2009 was a momentous year for cycling in Austin with several mile stones passed and the volume of people moving on two wheels growing. Here is a quick run down of what I think are the top ten Austin bike related stories in order of importance. If 2010 is anything like this year, Austin’s cycling scene is only going to get better.

Austinite James Clayton, arrested on burglary and theft charges regarding $60,000 worth of high end bikes

10. James Clayton bike theft ring

We started 2009 with this juicy tale uncovered by Jason at ATXBS. James Clayton was a local cyclist and mechanic who claimed to be a former pro mountain bike racer making six figures/year. As unbelievable as that tale was, nothing compared to the truth. Clayton made a habit of befriending cyclists riding high-end racing bikes on group rides then breaking into their homes days later to steal their steeds. He made a habit of casing homes via bike for sale Craig’s list ads and scoping out rides by wrenching at local bike shops. When APD arrested Clayton and searched his property, they found over $60,000 worth of bikes and components. Clayton had a girlfriend whom police thought was an accomplice but who was released from charges this fall. As for Clayton, he made a plea bargain with prosecutors and got four years in jail after which he’ll be extradited to other states where he faces similar charges.

9. Yellow Bike Project breaks ground on new HQ

The Austin Yellow Bike Project has been a staple of Austin bike culture for years refurbishing bikes for community use and teaching bicycle mechanic skills to any who volunteer. After the lease on their initial workshop was not renewed, YBP had to move their shop to a shipping container while raising the $270,000 needed to start construction on their new Webberville shop. Having secured a majority of the funding and successfully launching a micro-loan program, YBP broke ground on their permanent home this fall ensuring they remain a part of the Austin community.

8. Austin stop on the Bicycle Film Festival

After a hastily thrown together 2008 stop, the Bicycle Film Festival made a concerted effort to make Austin a full fledged stop on the 2009 schedule. Local staff were hired, bike parking secured, and plenty of notice given through the bike communities communication channels. There was a kickoff concert, incorporation into Social Cycling ATX’s Thursday Night Social Ride, a bike polo tournament, Yellow Bike Project fundraiser and after party, and three full days of screenings. The festival was a smashing success though some questioned the selection of hellishly hot August as a date for Austin.

7. Texas Custom Bicycle Show

Austin’s bike industry including bicycle frame builders has been quietly growing for years, but Austin’s selection as the location for the second annual Texas Custom Bicycle Show brought locally made, hand built bikes to the forefront. Show organizer Glenn Thompson pulled together a dozen quality builders from the Lone Star State including seven from Austin exposing the public to the existence of local frame builders. Show bikes ranged from frames made of steel, aluminum, titanium and carbon in styles as diverse as road, 29er, track, and cargo bikes. Operating as a show within the LiveStrong Challenge Expo hundreds turned out in addition to the ride participants just to see the finely crafted unique bikes. Austin will be the 2010 location for the Texas Custom Bicycle Show and is on a short list of cities in consideration for a possible future stop of the North American Handmade Bicycle Show.

Group Picture of the frame builders and participants at the 2009 Texas Custom Bicycle Show. Image courtesy of Tim Massengill of Massengill Cycles.

6. Social Cycling ATX

Austin already had lots of recreational cycling clubs from Austin Cycling Association to racing clubs like Austin Flyers. Though there had been smaller groups doing pub crawls and the annual moonlight ride was always popular, missing was a similarly broad and inclusive group dedicated to regular social riding until the Facebook group Social Cycling ATX was started. Created by Brooks Goldsmith, the groups signature Thursday Night Social Ride has grown from a small group to regularly having over 300 people in attendance. In fact, the ride got so big it had to leave its starting place at the Lamar Blvd Pedestrian Bridge this fall due to its size. Though the ride’s size can equal Critical Mass, the Thursday Night affair has ride leaders and goes out of its way to obey traffic laws and co-exist with motorists. Social Cycling ATX has expanded to include a Monday Night Heavy Medal Fitness Ride and Wednesday midday Hump Day Ride, but the Thursday Night ride remains the cornerstone and proof that Austin’s growing bike culture includes more than spandex.

5. Sharrows, bike boxes and colored pavement

With passage of the Austin Master Bike Plan in June, City of Austin Bicycle Program got to work testing new concepts on Austin roads for bicycle infrastructure. These included: sharrows, large pavement signage indicating bikes belong on the street; bike boxes, spots reserved at the head of the line at lights to give bikes priority; and colored pavement, green coloring of bike lanes at key points as a visual cue to motorists to watch out for cyclists. City staff is partnering with University of Texas transportation researchers to test these innovations for possible further replication throughout the city. Next up: Austin’s first bicycle boulevard on Nueces Street.

