Laura McCamy

A small sampling of the diverse tapestry of bicycle-powered change happening throughout California.

Community bike shops empower people to build and repair their own bikes. Often located in disadvantaged communities, they usually provide training, shared tools, and a supportive atmosphere.

After public pressure, the City of Oakland held a second community meeting Wednesday about the design of the Latham Square pilot plaza, where a lane of car traffic was reinstated prematurely at the behest of Planning and Building Director Rachel Flynn. Despite a standing room-only crowd of attendees showing up to weigh in, the meeting was shut down 45 minutes early.

The crowning achievement for Oakland's new planning and building director so far might be ensuring that cars are being driven through the Latham Square pilot plaza once again.

In its second iteration, Sunday Streets Berkeley flooded Shattuck Avenue with an estimated 50,000 people last weekend in an even more powerful demonstration of the draw of closing streets to cars and opening them up to people.

Just two weeks after Oakland’s Latham Square opened on August 16, office workers could be seen arriving in ones and twos at lunchtime. A clutch of high schoolers from the nearby Oakland School For the Arts zoomed in on skateboards and sat together on a big bench in the shade, looking cool and disaffected. The park, which made the last block of Telegraph Avenue below 16th Street car-free, provides such a natural definition of the border between downtown and uptown Oakland that it feels like it has always been here.

When Walk Oakland Bike Oakland hosted the city's first Ciclovia-style event in downtown Oakland in 2010, onerous city fees meant plans for a second Oaklavia that year proved too ambitious for the small organization. "We thought we wouldn’t be able to do it again," said Jonathan Bair, WOBO's Board President.

Oakland will become the latest city to temporarily liberate city streets from car traffic this weekend with its first ciclovia event. Oaklavia will open the streets from Uptown through Downtown and West Oakland to cyclists, walkers, skaters and strollers, artists and performers. Kids on their first tricycle will wander across the lanes in safety, games of 4-square will be chalked out between lane markings, and diners will enjoy exhaust-free café seating.