duncan spray painting an abandoned bike...

... making the golden bike and bike stand on john and king.

taking a break...

... and riding to paint the next abandoned bike.

elizabeth street, south of dundas. north of city hall.

st. patrick south of dundas.

spadina and cecil street.

pedals and paint is an event held by the great spacing magazine and the city beautification ensemble. once a year, they hand out toronto downtown maps indicating the location of the locked abandoned bikes to groups of volunteers who go and visually liberate the neglected vehicles! this year I accompanied one of the groups.

Update from Matt:
As one of the organizers of the event I'd like to cmment on a few of the posted comments.

1. Thanks for the positive feedback.
2. We watched the bikes for three weeks to make sure they were not active and that they were truley abandoned.
3. The city of Toronto does not sanction this. We have taken it upon ourselves.
4. part of the project is to highlight these neglected bikes so that the city can come and take them away. We also think it helps defeat the people who steal these bikes and re-sell the frames.
5. Please do this in your neighbourhood or city. It takes 5-10 minutes to cover a bike, and about one full can.
6. yes we shold have wonr masks. Some of us did.
7. We used garbage bags and carboard bozes to protect the sidewalk. Some of the paint did slip through.
8. For more links to images of bikes go to http://www.spacing.ca/pedals/