Former school teacher Sam "Coach" Balto has made biking to school trendy with his revolutionary "bike bus" idea, which has inspired similar movements worldwide.
As The Guardian reported, after watching a social media video of children biking to school in Barcelona via what they called a bicibús, or bike bus, Balto wanted to implement the same idea at the elementary school where he worked in 2022. He decided to launch it on Earth Day in celebration of getting outdoors and improving children's health through physical activity.
Combining his passion for health with the newly revived trend of biking to school, Balto has watched the movement grow to over 200 bike buses across the United States. When the word spread to the White House, Balto was even invited to a holiday gathering by former President Joe Biden.
Cycling to school was once the norm in the 1960s, but because of safety concerns, long commutes to schools, and parents' work schedules, the practice has declined significantly, leaving children vulnerable to a lack of physical activity. Balto is hoping to change that with the bike bus, which offers kids a much safer way to cycle to school with parent and teacher volunteers guiding the rides.
Balto isn't the first to come up with a community biking idea, but it has certainly grown in popularity over the years. Back in 2010, bike enthusiast Kiel Johnson started a "bike train" movement in Portland, Oregon, giving kids an opportunity to socialize and commute to school in a fun, healthy way. Seven schools joined, and Johnson's idea even earned him a grant and an interview on a national TV show.
He used Facebook to share information about the bike train, but with social media just taking off at the time, the movement didn't sustain the momentum after a couple of years. In 2022, the digital landscape was obviously much different, and Balto used it to leverage his bike bus movement, garnering hundreds of millions of views in the last two years.
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The Guardian explained his "videos went viral beyond anything Balto could have imagined," with some of his bike bus footage on TikTok raking in 1-2 million views. Shortly after, he was contacted by CBS, NBC, and other news outlets.
Balto's bike bus idea has given him a taste of fame, with even Justin Timberlake joining one of the rides along with Balto and hundreds of children. He now owns the nonprofit Bike Bus World, which "is on a mission to transform the well-being of children, communities, and our climate through biking together to school."
With his videos having been watched over 200 million times, the movement has spread rapidly, and Balto believes social media is the main driver behind its success.
"Without it, this might have remained just a cool local initiative in Barcelona. But social media made it global. The visibility also helped change public perception about kids biking to school, proving that it's fun, safe, and scalable," he said.
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"It's a movement, not a moment," he added.
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