City Planner Hillary Morgan, leader of the City Hall Cruisers. Photo courtesy City of Prince George

Prince George, B.C. – Residents of Prince George have a couple of opportunities coming up to do something for their personal health and for the city’s airshed.

Over the next two weeks, the City of Prince George is taking part in two initiatives, Bike to Work and School Week, and the BC Commuter Challenge, which encourage staff and the public to consider commuting via active and/or sustainable modes of transportation.

Bike to Work and School Week runs from Monday, May 25^th to Sunday the 31^st.  The City has two teams, one composed of employees from City Hall (the City Hall Cruisers) and the other of staff who work at the 18^th Avenue Yard (the 18th Avenue Green Gears). City Council has also formed a team, aptly-named “Motion Carried”.

Bike to Work and School Week will be launched with a kick-off event at City Hall Monday morning, and Mayor Lyn Hall says he is taking part in a head-to-head challenge with one of his councilors later in the week.  “Councilor (Jillian) Merrick and I are doing an interesting thing.  We are going to be at Southridge Elementary School at 8 a.m. next Thursday.  I’m going to drive from Southridge Elementary, which is about three blocks from my home, and she is going to bike.”  They’ll be travelling to the Three Rivers Art Gallery where a rally will be held.

“I’m going to drive and she’s going to bike and we’ll see what time difference there is.  The mayor’s route will be along Southridge to Highway 16, east on 16 to Ferry Avenue to Q    ueensway and then to the Gallery” (or City Hall).  She’s probably going to come down Cowart and then take the bike path through the cemetery, and take as many bike paths and bike lanes as she can.”

Councilor Merrick, who bikes throughout the summer months and will be riding an 18-speed Rocky Mountain touring bike, says “from the cemetery I’ll be crossing Ferry and onto Upland Street, and then there’s a park that that runs into to get downtown.”

She says a similar challenge was held recently in Vancouver between the mayor and two councilors.  The mayor drove, one councilor used the transit system and the other biked.  “The councilor on transit came in first, the cyclist came second and the mayor in their vehicle came in last.  Of course that’s downtown Vancouver where there are severe congestion problems.”

She says in the challenge here “under normal circumstances I think the mayor, departing College Heights the same time as me, he would arrive first downtown.  But, because it’s during the morning commute, that’s where the delay is at in a vehicle, generally you do bypass quite a large area when you take Cowart Road on a bike and bypass that whole highway area.  So whatever it is we won’t be far off from each other, probably a matter of minutes.  It’ll be a fun challenge.”

You can got to http://www.biketowork.ca/prince-george for more information and registration for Bike to Work and School Week.

The City of Prince George has also signed up for the BC Commuter Challenge, May 31^st  to June 6^th.  The Challenge promotes sustainable transportation, healthy lifestyles, and team-building by challenging residents to commute to work by walking, biking, carpooling, or using public transit during the week.

You can register and get more information at www.commuterchallenge.