Announcing the 2014 Bike Commuter Challenge winners!

For the last 23 years, the Active Transportation Alliance has created thousands of new bike commuters each year through the Bike Commuter Challenge. The Challenge promotes bike commuting as an activity that is easy, fun and environmentally-friendly.

Throughout the Challenge’s long history, it has been under the enthusiastic guidance of the Team Leader – our bike commuting evangelists – to create and recruit teams that have set new records for participation nearly every year.

Tuesday night Active Trans honored this year’s team leaders and winning teams as part of the 2014 Bike Commuter Challenge Awards Party at DIRTT Environmental Solutions. Jerome McDonnell, host of WBEZ’s Worldview, emceed the event and entertained attendees with his Bike Commuter Challenge dioramas and sharp wit. Attendees shared their Challenge stories over Revolution Brewing beer and Chipotle.

A big thank you to all the more than 6,000 Bike Commuter Challenge participants that made this the best Challenge yet. We rank winners in the Bike Commuter Challenge based on the percentage of employees who biked to work during the Challenge, the new website also tracked other valuable data:

• Total teams: 946 (more than twice last year’s number!)
• Total participants: 6,190 (5,277 last year)
• Total female participants: 42% (43% last year)
• Total new participants: 936 (15% of total)
• Total number of bike commutes: 151,895 (20,000 last year)
• Total miles biked: 151,960 (110,000 last year)
• Total pounds of C02 saved: 148,920
• Total calories burned: 7,446,042
• Most miles biked by a single commuter: 347 – Fred Stanton @ Allstate Insurance Northbrook Campus (329 last year)
• Biggest team: 300 – Groupon (204 last year)
• Most team commutes: 906 – Northwestern University (1,223 last year)
• Most team miles: 9,794 – Northwestern University (5,500 last year)

Everyone who participated in the Challenge is a winner, but here is the official list of this year’s winning teams. Congratulations to the 2014 Bike Commuter Challenge winners!

Bike Related Business
<5 employees: Warren Cycling & Scott Padiak & Associates
5-24 employees: REI – Northbrook
25-99 employees: REI – Lincoln Park
100-499 employees: SRAM

Education
<5 employees: Northwestern Medicine – Hospital Campus & Hive Chicago Learning Network
5-24 employees: University of Chicago Flow Lab
25-99 employees eSpark Learning
100-499 employees: Old Town School of Folk Music
500+ employees: The Museum and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago

For Profit
<5 employees: Nancy Veloo Photography, Wargaski Violins, Tzer0, Data Everywhere, Nolan Collaborative, GrandBox & Pines of Edgewater
5-24 employees: moss::, Sam Schwartz Engineering & Cyclone Energy Group
25-99 employees: Studio Gang Architects
100-499 employees: Upshot Marketing
500+ employees: Orbitz

Non Profit/NGO
<5 employees: AEA
5-24 employees: Plant Chicago
25-99 employees: Midwest Energy Efficiency Alliance
100-499 employees: Center for Neighborhood Technology + Elevate Energy
500+ employees: Field Museum

Public Agency
<5 employees: State Rep. Elaine Nekritz District Office
5-24 employees: Alderman Deb Mell, 33rd Ward Office
25-99 employees: CTA Planning
100-499 employees: Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning
500+ employees: US Environmental Protection Agency

The Bike Commuter Challenge is sponsored by WXRT, Revolution Brewing, Portland Design Works, Clif Bar, Dark Matter Coffee, SRAM, Village Cycle Center, The Chainlink and the City of Chicago.