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The Chicagoland Bicycle Federation introduced its
new Hall of Fame by inducting the founding board members at the
annual members meeting Nov. 2 at the Chicago Cultural Center. From
left are: Sean Morris, Sue Ulrey, Phyllis Harmon, Mike MacDonald,
Cindi Licht (accepting for her father, the late Ken Licht), Greg
Dreyer, Lyndon Babcock and Suzan Pinsof. (photo: David Callahan)
New Hall of Fame Honors Founding Board
Members
Twenty-one years after joining together to make bicycling
better in their communities, the founding members of the Chicagoland
Bicycle Federation stood before a crowd more than 150 members on
Nov. 2 and were honored as the first inductees into the CBF Hall
of Fame. The induction ceremony was held at the annual CBF member
meeting in the Chicago Cultural Center. Inductee Suzan Pinsof spoke
following the induction. As a planner at the Northeastern
Illinois Planning Commission, Pinsof began convening interested
bicyclists and bike club and industry leaders in 1984. Out of this
effort emerged the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation. Following is
the text of her remarks:
CBF has been a force in Chicagoland for more than 20 years! We
have grown from a handful of people with a vision of a better bicycling
environment in Chicago and its suburbs to an organization with 5,000
members, that has in fact, made that vision a reality. Of those
individuals who came together to found and guide CBF in its infancy
we are fortunate to have with us Lyn Babcock, Sean Morris, Mike
MacDonald, Greg Dreyer, Sue Ulrey and Phyllis Harmon. The late Ken
Licht our first president is represented by his daughter Cindy Licht.
To adequately talk about the beginnings of CBF, I must tell you
a little about the happenstance of my own career. In 1979, as a
young woman, I returned to Chicago where I was born and raised,
with a master's degree in Environmental Studies. I got a job at
the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission (NIPC). As the rookie
in the Transportation Department, I was assigned the "environmental
work" which just happened to include looking at bicycles as
a transportation alternative. As it turned out, NIPC had done some
research on bicycle facilities and several files identified some
of the key organizations and individuals involved in bicycle issues,
both locally and nationally. This is how I came to know of and contact
Phyllis Harmon and Keith Kingbay who were important leaders in the
League of American Wheelmen which later became the League of American
Bicyclists. I had the good fortune to meet other individuals who
were involved in the local bicycling scene, among them all of those
who are being honored this evening. I also learned that there were
50 bicycle clubs in the Chicago area! And that this region is historically
important in the development of bicycling as the home of the League
and of several major bicycle manufactures for most the 20th century.
I also discovered that a national movement was underway to conduct
research, to try new facility designs and to debate the potential
of bicycles as a transportation resource. I initiated several bicycle
and trail projects at NIPC and wanted to see more done to encourage
bicycling in the Chicago region - with 50 clubs I knew there must
be a lot of people bicycling and that perhaps there were a lot of
people who wanted to bicycle but found conditions on the roads and
the few existing trails to be inadequate, if not down right scary.
At a meeting at Lyn Babcock's in 1984, all of us agreed that we
needed a new kind of bicycle organization, that would advocate for
better bicycling conditions for transportation and recreation in
the Chicago region. We knew that we had set for ourselves an enormous
task. We needed to get the private and governmental interests involved
in transportation planning and engineering interested in the lowly
bicycle! We wanted to get more people bicycling more safely, but
to do so we knew that we needed funding, policy and research priorities
to change and that in the entrenched world of auto centric transportation
planning, that was a tall order.
With the support of NIPC and a small grant from the Chicago Area
Bicycle Dealers Association we became incorporated in 1985 and published
our first newsletter. Sue Ulrey, who is here tonight, was the editor
and continued in that role for more than 10 years.
Our small board took on projects, went after members and tried to
raise money any way we could, including selling candy bars. Our
earliest CBF ride was something called the Kodak Liberty Ride. In
1986 the Kodak Company decided to sponsor rides in various communities
across the country. All of the rides were to happen on the same
day and were to help local bicycle advocacy efforts. We decided
to organize a 30 mile ride in Chicago on the May date chosen by
Kodak. It turned out to be a miserable 35 degree rainy windy May
Sunday on which almost no one would chose to ride a bike. Nevertheless
50 or 60 intrepid souls showed up (including my husband Bill and
then 13 year old daughter Laura).
