Photo by: Heather Coit/The News-Gazette Members of Prairie Cycling Club's weekly Tuesday Morning Ride cut through the country wind as they pedal their way along county road 500 E in southwest Champaign on Tuesday, May 12, 2015. The morning riders start in Savoy and travel for about 15 to 20 miles.

URBANA — Champaign County Bikes will make your bike commute to work on Thursday a lot easier as well as more fun.

From 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. Thursday — Bike to Work Day — the organization and bicycle shops will staff nine Bike to Work Day Welcome Stations in Champaign, Urbana and on the University of Illinois campus.

Two-wheeling commuters are encouraged to stop by to have their bike tires pumped up, grab a cup of coffee and other breakfast treats, and pick up the latest community bike map.

"We call it air, brakes and chains," said Drew Hagen, manager of Champaign Cycle in Urbana. "It's a chance for people to roll by. Usually we're filling tires and doing a quick check of their bikes."

This is the sixth year Champaign County Bikes has hosted Welcome Stations on Bike to Work Day. In past years, Hagen and others staffing the stations have seen familiar as well as new faces.

"It's nice to see a continuance and it's nice to see people trying it out for the first time and joining the community," he said.

Jeff Yockey, president of Champaign County Bikes, said many of the bicycle shops in town will provide mechanics at the Welcome Stations, which are scattered throughout the community near employment centers:

— Hyatt Place in downtown Champaign.

— Busey Bank parking lot, downtown Urbana.

— Champaign Public Works Department, 702 Edgebrook Drive, C.

— Campus Engineering Plaza, Wright and Green streets.

— Wolfram Research, State Street and Kirby Avenue, C.

— UI Research Park, Hazelwood Drive and First Street, C.

— Campus Recreation Center East behind Freer Gym, Urbana.

— Campus Bike Center, 608 E. Pennsylvania Ave., C.

— Brookens Center, 1776 E. Washington St., U.

Bicyclists who plan to visit a Welcome Station are asked to pre-register at cubike.org to provide Champaign County Bikes with helpful data. However, bicyclists do not have to pre-register before stopping at a station Thursday, Yockey said.

Also during C-U Bike Month, Champaign County Bikes is raising money and awareness for the 24.5-mile Kickapoo Rail Trail between Urbana and Danville. So far, Champaign County Bikes has collected more than $4,000 for the trail effort.

Construction is expected to begin this year from both ends of the trail as local funds are raised to match a federal grant.

Everyone who makes a donation to the Rail Trail, which will have a stop at Kickapoo State Park, will receive a T-shirt with the tagline, "I helped kick start the Kickapoo Rail Trail!" To donate visit champaigncountybikes.org/.

Champaign County Bikes encourages bicycling as transportation and recreation and works to promote public awareness of the benefits of bicycling for individuals and the community. As part of CU-Bike Month, Champaign County Bikes released several national statistics about the benefits of bicycle commuting:

— More than half of the U.S. population lives within 5 miles of their workplace, making bicycling a feasible and fun way to get to work.

— With growing interest in healthy, sustainable and economic transportation, the number of bicycle commuters in the U.S. from 2000 to '13 grew by more than 62 percent.

— Bicycle commuting burns an average of 540 calories per hour.

— The average person loses 13 pounds the first year of commuting by bike.

— A daily 4-mile bike commute saves about 66 gallons of fuel per year.

— If the average person biked to work or to the grocery store once every two weeks instead of driving, close to 1 billion gallons of gasoline would be prevented from entering the atmosphere every year.