[CMI-CM] Yesterday's Ride, here and Madison

[Paul Riismandel]

Yesterday's ride was a fun success with about 30 riders and a lot of new 
faces.  With any luck some of the new folks got themselves signed up to the 
mailing list.

The weather was beautiful and perfect for a bike ride, while traffic was 
relatively light for a Friday, perhaps because people cleared out early for 
the holiday weekend.  Angry drivers were pretty scarce, aside from one 
incident.  Going South on Neil Street, just South of Stadium Dr.,  an 
impatient motorist cut into the middle of the Mass, coming close to hitting 
at least one bicyclist, but then finding himself boxed in by the Mass.  On 
that same stretch some jokers who appeared to be at the Verizon wireless 
store announced to the Mass over a loudspeaker for us to pull over.  Some 
of us were briefly confused, looking for a police car, but quickly realized 
there was none.

Towards the end of the ride, going North on Lincoln Ave., Critical-Mass had 
the opportunity to meet sorority rush season in progress.   A sea of 
identically white-t-shirted young ladies looked on in apparent confusion as 
the Critical Mass rode by.

While the Champaign-Urbana Critical Mass was relatively calm and free of 
harassment, our sister ride in Madison, WI was not quite so quiet.  This 
report was posted to the Urbana-Champaign IMC site 
(http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=1878&group=webcast):
"Madison's Critical Mass bicycle ride ended this evening with the arrest of 
one rider, "Martin," who was cited & released. He was charged with "failure 
to obey an officer's signal" and "impeding traffic." The roughly fifty 
cyclists looking on argued that they had not been impeding traffic because 
they were traffic."

You can see pictures at this URL: 
http://madison.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=939&group=webcast

This arrest in Madison follows similar harassment that they experienced in 
their July ride, which you can read about here: 
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=1641

THE NEXT RIDE IS FRIDAY SEPT. 28 @ 5:15 -- HOPE TO SEE EVERYONE THERE!