Later this month, Velo Cruz will host the Green Fondo, a mass bike ride to benefit Santa Cruz nonprofits.

The goal of the Everyday Hero Bike Ride, sponsored by UCSC Transportation and Parking Services, was to educate cyclists about rain gear and encourage students to bike safely in all types of weather. The event was supposed to be held on the rainiest day of the year, but the best laid plans will go awry sometimes, and this year the sun won.

In a Q&A, UC Santa Cruz student Jenna Conway, organizer of Party, Bike and Jam, talked about how the bike group promotes community, alternative transportation and the local music scene.

The sixth annual Tour of California makes its second return to Santa Cruz in as many years, with one small change: the finish line shifted from downtown to the iconic Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk.

They gathered at the downtown clock tower around eight o’clock in the evening. At first, there is nothing to alarm or catch the eye of passing motorists, but the group soon swells to around 200 cyclists, and it becomes impossible to ignore.

Last week the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk signed on as the official sponsor of the third-stage finish for the Amgen Tour of California, affirming that the famous bike race will be making a return to the city in 2010. Organizers are hoping it will be an even bigger success than last year, with a larger venue for the finish line and a variety of local sponsors.

Student-run cycling organization promotes sustainable transportation.

Always taking steps to sustain a healthy environment both locally and globally, the citizens of Santa Cruz appealed to City Council last week asking them to prioritize alternative modes of transportation in the city.

For the past 18 years People Power, one of the county’s advocacy groups for human-powered transportation, has been fighting for a redesign of King Street that will improve biker safety and promote alternative modes of transportation.

Santa Cruz prides itself on being a community that is backward in a good way, and takes steps towards sustainability whenever it can. The next among these efforts needs to be the long awaited finale to a long-standing Santa Cruz debate over the construction of a bike boulevard in Santa Cruz, located on King Street.