After a Murder, New Haven's Biking Community Sets High Goals

Two days after cycling enthusiasts mourned the senseless murder of one of their own, they initiated a more hopeful plan to build safer streets.

“Safer” in terms of places to ride bikes in traffic.

The occasion was the unveiling of a new “Smart Cycling” handbook for New Haven bicyclists, the culmination of months of work between advocates and City Hall; and a new “Smart Cyclist” pledge for cyclists to sign, promising, for instance, not to talk on cell phones while on bikes. (OK. Promise.)

The unveiling took place at Devil’s Gear Bike Shop in Pitkin Plaza. Devil’s Gear, the hub of New Haven’s vibrant cycling community, is where popular bike enthusiast and vegan “straight edge” punk rocker Mitchell Dubey worked as service manager until a home intruder shot him to death in his Bassett Street home last Thursday night during an attempted robbery. It’s also where hundreds of people gathered Sunday night to memorialize him.

Tuesday’s upbeat event at the shop had been planned before the murder took place. But participants couldn’t help noting the connection—how Dubey was part of building a strong community that has strengthened New Haven and led to the city’s campaign to help cyclists and drivers share the road safely.

Before the unveiling, Mayor John DeStefano spoke of how the violence in Newhallville that led to Dubey’s death stems from people in New Haven detached from a sense of community. (Click on the play arrow to watch.)

“This cycling community did not exist in a meaningful way 20 years ago when I became mayor. It has become such an important part of the city. People see through cycling their connection to one another, finding joy in one another. It’s a really important and big thing in enriching our community. There are a lot of circles like that in New Haven,” DeStefano said. “In the end, a lot of the answers that we see in senseless violence are found frankly in the values reflected in this cycling community, this sense of connectedness to one another.”

Much of New Haven’s violence is caused by people who lack that sense of social connection and communal values, DeStefano said. He called on churches, government, and informal networks of “connected” people to “see their self-interest in reaching out to these folks who don’t get it at home.”

Then officials and Devil’s Gear owner Matthew Feiner announced the completion of the 49-page “Smart Cycling: a handbook for New Haven bicyclists.”

The effort will help “make this a safer city to cycle in [and] make it a safer city in general,” Feiner said.

Then-City Hall intern Dana Barnes, a Yale public-health student (pictured with Feiner), started putting together the booklet last summer, based on input from cycling advocates and city officials.

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