Corbin ATC students create specialty bike racks for city

The City of Corbin will soon be adorned with one-of-a-kind bike racks designed and built by local students as plans to make the area more bike-friendly continue to move forward.

These Corbin Area Technology Center students made these two bicycle racks for the City of Corbin that are being painted and will soon be read for use.

As part of a joint effort between the city, the Whitley County Health Department, Corbin Tourism and the Cumberland Valley Area Development District, a group of welding students from the Corbin Area Technology Center were tasked with a project that would showcase not only their skills and ingenuity, but also allow them to create something that will likely be used and enjoyed by residents for years to come.

Kathy Lay, health educator at WCHD, spearheaded the project as part of her ongoing campaign to help make Whitley County more bikeable. Plans have been underway for years in both Corbin and Williamsburg to develop and implement bike lanes/routes that would make the cities safer for bike traffic. Lay, who has played a major role in the planning process, has been looking at next steps that can be taken while development continues. For both cities, it made sense to have somewhere for cyclists to store their bikes for when the routes are finalized.

“I had been thinking about doing this the past couple years because we did the same project at Whitley County High School for the bike racks in Williamsburg, so I wanted to do the same thing for Corbin because they’re working on bike routes and are trying to establish one pretty close to the middle school,” said Lay.

In March, Lay secured the proper funding and approached Adam Hoskins, welding instructor at the Corbin ATC, to gauge his and his student’s interest in the project.

“He said, ‘Yes, they would love to do it,’” said Lay.

With Hoskins and his students on board, the clock was already ticking as students just had over two months to research, design and create the bike racks. Hoskins said the class was grouped and designs from each were submitted to the entire class for a vote, where they were rated based on aesthetics, time frame and required skillset. Once being narrowed down to one design, the groups then drafted blueprints with dimensions and a material list. After again selecting one blueprint, the materials list was quoted and submitted to the WCHD and City of Corbin for approval.

The bike racks were constructed using 3/4” and 1 1/4” schedule 30 steel pipes and 16-gauge sheet steel.

“Overall, the project took six weeks,” said Hoskins, via email. “One week was designing/submitting paperwork/ordering material and five weeks for fabrication and welding of the project.”

The bike racks were sent off for a powder coating last week and are expected to return sometime within the week. Once received, students will install nameplates and make arrangements with the city to have them installed next week.

With the racks nearly finished, Hoskins stated that he believed it to be a great benefit to his class to be able to participate in such a project due to it being a “real world” application that allowed both advanced and beginning students alike to work together. And not only did it provide practical experience, the students valued and enjoyed their time working on it.

“The students had a lot of pride while making these knowing that the bike racks were going to be placed around the town in areas that they could tell someone, ‘I built those in my welding class,’” said Hoskins. “The moment I knew the students really enjoyed the build was when they were talking the day before spring break about what was left to complete on the bike racks after they returned instead of how much they were looking forward to the break. This conversation between students reiterates to instructor that students are having fun, and if it is fun, they are truly learning.”