Biking advocates of the year

Posted May 17, 2012
15,026

Each year during Bike Month a "Bike Advocate" of the year is chosen.. This year.... we chose two.

By Carl Voss - Bike Month Coodinator

If we could crown a king and queen of this year’s Bike Month
activities, Scott Sumpter and Angie Dalton McBride would
certainly earn uncontested titles.

The two put together the first Bike to Work Day in 2003 and
have continued to play integral roles right up through this year’s
10th anniversary events.

McBride’s vision for the metro area began to take shape in
2002 when she joined the Des Moines Bike and Trail Advisory
Committee, a new group. This committee was charged with
identifying needs for a network of streets and trails for bike riding.
“At the time,” Angie recalls, “I was doing a lot of studying
about urban design and bicycling cultures in other cities and was
fascinated with how we could make the Des Moines metro area
more bicycle-friendly.”

Her research led her to a “Bike to Work” movement in some
larger cities. Angie set out to make it happen here.
BikeIowa.com was in its infancy when Scott joined with Angie
to create the first Bike to Work Day. It seemed logical to
encourage bicyclists to register at bikeiowa.com for Bike to
Work Day. To their amazement, 500 commuters registered and
became long-time supporters. In 2004, the two organized the
first Bike to Work Week. By 2009, the cycling events grew into
Bike Month.

“It was a natural fit,” Scott says, “to educate people about
commuting by bike and ask them to go to BikeIowa.com to
register. There, they could pledge to commute to work and become
part of this network that offered information about rides,
events, trails and overall news about biking.”

As the bike community grew, BikeIowa.com became the portal
to information about Bike Month and year-round activities.
Scott also became the driving force behind the Ride of Silence
(May 16 this year), an annual event to honor cyclists killed or
injured while riding their bikes.

In addition to other Bike Week (and then Bike Month) roles,
Angie ramped up bike education activities (she’s one of a handful
of League Cycling Instructors in the area) and logged countless
hours leading lunch-and-learn commuter workshops at companies
and parks departments.

“I knew we were meeting my vision when I could see cyclists in
every direction while sitting at a light at 10th and Grand,” Angie
says. “I remember smiling from ear to ear and thinking, we are
changing the commuting culture of Des Moines.”