Its been a while since Play on Pedals shared its successes so we thought we’d give an update on how far we’ve come over the last 18 months.

Since April 2014 Play on Pedals has:

• Engaged over 2,000 children, with just over 1,260 children having received the 8 week training programme within their nurseries and 820 children engaged through shorter drop-in sessions.
• Trained 176 Instructors from 128 different nurseries and organisations, each receiving bikes and resources to carry out an 8 week training programme with nursery children.
• 151 of the existing 176 trained Instructors are women – many of whom haven’t been on a bike in their adult lives!
• Trained 9 Instructor Trainers to roll out Instructor training across the city and nationally.
• Recruited 15 Hero Organisations across Glasgow to support the coordination and local sustainability of the project. Hero Organisations include local bike shops, community groups, housing associations and nurseries.
• Rotated over 450 balance and pedal bikes around the city.
• Coordinated two city-wide bike amnesties with support from Glasgow Life and Hero Organisations, to date fixing over 100 unwanted bikes for distribution back for use by pre-schoolers across the city.
• Created a bespoke maintenance training course, delivered by the Glasgow Bike Station, for volunteers, parents and staff to fix and maintain bikes; to date training 30 individuals.
• Attended 40 community events across the city holding taster sessions and providing information and advice for parents.

Here’s a map to give an indication of the current spread of venues trained and delivering Play on Pedals across Glasgow (correct for Oct 2015)

We have also:

• Received support from NHS Community Health Partnerships Team across the city; in the North East this has been in the form of additional funding to provide expert mentoring from one Hero Organisation to a selected cluster of nurseries.
• Secured the entry of a question relating to riding a pedal bike into the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire, with thanks to Glasgow Centre for Population Health.
• Worked with Glasgow Life Cycling Development Team on a number of projects, including a bike amnesty, community fun days and provision of training facilities.
• Featured in local and national press, including The Scotsman, The Herald, The Evening Times, The Daily Record, STV Glasgow, The Community Channel, BBC Radio Scotland, United Christian Broadcast Radio, Third Force News, CTC’s ‘Cycle’ and Cycling Scotland’s ‘Spin’.

Huge thank you goes out to players of People’s Postcode Lottery for supporting Play on Pedals to deliver these successes 🙂