FERN BICYCLE PROJECT REPORT EVALUATION REPORT C39

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1 FERN BICYCLE PROJECT REPORT EVALUATION REPORT C39 This publication has been produced through a grant project funded by the Waste Authority. The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position or policy of the Waste Authority or Government of Western Australia, which may not be held responsible for the accuracy of information provided, nor is it liable for any and all outcomes from the use of this information. About FERN Fremantle Environmental Resource Network or FERN (est 2006) as it is affectionately known, is a magical community hub dedicated to sharing wise ways of living sustainably and inspiring holistic care for earth and its people. FERN is a not for profit inclusive community driven center that engages, responds to and inspires a sense of community, place and action toward healthy sustainable environmentally friendly, living practices. FERN currently relies solely on the generosity of grass roots community and is run by volunteers comprised of a wide range of local residents from local community, many seasoned travellers who regularly return with new best environmental practices and information, and a range of cultural and environmental students from overseas, who promote earth friendly sustainable lifestyles. FERN formed to ensure the wishes of more than 1000 residents supporting continued use of Montreal/High Street Community Garden for biodynamic/permaculture use and public access are met. We have achieved a lot of progress toward reinvigorating the site and continually surprise ourselves with the leaps and bounds we make toward achieving our goals with the support and input of our bright supporters and volunteers. We support a variety of Native flora and wetland fauna, such as frogs and native perch, whilst balancing these with non indigenous species in an organic permaculture, aquaculture productive garden blend. We offer a range of enjoyable workshops, a raw food café, a center which sells organically grown seedlings and plants and offers gardening workshops to the community, we offer a space for social activities and events that promote sustainability and generate a sense of community and place. Many of our values are aligned with organisations such as The Eden Project, East Perth City Farm, Rockingham Regional Environmental Centre and CERES in Melbourne and we modeled some our vision for FERN on their example

2 Background Information on the Bicycle Recycle Project The FERN Bicycle Recycle Project is an independent project, however it exists in a support network of enterprises that are all doing something different with bicycles. The FERN Cycle recycle Project supports Bicycles for Humanity by acting as a drop off point for donated bicycles. It also supports as a source of recycled parts for use in Dismantle Projects. The FERN Bicycle Recycle project is already operational. It is a very successful project that collects repairs and recycles hundreds of bicycles from the community. It is run as an entirely volunteer social enterprise of the Fremantle Environmental Resource Network. Repaired bicycles are sold for a nominal fee that supports purchase of parts and general expenses of maintaining the FERN site. The project has grew beyond expectations and was in need of some infrastructure to support it thus a grant application was put into the Waste Authority to support the purchase of infrastructure that would enable the Bicycle Recycle Project to grow. David Bar, the bike shop manager is a qualified mechanical engineer and has worked many years as a mechanical fitter prior to being involved with the bike project. His skills and qualifications have been very beneficial in terms of ensuring that the bikes are fixed to a high level. David is passionate about offering quality recycled bikes for sale. Project Goals Prior to Grant Funding The project goals prior to the grant funding being available can be outlined below: - Collect Recycle and Reuse (CRR) Bicycle Parts donated by the Community and for sale at a discount to the Community. - Provide a space for the bike manager to fix bikes under the supervision of the Bicycle Recycle Project Manager. - Provide recycled bikes to the community for a reasonable price. - Provide a source of contact for the local community to go to for cheap bike parts, repairs and advice. - Encourage community members to recycle their used bikes and purchase recycled bikes as opposed to new bikes. - Provide support to other community bike programs such as Dismantle and Bicycles for Humanity by providing these programs with surplus bikes and bike parts. Note: Prior to the grant tools were very limited and could only be used by the bike shop manager no community Fix your Bike workshops were done. 2

3 Expansion of Project Goals as a Result Grant Funding The additional project goals as a result of the grant funding being available can be outlined below: - Provide a full bike workshop space to the community. - Provide training to community members on how to fix their bikes - Provide secure storage space for bicycles built from recycled bikes - Provide a secure storage space for Bicycle Recycle Project bike tools. - Expand the provision of services that can be offered to the community. - Offer bikes at a further discount to FERN members. Items Purchased with Grant Funding Included: Items Purchased include but is not limited to: - 2 storage containers with additional security fitted - A large range of bike repair tools, parts and stands - Misc tools required by the Bike Project - Lockable tool boxes to store the new tools purchased - Decking equipment - Electrical items - Labour and materials to build the deck - Web Page Development to better promote the Bicycle Recycle Project to the local community Benefits to the Community and the Environment in terms of Reducing Waste - Provide comprehensive bike repair workshops to the community where they can bring in their bike (regardless if it was purchased from FERN) and learn how to repair it and maintain it. - Extend the life of bikes that are owned by the community - Educate the community on the importance of recycling bikes rather than sending them to landfill. - Allow the bike shop manager to train community members to work on bikes and gain confidence with bikes not just ride them. - Allow the workshop to expand the type of services offered fixing high end racing bikes, which we could not do before. 3

