 and Christina from local motion is gonna come up here in a second but I want to thank everyone for coming out this is the 14th time we've done this the mayor who's been in office for 12 years has done this I'd say six plus more than half it's always fun to have him here and I think he thinks it's a fun event and give the microphone over to him hello everybody welcome thank you for joining us I do love this event John how could you suggest otherwise it's awesome and it's particularly great because of the incredible creativity you all bring to it awesome well done led by director Cindy White and on these bike efforts very much led by John Adams College for everything you do to make this a great event and make Burlington a bike friendly community and I want to say thank you to local motion who have been a real partner in so many ways of course in the improvement of bike infrastructure over decades and I understand are particularly involved in this year's event making it all both a biking and walking true active transportation event so if Christina is around and she here she is thank you Christina and good luck with your new role and your new role as an executive director we love local motion so thankful for everything you've done to make Burlington a better community and make this a better event thanks for hello everybody I hope you got your official 2023 collectors that collectors edition spoke card if you don't have got a couple left my name is Christina I'm so glad to see you here this is one of my favorite holidays in Burlington I'm thrilled to be part of the local motion team where we are making it safe accessible and fun for everybody so be part of us if you're not already we'd love to hear your input about how we can continue to make it better here in Burlington but all communities throughout Vermont and yeah special props to John who has checked every box you see the check in the box anyway it's been a lot of fun he makes meetings fun and let's go ride and have a great safe time Cindy's gonna do rules of the road Cindy all right I get the fun part the rules all right so I'm Cindy Wade I'm your director for Park Check here in Burlington Parks Recreation and Waterfront and the general rules besides how fun is when you get to intersections you are a group so if the light turns don't stop and it looks like a cars coming up don't stop we operate as one massive blob going through the city so again don't stop with the lights don't stop as like to let a car through you are one big blob also very important just like in the days of PE do not pass the front and stay ahead of the back there'll be a police car at the front you do need to stay behind the police car don't try to see if you can get out of front and there'll be a swag wagon in the back you got to stay ahead of them so pick up the pace a little bit we will have one place when we get to the rotary where we're going to stop there to make sure everybody's compressed together so we can safely go around that rotary together so again when we get to that point we'll make sure everybody's all tight and then we'll go around the rotary to head back up the street the other side as we say is to try to take our own lane we take the full street please try to stay on the one side of the street there we do not close traffic so you want to make sure you stay on the right side of the street but you do not need to stay just in a bike lane when there's bike lanes on the street we take the full lane alright one just last thing I do want to thank the full planning team and a recreation this is a recreation and planning team event our planning folks have been working really hard they've got a big exciting day coming up a week from yesterday Saturday from I believe it's two starts at two two o'clock John's looking at me sure our big event at Oak wedge Park it's an opening of our Vermont's first University accessible playground and we hope you get a chance to come down and celebrate with us at the park and that's been a big project of this guy's here John's for over a decade they've been working on that project I just didn't remember that there was an event having to do with it that's all all right so walkers will head to the north and they will follow Richard Chewbacca who has a dog in tow bikers will head to the south on St. Paul Street gather behind Officer Moran and we will head down towards the rotary one reminder our photographer I don't know how do you get them to not have their photographs either taken or shared online if you just want to make sure that you talk to either Homer or myself about that and one thing I want to point out when we arrive at the rotary there will be a drone in the air that drone is courtesy of the UVM spatial analysis laboratory Sal who's providing that photography and so look good as you're cycling around the rotary as Cindy reminded us stay together as a group we will gather in a mass before we enter the rotary to kind of minimize the interference with traffic and then the Sal drone will join us again up at Roosevelt as we parade into the park all right have fun everyone thanks for being here and bikers head down to St. Paul and Maine