Critical Mass and the SF Bicycle Coalition are often seen as one entity by the public or by the media. That’s a huge categorical error, and one it is often necessary to try to correct. On the one hand you have a leaderless street action, and on the other you have a nonprofit organization that works with city government. Those are two very different breeds! But happily there *is* a lot of overlap, and over the years lots of synergy and mutual support.

The SFBC chose to stop listing Critical Mass on their calendar some time ago, and just recently did not list the 20th anniversary and associated activities that have been put together.

Some people in the bike community were upset about this, so this blog published an open letter yesterday from Quintin Mecke to the SFBC, taking them to task for not including these events in their calendar. Quintin’s views are his own, but we were happy to publish them.

That’s why we started this blog — to give a home to many diverse views about Critical Mass, bicycle activism and bike culture in the Bay Area. We’ll publish almost anything! If you have an opinion about Critical Mass or bike culture and activism, send it to us. If it’s not outright hateful/racist/inflammatory/threatening, we are happy to publish it.

Though surprising, for those of us who moderate this blog and for those of us who volunteered to put together many of the activities this week, not being on the SFBC calendar is OK with us! We still appreciate all that they do at the SFBC. (Sitting through hours upon hours of meetings with city bureaucrats for one thing — not many of us can possibly face this! Thank god the SFBC has the patience!)

Looking forward to the Critical Mass ride on Friday!

— Hugh D’Andrade, LisaRuth Elliot, Chris Carlsson, Adriana Camarena