Brighton & Hove planning notes
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If you'd like to involved in organising or promoting this ride, please join the WNBR Brighton & Hove Yahoo group.
Contents
Ride date
Now confirmed as Sunday 14 June 2009.
Decisive factors
We discussed riding on the Saturday, and on the previous weekend. The following factors were taken into consideration:
- The London-Brighton Classic Car Run will be on Sunday 7 June 2009. This takes up a lot of city road space and finishes on Madeira Drive.
- The London Naked Bike Ride is on Saturday 13 June 2009.
- The London to Brighton Bike Ride will be on Sunday 21 June 2009.
- There may be other clashing events (eg: see Brighton Run, although their calendar isn't definitive).
- In the Northern Hemisphere, WNBRs have traditionally been on the second Saturday in June. However, this isn't mandatory.
- Having international rides on the same day has led to stronger publicity and better solidarity between ride locations.
- The Brighton 2008 ride saw a massive increase in numbers (400, up from 180 in 2007). Many feel this was due to the ride being on a different day to London, giving riders a better chance to take part in both.
- International rides have often taken place on Saturdays, although this isn't mandatory.
- It'd be an interesting experiment to try doing it on a Sunday.
- Riding on a Sunday might mean a better chance of getting into Monday newspapers, which are often eager for stories.
- The volume and "mood" of traffic may differ between Saturday and Sunday
Jobs
Volunteers wanted
To really make this ride happen, people are wanted to get involved in organising and promoting the ride. The following jobs need to be taken on by eager volunteers:
Before the ride
- Pre-ride event organisers (1 volunteer)
- Police liaison (URGENTLY NEED MAIN VOLUNTEER!)
- Press release writing and media liaison (3 volunteers – press releases written and distributed by Press Dispensary)
- Flyer and poster printing and distribution (1 volunteer)
- Legal support
- Outreach (see interest groups, below)
- Publicity
- Web editors and designers (for this wiki and the main site)
- Fund-raisers (funds needed for advertising, flyer/poster printing, legal costs etc)
- Communications officer – email-outs, mailing list etc
On the day
- Body painters
- Cycling marshals, front and back (with walky-talkies?) (1 coordination volunteer)
- Stationary marshals at key junctions
- Stewards (non-riding), to set up and clear start point etc
- Bike/skate mechanics
- Sound system bikes and riders
- Trailer bikes to carry clothes?
- Refreshments provider at end of ride (nudist beach?) (ice box with beer, fruit etc?)
Interest group representatives
Individuals and representatives from the following interest groups are also sought:
- Activists
- Body arts practitioners
- Cyclists
- Environmentalists (1 volunteer)
- Lesbian, bisexual, gay and transgender community (1 volunteer)
- Naked protesters
- Naturists/nudists
- Performance artists
- Skaters
- Students
- Sustainable transport advocates
See also: the Related Interest Groups section of the WNBR Brighton Yahoo! group.
Event clearance
- The event and route will be cleared with Sussex Police Planning & Events Department
- It may also need to be checked with the Brighton & Hove Council Events Office
- We will have free public liability insurance through Bike Week
- We will have to confirm that our ride can start from the Level. Eg: it may clash with BASS (Brighton Alliance of Sound Systems), who have staging festivals at the Level around the same time as the Brighton Naked Bike Ride in previous years, or the funfair that is sometimes hosted there
- Katherine Travis may be able to help with council clearance and promotion
Police ”censorship”
Hopefully the issue of full nudity has been resolved now, following the 2007 ride. (Exposure of "rude bits" was banned at the 2006 ride by Chief Superintendent Jeremy Paine. He has since been replaced by Graham Cox, then Alan Ladley, Kevin Moore, and now Paul Pearce.)
Pre-ride events
Planning meetings
Planning meetings to discuss this ride will take place at least once a month in the months leading up to the ride. The January meeting will take place in the last week of the month. Date, time and location to be confirmed as soon as possible. Please come along if you'd like to get involved!
Film screenings
Films
WNBR Brighton & Hove films (5-10 minutes each) – see Brighton & Hove video
Other WNBR, naked protest and Critical Mass documentaries considered:
- Road Rage (BBC?)
