Carmel earns bicycle friendliness award

This week, the League of American Bicyclists recognized the City of Carmel with a Bronze Level Bicycle Friendly Business (BFB) award, earning it a place alongside 1,366 businesses across the country contributing to the movement to build a more Bicycle Friendly America.

The City of Carmel joined 153 new and renewing BFBs including local businesses, other government agencies, and Fortune 500 companies in all 50 states and Washington, D.C. These businesses are showing their commitment to transform American workplaces to be more welcoming to customers and employees who bike.

Brainard

“When places make it easier for people to choose to bike, they are building safer, stronger and better connected communities,” said Executive Director Bill Nesper of the League of American Bicyclists. “The League of American Bicyclists is thrilled when organizations like the City of Carmel join us in this movement to build a more Bicycle Friendly America. When more people are biking to work or shop, life is better for everyone.”

“The City of Carmel encourages bicycling as an easy option for transportation and provides amenities such as bicycle lockers and a bike share station to help get our employees and citizens out on their bicycles,” Mayor Jim Brainard. “As a city, we are ranked a Silver Level Bicycle Friendly Community, with more than 210 miles of paths and trails, so it only makes sense that we would want to make it easier for our employees to ride bicycles more often.”

The City of Carmel would like to challenge other employers in the community to become a Bicycle Friendly Business. There currently have three other BFBs locally, including Methodist Sports Medicine, Pedego Carmel and SEP. It has been shown that bicycling increases morale, better connects people to their community, creates a fun and healthy work culture and decreases carbon footprints, which results in cleaner air. Help your employees and the community by encouraging bicycling to and from work and around the city.

“As a Bicycle Friendly Business, our employees appreciate having our office located right on the Monon Trail. Additionally, the ability to bike to work or take one of our loaner bicycles to lunch makes SEP more attractive to top tech talent,” said Kelly Wilson, Director of Marketing and PR at SEP.

The next application deadline – Feb. 20 – is approaching quickly, so contact Kevin Whited, Transportation Development Coordinator with the City of Carmel, at kwhited@carmel.in.gov to get your application started.

To learn more about the BFB program or to apply, visit the League online at bikeleague.org/business.

About the Bicycle Friendly America Program

To learn more about building a Bicycle Friendly America, including the Bicycle Friendly Community (BFC), Bicycle Friendly State (BFS), Bicycle Friendly Business (BFB), and Bicycle Friendly University (BFU) programs, visit bikeleague.org/BFA.