What image does the word “cyclist” bring to mind? Many people may think of white men with tight, logoed jerseys, heads down, cycling uphill and somehow not breaking a sweat. Local cyclist advocate Ky Plaskon encourages folks to expand their view of who a “cyclist” actually is.
One of the ways he hopes to accomplish this is through a bike film festival here in Reno on September 22nd at the Savage Mystic Gallery on South Virginia Street. “They’re pretty emotionally intense movies,” Plaskon says, hoping viewers will get a broader perspective on bicycling and its many communities.
“There's a misconception about who's riding a bicycle, which is…people in lycra,” says Plaskon. (Lycra is that spandex-like material that those logoed jerseys are typically made with). “But the vast majority of people riding bicycles are just trying to get to work, using it as regular transit.”
These people, Plaskon says also need to be served in terms of our transportation infrastructure.
“(Those people) typically aren't bicycle advocates. If you speak to them…they're like, ‘yes, I feel in danger when I ride my bicycle, just like everybody else does’. We need to expand that understanding, and also explain to our leaders– it's not just people in lycra, and it's not just white people.”
A useful term for this is “infrastructure injustice,” according to Plaskon, who will serve as president of the Truckee Meadows Bicycle Alliance until December. Throughout his term, which began in 2021 according to his LinkedIn, Plaskon provided a passionate voice for the cycling community, from city council comments to publishing opeds to organizing countless public events. “I'm a really aggressive bicycle advocate,” he says. “I’m very pushy.”
And push he has, although sometimes working against infrastructure injustice takes a lot of pushing. Plaskon recalls the Regional Transportation Commission proposing gorgeous, but very expensive bike lanes– infrastructure that would be separated by pass, lit by bike lights, and lined with trees. “They were talking about spending 10 million dollars on less than a mile of bike path on Center Street,” he says.
Part of Plaskon’s work with the Alliance involved finding better, cheaper options that had already been implemented in other cities. In Washington D.C., equally safe bicycling alternatives have cost only $750,000 per mile. Bringing this research back to Reno resulted in the Regional Transportation Commission’s consideration of cheaper options. “(They) asked the public: ‘Hey, what do you think? Should we spend a ton of money, and not do a lot, and take a lot of time? Or should we not spend very much money, and do it really fast, and have lots of safe infrastructure…and still be really effective?’”
Unfortunately the RTC has not been quick about releasing those survey results, and the process has slowed. Plaskon thinks “maybe they were hoping that everybody would say, ‘no, we want to spend more money and take more time.’ And my thought is that people were probably like, ‘no…get it done fast and do it cheap.’”
Plaskon has also focused on DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) during his term with the alliance. And thankfully his goals have aligned with the RTC’s on some occasions. Plaskon remembers that last year, “the RTC sponsored 50 riders to come to downtown Reno and do a ride.” He says that they “only promoted in the Hispanic community, in Spanish.” And they had about thirty people show up to bike.
“One (of the riders) was a little girl who had no brakes on her bike,” Plaskon recalls. “We had our supporters out there, helping, but they had to surround her because she would just go off in some crazy direction towards a car…That's an example of the local government supporting diversity and inclusion in the bicycling community, which is fantastic.”
Representation is a primary goal of the upcoming film festival as well. Featured films include stories of folks with various disabilities, “things that make it really, you would think– challenging to ride a bicycle.” Plaskon reflects. “And they’re totally doing it.”
There will also be a special guest speaking on September 22nd– documentary producer Cyrille Vincent. Vincent is currently raising funds to produce a film about the life of Major Taylor, one of the most famous, and maybe most forgotten, cyclists in history. Taylor was a Black athlete who started racing during the aftermath of the Civil War, when white folks “made it clear that his elite position was not to be used as a platform to…demand that equality be extended to other members of his race,” according to the documentary’s website. Vincent will be discussing why he’s intent on completing the film.
Plaskon came up with the idea for the film fest several months ago, after seeing Vincent’s website and his funding goals for the documentary. Plaskon didn’t know who Taylor was until his daughters participated in a bike camp that held the athlete’s name in the title.
Sometimes, organizations like the Truckee Meadows Bicycle Alliance, and folks like Ky Plakson fall to the background, as they do a lot of ‘behind the scenes’ work for the Reno community. The same can be said for the story of Major Taylor, who was an unstoppable force throughout his cycling career, and the second Black athlete to win a world championship. At this film festival, Renoites can support both Reno’s current efforts towards inclusivity and justice for cyclists, as well as the important history of someone who paved the way for Black athletes.
Our Town Reno reporting by Ray Grosser
More information about the film festival:
Cyrille Vincent’s upcoming documentary, Whirlwind: https://www.worcesterwhirlwind.com/about
The Truckee Meadows Bicycle Alliance: https://bikewashoe.org/