This weekend was also the official opening of the Central Valley Greenway, which can take riders from New Westminster Quay to Science World.

Tobias had set up a mechanic stand for free checkups and consultation, while I joined the ride from Trout Lake (John Henry Park) to The Winston Overpass near Sperling SkyTrain Station (google map doesn’t show the overpass).

VACC who was coordinating the rides from New Westminster and Trout Lake saw approximately 350 people join us on the rides. I had a awesome chat with a couple of the riders, while we rode to the celebrations, about The Tree and why we made it.

Some common questions we received about The Tree were:

Why did you decided to make it?

We wanted a bike with a higher level of Canadian manufacturing and a more robust bike made for the rigors of our West Coast climate.  We were generally frustrated with the quality and spec of commuter bikes coming from Canadian and other manufacturers.

What makes it so special?

Everything about this bike was selected for durability and serviceability taking into account the wetness of our climate in the fall, winter and spring.  It’s really a win win, the environment wins and so does your pocketbook.

How is this Bike Greener then your average bike?

The powder coating yields less waste, is more durable, and lasts longer. Canadian manufacturing is generally regulated by higher environmental and social standards than China, Taiwan, Vietnam and Mexico.  To top it all off Bikes on the Drive is donating 1% of the sale of the Tree to Canopy, a fabulous environmental organization.

All Bikes can be fixed, so why are the parts important?

We service a ton of bikes each year and we see which parts are lasting through the rigors of year-round Vancouver commuting and which ones are under performing. Sometimes a part, like a hub costs 90 cents more for an upgraded seal and will last several times longer than its cheaper counterpart. Obviously we spent the 90cents.

Not all parts can be easily repaired. Often replacement is the only course of action available should a repair be required.  Using the hub example again, it is not always easy or possible to get new cones for some of the newer hubs that come stock on new bicycles.  We chose a hub for which Shimano has been making the cones for years, the part is wide available and easy to service at virtually any bike shop your touring heart desires.

Mass Arrival

Although some parts of the trail are still being worked on, I am amazed but the quality of the route that has been made. Giving more people the opportunity to bike to work is one of the best things we can do to affect the sustainability of our city.

Once we had arrived at the BBQ I dropped into to see Tobias was as busy as ever at our Mechanic Stand and one of the largest bike valet set ups I hve ever seen. The BBQ food was awesome.

Such a Grind

After checking in with Tobias I saw the Ethical Bean station at the BBQ and a bike powered, coffee grinder. Yes, a grinder was all peddle power, and while they had some trouble with the brewer (mainly, it was a little over-worked due to the size of the crowds that showed up), the volunteers certainly put in a great deal of highly appreciated effort to get some peddle powered coffee to the weary cyclists.

All in all it was quite a well attended event with well over 1600 people in attendance. And we found this bike route quite a joy to ride and know why it is called a greenway – because of the route being more field than street. Congrats to all who developed this greenway. We at Bikes on the Drive hope it is a sign of many more similar things to come.

Category: News

Tags: Advocacy, bicycle, burnaby, celebration, commuter, culture, greenway, ride, sustainable

We at Bikes on the Drive had a very special event last Sunday, June 20th. Fawzia Ahmad of Canopy (formerly Markets Initiative) came to give a product knowledge session about her organization.
She came in to our regular Sunday staff meeting to talk about the mission of Canopy and how their mission coincides with what we are doing with The Tree.

Canopy has been a driving force in lobbying book, magazine and newspaper publishers to change from paper printed on old growth forest to post consumer paper product. Throughout our product knowledge session we found out that Canopy was behind the Canadian printing of Harry Potter series on Ancient Forest Friendly paper.

What does Harry Potter have to do with The Tree?

Well, we think The Tree is a pretty magical, but really, both are more sustainable products that were designed and implemented to improve and inform consumers of a more sustainable culture. With this being said, Bikes on the Drive is donating a portion of all Tree sales to further Canopy’s mission.

