Category: News

Profile Bikefriendly business: Svelto Bikes

We love featuring local business that help promote riding bicycles.* Is there a more bikefriendly business than one that actually builds bicycles? We’ve had a chat to Kate Biondo of the Galactic Cooperative, which is the mothership of Svelto Bikes, the only Western Australian (maybe even Australian?) e-bike manufacturer:

“Svelto Bikes is our quality Australian designed and built e-bike, and, as a business, is part of the Galactic Co-operative. As a local business with a passion for renewable energy we had a mission to see less cars on Australian roads. Electric bikes can be seen as a definite answer to Australia’s congested roads. Around six years ago we started experimenting with different electric bike technologies. We tried front, rear and two wheel drive motor combinations; many different controller and battery chemistry alternatives and always striving for the most reliable sustainable solution to the commuting problem. The result was our commuter electric bikes.”

“Our sustainability focus starts with the idea that an electric bike is a viable alternative to a second car. More than that though, a well designed and manufactured electric bike, suited to Australia’s climate and urban makeup is a sustainable alternative to a single occupant fossil fuelled car. It’s even more than that though; our bikes are designed to last longer than any other electric bike on the market, and in some cases will outlive most other motorised items as well. Our commuter electric bike has a 25 year design philosophy! We only make or use components that we believe will last 25 years (excluding consumables like tyres, brakes and battery). We’ll train you to ride and look after your bike, we’ll service your bike and maintain a relationship with you for the life of your bike. It’s all part of our commitment to the environmental, social and economic well-being of our planet and its inhabitants.”

“Several people from Galactic Cooperative and Svelto Bikes have come together to express their thoughts on the role that bicycles and e-bikes have played, and continue to play, in their lives. As a business, Svelto Bikes has a vision to put every commuter whose journey suits cycling on an e-bike. This ties in with the Galactic Co-operative mandates to engage with the community, and reduce the environmental impact of human activity. Svelto Bikes believes that innovation will allow people to move to a more environmentally responsible paradigm while also having a higher quality of life, rather than feeling like they’re sacrificing anything, which is where the environmental movement finds a great deal of resistance.”

“We have a pool bike ready for use at the office and everyone is encouraged to use it for small trips around the place from picking up parts from local suppliers and lunch items.”

“The Svelto Bike was conceptualised by Andrea Biondo. Andrea has always ridden a bike and given the opportunity will ride to most places. While in training for an apprenticeship back in the eighties he would ride his bike to the training facility on Ley Street, Manning from Langford everyday. Once in the workforce Andrea struggled to find opportunities to ride because of the nature of his work in the service industry. Change of career and a move towards being where we are today meant that bike riding came to the forefront once more. Riding his bike to and from Curtin University where he studied Physics and then went on to work at Curtin University for a couple of years riding his bike rain or shine. Starting work at University of Western Australia meant more a longer commute and Andrea started thinking how to make the 16 kilometre journey there and back more manageable. His thoughts went into the realm of an electric bike, and hence the beginning of the Svelto prototype.”

“Kate Biondo didn’t have such a close relationship to the bicycle as some others. It was always a means to get to places and she was so keen to get her licence and drive a car at 17. Until she could drive though, Kate has many fond memories of being one of the Charlie’s angels riding around the deserted Primary School grounds with her friends and the independence of going to and from friends homes, the shops and High School. Having her son, Isaac, was another big boost to use a bike once more. Kate wanted to make sure Isaac new that cycling was a part of what he does as a family and it was seen as a normal way of getting about. Kate, Andrea and Isaac have cycled a lot; to and from Isaac’s school, all around Rottnest on a yearly basis from when Isaac was 3 to about 10 years of age and still do at any opportunity, and on weekends to explore along the Canning and Swan River. Isaac to this day rides his e-bike (A very pieced together machine from discarded items Andrea didn’t need) to High School and the local shops.”

“Kat Sherwin’s personal relationship with the bicycle combines different facets of the commuter, the exerciser and the leisure rider. She uses her bike primarily as a commuter vehicle, but considers its fitness benefits as a supporting factor in her sports training. For her, it is a way to minimise her environmental impact as a commuter. Not least of all, she has found an unexpected joy in feeling connected to the world as she moves through it, rather than being insulated and isolated as one tends to be in a car. She finds it fascinating to be able to smell the seasons and the different times of day, to note the different wind directions between morning and evening, and to enjoy the work of gardeners whose roses and jasmine and fig trees line her route to the gym, work and home.”

“People have a preconception of e-bikes as being big, clunky, inconvenient things. Svelto Bikes are designed from the starting point of a traditional bicycle, to be sleek, modern and easy to handle. They’re simple and safe to operate and maintain and this makes them the ideal replacement for cars as commuter vehicles. A Bluetooth Android app allows you to be in total control of your bike and achieve the most personalised, connected riding experience possible.”