- World Naked Bike Ride, London, 11 June 2005, by Keith Roberson (5 mins)
- World Naked Bike Ride – The Documentary by High Altitude Films (30-min film about the London 2005 ride, narrated by Jon Snow)
- Naked (Canadian naked protest documentary, 30 mins)
- Other naked protest documentary (5-min London naked protest documentary available)
- Still We Ride (Critical Mass documentary, 37 mins)
- We Are Traffic (Critical Mass documentary, 50 mins)
- Car Nation, episode 2: 'Of Course I Can Have Five Cars' (?) (Denham Productions)
- CycleHero – a 1/2 minute advert for cycling by the CTC (features brief glimpse of Nick Sayers, WNBR Brighton 2006 organiser!)
Screening venues considered
- Ali-Cats Bar, Brighton
- Cineworld/UGC, Brighton Marina
- Cowley Club, Brighton – possible link-up with their weekly film night (Tuesdays, 8.30pm)
- Duke of York's Cinema, Brighton
- Brighton Fringe Basement
- Gardner Arts Centre, Falmer
- Odeon, Brighton
- Sanctuary Café, Hove
- University of Brighton
- University of Sussex, Falmer – possible link-up with University of Sussex Environmental Society (meets weekly during term: Wednesdays, 5pm, Training Room 1, Falmer House)
Volunteers
Please get in touch if you can help organise these screenings: Do you have connections with he venues? Can you lend or borrow a video projector? Would you like to give a short talk to introduce each film?
Pre-ride cycle confidence training session/s
Ian at Bike For Life has offered to organise pre-ride training sessions to boost people's confidence with riding bikes, prior to the ride.
Potential affiliations, sponsorship and endorsements
- Baobab Café
Next to the Level. Have expressed an interest in supplying refreshments at the ride start. - The Big Lemon
Expressed an interest in chartering a double-decker bus for the ride (to transport riders from and to London? Clothing-optional?) - Brighton & Hove Council Walking & Cycling Officer
Abbie Hone has offered to set up a 'Dr Bike' session at the start of the ride. - Brighton Body Casting
Body casting studio on the seafront near Black Rock naturist beach - Castor & Pollux
Manager rode last year and mentioned they could sponsor us! - Down To Earth, Portland Road, Hove
- Five Miles To Fabulous
CTC's promotional weekend of women's cycling, coincides with the Brighton ride date! - Green Women (Brighton & Hove)
Liz Wakefield has agreed to promote the ride to the email list of this group - Natural Balance Foods
Interested in promoting their Nakd cereal bars at the ride (thanks to Liz Wakefield from the Green Party!) - Sustrans
Might be persuaded to set up a stall at the start of the ride - Yellowave beachsports
Volleyball club near the end of the ride
Taking part
Participants should be reminded to bring bags to carry clothes, but just in case, organisers should bring some!
Bike and skate hire companies need to be contacted about the possibility of hiring out bikes and skates. (Eg: Planet Cycles)
Pre-ride body and bike decoration
Volunteers wanted: Body Painters, Crafty People
Route
Start
Volunteers wanted: People to put up rider enclosure ribbon barriers, information desk etc
Route
The route starts at the Level and ends at the Black Rock naturist beach. It passes the following landmarks (in route order): Royal Pavilion, Old Steine, Brighton Pier, Brighton & Hove seafront, West Pier, Peace Statue, King Alfred Leisure Centre, George Street, Hove Town Hall, Floral Clock, Western Road, Churchill Square, Clock Tower, the (south) Lanes, North Laine, Jubilee Library, Kemptown. The route is 6.9 miles long (Critical Mass Brighton usually goes between 5 and 7 miles).
It would be a good idea to make stops along the route in case people want to take off more clothes. The best potential places for this are: the Peace Statue, the bottom of Fourth Avenue, Hove Town Hall and the Floral Clock (+ maybe New Road/Victoria Gardens?).
An alternative route may also need to be planned, in case of bad weather.
Eric's suggestions:
- "Riding anticlockwise reduces the number of times you cross the traffic."
- "Make sure that no other event/s are going to clash with your route on the same day."
