Thursday, January 22, 2009

More Bike Valet-Inauguration

The results are in: over 2000 bikes parked with none lost and just one locked at WABA HQ awaiting pick up by its owner. This is believed to be the largest number for a bike valet service ever!

For lots more pictures, go to WABA's Flickr page.

Estimates of the total inauguration crowd vary from 1.2 to 1.8 million. And just how mellow was this crowd? Number of arrests: 0.

Incredible.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Bike Valet at Obama Inauguration



Today was quite a day in Washington: huge crowds of people, all cold and all in a festive mood. I had a wonderful day volunteering as a bike valet. Ride your bicycle to the inauguration, we give you a claim check and safely park your bike for you while you enjoy the event!

The Washington Area Bicyclist Association (WABA) has done this for many events in Washington...Fourth of July, Cherry Blossom Festival, etc. But this was the biggest yet. There were two locations with room for 1000 bikes at our location. We filled up well before noon and had to build another bike corral out of barriers to accommodate a few hundred more.

Maybe this wasn't like a train station in Amsterdam but it was incredible for DC:

The lack of people in the pictures is deceptive. I grabbed these pictures while there was a very brief lull when the swearing-in was occurring.

You'll find a few more pictures over on my Picasa site.