The Big Toronto Bike Ride 2024 Fundraiser - Cycle Toronto - Opening Speeches, Ride and Closing Remarks
Music created for the timelapse is my own.
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00:00These decisions should be made on a local city level so please sign the petition and
00:04let's let the premier and our MPPs know this is to just stay in their lane.
00:15I do want to thank our partners and sponsors first of all of course Bike Law Canada
00:21they're here sponsoring us year after year you have Melissa and Pat you know
00:29it's just it's unbelievable their generosity and their support and so thank you so much.
00:34I want to thank Toronto Hydro as well the past couple years they've really been stepping up
00:38and helping support this and thank you Kerbside Cycles as well for coming as a sponsor this year.
00:44I want to thank our we'll talk more about a little bit more about the teams and the
00:53fundraisers but I do want to give a shout out to the top fundraiser
00:56I believe it's currently Chris Robinson. Chris you want to put your hand up?
01:04And the top team which I believe is right now the Friends of Cycle Toronto
01:09do you want to put your hands up folks thank you all thank you.
01:16And I want to thank Dylan Bebek for being here Dylan's right there Dylan's a world
01:23champion bike racer on the track representing Canada at the Olympics still at this 21 now.
01:31Are you 20 or 21? He just turned 21 he still has a long career ahead of him really excited
01:36that he's here but with that in mind we'll talk about what kind of ride this is or isn't
01:41so we're not going to be setting any KOMs Dylan's not going to be leading us out for any sprints
01:46this is a slow roll friendly family we're all going to have fun on a lot of it we are using
01:52shared trails so do be cognizant that there are other trail users out there people walking they
01:58might not be thinking or looking where they are that's cool because they shouldn't have to worry
02:02about 90 people barreling down on them so please be respectful of it that way and it's also why
02:07we're asking not to play music while you're doing this not that we don't want you to have fun but
02:11we want to make sure that everyone's aware where they are so should be very fun happy chat with
02:17people but just make sure awareness number one you know ultimately we're ambassadors for everyone
02:22who rides a bike if everyone could just do a quick ABC check so that's air brakes and chain
02:30so you want to make sure that your brakes are working you know you can check your things or
02:34if you have coaster brakes you can do that you want to make sure you've got air on your tires
02:38again it should feel pretty hard you don't want it too soft and then lastly you want to make sure
02:44that your chain's on and it's not too rusty obviously at this point if you notice something
02:50that looks a ride find someone in an orange vest one of our cycling educators or ambassadors
02:55they can help do a quick tune up and get you going that way and then lastly in terms of the
03:00ride itself so the front of the ride will be George and the sweep of the ride will be Rick
03:07so you want to stay between those two gentlemen basically for the most part we're not crossing
03:14many roads many lights not many stop signs so the front of the road will sort of decide how
03:19we're navigating those but by default unless other what you're otherwise told please respect
03:25all uh lights and traffic signals and that things again you know we're out here being
03:30ambassadors for fun but for the most part it should be a pretty smooth straight uh straightforward
03:36trip i think that's it uh last thing because i'll get to see this later but i want to say it again
03:42i want to give a quick shout out to uh the cycle toronto staff team uh and i especially want to
03:47give a shout out to sonam um so for folks that don't know this is sonam's last day with cycle
03:53toronto uh i can assure you i can i can assure you uh she'll be greatly missed uh please feel
04:01free to bug her uh talk to her uh but yeah she's the one who really helped put this event together
04:07so thank you sonam and thank you everyone
04:16yeah right here line up i'm gonna be down there at the front um i ask that the slower riders stay
04:24right behind me okay the faster riders towards the end because it will just help keep the group
04:29together all right um you guys all know your signals you see me do this it means i'm gonna
04:59do
05:29so
06:00so
06:21ah
06:29so
06:59so
07:29so
07:59so
08:17so
08:29so
08:49um yeah i'm really happy that you all joined us today um and i'm really sad that this is
08:55probably the last time you're gonna see me for a while but also thank you all for joining
09:03i want a special shout out to taylor and caitlin for putting this together with me this has been
09:11like the best team to work with and shout out to allison and michael for fundraising as well
09:17and to the top fundraising team um the top two fundraising teams like city of toronto
09:24and bananas for biking thank you um yeah so without further ado i'm gonna introduce the
09:32executive director of cycle toronto michael he's uh not injured that's great
09:40thanks sonam um i don't know if folks saw me when i was here last year at the neck brace and the back
09:46brace i actually um debated um you know for those of us who are old enough to remember the original
09:52chocolate factory um and the first time gene baller makes his appearance you know he's got
