The Good Bike Project

I saw one of these painted bikes locked to a post the other day and my friend told me that they're all over the city and that each one represents something different. Seemed something of a nice idea, but I did wonder why they were not putting the bikes to more practical use...



Anyway, this morning I read a little more about it in the Torontoist (read it here). See their map of the bikes above. They said:

The bikes are now colour-coded according to six categories, chosen primarily to reflect the visual arts community and urban issues:

orange is for locations supporting emerging artists,
hot pink designates venues of historical artistic significance,
blue represents strong community builders,
yellow marks community hubs and hot spots (like Honest Ed's in the Annex),
green flags the victories and failures of Jane Jacobs's urban theories, and
rose bikes commemorate a personal memory from a Torontonian 

The project was started by Caroline Macfarlane and Vanessa Nicholas, making abandoned bikes on the street into public art. Their first subject was ticketed and removed. And so, with a little lobbying from a couple city councillors, they convinced the City of Toronto to donate confiscated bikes to their public art project. You can read more about it and see some pictures on their blog (see it here).

Seems it's going well and they're certainly nicer, and more thoughtful, than Moose in the City.



Bike logo and pink bike photo from the Good Bike Project blog.