A bike ride around the block doesn’ t always make headlines, but when it’ s a resident from a care facility feeling the wind on their face for the first time in years, it’ s proof that joy doesn’ t have an age limit.
Along for the Ride
Jennelle Lew Communications Coordinator, ARTA
A bike ride around the block doesn’ t always make headlines, but when it’ s a resident from a care facility feeling the wind on their face for the first time in years, it’ s proof that joy doesn’ t have an age limit.
We often hear about the benefits of spending time outdoors and connecting with others, but for many seniors in care facilities, limited mobility and resources make that difficult. As we age, our social circle gets smaller and our opportunities for new experiences decrease. After a lifetime of trying new things, how do you find excitement in everyday life?
Julie Lacasse, a retired dietitian, came across a trishaw— a three-wheeled bicycle with a carriage in the front— in the physiotherapy department of a care facility in Brooks, Alberta. A staff member explained that they take the residents on rides.“ They come back and they have stars in their eyes,” Julie was told,“ they just love it so much.”
Inspired to bring this same joy to seniors in Medicine Hat, Julie threw her efforts into starting a similar initiative. She wanted to address the social isolation often experienced in care facilities and saw the value in creating a space where seniors with mobility differences could experience being outdoors again. After countless phone calls, dead ends, and late-night Google searches, she discovered Cycling Without Age( CWA).
Founded in Copenhagen in 2012, CWA began when Ole Kassow started offering free trishaw rides to residents from a local care facility. Since then, it has grown into a global volunteer movement with more than 3,500 chapters across forty countries, including 111 chapters in Canada. CWA provides all the information needed for someone to start another chapter: securing funding for trishaws, training volunteers to become trishaw pilots, navigating insurance forms, and more.
Armed with resources from CWA, a strong network of volunteers, and local organizations such as Bike Medicine Hat and Cypress View Foundation, Julie developed the Medicine Hat chapter. Since its inception in 2022, pilots have provided over 340 rides out of four care facilities, striving to improve the health of residents and reconnect them with nature.
Aside from getting fresh air, passengers get to cherish a new experience during each ride.“ It’ s about creating these special moments,” Julie says,“ because life is short, we just like to make it special.” Some of these moments include receiving free ice cream cones from a nearby Dairy Queen or getting caught in a sudden rainstorm with nothing but flimsy, disposable ponchos. One rider who never learned how to ride a bike in her childhood delighted in clipping on a helmet for the first time.
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