Last Thursday, the New Orleans City Council unanimously approved the cooperative endeavour agreement with Blue Krewe, a new non-profit, to bring bike share back to New Orleans. This new iteration of bike share in New Orleans will be for and by the people of New Orleans, and is planned to launch this fall. Read more about it on our blog here.
Just the day before, our Executive Director, Dan Favre, joined Mayor LaToya Cantrell and Councilmember Kristin Palmer in welcoming New Orleans’ newest protected bikeways. On Elysian Fields and Burgundy, they cut the ribbon not just for one street, but for a new era of easy, safe, and fun biking in Greater New Orleans. Check out the ceremony here.
With all this good news though, there’s also sad news. In the past month, 4 people have been killed while biking in Greater New Orleans. At Bike Easy, we’re navigating the emotional roller coaster of witnessing these tragedies while also celebrating these milestones for better biking in our city by connecting with our community.
Many of us are already isolated in these times, and it makes celebrating and mourning that much harder. But, for our personal well-being, and to keep promoting safe biking, we all need to do both, together but safely.
Whether it’s by engaging with us on social media, joining our virtual education workshops, or volunteering over Zoom with the New Orleans Complete Streets Coalition, we invite you to connect with the biking community right now.
Now is the time to make sure your tires are pumped and your gears and brakes are working, because we have quite a ride ahead of us. In the next year, the City plans to add 75 miles of connected and protected bikeways to our network. We’re on the right path, but it’s still on all of us to make sure the ride is smooth.
If you need to connect, feel free to reach out to us by emailing us at info@bikeeasy.org or messaging us on social media. We’re always happy to chat with you.