Weekend Outlook 8/19-8/22, 2021
Downtown mobility alert! Immediate Action Needed!
Background
Over the past few years, the city of Reno has been grinding through a grass roots effort to bring a protected bike lane to center street for the entire length of downtown. This project was studied, restudied, and finally approved over a year ago. This will provide a safe corridor for riders to go north and south through downtown without having to worry about parked or moving vehicles and can serve as the first demonstration of how much our non-car infrastructure can improve. This project has been a citizen led effort from the beginning and unfortunately is now seen as a threat to big downtown businesses that rely on keeping their visitors on their own property the entire stay. If visitors downtown can better access businesses in midtown or around campus, that is less dollars going into casino property vendors. Their most recent letter to the city suggesting yet another ‘study’ for the streetscapes surrounding their properties is just a veiled delay tactic to make this project disappear. The studies have already been done.
Action Needed
Write, call, or attend. Before 4pm today (Thursday), tell the city and the Regional Transportation Commission (RTC) that enough is enough and anything other than moving forward on the Center Street Cycletrack without further delay is ignoring the most democratic effort this city has seen in a long time. More details about who to contact and how you can attend in person are on the Truckee Meadows Bike Alliance page here. Please let the commission know that we will not let a few big businesses stop us from improving downtown for ALL residents and visitors.
Weekend Events:
Here are the events that are on the radar for the last weekend of July:
Thursday, August 19, 6pm:
Silver State Striders have decided not to organize group runs this week due to air quality issues.
Friday, August 20, 6:30pm:
Biggest Little Trail Stewardship’s monthly meeting will be held at Mi Casa Two on West 4th Street. This meeting is open to anyone and generally covers group business, project updates, and upcoming initiatives. If you want to get more involved in trails organizing, sitting in on these meetings is a low effort entry point. Additional information at their FB event page.
Saturday, August 21:
Silver State Striders have decided not to organize group runs this week due to air quality issues.
Trail Outlook
BLUE SKY!!!! For a very brief moment that is. National weather service is expecting another shift to our more regularly scheduled westerly winds on Friday evening so smoke may return by Saturday morning. Regardless, the temps are expected to be much more fall like topping in the high eighties to low nineties with no expectations of precipitation. This morning’s dawn patrol ride was actually chilly so if you can spare the time, Friday morning is likely to be the absolute best conditions for outdoor activity. Beyond that, lets all hope for progress on the fires north and south of us and otherwise take advantage of what we get when we get it.
Sunrise at Hoge Road, August 19, 2021