The Cotmandene Bike Hub has been created, with the aim of diverting young people in the Cotmandene and surrounding areas of Cray valley, Orpington, away from cycle-related Anti Social Behaviour (ASB). The bike hub has been built with funding provided by Travis PerkinsManaged Services, through the legacy fund for Clarion Futures and is going to be used as both a hub for storage and a workshop for the bikes.
50 bikes have been donated from the MET Police, ready to be picked up and distributed to victims of crime, young people and families who would need to travel to school or work, refugee groups for work travel, and can be used in the community if people need to borrow a bike for specific reasons. There will also be weekly workshop sessions to teach young people bicycle maintenance, tools for these workshops have been donated by Palace for Life.
Travis Perkins Managed Services delivered the container to St Barnabas Church in St Pauls Cray, Orpington, who’ve kindly donated their land to house the hub. A number of families in this area are disadvantaged and the church has an active youth club with over 80 regular attendees. A graffiti artist came and helped the local youngsters paint the container, to help bring it to life.
This project is aimed at raising young people’s aspirations and equipping them with skills to learn about local social action and cycle maintenance. It will also have health and wellbeing outcomes and will seek to improve community cohesion. The link to the local development of a cycle track will also benefit the community and the project will aim to increase community ownership of this brand new local facility.
The project will also support young people to build skills by learning how to maintain and recycle bikes. There will be a social action element included, by encouraging young people to invest in their local community by gifting bikes back to those in most need.
If you’d like to find out more about how Travis Perkins Managed Services could help your community please contact us today.