Another Downtown Event bites the dust?

It's no secret I haven't been a fan of the streets being closed so bike riders could circle us like wagon train pioneers being circled by rampaging Indians. 

However, the effects have been less each year as I have slowly "mainstreamed" my store.  This year, in fact, we did very well. 

So whatever happens, I'll live with it -- as if I have any choice.

So Cascades Cycling Classic.

I wonder how much money is really raised on these things, or whether the vast majority is just 'cycled' (so to speak) back into the promotion industry?  It sounds like it costs a lot of money to put on the event, too much for the organization that benefits to put it on without a sponsorship.

It sounds a little desperate -- they have only a month to come up with a new sponsor.  (It sounds like they've known for some time, and I assume they've been looking...)

This has been a 'traditional event' -- and homegrown -- and despite it's inconveniences over the years, I may even be a little sad to see it go.  I'm willing to take one for the hometown team, if you will.  (What I object to is the constant expansion and numbers of events...and, well, the closing of streets when it isn't necessary.)

Chances are, they'll find a sponsor.  Too many fingers in the pie to let it go.

These things just take on a life of their own.

I also wonder if these things just have a life-span and that's it.  The bigger they are, the more they seem to be vulnerable. 

We've lost a big golf tournament, a downtown music festival, the Bend Film seems to decline each year, the Nature of Words is done, and so on and so forth.  A combination of overreaching (we aren't Portland) and losing founders and just wearing out.

Here's something I'm pretty sure of.  Downtown Bend is not only getting lots of visitors, it is in danger of being throttled by too much stuff going on.  I'm serious.  I'm not sure a decline in events would have as big an impact as the planners seem to think.  Not distracting the tourists and just being a normal, thriving retail center might not be such a bad thing.

What I would like to suggest to the Downtowners, and the city, is that we don't instantly replace this event with another -- that we let a summer weekend go free.  Please?