“Additionally, a concerning trend has emerged, where more and more people are purchasing e-bikes as short-term, consumable, throw-away items. This approach is clearly disastrous on an environmental front, which is why Svelto Bikes are designed to last 25 years. Current battery technology isn’t quite sufficient but Svelto Bikes is constantly working to improve the product, and battery life will only get better. To this end, we are committed to helping you keep your Svelto Bike at the cutting edge of technology throughout its lifetime, by offering opportunities to upgrade the hardware as better innovations become available.”

“Svelto’s aim is to move people away from thinking of bicycles as accessories to be replaced when they’re “out of fashion”. This bike is an investment in your future, and a companion that will be in your life for many, many years to come.”

*Please note: our regular bikefriendly business profiles aim to highlight businesses that are of interested to people on bicycles. We don’t receive any payment for these features. If you run a business that supports people riding bicycles, please drop us a line!

A review of how we’re doing

It’s the beginning of a fresh, new financial year: Woohoo and oh boy! How does it happen that another 12 months have passed?

It’s a good time to look at how we’re fairing in our quest to get more people on bicycles. Over the last twelve months I have:

  • Up-skilled a total of 445 people. 133 adults and 312 children.
  • Ran 20 adult workshops and two school holiday workshops for children.
  • Visited two schools.
  • Presented about bicycles at Transition Town Vincent.
  • Wrote and published a set of school resources for teachers.
  • Published 17 blog posts and 9 newsletters.
  • Launched our Facebook page.

Overall, this is a pretty good result and pulling this together a mighty effort given that most of the above work happened on weekends and after-hours complementing a day job.

A big challenge was offering school bicycle education to schools. Being limited during the week has required this social enterprise to grow from ‘micro’ to ‘small’ in a short amount of time. What an amazing experience though to offer more workshops during the week and getting little people on bicycles. Not to mention the buzz one gets when having additional coaches help and pursuing the same goal!

Public speaking has evolved to be part of this organisation, which has been a thrill – slightly terrifying, but so rewarding. I’d love to do more of those!

There is only little visible of all of the hours spent on marketing. Looking at the annual output I’m actually surprised of the regularity of posts over the months. It always feels like I’ve forgotten to capture an event or missed to announce an upcoming workshop, but reality says I’m doing okay.

All in all, I’m pretty happy with the last twelve months and it’s nice to take a step back to look at the milestones.

What do you think?

Switch your thinking: Speed date an E-bike

For the last twelve months we’ve been part of Switch your Thinking and it’s been such an amazing experience. Switch your Thinking is a project initiated by the RAC and run by the City of Gosnells that sees a fleet of four e-bicycles being supplied to different local governments for a specified period of time, usually for a month.

The goal of the project is for the participating local governments to trial how staff respond to e-bicycles and whether they are used to replace short car trip. Different cities amend the framework to suit their goals – some allowed staff to take the bicycles home and use them for commutes, some enabled people to take them home over the weekend and allowed private use whereas others were keen to focus on work trips only.

The parameters of the induction training were that it had to fit into staff’s lunch breaks and couldn’t impact on their service delivery. With this in mind we’ve developed a very short and sweet training concept the “Speed date an E-bike” focusing on the elementary aspects of using the features of e-bikes effectively and safely.

Providing staff with an induction in such a short time frame is challenging from a trainer point of view, but the results of the training are instantaneous: there’s not a single group we’ve trained that didn’t whoop and cheer as soon as the pedal assist kicked in. There is something magical about discovering how easy it is to ride an e-bike and what options suddenly open up. Staff who work in the field suddenly realise they could simply ride to their locations instead of driving, or commutes could become feasible to travel by bike.

For local governments’ trialling the use of e-bikes without having to commit to purchase equipment is a low-risk, low cost project and can build a compelling case for future projects. With Switch your thinking coming to a close soon revisiting the data and measuring the outcomes will be interesting.

As a training provider it’s been an exciting challenge to work within the time constraints and developing a training session which is providing the most essential information and is fun and accessible.

Have you been part of Switch your Thinking? If so, let us if and how the project has affected you, we’d love to hear your story!

Payal’s chain reaction

I actually never learnt riding when I was young, just one of those things that got totally missed out. We had a bicycle at home and my brother rode it often, but I never did! I learnt how to drive a car but could never balance myself on a bicycle and never really tried. Somehow, I wanted to learn much later in life in my late twenties, but never came around to doing much about it.

I had my kids and then whenever they’d ride I would think of teaching myself. Finally, when I saw the course at the City of Belmont I just had to join. I learnt a lot at the course, but my balance was still off even on the last day of training. By that time though my confidence was high and I was persistent. I just learnt how to balance very recently after practising with my kids on my elder boy’s bike. It’s only been three or four weeks since I can ride a bike. But I enjoy it immensely.

