Buddies -
Our second club meeting of the year, and my first as VBC President, is in the books so I thought it might be a time for another update!
Club Survey Coming Soon!
Heads up: we're about to launch a new version of the VBC Club Survey we did last year. The survey should start within the next couple of days. Be on the lookout for an email from
zohosurvey.com or a similar address. Your answers to this survey will help guide what the Board does this year and how we try to accomplish our goals. We'll repeat some of the questions from last year's survey (to see if we're making progress) as well as adding a few new questions to the mix. The survey should only take 10-15 minutes to complete.
In case you want a refresher, here are the questions and results of the 2025 Club Survey:
We'll run the survey for 7-10 days and I expect to be able to share survey results with the club during the week of April 13th, if not before.
Advocacy Update!
Joel Christiansen, our new Advocacy Director, is interested in hearing what you think we should be doing as far as advocacy goes in Vancouver and Clark County. You can read Joel's post to the Buddies List here:
Use the link in that post to book a meeting with Joel or contact him using
advocacy@vbc-usa.com to let him know your thoughts on advocacy or to arrange a meeting.
NE 50th Ave. Road Closure
One of our first advocacy projects will be to tackle the simultaneous closure of NE 29th Ave. and NE 50th Ave. As you may remember, NE 29th Ave is closed at NE 179th Street and NE 50th Ave. is closed between NE 179th St and NE 159th St. Because of these closures, we now have limited options for rides returning to Salmon Creek from Ridgefield and Battle Ground.
With help from Joe Cote, we've identified an option that bypasses the closures and we've updated routes like the Reverse Newliner and Ridgefield Ramble in RideWithGPS. Be sure to sync the new versions of these routes to your phone or GPS!
We'll update other routes as they're added to the calendar. In the meantime, if you're riding on your own, you can see our recommended detour here:
Within the next few days, Joel Christiansen will be reaching out to the Clark County Council to request bicycle transit through the construction zone on NE 50th Ave or for better signage about the presence of bicycles along the (short) portion of our detour that doesn't have bike lanes. We'll be asking you to do the same and Joel will provide a template you can use to email your counselor and the construction project managers. The more people who send emails, the more likely we are to have County officials take action!
Hands-On Workshops?
Our last club meeting featured a hands-on Tubeless Tires Setup workshop. While the process was a bit chaotic, and we'll work on that, it looked to me like almost everyone got involved and we managed to complete tubeless tire setups on 4 of the 6 demo wheels. Thanks to everyone who pitched in and helped get those tires mounted! I thought this meeting format was a success, but I'm looking for feedback on this format:
• Is this something we should do more often?
• Do you like the idea of a hands-on workshop or would you rather watch someone demonstrate a skill without having to get your hands dirty?
• What type of hands-on workshop or demonstration should we do next: Chain waxing? Wheel building? Turning a bare frame into a functioning bike? Something else?
• Do you have a skill you'd be interested in teaching at a future hands-on workshop?
Feel free to email me with answers to any of these questions, especially if you're interested in leading a future hands-on workshop or demo!
Scott Storkel
VBC President