The Collective

Throughout the trip we have been meeting to discuss affordable housing as a group. The discussion started out as a book club, centered around the book Evicted, by Mathew Desmond. We all highly recommend the book, which is set in Milwaukee and follows the lives of several tenants. The book offers a powerful view on affordable housing and why it is so important and meaningful. Alyssa and another rider, Julia, were put in charge of the group. In the first few meetings, only the three of us, Julia, and one other rider (Higgs) were participating.

To try to get more people to come, our group “rebranded.” We named ourself The Collective and told the group that we would be collecting and sharing knowledge. We started assigning different people to do research on specific topics related to affordable housing like race, gender, mental health, or public housing. These discussions went a little better, more people came since they didn’t have to read the book or prepare. However, there were still meetings when only the five of us showed up.

Our last meeting took place last night, and we used the time to reflect on the trip. We reflected on all the things that we had learned. In particular we noted all the ways organizations tried to combat affordable housing, with emergency shelters, rental assistance and affordable apartments, avenues into first houses (like habitat), and with needed repair work. These many different approaches are all valuable and necessary given the extent of the affordable housing crisis.

Finally, we talked about solutions to the affordable housing crisis. We think that there is no single solution, and many things can be done. Most importantly, we think it is up to us (and everyone who believes in affordable housing) to find a way to make a difference. We reached out to the program director for suggestions on how to stay involved and he recommended trying to volunteer at a local AH organization. He also said that the importance of getting involved and understanding the local politics issues around housing was invaluable. Finally, in Evicted, Desmond suggests that we should view housing as a human right, and suggests that the voucher program could be an important part of the solution.

Overall, The Collective was a success. We were a little disappointed when people didn’t come, but those that did seemed to really appreciate the experience. Groups in the past have been dissatisfied with the AH curriculum, so our effort was an attempt to address that. We will be passing along notes about how the group worked and what went well so that future groups can build on it. We are excited that new bike and build groups will be able to follow our lead and integrate affordable housing more into the fabric of the trip.

Glacier Ride

We biked through Glacier on the Going to the Sun road. It is 50 miles long, and bikers have to be off it by 11:00 am. In order to finish the ride we tried to leave by 6:00, which meant getting up at 3:30. We packed our bags, ate breakfast, and had route meeting in the dark and left before the sun came up.

We spent the morning climbing up to Logan’s Pass. Our favorite part of the ride was about half way through the climb when we stopped at an overlook. The sun was just coming up, and there was a rainbow between the mountains.

As we climbed closer to the top it got colder and colder, but the hard work was keeping us fairly warm. We biked into some dense fog and up into some low clouds. We got a rest at the top, but when we started again we were soaked and freezing.

 The ride down was a very different experience. Visibility was down to less than an eight of a mile, and we were moving much faster. We braked the whole way down, trying to pulse them to preserve our brake pads. We tried to stay moving at around 20-25 miles per hour, slow enough to see the turns just in time but fast enough that traffic wasn’t trying to pass.

When we had made it about half way down we were too cold to keep going safely. Several other groups had already stopped, and we could smell our break pads melting. With the rain and the fog, all we could see was the road. We pulled off at the loop and joined the other bikers shuttling out of the park on the free busses. We were cold, tired, and wet, but also exhilarated from the ride and stunned at the beauty of the park.