Now I ride about two to three times a week and for very short distances. I still do not have the stamina to ride uphill from my cul-de-sac, so haven’t gone much further from home yet. But I practice regularly and intend to eventually be able to ride farther from home, maybe to the train station or every day for work, if possible.

My kids ride with me too. And just a couple weeks back my husband bought a bike for himself. Even my father in-law has picked up bike riding. He used to drop my kids to school and walk with them while they rode, which was frustrating for him. He now rides a bike alongside them when he goes to drop and pick them up. This all started in a way after I mentioned that I wanted to learn how to ride…like a chain reaction!<

Barrack Square Ice-Cream Kiosk Offer

Riding along the Swan River is GORGEOUS and perfect for a family day out, group ride or solo trips. Frolicking dolphins, soothing parks and the marvellous scenery of the river – why wouldn’t you want to explore the shared paths along the area?

The new Elisabeth Keys development is worthwhile checking out too and while you’re there we’d like to pass on an offer from the Barrack Square Ice-Cream Kiosk, which is tucked between the Lucky Shag and Halo, which form the Old Perth Port to the East of the Bell Tower.

If none of these locations mean anything to you then it’s high time to venture into town. But, back to the offer: Print the above voucher and get 10% off of your next purchase over $5. Yay!

Glendale Primary: Getting Kids to Ride to School

Glendale Primary School in the northern suburbs of Perth is, probably like many other primary schools around town, nestled into quiet suburbia surrounded by quiet streets, parkland and ovals. One look and it’s clear: this location is pure bliss for anyone keen to ride to school.

Which is why it wasn’t a surprise that the bike parking area was filled to the brim with all sized, shaped and coloured bicycles on our recent visit to the school to teach bicycle skills. Or was it? The PE teacher Tanya, who had previously invited us to run the course, said otherwise. Usually not that many children ride to school and it was the fact that the she had organised the training that suddenly everybody rode to school. We like it!

Interestingly our visit was targeting the years 4, 5 and 6 how to ride safely wouldn’t have been unusual. But the racks were STACKED with bicycles and even the younger years, who didn’t even participate in the bicycle classes, were riding to school. All because they heard about the training.

So why is it even necessary to do bicycle education at school when everybody is already riding? Firstly, it is necessary because usually kids aren’t riding to school. The average distance primary school aged children travel from home to school is 4 kilometres or less. An easy distance to travel by bike. But by car it is a blip on the radar for any parent who needs to drive to work. And that’s the core of the problem. The short distance in which you can safely drop of junior at school is just a small diversion. Why not quickly do it and make sure they get where they meant to go?

The impact of riding to school is immense: a healthier, more engaged and alert student because they used active transport, a student who took ownership and responsibility of getting from A to B, a student who is a lot more familiar with their neighbourhood, understands the risks along the way and knows which ones to tackle and which ones to avoid.

Tanya is on the ball and two years after we ran our first bicycle education program through the City of Stirling, we were back with the goal to equip students with safe riding skills. Anyone can ride fast, but not everyone can ride safely. Being able to control the bike in difficult situations, being able to survey what’s around you and make decisions on speed and distance is key. Plus, games on bicycles, which teach and practice all of these skills are fun.

Glendale’s year 6 students looked familiar, just with longer limbs and yes, they did still remember the basics of fitting a helmet, mounting a bicycle and loved a good slow race. That’s a lie. Kids hate slow races. But being able to ride slowly and balance on the bike is a fundamental skill and that’s why we do it!

The bicycle training highlights that there are always a few kids – even in year 6 – who have never learned how to ride a bicycle. With the training they have the opportunity to do so with a coach by their side, which boosts confidence.

As the students bring their own bicycles to school the training also points a spotlight at the safety and maintenance levels of kids bicycles. Deflated tyres, rusty chains and faulty breaks are common and so are bicycles that have become too small for the child to ride on. All of these discoveries, whilst frustrating for students, are essential to unearth, point out and flag with parents. Riding safely also means having safe equipment and what better way to ensure this is happening by pointing it out?

We absolutely loved teaching the bicycle training and can’t wait to be back. For those who don’t want to wait for their school to organise a customised training can enrol their child into our upcoming school holiday workshop.

 

Upcoming workshop: All about bike commute

Have you contemplated riding your bicycle to work? Sometimes trying something new seems like an insurmountable challenge. That’s why we thought we make it as easy as possible and offer you a series of workshop to get you into the right frame of mind.

Partnering with social enterprise Befriend we’re pleased to launch our Commuter Series, which you can directly book online. Pick the topic that you’re keen to learn more about or choose all of them, it’s entirely up to you.

