Four decades, thousands of riders, nearly half-a-million dollars in grant impact, and uncountable miles traveled on Leelanau County roads. Such is the legacy of the Leelanau Harvest Tour, an annual autumnal event that will mark its 40-year celebration tomorrow (Saturday).

The Leelanau Harvest Tour is one of two major events hosted each year by the Cherry Capital Cycling Club (CCCC), the local biking club with 550 members “of all ages and abilities.” On the third Sunday of July, the club hosts another bicycle tour, called the “Ride Around Torch,” which has been running since 1988. The Leelanau Harvest Tour is held on the third Saturday of September each year, and has been around for almost as long as CCCC itself.

“The club started in 1984, this tour started in ‘85, and the whole premise was to create an income stream to give back to the community,” says Rick Venner, a long-time CCCC member who is serving as a first-time director for the Harvest Tour this year. “Ultimately, what the tour has done is it's created a grant program where over the period of 40 years, between this tour and the Ride Around Torch, we've given away upwards of $500,000 in grants.”

Most of those funds, Venner says, have gone to “biking-oriented infrastructure or nonprofits,” including support for TART and Norte or projects like the installation of bike racks or bike fix-it stations throughout the five counties that CCCC covers (Leelanau, Grand Traverse, Benzie, Antrim and Kalkaska). Occasionally, though, the club has been able to help with things as big as road construction projects.

“A few years ago, they were repaving the road out to the lighthouse on Old Mission Peninsula, and they were debating whether they wanted to put a paved shoulder on it,” Venner recalls. “They needed a matching grant in order to get the money for that project, so we issued the funds to make sure there was a paved shoulder, because of the benefit that has to cyclists.”

More recently, money raised helped pay for a website for the Grand Traverse Safe Streets Alliance, a new group the CCCC belongs to alongside other local nonprofits. The alliance, which “aims to promote the development of safe and effective transportation corridors in Traverse City and adjacent counties,” officially introduced itself to the Traverse City Commission in April, using its website to show off potential projects that could improve city streets.

“We're trying to create a place for everybody within our community, from pedestrians to cyclists to drivers, and these tours help fund that type of initiative,” Venner says.

Venner tells The Ticker that one of his big priorities as the director for this year’s Leelanau Harvest Tour was to involve local residents and area businesses more. With a staggered start, multiple routes that have taken cyclists all over Leelanau County, and a start and finish area that was relatively off-the-beaten path, the tour was largely hidden from view.

For the 40-year milestone, Venner wanted to make the Harvest Tour more comparable to the Bayshore Marathon, an event for which he volunteers each year. He noticed how much energy there was around that race, and how many of the people who live along the course route come out to cheer on runners, or even hand out food or beer. That kind of community enthusiasm, he says, is something he’d like to see more of at the Leelanau Harvest Tour.

“With that in mind, some of the routes that I've chosen for this year take us right through neighborhoods along the waterfront, and I’ve been working to get the word out for people to come out and cheer people on,” Venner says. “The way that the routes are this year will also have everybody a little more condensed, instead of spread out all over the entire peninsula, so I think there’ll be more awareness.”

Changing the routes proved to be a necessity this year, thanks to significant road construction on M-22 and M-72. “With all the detours going on, there is a lot more traffic right now on the roads that we typically would use,” Venner explains. “I just saw that as creating some conflict that's not necessary, so I’ve tried to keep our participants on safe roads. And it just so happens that, on the roads that I've picked this year, people are more likely to slow down a wave and say hi.”

Also new this year, the Harvest Tour will finish up with a waterfront picnic at North Park in Suttons Bay, rather than circling back to the race start point at Herman Park. The first riders will head out at 8am, with others to follow over the next two hours. The picnic, Venner says, is a partnership with Suttons Bay restaurants and vendors – another example of more community outreach.

More information about the Tour, including maps of the tour’s 18, 38, and 70-mile routes, can be found here.