With the recent launch of Bike Cochrane’s Back-in-Gear initiative, dozens of pre-loved bicycles have found a new purpose thanks to generous community support. However, as donations have quickly exceeded storage and processing capacity, the program has temporarily paused new donations and is now seeking volunteers to help refurbish the backlog of bikes.
“We're very grateful to the Cochrane community for donating so many bikes to help launch this program,” said Cody Alba, program director for Back-in-Gear. “We’re pausing donations for now and being more selective as we work through the inventory. Hopefully, once we have more space, we can reopen donations.”
Launched at this year’s Bike Swap, Back-in-Gear is a pilot project aimed at making cycling more accessible in the community.
“We’re not trying to make money,” said Alba. “All funds go back into this initiative and other Bike Cochrane programs that improve bike accessibility in Cochrane.”
The project received funding from the Cochrane Foundation and the Town of Cochrane, which helped secure materials and storage space. As part of the nonprofit Bike Cochrane, the program takes donated bicycles and bike parts, refurbishes them, and sells them at deeply discounted prices.
“We operate on a sliding scale,” Alba explained. “This means a bike could be priced from 30 to $50.00 for example, and the person buying the bike can choose between that range what they would like to pay.”
See related article: Bike Cochrane organizes bike swap at Ag. Grounds
A key partner in the program is Cochrane High School’s Rivers, Oceans and Mountains School (ROAMS) program. ROAMS students, under the guidance of two senior bike mechanics, helped restore many of the donated bikes before the end of their semester.
“We’ve placed a sea-can at Cochrane High for storage, and that’s where we collected the bikes,” said Alba. “Bike Cochrane operates from that location in the summer since school out, and we’ve lost access to the indoor mechanic shop.”
In addition to bikes, spare parts such as tubes, tires, pedals, and handlebars are still being accepted at Big Hill Cycle and Bike Bros during regular business hours.
So far, about 20 bikes have been restored, with 10 sold. The program has received positive community feedback, and Alba said they are eager to involve more youth and volunteers.
“We’re learning as we go, and the support we’ve received has been incredible,” she said. “We welcome feedback and would love to get more young people involved in the program and are hoping to work with the next ROAMS cohort in the fall.””
While the pilot was originally designed to run alongside the ROAMS school semester, the overwhelming number of donations created a backlog too large for the existing team to manage. The current inventory includes roughly 60 bikes waiting to be refurbished.
To help address this, Back-in-Gear will host free bike repair workshops on July 15 and 17, led by senior mechanics. Alba hopes the sessions will attract new volunteers to assist with restoring bikes.
“We were initially worried we wouldn’t get enough donations,” said Alba. “Now we have too many—which is the best kind of problem to have. There are a lot of bikes that will be available for sale in the coming weeks.”
While donations are on hold for now, the team is reviewing logistics and hopes to reopen intake this fall. In the meantime, residents interested in purchasing a refurbished bike can view current inventory on Instagram at @cochrane_back_in_gear, or fill out a request form to be matched with a bike:
Bike Request Form
To volunteer or get involved, email: [email protected].