Volunteers wanted: Ride Marshals/Stewards, Bike Mechanics
Post-ride event
As the ride finishes at the Kemptown Nudist Beach, a post-ride sea swim and beach picnic would be ideal for riders to wind down after the event.
Local companies could be found to endorse the ride by providing food.
Volunteers wanted: Post-Ride Event Organisers, people to find local companies willing to donate food and drink
Publicity
Flyers, posters, stickers etc
Printing
No posters or flyers currently available for the Brighton Naked Bike Ride!
Please print and distribute posters and flyers around Brighton & Hove, Sussex, London and the UK. Download PDF files from the Files section of the WNBR Brighton & Hove Yahoo! group site.
WNBR London have had postcards, business cards and fridge magnets printed for free, or very cheaply, at VistaPrint.
The Brighton Resource Centre has computers available for cheap printing and photocopying.
Can any printers offer to do a cheap/free print run? (Preferably using recycled paper and/or vegetable-based inks.)
Distribution
Suggested places to put flyers and posters:
- On bikes (trap under brake levers/cables etc)
- Bike racks at the train station, library, colleges and universities
- Infinity Foods noticeboard
- Brighton Fringe office window noticeboard
- Café noticeboards (eg: Dumb Waiter, Sanctuary Café)
- Shops (Brighton shops often accept A3 posters)
We could approach a company such as SWAT to help us?
Web links
A list of links related to this ride is maintained at the WNBR Brighton & Hove Yahoo! group.
If you know of any related sites that can link to us, please ask the site administrators to do this. The link text should be "Brighton Naked Bike Ride, UK", and the link URL should be www.worldnakedbikeride.org/brighton. To link to the global site, please use the link text "World Naked Bike Ride", and the URL www.worldnakedbikeride.org. Blurb:
- Every year, in cities around the world, people will be riding naked to celebrate cycling and the human body. The ride demonstrates the vulnerability of cyclists on the road and is a protest against oil dependency. Be there, as bare as you dare!
Please also add related links to the Related Interest Groups section of the WNBR Brighton & Hove Yahoo! group.
Media coverage
See also:
WNBR Brighton & Hove press releases, produced by Press Dispensary
These links are from 2006 and need updating!
The following media have been contacted about covering the event:
- Attitude magazine
- BBC Southern Counties radio – interview on 23 May 2006 at 12 noon
- Blue Guide To Brighton – post-ride editorial planned for July 2006 edition
- Don't Panic – article in the Transport issue [1]
- EasyJet magazine
- G Scene magazine – promised to publish article in June 2006 edition
- The Latest magazine
- London Cyclist magazine
- Radio Reverb
- Rocks magazine – promised to publish article in June and July 2006 editions
Film crew/s
If any film crews are interested in filming the ride, there may be a seat available on a rickshaw or tandem...
First aid
The following people should be approached about the possibility of providing professional bike-mounted first aid:
- Michael Brian Nugent (see his Facebook or Flickr profiles to get in touch)
- South East Coast Ambulance Service have a Cycle Response Unit (see press release for further information). Contact cyclist Paul Hadlow [?] 07702 463767 to discuss – also operates privately.
Unusual bikes
We're always keen for tandems, unicycles, rickshaws, penny-farthings etc to take part. Potential contacts:
- Duncan Blinkhorn's tandem
- Guy Marley (?) and his penny farthing
- Silver bespoke glass shop, 38 St James Street, Kemp Town (contact Paul Lewis 07980 599043)
- JUGs, 44 Blatchington Road, Hove (Contact: Russ?)
- Villa & Hut have a broken rickshaw in their Portslade warehouse that might be fixable. However, they're not very environmentally friendly as they import mahogany!
- The Bike's The Business (Brighton)
- Bugbugs (London)
- Nick Sayers' mini penny farthing
- 'Lick' ice cream and frozen yoghurt emporium have a special ice cream bicycle!
- Mobile Media – Adbikes and Pedicabs
- mADbike Marketing ad bikes – based in Kent? T: 0844 884 5348 / M: 07825 828252
- Filomena of Café Yum, based in Peacehaven, has an ice cream bicycle from which she sells Downsview Farmhouse ice cream
