Bike Advocacy
Since she first rode a bike at 5, Mary Frances Dunham (MFD) has made it her mission around the world to encourage the use of bikes instead of cars. In the early 1970s, she was among the original handful of members at Transportation Alternatives advocating for better bike awareness and support in New York City. She has spread her message and her enthusiasm for bikes wherever she has traveled. Riding her fold-up Dahon bike down city streets in the USA, Europe, Asia, and Central America, she has set an example to us all that a bike is the best way to get around regardless of age, income or gender.
Scroll down this page or click on the red links below to get a glimpse of the many ways MFD has been engaged in supporting bike transportation.
TRIBUTES TO MFD from Bike Organizations
Bike New York
Celebrating A Cycling Trailblazer
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Transportation Aternatives
Honoring Original TA Activist Mary Frances
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Bicycle Bank
A program of Asia Initiatives in Yavatmal village India
BIKE ARTICLES BY AND ABOUT MFD
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BIKE PROPOSALS & REPORTS BY MFD
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PROPOSAL FOR NYC BIKE ACTIVISM HISTORY
“I propose that it is time that we have a written history of the pro-cycling movement in New York …”
PROPOSAL FOR BIKE EDUCATION PROGRAM
‘WHEELS’: A Pilot Bicycle Education Program for Children
PROPOSAL FOR WATERFRONT ZONING
A Pilot Bicycle Education Program for Children
REPORT ASSESSING NYC BIKE TRAFFIC
Draft report for NYC Department of Transportation, Feb., 1991
BICYCLE BLUERPINT ch.9: SCHOOLS
A Plan to Bring Bicycling Into the Mainstream in NYC, Transportation Alternatives
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR BY mfd
Here is s sampling of letters to the editor and letters to government officials from the more than 70 letters MFD has written since the 1980s on the topic of bike transport.
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MFD and BIKE EDUcATION
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SOME MFD BIKE IDEAs & CARTOONS
Thank you from the bottom of my heart for everything
I remember days when my best friend Mary stayed in Dhaka. She used her folding bike that brought from NY. When it was raining she folded it putting on the back of a Rickshaw to get to her destination.
She has been always a role model in my life. ❤️
I reached YAYA and Kate again when I saw the photo of YAYA’s biking published on Shanghai Daily by accident.
Dear Yaya,
I still remember when we rode together in Shanghai from People’s Square to the Bund promoting biking 10 years ago, and the tricycle your grandson Nick made for you. You should definitely be proud to see thousands of share-ride bikes of all colors around the city now.
After I moved to Phnom Penh, I still ride bike and sending my son Antoine to his pre-school on my back. Now he is 5 and half years old boy, proudly riding bike on beach roads and mountain paths in Cambodia and France.
We have you to thank for!
Cecilia
Dear Mary Frances,
Please accept my warmest congratulations for your inspiring witness. My wife’s nephew, Fred Smith (<[email protected]) is an active campaigner for cycling and cycling safety in London, and I think has achieved some changes. I wish to congratulate you on your 88th birthday in March – just before the present "lockdown" which casts its strange shadow on the entire world. You are the same wonderful person I knew in 1953.
With love (and there is nothing disloyal to my dear Margaret in saying this),
Tom
Mary Frances was touched to read your comment. She remembers you fondly, especially time spent with you and Altan in Paris and is very pleased that you have a bicycle activist in the family. How fortunate that you found her website!
What a great archive in honor of a great person! The world is a much much better place for having Mary Frances/Yaya in it! Her work should inspire all of us.
-Jen H