Aranui Bike Fixup

The community bike fixup in Aranui was started by Steven Muir in August 2020. It is called the Aranui Bike Fixup and is based at Breezes Road Baptist Church grounds. Every Thursday from 3-6pm, young people are coming regularly to ‘earn’ their own tools at a rate of one tool for every 5 weeks attending. The Aranui Bike Fixup have restored and given away over 210 bikes and repaired over 200 bikes for people in the community since they started, and it seems to be fulfilling a large need in the community. Regular volunteers come to help with the fixing and teaching bike repair skills and volunteers from the church provide a very welcome afternoon tea.

The initiative started off from one container and has now expanded to two containers with a roof between the two containers to allow work to continue if it rains. The church has also offered space to work inside the church if the weather is bad.

The Aranui Bike Fixup is also developing a new initiative called the Christchurch Bike Library. Two covered trailers that can take about 18 bicycles will be available for hire to community groups, schools, or businesses to enable them to take people out biking. Or you can also get together a group of friends and hire the whole trailer with bikes and helmets for a great cycling trip. For more information about the Christchurch Bike Library, check out this link or the video below.

If you’re in the Christchurch area and if you have any surplus bikes, parts or time to help, or if you would like to contribute financially to the initiative, contact Steven through the Aranui Bike Fixup facebook group.