What do the Sierra Club and Moving Design of Chicago have in common?

City bicycling is getting support from an ever-increasing eclectic list of organizations. Every month it seems we partner with some cool group working to encourage more people to incorporate a bicycle into their daily urban lives.

This month we’re working with two very unique groups, The Sierra Club, one of the largest national environmental advocacy organizations, and Moving Design, a small design-based group in Chicago.  Both groups use their unique skills to encourage people to rethink the way we get around in our communities and to reduce our dependency on cars and fossil fuels.

The Sierra Club
Founded in 1892 by John Muir, The Sierra Club has over a million members and supporters and is one of most influential grassroots organizations in the United States. They literally defined environmental activism for many of us. The Sierra Club is giving away three PUBLIC bikes to encourage more people to leave their cars at home. You can enter to win by going to The Sierra Club website or visiting The Sierra Club Facebook page.

The Sierra Club also created a video, with help from our friends at Agency Charlie, to showcase how someone can move around their community by bicycle instead of a car.

Two Mornings from Sierra Club National on Vimeo.

We all recognize that we need our cities to become more livable and dense in population in order to reduce urban sprawl and protect our environment. We’re happy to team up with The Sierra Club to invite more people to make a difference on city streets.  While our partnership with The Sierra Club may not have the same dramatic effect on our environment as NYC Mayor Bloomberg’s recent $50 million gift to The Sierra Club to reduce coal consumption, we’re happy to do our part.

Moving Design
Founded in 2010 by renowned graphic designer Rick Valicenti, Moving Design is pushing a number of civic-minded community based projects in Chicago. They hosted an event this week in Chicago where City Planner Adolfo Hernandez and PUBLIC Founder Rob Forbes made presentations on urban bicycling and the progress to make Chicago streets more livable.

Chicago has been an international leader in urban architecture dating back a century. In recent years they have again launched themselves into international prominence with the development of Millennium Park, which includes the fantastic Anish Kapoor Cloud Gate (aka “The Bean”), the Jaume Plensa Crown Fountain video sculpture, the Lurie Garden, and the Jay Pritzker Pavillion designed by Frank Gehry in Grant Park.  Former Chicago Mayor Daley and the spirited civic-minded community can be credited for these monumental achievements. We rode by these projects and the lakeshore as we biked around Chicago this week.  See photos.  We hope new Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and groups like Moving Design continue to make Chicago an example of a modern livable city with blue bike lanes across the city.

Posted by: PUBLIC
On Thursday, August 18th, 2011 at 6:29 pm and is filed under Bicycle Safety, Customers & Fans, Sustainable Transportation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.