EcoMatters Bike Hub has helped 80,000 Aucklanders start cycling. Shanti Mathias rides over to understand the impact of these community bike workshops.
When An Na moved with her husband and two kids to Auckland in 2022, it took a while to start learning their way around. “We started taking our kids to different activities each weekend,” she says. One weekend, they attended a family festival in New Lynn and spotted a raffle for a kids’ bike – which they won.
“My son is a big fan of biking, he was so excited to get a bike that was the right size for him,” Na says. When they went to pick up the bike, they talked to the people at the New Lynn Bike Hub, who had offered the prize. “They help a lot of people, and they help recycle bikes,” Na says. Biking is now one of the family’s favourite activities; even her teenage daughter can (sometimes) be convinced to come along. “Biking is good for our health, and there are lots of nice biking trails – we go almost every week, especially in summer.” It’s a big contrast to where they lived in China, where the roads were narrower and there were few bike lanes, making it hard to find safe places for kids to ride.
The New Lynn Bike Hub, where Na has become a regular visitor, is one of a network of community bike workshops across Tāmaki Makaurau. Many hubs receive funding from their area’s local board, along with Auckland Transport. This funding helps each hub to open four days a week, with paid mechanics and volunteers always on site. The hubs receive bike donations, sell refurbished second hand bikes and, most importantly, have tools and space available to help people fix their bikes.
It’s impossible to miss the bikes when I roll up to the Glen Innes Bike Hub on a summery Friday morning, having ridden to the workshop from central Auckland with bike lanes most of the way. Outside the three shipping containers – one is the workshop, the other two store bikes – is a flock of cycles in neat lines. All these bikes have been donated by the community, repaired and put up for sale. “Selling bikes is an important source of income for us, but we want to keep them pretty cheap and affordable,” says Brent Bielby, who works for EcoMatters to manage the network of bike hubs.
As he sips his coffee, Bielby gives me a quick tour: mechanics Tyson Hobson and Ewen Blackburn are working on donated bikes. One, which has significant damage to the frame and can’t be salvaged, is being stripped for parts. Another bike, an older teal model, “has potential,” Hobson explains, checking the derailleur mechanism which changes the gears. “We try to keep as many bikes as possible in a functioning condition, just knowing that it is an affordable entry point, it might be that bike that starts a journey for someone,” Bielby adds.
EcoMatters is an organisation that started in West Auckland, with a focus on providing resources for sustainable living: helping people increase the efficiency of their homes, reduce waste and connect with the environment. They started their first bike hub at their site in New Lynn in 2017, inspired by other workshops like Tumeke Cycle Space, the Mount Roskill Bike Kitchen and Whare Bike in Whangārei. “We knew transport was a big source of carbon emissions, and we had to find the right avenue in,” Bielby says.
Bikes were a perfect area to take action in. A big barrier to people riding bikes is lack of knowledge around maintenance; the EcoMatters team realised lots of people have bikes in the garage that aren’t being ridden because they need simple repairs. A flat tyre can be fixed in under half an hour with simple tools, malfunctioning brakes can easily be replaced with new brake pads, sliding gears could be the fault of a stretched chain. Other people simply need encouragement: knowledge of where cycle lanes are from enthusiastic locals and access to the right tools, like bike stands and chain checkers, to learn how to make fixes themselves.
Paying mechanics, rather than only relying on volunteers, meant that the hubs could be open more; this was only possible with the help of the Whau Local Board, who helped the first bike hub to open. The bike hubs are now supported by the local board of the area they’re in, as well as Auckland Transport. “The local boards have a broad sense of what the bike hubs are, that it’s more than just transport outcomes – it’s health, it’s connectedness, it’s a sense of place,” Bielby says. Unlike a bike shop, people don’t just drop their bikes off; they work with the mechanics to learn how fixes are done, and identify used parts that can restore their bike to working order.
To make the Glen Innes hub inviting, Hobson has built a small pump track for kids to play on. It’s important to him that people feel welcome when they visit. “We want to show people the best hospitality ever, to show them how their bikes work, get them out there on a good working bike and say, this is what is possible.”
The mechanics at the hubs are almost always locals; this means they can give visitors a good sense of the best places to ride and what routes might work in their area. Hobson had just quit a depressing job five years ago when he saw a TV programme about people on bikes, and realised there was a network of cycle lanes near his house. He bought a bike and started volunteering at the Glen Innes Bike Hub, which soon turned into a job. Five years later, he’s still there. “I wake up in the morning and there’s no alarm, I just want to go to work – my life has changed in a good way, and I can only blame bikes for the change.”
The Bike Hub team is motivated by many elements of bike repair. It’s satisfying work to reduce waste, provide safe and affordable bikes to people who need them, use tools designed for the job, lower emissions and empower others to repair their vehicles. But it’s ultimately the joy of riding that keeps them coming to work.
“Bikes are a real, tangible way to make a difference – they’re beautifully engineered, and they’re easy to access,” Bielby says. Hobson makes videos of his rides, as well as events like bike raves. “Riding a bike is so smooth that people ask if I shot the video on a drone,” he jokes.
To grateful visitors like An Na, the feeling of community at the bike hubs is something that grows outwards. “My husband and I would like to volunteer to help people at the hub, especially if a hub opens close to where we live,” she says. “When my son gets a bit taller, we’ll donate his bike so someone else can use it.” Just like wheels, the enthusiasm for bikes keeps going around.
