Austin is finally jumping on the ciclovía bandwagon with the proposed first one dubbed Viva! Streets scheduled for this May. The event will close East 6th Street to automobile traffic and reclaim city streets as public space for people. Tonight is an information session on the event.
encourage recreation for active, healthy lifestyles. Austinites will be walking, biking, running, skateboarding, inline skating, and
generally enjoying a family-friendly, car-free environment. The first Viva! Streets will open East 6th Street (from Brazos Street to just east of Robert T. Martinez Jr. Street) to the whole Austin community from 10AM-3PM on May 20, 2012. We hope you can come to hear more about this exciting event and how you can get involved.
WHAT: Viva! Streets Community Meeting
WHEN: Wednesday, February 15th, 4:00-5:30PM
WHERE: The Alamo Drafthouse Cinema at the Ritz, 320 E 6th
Street, Austin, TX 78701
**Feel free to invite others, but space is limited – please RSVP to
Katie Whitehouse at (512) 974-7913 or Katie.Whitehouse@austintexas.gov
**If you are unable to attend this meeting but would like more information, or if you want to be included on future communications about the May event, please email: Lewis.Leff@austintexas.gov
on Feb 15th, 2012 at 9:35 am
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on Feb 15th, 2012 at 10:51 am
East 6th Street? LAAAAAAAAAME! Lets see them do it with Congress, Lamar, or a street that actually matters. Shit like this is why Austin will always be a college town instead of the city we wish we were.
on Feb 15th, 2012 at 10:52 am
And for only FIVE HOURS? Yeah, we’d hate to inconvenience anybody wanting to drive to the bar at 4:30 in the afternoon…
on Feb 16th, 2012 at 4:39 pm
I think this event is going to rock, but I sympathize with Jason’s comments above. Why not the entire stretch of 6th, from West Lynn to Pedernales? I think very obviously the answer is that the livable streets community here in Austin is dispersed and disconnected…
on Feb 16th, 2012 at 8:00 pm
What can I say?
Austin’s Ciclovía will be similar in size and in duration than the ciclovía held every Sunday in Guatemala City (link in Spanish: http://www.muniguate.com/index.php/component/content/article/67-viapublica/6816-ciclovia)
It may look sad if we know that Guatemala is the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere after Haiti; but not so sad if we consider that, at least, it will be a ciclovía in Austin. I was very much convinced that it would never happen here since the City always found very good reasons not to commit to the idea.
I had suggested in every possible venue to have it on Congress, since the idea of having children safely riding in the most important street in Austin with the Capitol as background, looks to me as the real image of a city commited to cycling.
But well, compromise is the world we live in. So let’s cheer it’s coming–however lame it may look to some.