About 60 students at Wilshire Park Elementary, in St. Anthony Village, bike to school each morning as part of a community-organized bike bus. Parents don reflective vests and keep an eye on the children, making sure they stick with the group. “I think it’s just joyful to see the kids exercising and being together and goofing around before they go into school,” said Natalie Warren, one of the group’s organizers. The two-mile route includes stops to pick up additional kids throughout the neighborhood. Some parents have said the group is a good way to get their children comfortable cycling. (Luis de Leon)
The school year is heading to a close and the thaw across Minneapolis’s metro area is giving way to colorful blooms of tulips and violets along Northeast’s streets. For many kids, that means one thing: It’s finally time to get the bikes out.
In the case of Wilshire Park Elementary in St. Anthony Village, the crisp and clear morning of April 30 brought that very energy — literally. Around 60 kids turned the corner onto Chelmsford Rd. NE in one large bike bus, filling the street with chatter as they rode together toward school.
“I think it’s just joyful to see the kids exercising and being together and goofing around before they go into school brings me a lot of joy,” Natalie Warren, one of the organizers and “bus driver,” said.
“I think for the parents, too, a lot of people — especially this year — said, ‘I was crying while I was on the bike bus,’ because it was the most beautiful thing they’ve experienced while there’s so much chaos around us.”
Bike busses aren’t necessarily a new trend, but they have gained global traction in recent years. In the activity, kids gather before the school day begins and bike together — accompanied by the supervision of adults, of course. Like a school bus route, there are multiple stops around the neighborhood where other groups of kids wait to join the ride. One website, Bike Bus World, provides guidance on how to safely start up a bike bus ride in one’s community. The Instagram page has more than 200,000 followers.
John Dempsey, another organizer who rides with the group, said the idea for Wilshire Park Elementary students started during a play date between his and Warren’s children last summer.
“Once my kids got old enough to bike, I was like, ‘Oh, there’s kids biking too. Maybe we should just slow-roll it to school one day. (Then) missing pieces came together,” Dempsey recalled.
Warren started a survey to collect email addresses. Meanwhile, the group of adults test-rode the two-mile route to make sure it was safe.
“I think the networks in St. Anthony are so tight that once you tell a couple people they just kind of share it with their community,” Warren explained.
A group of parents and organizers of the Wilshire Park Elementary bike bus. The volunteer riders agree that the group ride has a deep impact on their community. (Luis de Leon)
The first ride occurred at the start of the school year last September, with a break during the winter, and resumed this spring.
“It felt like, (during) that first spring ride, all of a sudden our group had doubled,” explained Brian Sorenson, another adult rider. “I think it was just a really great way to add in some of the younger kids too. Like, I have a fifth grader who was already biking to school on his own with friends. With my daughter being in second grade I wasn’t really ready to let her bike by herself, so (it was) just a great way to get everybody involved.”
Sorenson said there are numerous safety measures in place. Every adult rider accompanying the group of kids wears a neon vest for visibility, and there are always adults at the front and back of the group. Some riders also have walkie talkies to ensure both ends of the group can communicate, ensuring all riders stay safely within the group.
St. Anthony Village Police also has an officer with their vehicle lights on where the group crosses Silver Lake Road NE, a road which sees heavier traffic in the neighborhood.
There’s quite a creative method in making sure kids stay behind the bike bus leader: The unofficial mascot of the ride, a giant stuffed panda named Jerry, sits on the back of Warren’s bike. All kids must stay behind Jerry, or else.
“If you pass the panda, it will haunt your dreams,” Warren joked.
The group of volunteer adult riders agree the rides have a profound impact on the community.
“(There’s) a mental component too: Just, like, clearing the head before (the kids) go to a physical structured school program,” Dempsey said.
Warren, who also serves as the chair of the St. Anthony Village Parks Commission, explained that they believe the initiative has brought attention to what they see as a need for more pedestrian-friendly improvements around the area.
“The bike bus has really been an instigator for thinking how can we make it safer to bike to school in general especially crossing Silver Lake and things that people have been asking for for a long time like crosswalks or better signage,” she said. “The city’s paying attention to kids biking to school and they’re like, “Oh, we actually need to improve our infrastructure.’”
To learn more about the bike bus or to join the kids on the way to Wilshire Park Elementary, email wilshireparkbikebus@gmail.com. The ride is once a week on Thursdays.