Bike Education Center Opens In Riverside Park

HARLEM, NY — Adults in New York now have the resources to learn to ride a bicycle thanks to a new education center in Riverside Park.

The Riverside Park Conservancy this week announced its new bike education center at 158th street will help teach people of all ages to ride and offer free public programming.

It also intends to install new playground equipment and invest $2.3 million from the city in infrastructure around 158th Street.

“We are taking real, concrete steps to improve the conditions and experience in the northern part of Riverside Park,” said Dan Garodnick, President and CEO of Riverside Park Conservancy. “This partnership with Bike New York will allow us to bring greater energy and more resources to the area."

The bike education center is named for John-Carlo Monti, an avid Riverside Park-area biker who died last year at age 27. The conservancy said the bike center will honor Monti's memory by empowering new cyclists.

"As someone who bikes regularly, I am excited about the opening of the John-Carlo Monti Community Bike Education Center," said Manhattan Borough President Gale A. Brewer. "This new facility will serve the community of uptown Manhattan and is possible thanks to the Riverside Park Conservancy's North Park Initiative Campaign, which focuses on historically under-resourced areas of Harlem and Washington Heights."

More information about the conservancy's plans for North Park can be seen online.