Taylor is gearing up for an event that will train the city’s youngest bicycle riders.
Taylor Parks and Recreation is hosting the Youth Safety Bike Rodeo Saturday, March 23 at Naomi Pasemann Elementary School. The event will begin at 3 p.m. and is expected to end at 4:30 p.m.
Ian Davis, Taylor Park and Recreation programs coordinator, said the Bike Rodeo is designed to promote bicycle safety and education for children.
“We’ll have a series of educational stations on bike maintenance, bike safety and helmet fitting,” Davis said. “Then we’ll have an obstacle course where the kids will learn stop signs, yield signs, hand signals and practice the rules of the roads that they just learned.”
Davis said the bike event is designed for students from kindergarten through middle school.
The obstacle course involves six different stations that each instructs participants about a safety aspect.
After completing the obstacle course, Davis said the younger students will complete a loop around the driveway at Pasemann and the older riders will do a loop around the hike and bike trail.
“We defer to the parents to decide whether or not they’re comfortable with their kids doing the bigger hike and bike loop,” Davis said. “But we will have bike leaders for the hike and bike trail, so they will be accompanied by an adult throughout the route.”
In addition to the obstacle course and loop rides, organizers will give out free pizza and sno-cones to attendees. There will also be a bounce house and an arts and crafts table for kids that might be too young to participate.
He said the first 60 kids to arrive will receive giveaway bicycle safety helmets.
Davis said the event is branded as Bike Rodeo in order to make it more appealing to the kids to learn safety, which he said is not always the most exciting thing for young minds.
“Bicycling is a healthy option for kids to get exercise,” Davis said. “We want kids to be outdoors and ride their bikes from home to school, from home to parks. Really utilize the resources that Taylor has and we really do have a great city layout for biking.”
The Bike Rodeo will allow scooters in addition to bikes, but not skateboards. Davis said scooters follow the same road rules as bikes, but skateboards follow different pedestrian rules.
Parents are asked to park in the southwest parking lot outside the cafeteria, and enter and exit the school parking lot from Mallard Lane and Smith Ave. Then, families can walk around the west side of the school to check in.
The Bike Rodeo is free to the public.
