Charity project to help unemployed needs unwanted bikes

A charity project is appealing for old unwanted bikes for a new venture.

Exeter Community Bikes has launched a scheme to recycle and refurbish bicycles while giving training and skills to the long-term unemployed. The money from the sale of the re-vamped machines will go back into the project to help more trainees and give them useful business experience.

Jola Pawlikowski, who is heading up the scheme said she had been delighted with the level of support from across the city including bike enthusiast city MP Ben Bradshaw. “We have had loads of help from all sorts of people, particularly from within the biking community, which has been terrific.

“What’s also great is that it is bringing so many different people together because they are all mad about bikes.”

A workshop has been set up in the Harlequin Centre in Exeter and the team have been given a number of unwanted bicycles in various states of repair but they still need more. “We want to make sure we have got a really good stock of old bikes so that there will be will plenty of work for all the trainees,” she added.

As the pilot is very much a “test-phase” it is relying heavily on the good will of volunteers. Andy Richardson has given up his time to be a mechanic trainer. He works part-time as a bike mechanic in Crediton and said he was happy to share his knowledge.

“I heard about this through friends of friends and I have been involved in volunteering before, for Age Concern, but I’m also very much into my cycling so I guess you could say this was the perfect marriage.”

Andy has spent recent weeks concentrating on gathering tools and equipment, some of which have been donated, as well as setting up the workshop. He will assesses each trainee as they arrive to establish how much mechanical experience they have and what level of training they need. The pilot will be used to iron out any problems with the business model. The team then hopes to get funding later in the year to run ECB as a fully fledged project and ultimately a sustainable business.

Click here to access Exeter Community Bikes' Facebook page.