Shopping centre in Eastbourne sending bikes to communities in need
The Beacon has found the perfect solution to deal with discarded bikes left in the shopping centre
The Beacon in Eastbourne is sending abandoned bikes left at the shopping centre to communities in need.
The site in East Sussex has teamed up with retailer Halfords to donate bikes.
The project sees Halfords take the bikes, make all necessary repairs to make them roadworthy, then store them in a shipping container until they have a full load to take to Africa.
Halfords works with charities Re-cycle and Krizevac Project, which operate in Ghana, Gambia, Malawi, Zambia, Rwanda, South Africa, Sierra Leone and Nigeria.
Mark Powell, General Manager at The Beacon, said:
"The services Halfords have to offer was an excellent way to solve the headache of abandoned cycles.
“We tend to store bikes for up to 6 months, and currently have five bikes that have just been left in the centre.
“For years, we’d accumulated unwanted bikes, but we were never quite sure what to do with them.
“The link with Halfords has proved really helpful,” Mark said. “We now wait until we have a five or so bikes, then hand them over for recycling".
A spokesman for Halfords said: “Across the UK, millions of bikes lie unused and rusting, whereas in some parts of Africa, a bike can provide a lifeline enabling people to travel to work, school and carry goods further afield to sell.
“Since 2013 we have been working with Re-Cycle to gather donated bikes to send to rural Africa,” the spokesperson said. “We have collected nearly 60,000 bikes which would otherwise have ended up in landfill.”