Hop on your bicycle and ride around St. Augustine for this educational three-day event, fundraising for the Velo Fest Community Initiative. Take part in the event which usually features parties, pedal-power parades, and road races.

The VeloFest Community Initiative was founded by Heather Neathervile after her friend was killed while riding a bicycle. The main objective of the initiative is to promote the safe coexistence between car-drivers and bicycle riders in the community. By launching the VeloFest Community Initiative, Heather Neathervile went from a casual cyclist to a full-time educator and advocate to keep roads safer for all those who use it. When Bryan Wrigley was killed in a bicycle accident on 13th April 2011, Heather and other people close to him held a memorial service for him and to create awareness about the challenges that cyclists often face. Not long after the date for the memorial event was set two things occurred. First, Heather learned about the terrifying rate of cyclists being killed on the road, and second, city staff and elected officials started to develop ways to improve the situation. At the launch of the Initiative, Velofest was just a word, but now it has become an adjective and a verb that represents a movement of the people with a mission to make the roads a safer place for all those who use it.

Initially VeloFest Community Initiative targeted car drivers as its main audience. Later, it developed for both people who drive cars and those who ride bicycles. Since then, the initiative has encouraged people to be a little more concerned with the safety of their fellow human beings. People support the VeloFest Initiative by Velofesting to create mutually beneficial roads in rhetoric and practice. The organization hosts various fun events such as the St. Augustine VeloFest Bicycle Festival.

The best way to ensure the safe co-existence of bicycle riders and vehicle drivers in St. Augustine is by creating awareness through events and educational campaigns such as the St. Augustine VeloFest Bicycle Festival. One of the rules that vehicle drivers forget is that cyclists can be on the same lane as cars, even if there is a bike lane. The only exception to this rule is on interstate roads. Both bicycles and vehicles need to pay attention when entering traffic, at stoplights, and at stop signs. Drivers should maintain a three-feet distance when overtaking bicycles, or move over to another lane if there is one. There is absolutely no point in running someone over, just so that you can make it to Starbucks a half-second earlier.