Oct 1, 2006 By Cindy Ekas-Brown 4 min read

When he woke up Saturday morning and saw it was raining, Ron Romeo wasn’t discouraged. He jumped on his Road King Custom Harley Davidson motorcycle and roared into downtown Uniontown. Romeo parked his shiny Harley along Main Street near the State Theatre Center for the Arts and waited for other bikers and motorcycle enthusiasts to follow his lead.

It didn’t take long before bikers began to thunder into Uniontown on their shiny two-wheeled machines to rev up the third annual Cycles in the City event.

“I figured if I rode my Harley into town and everyone saw it, then they would start coming to Cycles in the City,” said Romeo, one of the event’s organizers. “I guess it worked.”

Even though it was chilly and raining, Romeo said it didn’t seem to dampen the spirits of people who attended Cycles in the City.

“It’s been a bad weather day, but the people have been coming in spurts,” he said. “The crowd is a little spread out this year because we’re also having bands play at Grindle Station, so it’s really hard to tell how many people are here.”

Last year’s event, which was held on a beautiful day in July, drew about 3,000 people. As of about 5 p.m., Romeo estimated that about 500 people had attended Saturday’s event. But he was hoping that attendance would increase in the evening as the rain stopped and the sun began to shine.

“I’ve been watching the temperature, and it has gone up about two degrees in the last hour. It’s now 62 degrees,” Romeo said.

“We had the event in July last year, but we decided to change it because we didn’t want to compete with the summertime events,” he added. “I’ve been tracking the weather for a few years, and I noticed that there is usually pretty good weather the first weekend in October. It’s usually around 70 degrees and sunny. I guess we just got caught on a day bad.”

The event was expected to continue until about 9 p.m. with eight bands playing on two stages – one set up in front of the State Theatre on Main Street and a second at Grindle Station on Pittsburgh Street.

Three years ago, Romeo and one of his friends, Ernie Cerini, owner of National Road Harley, decided to create the Cycles in the City event.

“We’re good friends, and we noticed that Uniontown never had any motorcycle events, so we decided it was time to start one,” Romeo said. “All of the local motorcycle businesses got together and decided to sponsor the event.”

Romeo said he rode a motorcycle when he was 18 years old but gave up biking when he got married and had a family. About four years ago, he decided to take up the hobby again, even though his wife voiced some concerns.

“It wasn’t a popular decision,” said 52-year-old Romeo, as he laughed. “But I wasn’t afraid to start riding again. When you get close to 50, you don’t worry about things as much as you do when you’re younger. Time and health are the most important things. If you have that, you have everything.”

After Romeo and Cerini decided to create Cycles in the City, Tim Grindle, a member of the Uniontown Downtown Business District Authority, also got involved in organizing the event.

“Cycles in the City gives a lot of opportunity to local businesses and organizations,” Romeo said. “The fire department and police department are raising money, and so is the State Theatre. We wanted to pull some opportunity into the city.

“We’re trying to get the Uniontown Downtown Business District Authority to take it over,” he added. “It would be easier if it became a community event because there are a lot of liability issues and our committee has been jumping through a lot of hoops to make this happen every year.”

Several years ago, Romeo said Johnstown began a motorcycle event called Thunder in the Valley, which now draws about 100,000 people during a four-day period.

“This could become a very successful event for the city of Uniontown if we could get the community involved,” he said. “I know a lot of people think that bikers are radical, tough guys, but that’s just bull crap.

“These guys have a lot of money tied up in their motorcycles, and they want to help the community,” he added. “One guy I know has put $75,000 into his bike. That’s more money than some people have in their houses. That’s how important their motorcycles are to them.”