I volunteer and sit on the board of what may be the oldest bike co-op in North America.

The Edmonton Bicycle Commuter's Society was founded in 1980 and has been operating continuously for nearly 29 years.

Our mission is to promote cycling as a viable transportation alternative and we also operate a fully equipped community bike shop called "Bikeworks" where people can come in and work on their bikes for nominal amounts and purchase decent bikes for very little money.

We receive hundreds upon hundreds of bikes every year... these are everything from dept store models to one of a kind hand built models to vintage collectibles.

Sometime folks buy bikes that need some work and sometimes they buy bikes that our crew of volunteer mechanics have serviced... the cumulative knowledge of our volunteers is immense.

We teach people how to repair and service their own bikes, do many workshops on specific topics (like winter cycling), and do community outreach in the summer time when we have several full time paid mechanics and a volunteer coordinator to organize our participation in many summer events and festivals.

If there are bike racks on our buses it is because we have been a strong advocate or a royal pain in the ass for city council... it depends who you ask.