They have also been successful with newspapers too. Just last week The Globe and Mail committed to using Ancient Forest Friendly paper in the printing of their daily newspaper in plants across Canada. With the success of such successful campaigns, Markets Initiative decided to re-brand itself as Canopy and with the new name they decided to hold a bike scavenger hunt, and here are a few details:

The Great Paper Chase

• has been canceled. We at Bikes on the Drive look forward to the event in 201o

Well when we heard about this the entire staff wanted to drop everything and go!  Unfortunately for some of us we do have to keep the shop open, but we will certainly be sending a team of Tree-wheeling scavengers to take part.

Free for Tree’s

ilan did one better – for anyone who has purchased The Tree this summer, Bikes on the Drive will pay your entry fee to this event. This is our way of saying Thank You for making this first year of The Tree a success.  If you have purchased a Bikes on the Drive Tree from us this summer and you want to attend a scavenger hunt along with a wicked BBQ, here is your chance!

Not wanting to be out done by ilan, Autumn then suggested the staff donate our July tips to Canopy and with a unanimous raising of hands the deal was done. The product knowledge session ended with a round of applause, which by all accounts was a first in the history of our shop.

Test Ride

Fawzia then took out a Tree for a test ride.  She was used to riding an old heavy mountain bike and living in the heights of Burnaby she detested the hills on the ride home. But with one test ride, and a couple of hills under her belt, she liked our bike and decided to purchase one herself! She has been biking to work ever since.

We will be working more with Canopy in the months and years to come and we hope it fits as well as the Brookes saddle Fawzia likes so much.

You can read more about Fawzia’s little investment on the Canopy blog. Here is a excerpt.

I became aware of Bikes on the Drive’s new creation – The Tree – for some time now.  The first time I saw it in the shop I thought what a sensible bike – not flashy- but it stood for values that I believe in.  It’s a sustainable bike and that was enough to turn my eye.   Every time I walked by the shop for the past month or so I stopped and looked at it.  Did I fall in love with it at first sight?  No.  But the more I learned about it the more I wanted to give it a try. ~ Fawzia Ahmad ~

Category: News

Tags: Advocacy, bicycle, branding, charity, commercial drive, recycling, sustainable, Tree bike

The Tree was designed around being eco-friendly in so many aspects, from it’s concept to creation to it’s name. The colour we chose is directly associated with the name we chose, it was up to me to decide where we where going with the colour scheme.

We talked about browns and greens, very earthy colours the whole time. Eventually we decided on the matt black, by a combination of peoples interest and our needs as a far as what we wanted the bike to represent. It is not a sporty colour it is solid and dependable. They don’t say flash. The bike grabs your attention by what it is, not how nice it looks.

When I came along in the production of the bike we already had the name. The name kinda sells itself. In the end we found it a representation of our vision and the ethic of the shop.

When looking at a graphic we explored both rural and urban trees.  Coming from a rural island lifestyle I went with more of a mountain side tree at first but then through some feedback I decided to go for more an urban tree something you would see while biking to work.

The one graphic we finally choose was the single tree with a great silhouette. It was originally going to be on the top of the bike and have lines wrap around the bar, all designs change a little bit before production. There was a simplicity to it that everyone just really liked.

The bike is a workhorse.

If you know what your looking at. Your going to look at the bike and say that is really well made, it is really though out. I think all of the stuff we brainstormed about showed up in the end product really well.

I was unable to visit the factory with Darcy and ilan. But from what they told me the bike looked pretty sharp.

When I first saw it, I got to see it in the box all packed up. Living in a consumer culture you love opening new products some time your impressed, sometimes your not so much. This time it had a more personal touch, seeing something of mine on a pretty major product I was excited.

When it was built and realized that the simplicity of the design, the colours we chose and the placement of logo everything just turned out really wonderfully.

We aren’t really trying to brand the bike, we’re trying people to get people to look at the quality of the bike itself, not at who made it or who made the parts we wanted people to look at a quality that make it a nicely designed bike.

