HBL represented Hawai’i at the 2026 National Bike Summit in Washington D.C. in late March. This is HBL’s 4th year in a row attending this national conference. HBL’s Executive Director, Travis Counsell and Advocacy Director, Eduardo Hernandez attended this year. HBL was well represented with HBL’s Education Director, Malia k Harunaga (who attended last year) featured on the front of this year’s program!
Each year the League of American Bicyclists hosts this conference to bring together bicycle advocates from across the country to learn, share, lobby, and network. The event is hosted at the gorgeous Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library and brings together nearly 500 people.
The conference has several different focus paths across the days including advocacy efforts, education efforts, organizational development, and more.
One of the mobile tours was a behind the scenes tour of Capital Bikeshare’s operations. This is an 8000 bike, 800+ station system that covers D.C. and 7 surrounding jurisdictions. It is government owned & funded, with operations handled by Motivate & Lyft using PBSC bikes. We weren’t permitted to take photos inside the operations center, but let’s just say it was impressive! There are both electric and traditional bikes in the fleet. Huge racks of battery chargers, over 30 bicycle repair stations, vehicles used to balance the docking stations, and more.
This site tour was very insightful especially given the similar equipment to Honolulu’s Biki and future role of Honolulu’s Department of Transportation System in overseeing and supporting the program.
Thankfully as part of the conference, credits to use CaBi are provided. Our housing was just a few miles from the conference along protected bike lanes and we used bikeshare as our main transportation. The weather ranged from chilly to hot to rainy!
D.C.’s bicycle infrastructure has grown substantially in recent years. D.C. has several nice laws that prioritize people walking and biking, such as leading pedestrian intervals and the ability to treat stop signs as yield signs. This has help shift behavior and increase the number of people riding bicycles. It makes riding much nicer too!
On Wednesday, we shift to a lobbying effort where we aim to meet with our congressional delegates and share national and local priorities. We meet in front of the Capitol for breakfast and a bike ride before heading off to our meetings. We all get back together in the evening for a reception hosted by the Congressional Bike Caucus.
We were fortunate to meet with all four congressional offices again this year. Priorities included supporting federal reauthorization of important programs including the B.U.I.L.D. and Safe Streets For All programs, as well as highlighting local needs in Hawai’i to continue supporting Complete Streets projects and HDOT’s Navahine Settlement efforts.
An example of an advocacy effort from these meetings that has become a reality is a federal earmark for the South Shore Path project, connecting Nanakuli to Manoa. A $4.8M earmark was secured for this project with the support of Rep. Ed Case and Sen. Brian Schatz.
The week is full of workshops and presentations. We learn and share. In additional to networking with other non-profit advocacy organizations, we connected with our partners at the Rails to Trails Conservancy, heard from the authors of Life After Cars and The War on Cars Podcast, received encouragement from Harris County, Texas Commissioner Rodney Ellis, and received a state of current political affairs from Amy Walter. It is also a great time to explore D.C.’s excellent bicycle infrastructure with riders from across the country.
We finished the conference by joining the Washington Area Bicyclists Association in a protest against the removal of the 15th Ave protected bike lane. WABA had sued the federal government to prevent the removal, and has since won! The energy was strong at this protest!
