BENTONVILLE — The warehouse at AMP Sign and Banner off the Wishing Springs Trail is packed this week. Reams of paper have been pushed aside to make way for boxes and boxes of bikes. Trek bikes, to be exact. Five hundred and forty of them.
The Bentonville School District will be the first in the state and maybe the first in the nation to provide 30 high-quality bicycles in every one of its schools, elementary to high school, according to Alan Ley with Bike Bentonville.
At A Glance
Who Contributed
The following groups contributed a total of more than $130,00 for the Bentonville School District to purchase 540 mountain bikes:
• Walton Family Foundation
• Coca-Cola
• Walmart Visitors Center
• Bentonville Public Schools Foundation
• Bell donated 540 bike helmets
• Trek offered a 10 percent discount on the purchase
• Phat Tire and AMP Sign and Banner offered in-kind services
Source: Staff Report
A community of support has coalesced to make the project happen, from raising more than $100,000 to undertaking the monumental task of assembling the hundreds of bikes. The warehouse has been full every day for a week with volunteers breaking open boxes, attaching cranks to frames and checking brake cables.
Bentonville’s Phat Tire Bike Shop loaned mechanics to the project for as much as eight hours a day. Other volunteers are willing parents, community-oriented cyclists and physical education teachers excited about the new possibilities.
More than half of the bikes had been assembled by Thursday. The remaining bikes will be finished within the next two weeks, said Mary Ley, communications director for the School District. When complete, the district will have at least 30 Trek MT 200 mountain bikes in each school.
The district started a bicycle mechanic program at the high school this year. Students in the program will be responsible for maintenance and upkeep on the bikes.
Martin Johnson, a Phat Tire mechanic, inspected a bike hanging on an assembly station at the warehouse Thursday. He said it takes him 30 to 45 minutes to put a bike together if he’s working alone. With all the help, however, he can finish one in 20 minutes, he said.
Bill Hesse of Bella Vista worked alongside Johnson. A longtime cyclist, he has worked with the School District to train students in bike safety at Cooper Elementary School.
“My first bicycle was such a sense of freedom for me,” Hesse said. “My mom was one of the few in the neighborhood that didn’t drive. If I wanted to go somewhere, I had to ride my bike. You just don’t see kids doing that anymore.”
Hesse said he believes the school bikes and training will help raise the students’ comfort and safety level on a bike and riding in traffic.
The seven-speed bicycles are available in 20, 24 and 26 inches for varying age groups.
Most of the schools in the district are near the city’s many mountain bike trails. Lincoln Junior High School, Thomas Jefferson Elementary School and Sugar Creek Elementary School are all near a new flowy trail that connects with Park Springs Park. Washington Junior High School is next to the Memorial Park trails, and the high school backs up to the Razorback Regional Greenway. Mary Ley said teachers from districts not on a trail have worked out a way to get students safely to trails to ride.
The School District created a manual regarding the bike program outlining goals and providing a wealth of bike-related information such as first aid and bike repair. The district says the program will teach students trail rules, safety and respect for their surroundings. The program is also designed to improve student fitness levels while providing them with a viable means of transportation and a sense of “play.”
A minimum of three instructional hours on the trail system will be incorporated into the physical education curriculum for third- to eighth-grade students each quarter.
The manual provides teachers with interesting facts about trails to relay to students. A fact sheet of the city’s trails comes with community history compiled by Bentonville historian Monte Harris and information on the types of plants and animals students might spot along them.
While riding the Bella Vista Lake Trail, students might take away this history lesson:
“The Bella Vista Lake was formed when Sugar Creek was dammed in 1915 for the early development of the vacation haven. The old log house, now situated directly west across the highway, was moved when the creek was dammed. The log building is the only pre-Civil War structure in Bella Vista.”
Travis Riggs, a School Board member, said the donation is a “pretty major deal” for the district.
“It’s a great display of the need for our kids to be more active and to promote safe travel to schools,” Riggs said.