2008 Woodie Awards
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Bike Co-Op pursues space, provides repair lessons
Issue date: 9/13/07 Section: Letters
For more than a year, I have been working with a small group of people who are petitioning University administrators for an on-campus bike workshop. The Truman Bike Co-Op wants to provide a space with tools and replacement parts for people to learn how to repair their bikes. As I am sure anyone with bike problems can attest, it's almost impossible to repair your bike in Kirksville, which is unfortunate as there is a bike culture.
People understand the health, monetary and environmental benefits that come with biking. People like to bike to class or to the grocery store, and they like not to have to shell out gas dollars or circle parking lots for a space. In six years at Truman, I have seen a huge increase in bikes on the roads and the racks.
Too often, however, bikes are chained to the racks, rusted, with flat tires and sit stationary for an entire season. I know their owners are out there somewhere, abandoning the bikes not because of disinterest but for the mere inability to repair them. No more! In spite of the absence of indoor workshop space due to lack of support from people in positions to allocate it, the Co-Op has begun mobile workshops on the Quad, and our first occurred during the Activities Fair last Thursday. The Co-Op will continue hosting workshops on the Quad on the second and fourth Fridays of the coming months from 3:30 to 5:15 p.m.
For our workshop last Thursday, we obtained tubes from Walt's Bike Shop in Columbia, Mo., and charged $3 per tube. This fee included a crucial bonus: a lesson. Our organization is not interested in merely fixing bikes but in educating people. During the course of four hours, we helped between 20 and 25 people and talked to many others. I learned from one new student that the first thing he looked for when considering Truman was a bike shop. Luckily, he came to Truman anyway - in other cases, we miss out on great potential students who identify the lack of an adequate bike workshop as unacceptable.
Cassie Phillips
Graduate Student
People understand the health, monetary and environmental benefits that come with biking. People like to bike to class or to the grocery store, and they like not to have to shell out gas dollars or circle parking lots for a space. In six years at Truman, I have seen a huge increase in bikes on the roads and the racks.
Too often, however, bikes are chained to the racks, rusted, with flat tires and sit stationary for an entire season. I know their owners are out there somewhere, abandoning the bikes not because of disinterest but for the mere inability to repair them. No more! In spite of the absence of indoor workshop space due to lack of support from people in positions to allocate it, the Co-Op has begun mobile workshops on the Quad, and our first occurred during the Activities Fair last Thursday. The Co-Op will continue hosting workshops on the Quad on the second and fourth Fridays of the coming months from 3:30 to 5:15 p.m.
For our workshop last Thursday, we obtained tubes from Walt's Bike Shop in Columbia, Mo., and charged $3 per tube. This fee included a crucial bonus: a lesson. Our organization is not interested in merely fixing bikes but in educating people. During the course of four hours, we helped between 20 and 25 people and talked to many others. I learned from one new student that the first thing he looked for when considering Truman was a bike shop. Luckily, he came to Truman anyway - in other cases, we miss out on great potential students who identify the lack of an adequate bike workshop as unacceptable.
Cassie Phillips
Graduate Student
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