Iowa City Bike Library packs up shop

IOWA CITY - Volunteers seized on a tolerably cool Thursday afternoon to clear about 130 old bikes from the old red brick John Wilson Sporting Goods building the Iowa City Bike Library has called home since 2005.

They are being hauled to Working Bikes, an organization in Chicago with local and international distribution networks. Bike Library volunteers started this weekend packing up the shop where they have collected donated used bikes, fixed them and loaned them back out.

The Bike Library is moving across town to new digs ending months, if not years, of uncertainty.

'We knew our days were numbered here,” said Mark Pooley, a volunteer and member of the organization's steering committee. 'We moved into this location knowing the space was temporary.”

The library started informally in 2004 operating out of the Iowa City Farmers Market before the city provided the building being used for storage. A group called Environmental Advocates embraced the project and helped it take off.

The idea was to reduce waste, and remove the barrier to bicycling in a community full of mobility challenged college students.

In recent years, the city has zeroed in on plans to redevelop this prime downtown location, signaling the end was near. Rather than wait to be kicked out, the Bike Library volunteers began looking for a place to move.

'We are going to miss the location,” said Nathan Shepherd, who's been a volunteer since the early days. 'It's the perfect retail location in town. It made the library what it is today, but the new space will bring new opportunities.”

The library makes its bikes available once a week on Saturdays, overlapping times with the adjacent and busy farmers market. The space is also used for bike repair demonstrations, and workbench rental for do-it-yourselfers.

Volunteers repair or loan out about 200 bikes a year, and about 50 percent go to University of Iowa students as well as faculty or staff, said Del Holland, another volunteer and chairman of Environmental Advocates.

'All of this stuff would have ended up in the landfill,” Holland said.

The bikes are rented for $75 to $150 depending how nice of a bike it is. Users can just keep it, or return it within six months and collect their deposit.

'The thing that prevents people from getting into bikes, they think the need to buy a high end bike and all this gear,” Shepherd said. 'This makes it a really gentle entry.”

The city has let the Bike Library use the one-story building with a deep basement for next to nothing, and has extended the move out deadline several times as the organization tried to solidify its future.

They have needed the extra time, too, because multiple planned destinations fell through in the past year.

Pooley said recently the Bike Library checked if UI had any underused space. The university, which was recently rewarded for stepping up its support for cycling with a bike-friendly campus designation, found a location on the south side of town.

The new location is at 840 Capitol St., in an industrial area about a mile from downtown. The Bike Library will be closed to set up until Jan. 24, the weekend after spring classes begin.

The new location will keep the same schedule, and is considering adding a permanent schedule of bike repair classes, Pooley said. The library won't be taking donations until that time, he said.