Welcome to Bike Town AB

Bike Town AB is moving along faster than a cyclist in a time trial!

Why Brand? Why Bikes?

The Town recently undertook a branding initiative looking for that one thing that would set Devon apart from neighbouring communities.  Bike Town AB was inspired by the free spirited, adventurous nature of our residents and visitors.  The vision is to create a community bold enough to stand up and declare to the world what we believe in. Bike Town AB says that Devon is a community that believes:

·         In supporting and engaging people, especially their youth

·         That by providing people with the facilities and tools they need they will do great things.

·         In creating a community that is bike and pedestrian friendly

·         Ensuring that everyone, regardless of their age and skill level can come to Devon for an exceptional ride complete with           beautiful scenery

·         In being responsible for their environment for future generations

·         That  grassroots programs and events should be accessible to everyone

·         In a world where everyone has the opportunity to excel

In the history of this community, there has never been an initiative that has engaged youth quite like this one has.  Their passion for mountain biking and desire to get a park built is a clear indication that this initiative is on target. 

Last spring a delegation of youth from the local Middle School’s Mountain Bike Club presented Town Council with a proposal to build a mountain bike skills park in Devon. The group requested that a one (1) acre park be built. Council endorsed the project and challenged the Bike Club to help raise funds to get the park built.

The students took this one step further and nominated the project for the Kraft Celebration Tour to win $25,000 and host a live broadcast of TSN SportCentre.   From over 400 applications across the country, their nomination was short listed by the Kraft and TSN which put the Bike Park project in a head to head voting competition with another Alberta community. Votes were cast for this youth driven project from across the Country, the United States and Australia.   The students were ecstatic when their submission for a mountain bike skills park won by a vote of 145,574 to 95,958.

The kids' dream is fast becoming a reality with phase one of the park just about complete and the preparations are made to build phase two in the spring. Until now it was unheard of to move a skills park project from concept to reality in just 6 months!

Who is leading the way? Our Spokespeople are.

A Brand Leadership Team was formed and its number continue to increase.  Members of this team are all ages, most live in the Devon region and some even travel from Edmonton to support this initiative. The team is composed of students, competitive cyclists, teachers, cycling coaches, club leaders and enthusiasts, an ABA representative, members of the cycling industry, event organizers, a realtor,a marketing and branding professional and several in high level management positions not to mention there is also a Council representative, a representative from the Devon and District Chamber of Commerce and a local tourist attraction. Everyone on this team is one of our best spokespeople!

Our Leadership Team references their branding initiative to a book that put it very simply.  If you have not read the Purple Cow by Seth Godin, then you must.  Mr. Godin states, " If you are driving down the road and you see a cow, you think...wow, look at the cow.  And if you keep driving you see more cows that all look about the same.  Soon enough you stop noticing the cows.  But, what if you were driving down the road and you saw a Purple Cow?  Now that would catch your attention and make you notice." 

Click here to watch a video of Seth Godin explaining this concept

Other Fun Stuff

Mayor Fisher with cycling great Axel Merckx at United Cycle.

Walter Gretzky sporting a Bike Town AB T-shirt.

Have a peak at our Presentation!

This PowerPoint presentation was developed to highlight the branding initiative of Bike Town AB. This will provide you with a brief outline as to what the Brand Development Team learned about Branding from Roger Brooks at Destination BrandCamp in October of 2010. Since identifying a Brand for Devon, the Team has met with community members, groups, business, developers and regional groups who can support our claim as Bike Town AB. The Team will continue to meet with these individuals to explain the initiative and to gather feedback and ideas on how to proceed. The presentation also reviews research that was undertaken by the Team once returning from Brand Camp that outlines opportunity and reinforces Devon's claim to Bike Town AB.

Click here to view

November 5 - Stop by our booth at the United Cycle 2012 Expo Cycling Event of the Year for the latest update from Bike Town AB and the new Mountain Bike Skills Park

Economic Impact Assessment - Road National Cycling Championships 2010

October 19, 2011 - Riverview Middle School Mountain Bike Club honoured with Servus Credit Union Award for Youth Entrepreneurial Awardat the Devon and District Chamber of Commerce's Business excellence Awards.

Roger Brooks came to Devon on September 6 to present "Why Brand Devon?".  If you were unable to attend his presentation please visit his website for resources and information pertaining to this workshop.

The Town of Devon hosted a public consultation on September 6th for the Mountain Bike Skills Park as well as trail development and Bike Town AB.  Jay Hoots was in Town and hosted the session for the Mounatin Bike Skills Park with several of Devon's youth.  Jay has presented a phased concept for the park to be built in Devon starting in October 2011.  The leadership team is working to put together a sponsorship package to help get the park built this year.  Volunteer support and materials and equipment donations are being canvassed to build the park as a community.

The Brand Leadership Team continues to meet monthly to work on Bike Town AB initiatives.  The committee has broke out into three separate sub-committees with the hopes of narrowing the team members focus to their speciality areas.  The sub committees are:

1) Mountain Bike Skills Park and Trail Development

2) Business attraction and Development

3) Marketing and making it obvious

The Team welcomes new members to each of the sub committees.  If you would like to get involved please contact Town of Devon Administration for further information.

Bike Town AB has its first video! Created by Spokesperson extraordinaire Doug Smitheman.

Alberta Provincial Cyclocross Championships

October 22, United Cycle hosts the 3rd annual Lion's Den Cyclocross and for the second year in a row will also be the Alberta Provincial Championships!