We styled the Tree logo much like Devinci’s current style, not out of any request, but I out of fairness to Devinci. They have their styles going and their branding. It helps us to work with them in that way to create something in their current styles, straight up it just looks good.

Category: Story

Tags: bicycle, branding, city, concept, design, handwelded, logo, sketches, sustainable, Tree bike

Ahh Car Free Days, Who doesn’t love when they close down the drive to motor vehicle traffic and open up the streets to entertainers, street vendors and community groups.

We at Bikes on the Drive will be giving away one of our Tree commuter hybrid bicycles. And you can either fill out a entry form in shop  or download the entry form at bikemonth.ca and drop it off at the shop, 630 Commercial Drive, before 6:45 PM on June 13, 2009.

The draw will take place at Bikes on the Drive at 12 Noon, June 14, 2009.

Along with the fab-tree give away we will have a table out front that might have a few specials for you to gander at and one of us will be out their talking about the Tree.

See for us The Tree is more then just a bike we sell it is about the ideology of what we see in a new urban commuter for Vancouver and being the advocates of sustainable culture that we are we’d really like talking about it. (Were total bike geeks, but you knew that)

So we hope you’ll stop by the shop amongst the Old School Roller Disco, knittervention, and street hockey and I what I am sure will be day full of merry mayhem (car free of course).

Category: Events, News

Tags: Advocacy, car free, commercial drive, sustainable, Tree bike

The whirlwind trip The Tree has been on this spring just got a little bit more historic.

The Tree is on display at the newly branded Museum of Vancouver (the MOV; Formerly the Vancouver Museum) and their new show Velo-City: Vancouver and the Bicycle Revolution.

The Tree was chosen by Nick Rust from Propellor Design who heard about The Tree through the grapevine and thought it was an awesome project. He approached Autumn about having the bike as part of the show.

“We were blown away Nick asked us to have our bike as part of the show and though it would be awesome to be part of the exhibit.” said Autumn.

Autumn dolled up a large Tree with the disc brake upgrade, some lights and a pannier. She jumped on board putting foot to peddle(s) and headed to Kitsilano, the bikes new home for the next six months.

The Opening

The gang from the shop took off a little late and hit the 10th street bike route, we had a hilarious time biking across town trying to race each other on the hills. Darcy had his old school, three-speed Raleigh and was giving us gear heads a run for our money.

We then turned down the Cypress Avenue bike route and were welcomed by a cool breeze and a drop in temperature as we neared the ocean shore next to the venerable Museum.

We were impressed with the red carpet treatment by the Bike Valet. While we dropped off our bikes with Shera Kelly, a Bike Valet attendant, Jaimie had a little photo shoot with Rebecca Blissett outside the museum. Who knew we were so popular?

Walking into the exhibit I was completely impressed with the curator of the exhibit, from 1980’s road racing jerseys, to the exceptional quality of Tito Precott “Three Wheeled Method of Convenance” and a special performance of the BCclettes to cap the night off.

I kept on returning to the tree, trying to get a decent photo. Trying to shoot a black bike against a black room with a point and shoot camera is darn harder than you might think. But it allowed me to see a array of different people checking out our little creation.

It was far from the flashiest bike, the most expensive cycle, or most popular exhibit at the opening, but what I did hear was a lot of people coming by taking a closer look at the frame, inspecting the components, making subtle comments to friends about how cool the concept of our bike was.

Of course we are somewhat preaching to the converted at the opening of a bike show where the bike valet is as full as the parking lot.

This little project is barely into its first month and yet we’re already getting a huge and equally important positive response to our first cycle. So please drop by the museum, check out the choppers, the fixies, and the chalk murals. It is a great show and we could not be prouder to be a part of it.

Category: Events, News

Tags: Advocacy, art, BCclettes, bike, commuter, culture, exhibit, Kitsilano, museum, red carpet, sustainable, Tree bike