Bike Hub making two-wheel transportation accessible

'The Bike Hub' will teach Calgarians how to tune up their bikes and get a new ride for a reasonable price.

The Bike Hub is set to provide support for youth, families and riders of all abilities to trade, purchase or fix their bikes with support from experienced mechanics.

The new venture is a partnership between Youth en Route and Bathtub Bikes.

“We have 100 bikes that we take to schools to teach our programs,” said Laura Shutiak, Youth en Route executive director and founder.

“So we’re fixing them up all the time, and we needed a space to be able to do that. We thought, well, what else does the Calgary market need? And it really needed a do-it-yourself bike shop.”

Here, people can donate used bikes, purchase a refurbished bicycle or fix their existing bike.

But it also hosts a kids’ free bike trade-up program where a small bike can be traded for a larger one to keep a child riding on a bike that fits them.

“Our plan is never for a bike to come here and (take up space),” said Shutiak.

“We want to get bikes in and out the door as soon as we can; we want people riding. You know, summer’s coming; it’s bike season. Let’s get these bikes rehomed so that they can be used and loved.”

Adam Rhind, Bathtub Bikes owner, says there is a large variety of used parts for sale—many priced at $10.

But he also has some new parts for members to purchase.

“Bathtub Bikes is a bike shop focused on access to affordable labour,” he said.

“Over the last five years, we’ve been pushing access to affordable bikes as well as access to affordable tune-ups and parts for folks around the city just getting into bikes, just starting their bike journey.”

Rhind is excited about the partnership with Youth en Route.

“We split everything 50-50,” he said.

“Youth en Route has a couple of grants that they work with, but Bathtub Bikes is a for-profit business, but again, we are focused more on that community side of things, so we wanted more of it as a social enterprise.”

Shutiak says Calgarians can help the venture through a program it calls “Peddling It Forward.”

Bathtub Bikes will take credit that can be posted for a youth fixing a bike that needs a new tube or a chain so they can access new free parts that will help them continue to ride to school.

“We really believe in this whole idea of give where you live,” she said.

“People think we need to send bikes to Africa because there are kids that can’t ride bikes in Africa, but there are kids that can’t ride bikes here in Calgary. We have the data; we understand that 11 per cent of kids in our high school survey said that if they had a bike, they would ride it.”

The Bike Hub is located at 320A 65 Ave. S.E.

You can learn more about its operation at https://yycbikehub.ca/.