The Philly Bike Ride is back on the streets of Philadelphia Saturday, Oct. 18, for its fourth year bringing a car-free “party on two wheels.”
This year’s social bike ride expects to have 6,000 riders cruising through the 20- or 7.6-mile courses, starting from the Ben Franklin Parkway and finishing at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, along with a festival at the end. The landmarks along the course will include Independence Hall, City Hall, LOVE Park, Chinatown, Penn’s Landing and Boathouse Row.
“Philly Bike Ride is more than just a ride. It is a celebration of community, movement, health and the vibrant spirit of this city,” said Chris Browne, the managing director of Philly Bike Ride.
Those looking to see who can cycle through Philly’s open streets the quickest will have to wait for the return of the Philly Cycling Classic next year. The Philly Bike ride is not a race.
“The goal is to experience Philly on a bike, not necessarily to beat a time,” said Danielle Ruiz, director of partnerships and communications for the event.
A pace vehicle will set a ceiling speed that keeps any overexuberant riders from getting above the 18 mph limit, while there is an end time when the streets need to go back to the rest of the city. Between those limits, the event is the chance for riders, ages 3 and up and all ability levels, to leisurely enjoy the city’s streets free of cars.
Ruiz said the course will have photo stops, music, free food and drink, restrooms and other things.
Folks can bring whatever bike — and bike variants, including unicyles, tandem bikes, and class 1, 2 or 3 e-bikes — they have access to, or rent through the Rent-and-Ride Pass option. Scooters, skateboards, hoverboards, Segways, rollerskates and rollerblades are not allowed.
“We see plenty of folks on Indego bikes, plenty of folks that pull their bikes out of the garage for the first time in a while,” Ruiz said.
The event is run by American Bike Ride, which runs similar events in Dallas and its flagship race in Washington D.C., with one in Boston coming soon. Ruiz said the event has grown steadily by around 1,000 riders each year. Since its first edition, it has partnered with the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia, providing some of its proceeds to the coalition’s youth cycling program.
Ruiz said the ride is an opportunity to bring people and families into the bicycling community, by eliminating the worry about cars. She added that it plays a bike advocacy role, separate from, say, a protest ride, as an “awareness piece” to help expose newcomers to the joy of cycling, or at the very least make them more aware that cyclists are around them the next time they’re driving.
“Our goal is really to help the broader community see, ‘Oh wow, there is this community of people out here,’ ” Ruiz said. “And when you’re riding down … Market Street and you’re looking around saying, ‘Wow, this is so cool,’ maybe the next time you’re driving down Market Street, you’re more aware that there could be a cyclist. So maybe I will look before I make that right-hand turn. Maybe I will kind of check before I open my door if I park on the side of the street.”
The list of available ride passes are available on the Philly Bike Ride’s website. The packet pickup for the race is on Oct. 17 at Eakins Oval, from 11 a.m to 7 p.m. Keswick Cycle will be on hand then, and the next morning ahead of the 7:30 a.m. start of the ride, to provide safety checks for any bikes there
Editor’s note: For an in-depth discussion on street safety for cyclists, pedestrians and everyone else in Philly, come check out Billy Penn and WHYY’s Bridging Blocks’ town hall discussion this Thursday from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at the Parkway Central Library.