09:57the cane and does the somersault and he's fine i kind of debated doing that with the like neck
10:02and thing and then eventually break it off and show it was fine but i tend to get hurt often
10:07so i thought it might be interesting um yeah thanks everyone for coming out again like thanks
10:13for everybody for fundraising everyone for um you know reminding pushing i don't know maybe
10:19snagging to friends and families to contribute it really does matter it really does make a
10:23difference um it not only helps you know make events like this um helps uh us to have the
10:29you know incredible staff team that we have here with caitlin taylor sonam and allison and you know
10:34i'll include myself in that um and you know again i think we're seeing we're kind of in a weird time
10:40in toronto i think a lot of us maybe took for granted that um you know bikeways were just
10:45going to be kind of status quo now city would go on keep building things and now we're seeing
10:50uh provincial government deciding that uh bike lanes are part of the problem and you know in
10:56parts of the city where we have this really transformational project in northwest it's
11:00kind of constantly under threat and you know this is something that's providing a lot of mobility
11:05uh to a lot of people in the western side of the city i think it's going to be
11:09you know a huge key project um and yeah it really you know if i'm honest it really sucks but then i
11:16see everyone here now and know what we're doing and see the way the petition is performing um if
11:21you haven't signed it already cycleto.ca slash i love bike lanes and again regardless of how you
11:27personally might feel about the premier or this government i think this is just a big overreach
11:32and cities and communities know best themselves where bikeways should go maybe you know becky
11:38might know a little bit better than any of us uh but other than that um yeah sign the petition
11:43let's tell the provincial government to stay in its lane and thanks everyone for coming out and
11:47i'm going to pass to my colleague taylor thanks let's get a round of applause for michael
11:57okay i've got a very special announcement um we're going to be playing a little bit of a game
12:10called trivia
12:14i know all of us here like to ride a bike so we're very fit
12:18our legs are fit but today we're going to determine who has the fittest brain
12:23okay if you didn't get a number i want you to if you want to play uh come grab a number from
12:31our friends over here and uh the number is going to tell you what team you're on
12:36and we figured uh as a way to uh incentivize people mingling a little bit that maybe they
12:43could um be on a team with some people they've never met before so i want you guys to grab a
12:47number and uh find your team and once you get into your team i want you to elect a team captain
12:56real quick and come get a clipboard for me with the uh trivia sheet on see you in one minute
13:06you have one minute
13:08thank you so much um seriously uh two things just want to say really quickly um last year
13:14we announced the uh can i get everyone's attention just for one second and i promise i will
13:19not talk i was gonna say shut up that's inappropriate um last year at this time uh we
13:25announced uh an award uh the alex amaro circling kindness award uh in memory of a young woman
13:31uh who was killed uh needlessly killed riding her bike in toronto and at rajam this year uh the first
13:38winner uh unanimous winner jeffrey big carriage was awarded uh this uh jeffrey can't be here right
13:44now because he's actually planning for another ghost pipe ride tomorrow this has happened seen
13:49this is getting now uh we have joey schwartz here who'll be leading a ride tomorrow at maccohen park
13:55at noon at maccohen park if folks have the capacity to go out this is the seventh ride this year
14:01this has to stop this has to stop we all know this it's not acceptable and we're gonna make
14:07it stop one of these is going to be the last ghost bike ride and i can't wait for it um but
14:13with that just pivoting to something a little bit more positive um the next uh alex amaro award will
14:20be uh nominations will open in the spring and then at the next big toronto bike ride next year that's
14:26when we'll uh award it to the winners so um you know stay tuned in the spring we'll be promoting
14:31it uh please reach out to folks it'd be great to get somebody who's not already part of this
14:36community lots of people ride bikes for doing great things work in our ecosystem be great to
14:40know about them and celebrate them um so just want to say that and sarah's looking at me like
14:45she wants the microphone to serve um yeah that's it uh just lastly uh let's give everyone ourselves
14:51a big round of applause we've raised 55 000 dollars in orange that's incredible um thank you
15:00all i will say you know it's still open for another five days and we're still just under
15:0510 short of our goal um i know we did a lot of work but if everyone raised just another 150
15:10dollars we would hit that 10 000 and that would be pretty cool so you know feel free to keep um
15:15sharing it um keep doing what y'all are doing i'm really proud to be part of this community
15:21uh cycle toronto is nothing we're literally nothing without all of you and thousands of
15:25more people who just want a more vibrant and healthier second city so thanks everyone