4 - Allow FERN to price bikes at an even more reasonable price as we do not have to offset the cost of tools and infrastructure in the price of bikes to the community, which we had to do before. Prices vary between $0 (free) to $120 depending on the condition of the bike and allowances are also made for community members that are financially not well off. Also, the bike shop manager often will give volunteers who work at the bike shop bikes for free as long as they spend some time helping out. - Provide a drop off point for people to drop off bikes that would otherwise go to landfill. Between 3-5 bikes are dropped off every week. - Provide an option to the community to purchase recycled bikes rather than new bikes - Provide bikes and parts to Sims Metals for recycling the metal components these bikes would have otherwise gone to landfill Project Issues There were a number of project issues that occurred: - The initial project manager Louise resigned from the board of FERN and her role was left unsupported for a while; this was mitigated by the Treasurer taking on the ongoing management and acquittal for the project. - The bike shop manager s father fell seriously ill half way through the project. He was overseas for approximately two months where all work on the project halted and there were no further funds spent. - When he returned there was a lack of communication with the project manager and this resulted in no ongoing purchases or reporting on the project. - The project manager then had to take leave for unforseen circumstances and this delayed both the final evaluation report. - FERN had to get an early release of some grant funds as there was limited funding available in our operational account. - There was an extension granted for the project in terms of spending all the grant money and reporting on the project via the evaluation. In terms of avoiding these issues in the future I would have involved more people in the project so that the loss of one person did not bring the project to a halt. Unfortunately for FERN as we only have one bike shop manager and limited community members in a position to carry out administrative tasks handing over project management of this project was an issue. 4

5 Success of the Project There are a number of measures and outcomes that demonstrate the success of the project: - 2 containers were bought and additional security was built into the doors of the containers to prevent the theft of bikes from these containers. A 40ft sea container is being used for storage and a modified 20ft sea container is being used for a workshop space. (funding acknowledgement signage is being arranged for the sea containers October 2014) - Decking was built to provide workshop space to allow us to run community workshops. - Various tools and equipment to support the recycling project were successfully purchased. - Lockable tool boxes were purchased to prevent tools from being stolen. - These two containers will be linked with roof annexes and decking. - Work stations will be established to support several volunteers working together on bikes. - We have successfully run two Knowing Your Bike workshops on bicycle repair, rebuilding and maintenance open to the general community. Participants used tools that were provided by the bike shop manager, and some participants brought their bike to work on. - We can now collect and restore more bikes which reduces waste going to landfill, avoids the creation of waste and offers a recycled alternative for bicycling for the local community at a reasonable price. - Parts that cannot be used are either stored, send on to Simms Metal Management for efficient recycling or donated to other bike projects. This allows items to be disposed of in a responsible manner for the best environmental outcome if they cannot be reused. - Repaired bicycles are returned to members of the community and utilised as a form of clean green sustainable transport reducing emissions and keeping people fit an healthy recycled, repaired and serviced bicycles are returned to the community through the FERN project every week. By continuing to collect, repair and recycle bicycles from the community this project will be achieving the objectives of this grant program by reducing waste going to landfill, providing the community with recycling options for bikes they no longer want and proving the community with options to purchase cheap recycled bikes. 5

6 Project Impact The project s impact is being measured by keeping records of the numbers of bikes that return to the community and by measuring the volume of scrap metal that is recycled through Simms Metal Management. Within the period September 2013 August 2014 there has been 5 full skip bins collected from FERN. Every skip bin collected contained approx bikes. Skip bins are collected once they are full and ready to be collected. The bike shop manager David contacts the company and gets them to pick up the full bins. Similarly, we order skip bins to be delivered when we have a stockpile of bikes to offer up for recycling. The metal recycling companies such as Simms Metal Management delivers the bins and picks up full bins for us for free. The number of bicycle repair workshops being provided to the community is also being measured, we have held 2 workshops so far since the workshop area has been refurbished and comments are being collected from community members about how they found the workshops and what additional services if any they would like the bicycle project to offer in the future. First Workshop: 2 nd Duration 2 hours. August, 5 people attended. Workshop was Free of Charge. Second Workshop: 16 th August, 1 person attended. Workshop was Free of Charge. Duration - 2 hours. We plan to run free workshops every month for community members and advertise these workshops more widely to get more participants. The Bike Project Manager is very passionate about the Learn to Fix your bike workshops and is in the process of developing a workshop booklet that can be given to participants as a guide and to cement lessons learnt in the workshop There are comments being collected from bike workshop participants via a comment book located at the Bike Shop where participants are encouraged to leave feedback see below. 6

7 Comments from Community Members who attended the Workshop Thanks David for putting together a very enlightening workshop. I am looking forward to attending future ones. Thanks David for a wonderful workshop covering the basics of knowing a bike repairs and maintaining even a bike that seems like it cannot be restored You re doing an amazing job around here David it s impressive! Your passion for bikes is contagious, now I can t wait until the next workshop! Thank you for your time. Future Plans for Bike Project Increase volume of bikes collected by forming linkages with local Councils, so that bikes that are collected during verge clean ups are given to the FERN Rebike project. Similarly, form contacts with TransPerth so that bikes that are left at train stations are donated to the bike project. The bike shop manager is very passionate about getting young people trained in fixing bikes properly to a bicycle mechanic level. He would like to develop different levels of bike courses and to eventually create a school for bike mechanics. Webpages are still being developed to better promote the Bicycle Recycle Project. A Huge Thanks to Waste Authority for providing us the grant funding through the Community Grants Scheme Project which has enabled us to expand the Rebike Project. 7

8 Project Pictures Our new Slogan REBIKE Some additional signage 8

9 So Many Recycled Bikes for Sale More bikes some recently donated and not yet ready for sale. 9

10 Our new lockable 20 foot container bought with Project Grant Funds Our new lockable 40 foot container bought with Project Grant Funds One of the areas in the new workshop space where we are setting up a computer to keep records of bikes sold. Decking installed with grant funding 10

11 11 Newspaper article mentioning the CGS Project