The sessions will cover the following content:

Session 1: Road Rules & Safe Rides – Sat 15 October
This session will cover road safety and how to handle your bike (such as mounting, dismounting, breaking, gears and helmet use). We’ll also practice bike balance, riding with one hand, looking over the shoulder and overtaking.

Session 2: Commuting Kick-Start – Sat 22 October
Think about your needs in regards to your bike: which type would suit you best, and will it need much storage capacity? This session will cover trip planning; assess your skills and fitness; and strategies for shortening rides. We will also revise using gears and why they are key to riding longer routes.

Session 3: Bike Checks & Fixes – Sat 29 October
Learn about key safety requirements of your bike (such as breaks, seat position, chain, and tires). You’ll be taught some DIY quick fixes on the road (replacing the chain, fixing a flat) and what issues require urgent mechanical attention.

Session 4: Commuting Test Ride – Sat 5 November
Combining all the knowledge we’ve learnt from the past three session, we’ll do a medium length test ride, and if possible pick one of your chosen riding routes!

Launch of bicycle classes

Have you never learned how to ride a bicycle? Or has it been a very, very long time since you’ve been on a bike and it all seems a little too scary?

Learning how to handle a bicycle safely can be extremely daunting – particularly when you’re not a little child anymore and the thought of falling seems less than appealing. Finding adult classes that have no prerequisites and cater for the absolute novice can be equally frustrating.

From experience we know that people capable of riding a bicycle have forgotten how challenging learning these set of skills can be. And really, is hoping to remember how to ride a bike really the only thing you want to count on when it’s been a while?

For a few years we have been teaching – particularly women – how to master the skill of safely riding a bicycle. The classes have helped hundreds of participants to rediscover the joy of riding a bicycle.

We teach without judgement, just facts, useful tips and a whole heap of fun. No question is too little and the speed of how you learn is up to you – metaphorically and literally.

Sounds like the right thing for you? Check out our upcoming courses to find out where and when we’ll be running the next set of classes.

Fixies, Poverty, Your Chance to Help!

Companies promising to do something worthwhile with the hard earned dough you’ve handed to them should pique more people’s attention. Atma Cycles, who will be launching a their first drop-dead gorgeous fixie, are a companies with their finger on the pulse of current consumer demands, who’re not only asking for a good product, but a socio-economic benefit to the rest of the world.

For what you buy when procuring an Atma fixie is, firstly, your new treadlie and, secondly, another bicycle which is donated to a young teenage woman in Northern India for whom this donation is essential to ride to secondary school and complete her education. I know, goosebumps story, right?

Currently, there is a big IF attached to this premise. Alex Carpenter, the owner of Atma Cycles, is gnawling at the starting budget, which will enable the first shipment of fixies to Perth. His crowdfunding campaign launched a few weeks ago and is about to expire in a few days time.

Alex is seeking support from those who have fallen in love with his product and can’t wait to pre-order, those who share his vision of a “buy one, donate one” philosophy that does good, those who feel compelled to support women’s education and escape from poverty or those who just can’t help but donate to something good.

Let’s backtrack a minute. How do women escape poverty through your fixie? Alex is working with a well-established non-profit organisation based in Northern India, which provides microloans. Through their community work they realised that transportation is a major factor in enabling young girls’ secondary education. No low-cost transportation meant girls discontinued school as they were unable to reach their secondary school. Owning their own bicycle, however, meant the could travel to school.

If this is still clear as mud have a listen to Alex at his crowdfunding launch, but most importantly, head to his fundraising page and help out!

 

Launch of strategy paper: “Our Bike Path”

 

When we doodle around town on our bicycles we easily forget how much work goes into the stretch of path we’re using. Developing a bicycle network isn’t simply a matter of scribbling some lines on a map and hand it to the man with the shove excavator to make it happen.

Perth’s shared path network may not be perfect, but it’s taken a while to get to a point where we can access and use a fairly functional network. What many don’t realise is that Western Australia has a small, yet effective number of cycling groups which have pushed the development so far. Gill and I will talk more about these groups and introduce you to some of the faces that have shaped the city so far (*Gill nods*).

Competition for funding, membership and support hasn’t always created harmony amongst these groups and this is why WestCycle’s launch of the strategy paper “Our Bike Path” is a milestone.

The launch last Wednesday as part of Bikeweek 2014 and UWA’s Bike to Uni breakfast (read: free food and coffee, of course we were in!) meant plenty of people on bicycles got together. We were munching, slurping hot goodness and dreamt of an even better, more cycle friendly Perth.

Cynics may put it all down as a pipe dream, but having all of the cycling groups be part of the 18 month process of developing the strategy is one thing, having them agree is another.

If you haven’t had a chance to grab a copy, have a read here.