Faculty members are ?participating in a bike ?commute challenge for the month of September
By Rosemary Peters
At the beginning of September, 46 UP faculty members registered for Bicycle Transportation Alliance's Bike Commute Challenge in order to cut back on their carbon footprint and to improve their health.
The Bicycle Transportation Alliance's (BTA) Bike Commute Challenge is a friendly competition to see who can get more people biking to work in September. Any business, non-profit or public agency is eligible to participate. Within those categories, workplaces are divided by number of employees, to keep competition fair.
University of Portland is in the category for Business/Non-Profit Organizations with more than 500 employees. There were 10 organizations in this category.
?Faculty log thousands of miles
UP's faculty biked 3876.5 miles. The National College of Natural Medicine took first place, biking 11,435.27 miles, and Adidas took second with 9,385.06 miles.
This year, Laura Steffen, Coordinator of Sustainable Entrepreneurship, was in charge of organizing UP's part in the competition. Steffen made sure everyone logged their hours and was the go-between for UP and the BTA.
According to Steffen, she started biking to work because she lives a mile from the school, and it seemed like a good option.
"I want to avoid using gasoline in order to lower the amount of CO2 I am responsible for emitting," Steffen said. "Plus it's fun and good exercise."
?Commuting options
UP faculty members had three different choices that were considered commuting to school.
Their first option was to bike to and from the University. Their second option was to ride a bike one way and to ride back by another mode. Their final option was to bike part of the way and to join up with transit, driving or another mode of transportation.
"I bike to work because I know it will be better for the environment and my health," English professor Molly Hiro said. Hiro biked 100 percent of the way to and from UP. "I want to model this lifestyle for my kids by making choices to protect the earth."
Hiro commuted eight miles round-trip to work. She has worked hard at improving her biking skills, eventually cutting her time to 18 minute for each leg of the journey. She said it takes about 15 minutes to drive to work due to all of the stoplights and traffic.
"I think it's a misconception people have about biking. They think it'll take much longer," Hiro said. "I am happier on my bike than in my car. In my car, I feel so closed up, but when I am on my bike I have all that fresh air."
?Top riders celebrated
The 46 employees biking to work represents six percent of all faculty members at UP. When the competition ended, engineering professor James Male finished in first place at UP with 264 miles and German professor Ralf Genske came in second with 252 miles. Both were among 14 faculty members who rode 100 percent of the way.
The other participants rode 50-99 percent of the time.
Now that the competition is over, the BTA will hold a big "After Party," on October 8, at the Organics to You warehouse.
"The main prize you get out of this (after party) is that you get the glory," Steffen said.
