A group student bike ride in Bend.

Here’s an optional assignment for families with school-aged children. It’s due when school starts up again in the fall.

Start up a bike bus.

They are adult-led scheduled bike rides getting students to school. They can help get students to school, get them exercise and it’s like a community event. Parents might find they are win, too.

Bend has started to be more bike friendly. There is a mix of routes that can be plotted not free of car traffic but where bikes get more of a nod than a strip of paint. Waiting around for perfection, well, you’d be waiting around a long time.

Some children don’t have bikes. That gives us pause. But there’s got to be a bike in somebody’s garage that could be donated or shared.

There are already some scattered similar events in the district. Commute Options promotes a walking school bus, which does avoid the not-everybody-has-a-bike problem. Still, we want more bike bus.

What role will you play in the bike bus? The organizer? The sprinter to help control traffic? The sheepdog to keep it together? The caboose to bring up the rear? Or the naysayer frowning and grumbling? If you are a driver and see one coming along, just wait and let it go.

There’s an excellent article about bike buses in The Washington Post here: tinyurl.com/Bendbikebus.