Our View: Cleanup signals Spokane’s potential as cycling hub

It’s probably premature, and corny, to claim that Spokane’s on a roll, but several promising developments suggest cycling could become the next star in the community’s constellation of recreational sports.

Let’s say at the outset that last weekend’s ambitious cleanup of Beacon Hill was a laudable civic enterprise in its own right. The area near Hillyard had become a dumping ground for abandoned cars and a venue for misbehavior including vandalism and meth cooking.

On Saturday, led by the Spokane Mountaineers and Fat Tire Trail Riders Club, and supported by neighborhood landowners and businesses, volunteers removed more than a dozen hulks from their brush-covered rusting place.

But the organizers’ dreams for the area, with its 20-some miles of bike trails, go further than a cosmetic coup.

Like the kayak enthusiasts who envision a whitewater park below the Spokane Falls in Peaceful Valley, the cyclists who rolled up their sleeves on Beacon Hill on Saturday foresee an attraction that will draw riders to the area.

That will take sustained effort, but the start is promising and trends are encouraging.

Last May, a surprising 900 residents signed up for bike to work week. In September, some 1,200 cyclists joined in the first SpokeFest, a recreational event featuring a mass ride from downtown to Riverside State Park and back.

Meanwhile, the city has launched a concerted bike-lane initiative on Spokane streets and is seeking federal grants to encourage cycling as alternative transportation.

Twenty years ago, Spokane seemed poised to become a center for cycling as a spectator sport, as it may be doing now for figure skating.

Olympic trials and national championship events were held here in 1988 and 1990, raising hopes of an ongoing relationship with the sport’s elite, including permanent clinics and coaching enterprises.

The cyclists and others behind the Beacon Hill project have hopes of a well-tended location with clear signage that would be a magnet for serious cyclists from afar as well as residents of the immediate neighborhood.

Backers, who predict it could take a couple of years before those hopes take form, are wisely dedicated to maintaining a good relationship with the public and private landowners whose property they use.

Significantly, the Beacon Hill cleanup also caught the attention of the Spokane Convention and Visitors Bureau, which already recognizes cycling as an activity with marketing value. The bureau stands ready to help.

Utlimately, though, Beacon Hill’s transformation depends mostly on those who have the dream.