It's been a year since our last 5MTF group ride. We did not anticipate that our traditional International Women's Day season opener would be our last group ride for twelve months and counting. My initial reaction to the theme for IWD 2021 was somewhat jaundiced - we have had to face a huge challenge that we had no choice over. But then I looked up the IWD website and became a whole lot more optimistic.
IWD 2021 campaign theme: #ChooseToChallenge
A challenged world is an alert world. Individually, we're all responsible for our own thoughts and actions - all day, every day.
We can all choose to challenge and call out gender bias and inequality. We can all choose to seek out and celebrate women's achievements. Collectively, we can all help create an inclusive world.
From challenge comes change, so let's all choose to challenge.
IWD: IWD 2021 campaign theme: #ChooseToChallenge (internationalwomensday.com)
Let's celebrate our achievements and help bring about change for the better.
One way of doing just that is to comment on the Hertfordshire County Council Active Travel proposals. No detail is given, so when commenting you can make lots of positive suggestions. You have until 15 March to respond.
Active travel fund | Hertfordshire County Council
No group rides yet. We knew how to organise and lead rides before Covid-19, it will take us a wee while to develop procedures and protocols to enable us to set up a safe and legal ride programme for 2021. This is frustrating I know, and oh! how we miss our sociable rides. We are sad that we can't yet meet in person the many women who have enquired about cycling with us over the last year. We are all individuals and have different experiences through the pandemic - some groups may be riding together sooner or later than others as each group needs to carry out its own particular assessment, depending on various factors.
One thing I need to consider for routes is that my favoured traffic-free routes are now much busier with people walking. On my solo rides I have been going out on the lanes rather than the old railways and bridleways. Even the lanes are popular for walking these days!
