Contact
General information: info@velopalooza.ca
Calendar crew: calendar@velopalooza.ca
Sponsor requests: sponsor@velopalooza.ca
Volunteer information: volunteer@velopalooza.ca
About
Velopalooza promotes bike rides and events in and around Vancouver, BC. In 2023 we’re throwing a festival in June, and provide a year-round community calendar of bike rides and events.
Rides are put on by people like you. Anyone can add a ride or a bike-related event to the Velopalooza calendar. And most rides and events are free!
History
After a few Vancouver cyclists travelled to Portland for Pedalpalooza, they were inspired to bring that kind of community-driven bike fun to Vancouver. They reached out to more cyclists on the Velolove email list, and a festival was born.
The first Velopalooza in 2010 lasted ten days. There was something for everyone with rides for food, rides with costumes, and rides for kids.
In 2011, Velopalooza grew to 18 days with many favourite rides returning, including the Bike Rave and historical rides from John Atkin and Gordon Price. New ride leaders created lots of great rides, including a chicken coop tour, the Mount Pleasant Family Bike Ride, and the Mystery Ride.
Bike Fun in Vancouver
The Velolove community, from which Velopalooza was born, came together in 2001 when Vancouver hosted Bikesummer – a month long festival that for each year moved from city to city promoting and celebrating bicycle culture. The following year, the Velolove web domain was acquired to continue the spirit of Vancouver’s Bikesummer as an on-line community.
Since then, many movements have grown out of that community. Many in that community promoted and participated in Critical Mass – a celebration of traveling by bicycle that occurs the last Friday of every month. From its humble beginnings, Vancouver Critical Mass was known to attract thousands of enthusiastic cyclists for its larger summer rides.
Vancouver’s fixie, cruiser, and “chopper bike” afficianados found a home at Velolove before creating on-line communities in their own right. Other events and movements, such as the Wholesome Undie Ride (in response to Vancouver’s Molson Indy race), the World Naked Bike Ride, Vancouver’s Car Free Festival, and Momentum Magazine (now a North America-wide publication), were all founded by people using Vancouver’s Velolove email lists.
Vancouver’s Bikesummer, whose motto was the summer of velolove, itself originated out of groups such as The Bicycle People – a loose association of bicycle activists who in 1991 formed Better Environmentally Sound Transportation (BEST) – a Vancouver based not-for-profit organization to promote the use of environmentally responsible alternatives to the private automobile, and who formed Vancouver’s HUB Cycling (then the Vancouver Area Cycling Coalition or VACC). BEST and HUB Cycling are two of the region’s most active and clear voices for sustainable transportation choices.
Today, the Vancouver tradition of fun activism creating communities and culture continues with Velopalooza.