4. Chris Riley elected to Austin City Council

Austin City Councilmember Chris Riley

The Austin City Council has had cyclists as members but never individuals who live life on two wheels. In May, Chris Riley was elected to fill the remaining term of now Mayor Lee Leffingwell’s Council seat. Riley lives car-free, was a founding board member of Austin CarShare, and uses his bike as his primary form of transportation. With an active, competent Bicycle and Pedestrian Program, Riley provides a nice complement on the political/policy side to support Austin’s further development into a cycling mecca.

3. A bike event in Austin every 2 hours.

At the beginning of this year, we started an Austin Cycling Events Calendar including all the cycling related events in the Austin Metro area. Not content to focus just on club and shop rides and races, we catalogued bike-in movies, repair classes, pub crawls, and bike polo for an astonishing 4200 plus events. This means on average there is something bike related happening in this town every two hours. Amazing the amount and variety of things to do on your bike in Austin on any given day. And with groups like Social Cycling ATX thinking up new rides all the time, we expect the list to get longer in 2010.

2. Perry veto of Safe Passing Bill, the Safe Passing Petition, & Passage of the Safe Passing Ordinance

After an extensive lobbying effort, BikeTexas secured unanimous passage in the Texas House and a 30-1 vote in the Texas Senate for the Safe Passing Bill. The legislation would require motorists to provide at least 3 feet of clearance when passing a cyclist or other vulnerable road user such as pedestrians and those on horseback. Shockingly, Governor Rick Perry vetoed this bill in June despite its overwhelming support. His reasoning: the law put an “undue burden” on motorists. Most cyclists think cars put an undue burden on our bodies when they hit us. Not missing a beat, BikeTexas began an online and on the street campaign of gathering thousands of signatures from citizens displeased by the veto. In an attempt to make at least Austin streets safer for all users, the Austin City Council passed a similarly worded Safe Passing Ordinance in October.

Safe passing image courtesy Texas Bicycle Coalition

1. 2009 Austin Master Bicycle Plan

It had been 12 years since Austin last adopted a Master Bicycle Plan. In that time, Bicycle Program staffing faced an uncertain then stable future and only 1/3rd of the projects laid out in the 1996 plan ever got built. City staff did extensive hearing on the new plan and over 500 cyclist showed up to the City Councils initial vote on the plan. The new Master Bicycle Plan includes a commitment to make $250 million in bicycle infrastructure improvements including more bike lanes, bicycle boulevards, and bike parking. Also included in the plan was bike law training for Austin Police and a proposed city wide bike share program by 2020. Time lines were included to ensure we don’t wait until the next plan is enacted a decade from now to realize if we are behind schedule. The largest challenge moving forward is securing the funding to fully implement the plan.

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Honorable mentions: These two stories, one comically unfortunate and one just plain sad, are worth mentioning but did not make my top ten list.

- The Dirt Derby is dead, Long live alleycross: The Dirt Derby has been a staple of Austin mountain bike and cyclocross racing since Andrew Stackhouse started the autum Tuesday night series a few years ago. While a fun and challenging course, the Austin/Del Valle Motorcross Park is essentially all dirt meaning heavy rains turned the dusty course (and its parking lot) into a huge mud pit. After an extremely dry summer, the Dirt Derby couldn’t catch a break with week after week seeing heavy rain on Sunday or Monday making the course unrideable even if Tuesday was sunny and clear. In the end, less than half the scheduled Derby races were ever held. Fortunately, Thy Neighbors Bike stepped up and with the help of CycleBum created an underground cyclocross series dubbed an alleycross at parks throughout Austin on many of the Derby’s cancellation dates.

Local racer Kevein Underhill. Image courtesty of Training From A Barkalounger.

- The death of Kevin Underhill at The Driveway Crits: Austin’s racing community has been blessed by the relatively rare occurance of race related deaths. This August our luck ran out when local cyclist Kevin Underhill was seriously injured in a crash at The Driveway, a weekly criterium series. Underhill was an experienced cyclist but was racing in his first road race. The head injuries he sustained caused severe brain damage and Underhill was removed from life support and allowed to die.