PORT TOWNSEND — A newly constructed bicycle shelter at Blue Heron Middle School is expected to help encourage more children to ride their bikes to school.
“We need to really embrace this kind of behavior,” said Port Townsend School Superintendent David Engle, who arrived at the shelter’s dedication ceremony Friday riding a red Schwinn.
“This shelter will help get us there, encourage more walking and biking and all the good things that come from that.”
Engle, 67, has been an active bike rider all his life, saying that it has kept him young and fit and in no need to visit a gym.
The shelter, which measures 42 feet by 26 feet and is about 10 feet tall, took about a month to build, according to ReCyclery Board President Kees Kolff.
Construction cost was estimated at $17,000. Of that, some $10,000 was in donated labor and materials, Kolff said.
The remainder was covered by donations and an anti-obesity grant from Oregon State University.
“There are 41 bikes in there right now and you could probably fit another 10 under there,” Kolff said.
“Last week when we were building the shelter, there were only 25 bikes out there. It has already made a difference.”
Blue Heron students were encouraged to ride their bikes to school Friday in honor of the shelter’s dedication.
The school will also participate in the a national Bike to School Day on Wednesday.
Other Bike Month activities include a Bike to Work Day on May 15 with the more dedicated people taking advantage of Commute to Work Week May 11-May 15.
Engle said he commutes to work about three times a week, using the Larry Scott Trail to travel from his Cape George home.
About 130 students attended the dedication ceremony, which followed the sixth annual Masonic Lodge bike giveaway.
Each student who completed reading 10 books was entered into a drawing. Five were selected.
Each received a bike purchased by the Masons as well as a helmet and other bike supplies donated by Wal-Mart.
Bike winners were 13-year-old seventh-graders Trillium Dewyse and Gisel Alexandra; sixth-grader Finn O’Donnell, 11; fifth-grader Madi Witheridge, 11; and fourth-grader Taylor Gerneau, 10.
Blue Heron Construction donated the labor that installed four-foot deep pilings for the shelter’s corners, each using a yard of concrete where people were encouraged to leave their handprints.
Adults participating included Principal Diane Lashinsky and Engle, who characterized his print as “my legacy.”
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Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.
