Get Them Riding

​With all the non-profit bike organizations in Chicago such as Working Bikes, West Town Bikes, the Recyclery, Bikes N’ Roses, and Blackstone Bicycle Works, is there room for another non-profit devoted to bikes?  Free Bikes 4 Kidz, a national non-profit that focuses on collecting and donating bikes for kids, now has a Chicago chapter that promises to fill a void with their focus on bikes for kids.

​The idea behind Free Bikes 4 Kidz comes from these marketplace facts:

• About one-third of all bikes sold have 20 inch wheels for smaller riders which means there are a lot of used kid’s bikes available
• The zip code people live in impacts their life expectancy indicating that living in an underserved area impacts a person’s success

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There are a lot of benefits when kids ride bikes.  These include:

• Helps built muscle mass
• Boosts confidence
• Enables socialization with others
• A break from technology
• Builds family bonds
• Improves brain power and mental health
• Easy to learn

According for Tom Renaud, Executive Director of Free Bikes 4 Kidz Chicago, non-profit bike organizations in Chicago are willing to help each other.    He spoke at the Evanston Bicycle Club monthly virtual meeting on June 16 and described how his organization is partnering with 28 others in order to get bikes to the right families. 

The original plan was to have a bike collection drive in early April.  Over 30 locations were identified where people could drop off kid bikes.  Then on one day, within a 4 hours period, 24 trucks were to be dispatched to each drop off location to collect the bikes and take them to a central warehouse, a 18,000 square foot location at Elston and Cortland where the bikes would be staged for 10 weeks.  At the warehouse, bikes would cleaned and fixed by volunteers.  Before a bike was ready for distribution it would go through a quality assurance process for safety.  Once the bikes were ready, they would be distributed by two methods:

1. Bulk – A partner organization would pick up bikes at the warehouse and they would in turn distribute the bikes to members of the community.  These organizations would decide on the criteria for distribution, i.e., identify which families would get a bike or if a bike was given for school attendance, grades, income, or other criteria.
2. Give away event – families would be invited to the warehouse to obtain a free bike.  The process would include a sizing station, selecting a bike from a pool of the proper size, custom bike fitting for the child, helmet fitting, and road safety training.

When the program resumes many volunteers will be needed.  Key areas to get involved are:

• Donating a bike
• Collecting donated bikes
• Cleaning and refurbishing at the warehouse
• Promoting the program
• Funding including grants, donations, and gifts-in-kind

Since Free Bikes 4 Kidz was put on hold due to Covid-19, it will need to start over again next year.  There is an opportunity for individuals to participate in any of the key volunteer areas or as a group or corporate activity in a night at the warehouse.  With our help we can make bikes available to kids who need them and have fun working with each other in the process.   ​