Alberta Youth and Paralympic Road and Track Cycling Championships

September 4-5 Devon was honoured to work with Pedalhead Road Works to host this amazing race. We had so much fun we hope to host this event again!  Check out the YouTube video HERE

Morgan Grand Prix CYCLEFEST

One June 24-26 Bike Town AB hosted a community cycling celebration featuring one of the largest road cycling stage races in the province, a children's challenge and cyclefest.  Children were encouraged to climb the walls, to ride really fast, ride their bikes across obstacles and even to shoot things at the biathlon demo.  Mud, Sweat and Gears even hosted a BMX jump competition in theskateboard park. Everyone had fun and the races were awesome too.  We are looking forward to making the event even bigger and better next year.

Other Events;

- Devon hosted the annual MS Tour Training Ride
- Bike Town AB entered teams into the MS Ride and into the Ride to Conquer Cancer
- Regional clubs were invited to participate in the Devon Days Parade and to join in a guided Tour de Bike Town road or mountain bike ride afterwards
 - Devon hosted the Edmonton Bike and Touring Club ride from Devon to Stony Plain
 - Devon hosted River Valley Cycle's Dirt Girls club ride

Television 

Kraft Celebration Tour - The students from the mountain bike club at Riverview Middle School have nominated the creation of a Devon Bike Park for the Kraft Celebration Tour. Of 400 nominations the Bike Park Project was selected to move into the top 20.  In this phase of the competition communities are matched up for a 24 hour head-to-head voting battle. The community with the most votes will receive a $25,000 award from Kraft Canada to be put towards their project and will host a LIVE broadcast of TSN's SportsCentre! Our supporters voted and we WON with 145, 574 votes.  Bike Town AB is now hosting Kraft and TSN SportCenter on August 21, 2011.

Bike Town Alberta and a few of our other attractions were recently featured on Breakfast Televion as part of  Briget's Alberta Adventure.  Briget also visited the Devonian Botanic Garden during her Alberta Adventure.

Tune into 630 Ched July 13th to hear our most recent interview.

Bike Town AB has given radio interviews on CJSR's Bike Bits and TEAM 1260 Krush Sports Performance Show twice!  We had an interview with Jungle Jim Hunter on FAN 960 in Calgary.

Click here to hear the first TEAM 1260 interview - Team 1260 KRUSH Sports Performance Show. 

Print

Bike Town AB and the Riverivew Mountain Bike Club have been featured in several newspaper articles.

Edmonton Journal

Devon Dispatch - trademark

Devon Dispatch - becoming Bike Town AB

Devon Dispatch - about economics

Devon Dispatch - Riverview Students Presentation

Devon Dispatch - Skills Park Approved

Cycling Expo

People are excited and opportunities are abundant. United Cycle invited us to partake in their "Spring into Action" Expo on March 10-12, 2011. We were extremely well received and supported by all those who stopped by to see us. We were able to collect a number of fantastic ideas on how we can build Bike Town for you and even had the chance to meet Cycling greats Alex Merckx and Alex Steida!

Mountain Bike Skills Park Project

Inspired by the brand vision the Riverview Middle School Mountain Bike Club decided to make a presentation to Town Council to propose the building of a mountain bike skills park in town.  The students, with help from their Social Studies teacher and bike coach, Mr. Haugjord gave an excellent presentation to Town Council on May 9, 2011.  According to Mayor Fisher, the presentation was among the very best she has ever seen and not only that it was the best attended Council meeting ever!  There was standing room only the day the youth gave their presentation with approximately 60 people in attendance, some that even drove from Edmonton to show their support.  Council unanimously supported the presentation and directed Administration to look into the proposed project further.  

The Town has contracted Mountain Bike Skills Park Designer, Jay Hoots, to create a  park suitable for all ages and levels of riding. This will be the first park of its kind in the Edmonton region and will be designed to be a draw for cyclists from all over. Being the first major project Bike Town AB has taken on, it will certainly help to cement the brand promise and will undoubtedly be a park that will live up to expectations.

A Public Open House was held and the design work is in progress. Once the design work was completed construction on phase 1 began this fall! The goal was to have phase 1 open to ride before the snow falls and to get the site prepared for phase 2 in the spring.

Thank you to Rabbit Hill for generously donating a Giant Bike Skills feature for phase 1 of the new park!  What could be more perfect than a really big bike to ride on for Bike Town AB? This will be the first feature to be installed in the park. A volunteer team has been been working really hard to get everything installed so it is ready to go this fall. As of November 4, it is over 90% complete!

We would also like to thank the following supporters for making this project a reality so far:

Cancom Development  for supplying us with approximately 2000 Cubic Yards of clay

Camex Equipment for providing us with trucking which enabled us to move 2000 cubic yards of clay to the park site

Hayduk Lumber for providing us with hardware and lumber needed to complete phase 1

Devon Home Hardware for providing us with much needed hardware and tools to get phase 1 built

Kraft Celebration Tour

In the meantime, the youth decided to nominate the project for the Kraft Celebration Tour.  Of 400 nominations across Canada, the Devon Bike Park was selected as one of the top 20 and moved into the finals!  That meant the Town of Devon went into a head-to-head match up against Edson for a live on-line vote-a-thon. Bike Town AB WON! Thank you to all who voted, we received 145,574 votes from confirmed supporters from across Canada, the Maritimes, Nunavut, North Carolina, California, and Australia. This means that on Sunday, July 21 Devon will be hosting the Kraft Celebration Tour and a live broadcast of TSN's SportsCentre in Voyageur Park! Kraft Canada will present the $25,000 award to the students and to the Town at 3:30pm on August 21.