Club,

Occasionally a perfect storm of advocacy opportunities prompts me to write the entire list serve.  That storm is here.  We need your help.  

At the foundational public meeting of Gainesville Citizens for Active Transportation, City Commissioner Susan Bottcher urged the coalition of walking, disabled, cycling, and bus transit representatives to more actively engage in the public conversations in our community.  The Car-Only and Anti-Bike crowd is louder than us, and that needs to change.

Here are some opportunities for you to help change that.  Please act quickly.  Some talking points on 8th Ave will follow, but I believe most of you are well educated enough to act on your own.

1.  Today, you can comment on the UF campus Transportation Fair, a great opportunity to encourage new and returning Gainesville residents to pump up the volume on our commuter cycling.  I’ve already commented.

2.  You can be a part of the ongoing conversation about the positive effects of de-laning 8th Avenue, which is highly regarded as a rare opportunity for the City to encourage alternative transit on one of the few streets it has control of.

Take your comments on social media, turn them into a letter to the editor, and send them to the Opinion Editor of the Gainesville Sun.  Mr. Nathan Crabbe is doing well at filling the shoes of GCC Member and BikeFlorida CEO Ron Cunningham, a longtime supporter for positive transit reform as the past Opinion Editor.

Be sure to CC: the City Commission at citycomm@cityofgainesville.org and, more importantly, the government that controls most of our paved surfaces--the County Commission at bocc@alachuacounty.us.

Your work matters more if you act as an example by letting others know what you’ve done. Post your letter on FB on our site, but more importantly as an open letter on Commissioners sites and the mayor Ed Braddy's site. If someone takes it down or refuses to post, let everyone else know.

Please take some time out from posting pet tricks and baby pictures (yes, I know they are adorable ;) ) and let's do some heavy lifting this weekend when everyone will be all over FB during football and labor day festivities.

Regards,

James Thompson

Advocacy Director