September rides, two bike festivals, and the meeting that sets our streets |
In this email: 🚲 Family bike ride to Heather Farm, Tuesday 🎪 Bike Family Fest, Sunday Sept 13 🥐 Bakery morning at Gus's, Saturday Sept 19 🏛️ General Plan workshop, Thursday Sept 24 🚴 Concord Pedal Fest, Sunday Sept 27 💵 $150 to $300 back on an e-bike 📝 Three things you can do from the couch 🛟 New guides for when something goes wrong
We are looking for new members and volunteers who want to help make Walnut Creek safer, easier, and more fun to walk and bike. Please forward this email to a friend and ask them to join our newsletter, come to an event, and follow Walk Bike Walnut Creek on Instagram and Facebook. |
Heather Farm bike ride this Tuesday |
Our monthly family ride is this Tuesday, September 1. Meet at 5:15 PM in the traffic circle by the Civic Park back fields. We roll at 5:30 PM sharp and ride together to Heather Farm on the Iron Horse and Canal Trails. A couple of city council candidates are coming, so show up to demonstrate your support for walking, biking and traffic safety in Walnut Creek.
If you have been meaning to try riding with your kids but were not sure where to start, this is the easy version: paved, flat, no car traffic. You do not need to be fast or fit, and nobody gets dropped. We picnic and hang out for a couple of hours while the kids take over the playground, then ride back together.
Kids who are comfortable on the trail can ride their own bikes. Smaller kids ride on an adult's bike, a cargo bike, a trailer, or a child seat.
Bring: bike, helmet, water, and dinner or snacks. You can also order delivery to the park. Just show up — no need to tell us in advance. |
Bike Family Fest, Sunday September 13 |
10 AM to 2 PM at the DVC Overflow Lot, 440 Golf Club Road, Pleasant Hill. Free, but every attendee must register.
The biggest family biking day of the year around here, run by CCTA. Worth the trip for the free stuff alone: free mechanic tune-ups (bring the bike that has been making that noise) and free helmet fitting, which matters more than people think — most kids' helmets are worn wrong.
Beyond that: more than twenty activity stations, a pump track and obstacle courses for beginners through advanced riders, cargo bike demos, and BMX stunt riders in the final hour, so it is worth staying to the end.
Sunday parking is open in DVC Lots 6 and 7, and County Connection buses #314, #316, and #320 serve the campus with bike racks on the front. |
Bakery morning at Gus's, Saturday Sep 19 |
9 AM to noon, on First Avenue. Come toward the early end — some of it winds down before noon.
The third-Saturday bakery gathering is a genuinely good excuse for a short ride. It sits just off the Canal Trail, so from most of central Walnut Creek you can get there almost entirely on paved path instead of in traffic — about a couple of miles from Civic Park, flat the whole way.
That makes it close to ideal if you have been looking for a low-stress destination to try riding to with kids: a real place to go, a treat at the end, and no busy roads on the way. Coffee, pastries, neighbors. |
What will Walnut Creek look like in 2050? You decide! |
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Walnut Creek is rewriting its General Plan. That document decides where housing goes and, more to the point for us, how streets get designed — whether a road gets a bike lane or another lane of traffic, whether your kid can ride to school without you following in the car. It is written now and lived with for twenty-five years.
These processes are decided by whoever shows up, and the people who show up are usually the ones who drive everywhere. There are three ways in. Pick whichever fits your life:
An hour, and the one that counts most
Thursday, September 24, 6–7 PM at the Civic Park Community Center Auditorium: the first community-wide visioning workshop, a facilitated conversation with City staff. We will be there. Come find us.
Two minutes, while you are already out
City staff are running tables at the Downtown Farmers' Market on Sunday September 13, 9 AM to 12:30 PM, and at the Shadelands Farmers Market on Saturday September 19, 9 AM to 1 PM — the same morning as the bakery gathering above.
Zero minutes, from your couchSubscribe for updates or send your thoughts straight to the project team at walnutcreek2050.org.
Bring the specific places that worry you: the intersection you will not let your kid cross alone, the street with no sidewalk, the trail that dead-ends into traffic. Concrete local examples land better in those rooms than general support. |
Concord Pedal Fest, Sunday Sep 27 |
10 AM to 2 PM at John F. Baldwin Park, 2727 Parkside Circle, Concord. Free, no registration.
Concord's first one of these, put on by the City of Concord with Bike Concord and the Greater Concord Chamber of Commerce. Show up, bring a bike, that is it.
There is a bike rodeo and skills course for kids building confidence and for adults who have not ridden in years, blender bikes that make a smoothie if you pedal hard enough, bike-powered spin art, live music from Quattro, and food trucks.
The standout is the UpCycle Bike Program: kids outgrow bikes about as fast as shoes, so bring an outgrown one, trade it toward a better-fitting ride, and the old bike goes to another kid instead of a landfill. If you have one sitting in the garage, that alone makes the trip worth it. A well-attended first year is what convinces a city to do it again. |
Bought an e-bike this year? Claim $150 to $300 back |
Contra Costa runs a rebate on e-bikes that plenty of people who qualify never claim. How much: $150, or $300 if your household is at or below 400% of the federal poverty guidelines.
Whether you qualify: you are 18 or older, you live in Contra Costa County, and you bought the bike within the last six months. That window is the part that catches people — a bike bought in March is close to expiring. One rebate per person, two per address.
What counts: Class 1, 2, and 3 e-bikes and conversion kits. Working pedals, motor under 750 watts, top speed under 28 mph.
What you need on hand: photo ID, a recent utility bill with your address, the sales receipt, and the serial number off the bike. It is a short form. |
Three things you can do from the couch |
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1. Tell CCTA what is broken — and maybe win $100.They are asking people who live, work, or travel in Contra Costa what works, what is frustrating, and what would make getting around easier and safer. It is a survey about the roads you already complain about, and finishing it enters you in a drawing for a $100 Visa gift card. Take the Listening Survey → https://ccta.ca.gov/community/listening/
2. Say yes to connecting the Iron Horse and Canal Trails.CCTA is studying how to link the two trails near Pacheco, and the survey asks which of five route options you would actually use. The trail network has gaps that force you onto roads; closing them is the cheapest useful thing that can happen to biking here, and these studies genuinely get decided on response counts. Take the trail survey → https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSf6rLmFN-8WPD7Gz9DAfyFTfNH8aDwfrupKHtjR3ZKa_ocpVA/viewform
3. Back SB 1167.The bill separates real e-bikes from the 750-watt-plus machines that are sold as e-bikes but are really electric motorcycles, and requires those to be labeled and regulated as motor vehicles. It matters for keeping e-bike access: when a throttle-only motorcycle gets called an e-bike, the rules that follow land on the parent riding kids to school. It has cleared the Assembly Transportation Committee. Read CalBike's case for it → https://www.calbike.org/sb1167/ |
New on our site: what to do when something goes wrong |
We published four practical guides, worth knowing about before you need them:
If You Crash — what to do afterward, including the six-month deadline for filing a claim against a public agency, which most people find out about after it has passed.
Road Hazards — that pothole or overgrown hedge is either the city's or the county's, and this tells you which, and who to call.
Dangerous Driving — how to report a driver who ran you off the road.
Rules of the Road — which bike laws actually apply in California, minus the myths. |
Help Walk Bike Walnut Creek grow |
We are just starting up Walk Bike Walnut Creek after a hiatus and would love your help. Please forward this email to someone who might want to get involved, and ask them to join the mailing list, join us at an event, and follow us on Instagram and Facebook. |
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