Tomorrow evening, a bicycle parade will be leaving from Real Art Ways at 7:30pm. Anyone with a bicycle can join in.
The route is not announced. Their website says it will be an hour-long parade around the Parkville neighborhood, but I have heard from some involved that this will swing by Billings Forge. At last night’s Creative Cocktail Party, an announcer said this parade would be ending in West Hartford Center. Totally confusing, since neither Billings Forge nor West Hartford Center are in Parkville, but okay, not surprising since the U.S. has a poor reputation when it comes to geography, and add to this the absolute reliance upon GPS for anyone to even leave their houses in the morning. What has been consistent is that it will be leaving from Real Art Ways, so if you want to watch or participate, get there on time.
A DJ will be pulled on a trailer behind a cargo bike. There was a little preview of this at Real Art Ways last evening.
Expect to see decorated bicycles and bicyclists.
Dave Mourad
Correction – the route has been announced. Cheque out the Real Ride hARTford Facebook Page for information. The event begins at 7:30, but we’ll spend some time to ART up more bikes and give peeps a chance to practice. Emark approx 8:30. We’ll head to downtown and stop at Artspace (Art for AIDS) and then to Frog Hollow and stop at Billings Forge for a Solstice Fest. Then we’ll continue through Parkville to West Hartford Center and Blue Back and then head back to RAW via the West End. Nice pic of the Deejay kreww there… -DM EOM…out
Kerri Provost
It might be helpful to put such information on a website that is not “members only.” Some people are very guarded with their personal information and choose not to use Facebook. Anyway, the information on the Real Art Ways website should probably be updated to reflect more accurately where the parade is going so that people who want to view it know where to go.
Kerri Provost
I was just informed that Real Art Ways will be updating the information about this event on their website.
Dave Mourad
Ah…just re-read your post. It might be unlikley non- Facebook peeps would be able to see the content there. We’ll also coordinate with RAW to see if we can get up to date information up there including a route map. As much as this is an event sponsored by RAW, the effort also has a grassroots element so we’ll strive to work on overall communications towards greater public interest.
Kerri Provost
Thanks for this info.
This is not directed at you — I think that many organizations and people are becoming overly reliant on the social networking sites and forget that lots of people do not/will not use them. If an event is not private (i.e. something at a museum, dance hall, whatever) then it really should be posted on the sponsoring organization/venue’s website. I’m oldfashioned like that.
Dave Mourad
The folks @ RAW just called for clarification on the final route and stop piece. That information will be posted imminently on their website. I agree that all event communications should have an official source i.e. a sponsoring organization’s website.
What was interesting with this experience is that many ideas regarding how to proceed and what features to implement were developed on a social networking site with an eye towards the overall betterment and of the event. What we were able to do is learn about other synergistic events that were transpiring at the same time and envelop those activities into our route with some minor detours and brief stops. The ubiquity of the service meant that we were able to inform many people of the implementation of stops and ideas, but alas formal communications will be pursued even from the grassroots.
One more major note of importance is that all of the people involved in planning the Real Ride would like to sincerely thank Real Art Ways for their support and foster of grassroots ideas like this one that incubate into special and interesting events.
Speaking of old-fashioned communications I would really love to see bulletin board kiosks in Hartford in a similar fashioned to those positioned in New Haven.
Richard
Thanks Kerri. I can’t stand those facebook pages. So much of it sounds as if we are all still in 9th grade with “will you be my friend crap.” “Guess what I got 100 friends.”
I agree 100% that if an event is not private it should be posted for all to see. Many times it seems like it’s only a small circle of friends that are doing a event and making others feel like we are not invited.
Shouldn’t even be harping here as I don’t give one hoot for bike riding. I love my own two feet.
Dave Mourad
As far as I can tell it’s not a members only Facebook page…
“Event Information
This is a public event. Anyone can see the event, RSVP, or invite others to this event.”
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=120845307949641&ref=ts
If there’s still trouble seeing the info and posts I’ll contact Alan, the creator of the page to see if we can fix that. -DM EOM…out
Richard
As long as one goes on facebook.