November 2013 - Parks & Recreation - 27

Bikes in the Parks
Daily park maintenance goes green
By Chris Bundy

t all started with a few bikes and a willingness to try something new.
Our staff in the City of Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, Parks Department
wanted a more efficient and greener way to complete daily park
maintenance tasks. We had explored several options and decided to incorporate bicycles into our routine. This is how the Green Maintenance
Bike Initiative was born.
Through the initiative, our staff use
new and recycled bikes to maintain
the city's parks. With connected access to five of the city's most utilized
parks through the Mt. Pleasant GKB
Riverwalk Trail, bikes were a natural
option for tackling our daily maintenance tasks.
Gaining Momentum
Prior to 2011, our department relied
solely on gas-powered, motorized
utility vehicles for moving material,
equipment and personnel. Nearly 10
gallons of gasoline were being used
per day, creating pollution in the
form of exhaust and excess noise in
otherwise peaceful park areas.
To get the program up and running,
we invested in two new bicycles and two
specialized bike trailers. We then turned
to park staff members who had an interest in bike riding and challenged them
to see what tasks they could accomplish
with the new bikes and trailers.
Our mindset was to put one bike
and trailer into service and motivate
someone to try it out. This gave us the
opportunity to see how this new way
of doing maintenance could work.
Once the program gained some momentum, we began working with the
City of Mt. Pleasant Police Department. Through this partnership, used
Cannondale police bikes are refur-

bished and retrofitted with new parts
such as fenders, saddle bags and first-aid
kits. Bike trailer hitches also are added,
allowing specialized trailers to be connected to the bike that can transport
push mowers, weed whips, yard and
hand tools, as well as trash receptacles.
A New Way of Thinking
Mt. Pleasant's Green Maintenance
Bike Initiative has led the park staff to
change their way of thinking. They are
less dependent on motorized vehicles
and are consistently developing innovative ways to accomplish even more
while reducing our carbon footprint.
Just getting staff thinking about it
put them in a different mindset. Until
we experienced it firsthand, none of
us realized just how much a bicycle
can haul or how efficient they can be.
Reaping the Benefits
The Green Maintenance Bike Initiative helps reduce noise and air pollution, preserves financial resources and
makes our staff more approachable to
visitors. Promoting healthy lifestyles
within the staff and externally to the
community is yet another benefit.
The bicycles also provide an avenue for youth volunteers to get from
one park to another, reducing the
need to provide them with motorized
transportation to various work sites.

Sustaining the " Green "
in Our Initiative
The program continues to grow; we
now have 15 bikes and nine trailers.
Although there are some jobs that
still require the use of motorized vehicles, a growing amount of our daily
maintenance tasks are accomplished
using bicycles. Other than mowers,
there are even certain parks in Mt.
Pleasant that no longer require the
use of motorized vehicles to accomplish daily maintenance tasks.
A recent grant from the Mt. Pleasant Community Foundation is continuing to help further the program
by providing specialized equipment
for the bicycles and staff.
Our employees are also making the
initiative self-sustaining by learning
how to repair and recycle bicycles
that are abandoned in their own park
facilities. Our department now constructs some of their own bike trailers
and continues to look for innovative
ways to replace the use of motorized
vehicles in daily maintenance tasks
and adjust the initiative for future
park growth.
To see a video on this program, go
to www.bit.ly/19kuY6R.
Chris Bundy is the Director of Parks and
Public Spaces for the City of Mt. Pleasant,
Michigan (cbundy@mt-pleasant.org).

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November 2013 - Parks & Recreation

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