors" in luxury high-rises that reek of the practices of apartheid - another cause of outrage.

Whether or not you can ascribe the above quotes of Cheshire Kitty to Ms. Chirivas (and there is no way that can be done) Chirivas did come in second in the VP race, even in the context of the crooked RIRA election.

A lot of people in NYC, including RI, dislike racism, income inequality, and creeping gentrification, which, on RI, has led to the shut-down of the Catholic Thrift Shop (for example) in favor of empty store fronts; these voters are the people who are opposed to racism and in favor of brotherhood, fairness, and the preservation of RI as a mixed-income community - these are the voters who voted for Chirivas.

There is a lot of discontent with institutionalized racism in our society, as well as its intrinsic unfairness - witness the recent unjust Eric Garner and Michael Brown GJ verdicts, the unprecedented level of income inequality, and so forth - which have led to the ongoing demonstrations nationwide protesting the GJ verdicts in Ferguson and Staten Island. In response, de Blasio has called for an overhaul of the NYPD and Obama has called for nationwide body cams for the police. Last time I checked, both de Blasio and Obama, and the parties and many other politicians who support them, are considered main-stream.

Unless you are a monster, I trust you share in the demonstrators' revulsion at the GJ verdicts.

Rossie: There is a lot of revulsion at the establishment on RI, as I put it: "RIRA (almost) = WIRE = orthodoxy." It did have a moment of integrity and standing with the little guy in opposing Guerra, but in general, it always seeks to white-wash or rubber-stamp the retrograde decisions of the establishment. RIRA never took up the banner to fight for the construction of new permanently affordable housing on RI. Instead, it just goes along with the decisions of RIOC - especially during the years when RIOC carried out the pro-developer, pro-gentrification policies of the Pataki administration.

RI must not become a gentrified enclave, in contradiction to the General Development Plan. The same can be said for NYC in general. The development of luxury enclaves hearkens back to the days of de facto segregation. The goal should be integration by means of fairness in employment practices, school integration, and the provision of permanently affordable housing throughout the City and on RI. The goal should be a "class-blind" society - where opportunities are open to all. Greed should not be the principle that motivates investment - it should be replaced by fairness. Because it is perceived that having a poor neighbor on the block will cause property values to tumble, this is not the case today: Poor doors are constructed to exclude or segregate the poor. Poor doors are put in buildings because the poor are shunned, considered less than human - sometimes, like Eric Garner, they are even murdered by the police.

Considering Escobar's close ties to the RI establishment, Chirivas should have run for President! Maybe next time..