Cycle charity sends bikes to Africa
Maidenhead: Fifty bicycles donated to partner charity by ‘flourishing’ organisation
A Maidenhead cycling charity says it is ‘flourishing’ as it recently donated 50 bikes to a good cause supporting people in Africa.
Maidenhead Cycle Hub (MCH), based in Bell Street, says it has been inundated with donations from generous people who have given over their bikes for someone else to enjoy.
The charity, which aims to get more people on two wheels by repairing them in a dedicated workshop, moved next door to the Advertiser offices in November after having to vacate its previous base in Waldeck
Road. Volunteer and trustee at MCH, Mark Hansford, said the group was delighted to help out a fellow good cause as it could no longer store all of the bikes that had been donated.
Re-Cycle: Bikes for Africa, a charity providing affordable bike transport to people in Africa, took 50 bicycles off MCH’s hands to go towards
their own work.
“When we got more donations than we could cope with we called in the guys from Bikes for Africa,” Mark said, adding that the charity has been receiving 25-30 bike donations each week.
He said this has been partly due to lots of people having clear-outs at home and discovering bikes they no longer use.
He added: “The latest collection was about 50 bikes but we have given bikes to them [Bikes for Africa] before – this was their third collection.”
Mark said the increase in donations meant the charity was ‘flourishing’ and was now
in the process of recruiting a full-time mechanic, workshop manager and a part-time shop co-ordinator, helped by funding from the Royal Borough.
As well as their workshop in Bell Street, MCH still occupies a shop inside the Nicholsons Centre where people can buy repaired bikes.
However, with the impending regeneration of the shopping centre, the charity says it will be losing this space and will be looking to ‘establish another premises in the town or somewhere nearby’.
Visit cyclehub.org.uk/careers/ for more information on the new jobs available at MCH.