Mobile Mesa County - August 2021

Mobile Mesa County                                                            August 2021

Grand Valley Bike Month
Bike Month returns this September for a fall season. Pedal through September with a
number of self-paced challenges, group rides, and the Business Challenge. Join the Ride
Challenge and compete for the most miles or trips on a bike, register on Love to Ride and
sign up with the Mesa County Biking Group. Snap photos of your rides and submit for a
chance to win local prizes.

Mesa County is excited for the return of the Bike Month Film Fest, which will be held at the
Avalon on Tuesday, September 14th. The Film Fest will feature several local bike films,
speakers from local bike advocate groups, and door prizes. All proceeds from ticket sales
will help with matching funds for a grant that will help to add 30 miles of trail at 18 Road in
Fruita. Doors open at 6:30 PM, the show starts at 7:00 PM, click here for tickets.

Encourage your friends and coworkers to bike to work on Wednesday, Sept 22, the official
Bike to Work Day. Riders can get energized for the day with a FREE local breakfast, which
will take place on September 22 from 7:00 AM-10:00 AM at the Grand Junction City Hall
and Octopus Coffee on Horizon Drive.

Local businesses and organizations should join the Bike Month Business Challenge and
compete for the ultimate bragging rights. Register your team then encourage employees to
bike to work at least one time September 19-25. The top four groups with the highest
percentage of commuter participation will get to display a traveling trophy in their
workplace for an entire year. Visit the Bike Month website for more info on events.

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Walking & Biking
Bicycle and Pedestrian Counts in Grand Junction
Article by - David Lehmann

In the past, the City of Grand Junction has collected very little information on the number
of people walking or bicycling along local roads, though there is substantial data on
motorized use. To help remedy this situation, the Grand Junction Urban Trails Committee
began measuring bicycle and pedestrian use in the City five years ago. Following
procedures of the “National Bicycle and Pedestrian Documentation Project”, and in
coordination with the City, the Urban Trails Committee set up five locations where cyclists
and pedestrians are counted during peak use periods in the spring or fall each year.
 Volunteers do the counting, and local business provide rewards for the volunteers. City
engineers store the data and use it to determine trends in bike and pedestrian use, and to
see if infrastructure improvements have resulted in changes in use.

The counts were done in May of this year at locations including: 10th Street between North
& Belford, 1st Street south of Gunnison, 715 Horizon Drive, 7th Street north of South Street,
and Monument Road at Glade Park Road. The counts have shown that a separated bike
path (Monument Connector Trail) was the most effective way to increase use. Bicycle use
was almost three times greater and pedestrian use nearly seven times greater along this
route after the bike path was constructed. Use did not change much as a result of other
improvements such as painted bike lanes, bump out sidewalk extensions that shorten
crossing distance, widened sidewalks, sharrows, and directional signs.

The manual counts have provided five years of valuable baseline data at no cost to the City.
The Urban Trail Committee has encouraged the City to purchase automated counters,
which would greatly improve the accuracy of the data because they count over longer
periods. Manual counts would still be needed to calibrate and check the automated
counters.

GVT Ride Promotions

D51 Student Bus Pass Program

This summer Mesa County RTPO worked with the Mesa County Workforce Center to
launch the pilot bus pass program for middle school and high school students, allowing
them to ride GVT Fixed Route free through the summer months. The program was a huge
success, with an average of 730 student boardings in both June and July.

Mesa County Workforce Center helped to fund the program with the use of the funding
source Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and they found that they still had
funds available to work with, which is helping to keep the program running for the school
year. Mesa County is excited to continue to offer the D51 Bus Pass Program for middle and
high school students. The program will run from September 1, 2021 - August 31, 2022. In
order for Grand Valley Transit to capture the TANF funding for the upcoming school year,
there are a few extra steps before students can claim their free annual pass.

Parents must first complete the student pass form, which is available in English and
Spanish on the GVT website. The form is required to help identify the funding source for
the program, but all students will receive a bus pass, regardless of whether or not they are
TANF eligible. Once the form has been completed, middle school and high school students
will need to get a GVT Free Ride Sticker to ride free. The stickers are available at all D51
middle and high schools, the D51 Admin Office, Grand Junction Parks and Recreation, and
Mesa County Public Libraries (Central, Fruita, Palisade, Clifton, and Orchard Mesa).
 Students should take their ID with them when they go to pick up their pass, and place the
sticker someplace on their ID. After they have their Free Ride Sticker, all they need to do is
show their ID to the driver when boarding the bus.

The goal of the program is to provide youth in the community with the opportunity to
become more independent. With access to transportation, youth will be able to get to after
school jobs, participate in local activities, and visit a number of parks and recreation
venues throughout the Grand Valley. In addition, this program will help to increase
ridership on Grand Valley Transit.

                                                       D51 Student Bus
                                                        Pass Program

GVT News

GVT History

Earlier this month, our Mobility Manager had a chance to sit down with former County
Commissioner and one of the original founders of GVT, Kathy Hall. Sarah interviewed
Kathy on her monthly KAFM radio show, and Kathy shared the story of how transit started
in Mesa County back in 2000, noting that she gives a lot of credit to the students at R5
Highschool. In September, Mesa County will celebrate 21 years of GVT service in the valley.
Knowing that youth in the community pushed to get public transit started in Mesa County,
the launch of the Student Bus Pass Program is perfectly suited for this year.

Check out the whole interview and learn more about the history of GVT in the podcast,
click here to listen.