Following this event and other efforts we managed to raise our membership
to 250 and to generate a huge work plan. We got the State Bicycle
Advisory Council to meet after a 10 year hiatus, we testified at
public meetings on behalf of bicyclists, and, we wrote letters to
the editor, including one to a paper in Geneva supporting a trail
along the Fox River. When I received an 11:00 PM call from an incensed
homeowner who opposed the trail, I asked him how the trail was any
worse than an alley behind your house? There was a long pause on
the other end of the line and then, the incredulous caller said,
"I would never live someplace where there was an alley behind
my house!." This taught me something about the difference between
urban and some suburban perceptions and also that it wasn't just
riding in traffic that might inspire peoples' fear of bicycling.
A quote from the minutes of a 1987 Executive Committee Meeting pretty
much sums up our precarious, yet hopeful position in these early
years:
"the minutes of the August 4th meeting were approved with the
following change requested by Greg Dreyer: under the heading Fund
Raising, delete the second phrase which reads, "or CBF will
be out of business!"
Even if we didn't have any money none of us wanted that degree of
pessimism in the permanent record! Our optimism paid off and1987
turned out to be a pivotal year for CBF. We worked with local governments
in the region and managed to host the first ever conference of the
Rails to Trails Conservancy and we gained an executive director.
I got a call one day from a fellow who said that he was a member
and would like to come to a board meeting, I said fine; he came,
asked a few questions and told us a little about a recent cross
country bicycle trip with his young wife. A few days later I received
a letter. He said that it seemed that CBF was at a watershed point
- we had a lot of good ideas but no one person who could devote
enough time to really develop the initiatives to get things going.
He volunteered to work part-time for CBF without salary with the
hope that he could raise membership and support, enough to, eventually,
be paid. Greg Dryer, who was then the president of the CBF board,
and I met with him and were favorably disposed although a little
nervous about turning the organization over to someone who was clearly
crazy!! No actually, he was a community organizer and political
activist with a friendly, energetic but not overpowering style who
seemed dedicated to our mission of promoting bicycling as a means
to creating better communities, cleaner air and equitable transportation,
as well as, enjoyable recreation. Well, as most of you know - we
lucked out. We had the great fortune of gaining the dedication of
a truly talented organizer, an inspiring leader and one of the nicest
individuals I have ever known, Randy Neufeld. He did get that salary
and went on to help us build an organization that now generates
salaries for 37 people and is one of the most effective civic organizations
in Chicago, as well as, probably the most effective bicycle advocacy
organization in the country.
Early in the history of CBF a direction was set that distinguished
this organization from other civic and not for profit groups. Most
such organizations seek influential and financially connected boards
of directors and we were advised to do the same. But , we thought
that for our type of organization a member based, volunteer oriented
approach might work better. With as much luck as foresight, I think
that we can say that we made the right choice. We have benefited
enormously from and been shaped by the energy, creativity and dedication
of our members. I was greatly inspired by the loyalty and hard work
of our early presidents, including Ken Licht and Greg Dreyer, both
of whom graciously held us together and helped us build an effective
board. All of us were amazed and grateful for the dedication of
our long time newsletter editor, Sue Ulrey who held the membership
together through this one medium for more than 10 years. Lyn Babcock,
Sean Morris and Mike MacDonald used their lifelong love of cycling
and experience with racing, touring and the bicycle business to
ground our organization in the history, realities and joys of cycling
as both serious sport and recreation. And finally, we honor Phyllis
Harmon who inspired us at that early meeting with her lifetime of
commitment to bicycling and to the League of American Bicyclists
(LAB). LAB is the 100 year old grandaddy of all bicycle advocacy,
a great organization that has survived the technological and societal
changes of a century to still defend the rights of bicyclists to
take their place as equal and admirable users of our transportation
system and to help organizations like CBF to become effective agents
of change.
CBF has gone on to address that enormous work plan that we generated
and to do much more. We, the founders are honored to be the first
inductees into CBF's Hall of Fame. Thanks very much on behalf of
us all.
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