PetrSU bike pit stops are popular with cyclists
Free service stations for bicycles, created by employees and students of the Institute of Forestry, Mining and Construction Works, are located not only on the territory of the main building of PetrSU, but also on the streets of the city and are in demand among cyclists.
The bike pitstop is a design that allows cyclists to park their iron horse and make minor repairs, pump up the wheels using pumps and a set of multi-function wrenches, or just take a break.
Alexander Seliverstov, Associate Professor at the Institute of Forestry, Mining and Construction Sciences, said:
Five years ago from the cycling community of the city of Petrozavodsk there was a request for the development of cycling infrastructure. The number of bike users grew at a rapid pace. And now the popularity of bicycles in Russia is growing.
There are examples of successful infrastructure for non-motorized modes of transportation (bicycles, electric scooters, etc.), which can be seen in many cities of Russia, for example, in Moscow, Almetyevsk, St. Petersburg.
The free service station for bicycles “Velo-pitstop” was developed by us on the basis of the Engineering Park of the Institute of Forest, Mining and Construction Sciences with the participation of the KROO “Cycling Karelia” under the project within the framework of the “Sustainable Development” competition to support the infrastructure of non-motorized transport in Petrozavodsk. The grand opening of the first bike-pit stop in Petrozavodsk took place on February 10, 2017.
The following cycling stations were manufactured and installed in the summer of 2017 on the territory of the main building of PetrSU (Lenin Ave., 33) and the GORKA sports center (Lososinskoe sh., 17), which are in places where cyclists are actively moving. The station for PetrSU was created as part of the strategic project 2017 “New space: engineering solutions for creating small architectural forms in university territories, including the campus” of the flagship university development program .
The fourth bike-pit stop was installed in the summer of 2018 on the former factory territory, in the Petrovskaya Sloboda area, next to Komarina Troopa (Liteynaya Ploshchad, 3) with the support of the Pivotal University Development Program “Innovative Solutions for Forming a Comfortable and Creative Environment in the Region” in cooperation with the Gallery of Industrial History, KROO “Bicycle movement of Karelia” and LLC “Aleksandrovsky Zavod”.
The fifth cycle pit stop was installed in the summer of 2019 in the Petrovsky Garden Park of Culture and Leisure to service bicycles and scooters in the area of the DIY-Park extreme playground.
According to Alexander, he enjoys cycling during the summer season. Riding a bike is both a means of transportation and an active holiday. But he rarely uses bicycle workshops: he carries the basic set of tools for a cyclist with him – a pump, a multitool with a set of necessary hexagons, a chain wrench and a spoke wrench.
To repair a bike in the field, he recommends using the Velo-pitstop:
It includes: a rack for fastening a bicycle with a basic set of tools for maintenance and minor repairs of bicycles, a parking element with a pump station for inflating bicycles.
Alexander Seliverstov said that teachers, together with students of the Institute of Forestry, Mining and Construction Sciences, twice a year, carry out maintenance of each bicycle pit stop, for example, checking the health of a set of tools and a pump.