River of wheels

If you happened to be out and about in your car last Saturday night, you may have marveled at the sight of a seemingly endless stream of bicyclists, rolling through the city. Or, you might have been pissed off, as motorists were made to wait for the over 2,600 riders to pass.

What was happening? The 10th annual N.I.T.E Ride, whose acronym stands for Navigate Indy This Evening. Participants gathered at the Major Taylor Velodrome over the course of the evening, culminating in a show of fireworks. Then, at 11 p.m., we were unleashed into the city for a 20-mile, two-hour ride. A pit stop was provided halfway through at the American Legion Mall. The Fig Newtons were an especially nice touch.

Don’t think for a moment that the participants of this event were solely of the serious variety you see moving in packs in their brightly colored spandex — you know, the riders whose shoes attach via clips directly to their bikes. No, this event was comprised of all sorts of people — on all sorts of bikes — all of whom ended up back at the Velodrome at 1 or later in the a.m. to eat food, listen to the egalitarian sounds of The Reacharounds and take a few more laps around the oval.

Kudos to the brilliant and resourceful folks at CIBA (Central Indiana Bicycling Association) who put this event together — a spectacle of recreation that also rivaled any performance art Indy has to offer. This N.I.T.E. ride was a utopian vision made manifest: a world where bicycles rule, where cars have to cede the right-of-way, where cops and people are friendly and laughing together, and where chatting up strangers is a snap.

There’s always room for improvement, however. For example: Next year, let’s take the route through Crown Hill Cemetery. Some of the more macho or experienced riders complained of the lack of hills: Crown Hill’s got a hill. But moreover, can you image the surreal sight? Thousands of bicycles moving through the darkness of Crown Hill, their headlights and red blinking back lights illuminating the headstones, the river of wheels flowing through the land of the dead.