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Community bikes – onwards and upwards

Firstly a big thank you to recent donors including Halfords (Wandsworth and Brixton), Alleynian Rugby Club, the central London Giant store who have provided a lot of modern racing wheels and Lambeth Council for their ongoing support.

Thanks to Library of Things for letting us use their shipping container as an office and Community Shop, our hosts.

A few pics of happy customers we have provided recycled bikees for recently:

A happy customer
A restored vintage racer can be the best option for getting around town – for work or studies.

We are now always open on Saturday 10.30 – 3.00 and Wednesday mornings. At other times call ahead to check.

New developments we can look forward to are a Community Bikes van which should be coming shortly (subject to passing an MOT). That will enable us to pick up bikes from house clearances on a regular basis.

The long-lost Brixton market cargo bike (image coming) has now been kindly lent to us by Transition Town Brixton  and is available to hire for events or what-have-you and also makes a great promotional tool.

 

 

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Community Bikes Kids Bike Day

At the start of the half-term holidays, Community Bikes held its first Kids Bike Day on Saturday 26th to help local children repair or upgrade their bicycles and learn how to do basic repairs and safety checks.

Here are some images from a wonderful day:

A recycled Specialized and a repaired bike for the sisters.

Corry with his recycled Muddy Fox

Mohammed giving the kid’s repaired and recycled bikes a check-over

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Community Bikes winter wonderland

A flurry of show turned Community Bikes into a winter wonderland this morning and we continue to make progress setting up our project – though it is not the weather to be out cycling London’s roads.

Our new Sheffield bike stands – for when the cycling weather returns

We are very grateful to Lindhill developers for our new recycled bike stand and especially to Lee Fitzpatrick who helped dismantle and load it all up in a blizzard.

For those cyclists braving the roads in these conditions, Cycling Weekly have some tips on staying safe in the snow – but especially after a recent snowfall and before the roads and cycle lanes are properly cleared and salted, we would advise using an indoor trainer and sticking to other forms of transport.

If you do venture out, take care of anti-social motorists who neglect to clear their vehicle roofs of snow, creating a hazard for other road-users.

As Community Shop’s Emma demonstrates – it’s a day for walking boots not cycling shoes.

Last week we attended the London Bike Show and were pleased to make contact with many of the exhibitors.

This week we will be attending Ecobuild to explore the options for insulating our workshop and shipping container office and installing solar panels for heating!

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Community Bikes shipping container project

We are very pleased to have arranged the purchase of a 20ft shipping container from the Library of Things who are moving to Crystal Palace.

We will be refurbishing the container as our public-facing office for our bike-share scheme and other community bike activities.

The container comes with an external living roof and viewing periscope installed by London Wildlife Trust and local volunteers in September 2016, funded by the Western Riverside Environment Fund and Groundwork London to create local pollinator habitat and flood resilience.

So now we just need to insulate the container and add a door to keep out the cold!

We are looking to source insulation materials, with our preference being to insulate the container on the outside using some kind of wood cladding. We will also be adding a consumer unit for electricity.