Six-year-old Aiden Noon dreamed of a red bicycle to replace his outgrown toddlers' bike. But with many children's bicycles priced at £100 or more, and a younger sister in the family, his mother, Kirsty, a secretary from Castlemilk, Glasgow, sadly could not afford to make his dream come true.

The same was true for another local mother, Tracey Birrell. With two daughters aged 10 and five, and a restricted family budget, bikes came a long way down her list of priorities.

But then friends of both families pointed them in the direction of a neighbourhood charity and business called Community Can Cycle. Based in Castlemilk, the project sells a wide range of reconditioned, new-looking bicycles for as little as £10 and no more than £30 - a fraction of the average price for a shop-bought bike.

The minute Kirsty Noon walked into the large industrial outlet, a short distance from her home, she spotted the perfect bike. "There in the stand was a children's bike painted bright red, my son's favourite colour, with chunky wheels and a No 1 badge on the front," she says. "It looked exactly the right size for Aiden. But the best thing was the price of only £15. I was amazed."

Aiden could not have been more delighted. "He was totally thrilled with the colour of the bike and the look of it," says his mother. "Now you can hardly get him off it. He's out in the street playing with his pals as often as he can. It has been a brilliant buy."

Two girls' bikes, costing a total of £45 from Community Can Cycle (CCC), have also changed the lives of Kelsey and Toni Birrell. "I had no idea how much my daughters would get out of owning their own bikes," says mother Tracey. "They have much more freedom to go out with their friends, and to get to the local shops.

"It's a great way to get them active, too, especially when you hear so much about children being unfit and overweight. I think that for so little money these bikes have been one of our best-ever buys."

For Jim O'Donnell, the founder of CCC, every bike sale - and there have been more than a thousand in the last year - offers proof of his "simplistic yet highly rewarding project". The charity's other services include free bike repairs for all 16,000 residents of Castlemilk, as well as inexpensive bicycle hire.

It is now seven years since O'Donnell, a former painter and decorator, first began to formulate a scheme to offer every child in the community access to cheap bicycles and repairs.

A highly self-motivated O'Donnell explains: "It all began when I offered to fix several bikes that belonged to children of a neighbouring family, whose father had recently died. Word then got out in the community that I did free bike repairs and within no time people were coming to my house to ask for help.

"Suddenly I found myself surrounded by old bikes, worn out bikes and bits of bikes - and I realised how big the demand was for a free repair service."

O'Donnell also became acutely aware of the need in Castlemilk - an area characterised by low-income and high unemployment - for a ready supply of cheap children's bikes.

"When I was a kid it seemed that everyone had bikes. We'd be out in the street on our bikes all the time," he says. "These days there is competition from computer games and the like, plus the cost of the average bike seems to be proportionally much higher compared to average earnings in deprived city areas. Here in Castlemilk, more than half the residents have an income of less than £100 a week.

"Coupled with this there appears to be much less desire for children to be outside playing. I suddenly saw a mission to change this. I wanted to see many more kids out in the streets being active and more healthy."

But O'Donnell, 42, did not have the capital required to start an enterprise offering cheap or free bikes and services. So he hit upon the idea of encouraging the community itself to fund the scheme through a partnership recycling campaign.

"It's just about the most simple idea you could come up with for generating funds, and I wondered why I'd never thought of it before," explains O'Donnell, who recently married April, a volunteer he met through CCC. "By getting local people and businesses to bring all their used cans and bottles to me, I could then make money by selling them on for recycling.

"Of course, it worked even better because everyone had a vested interest in raising as much money as possible because they knew there would be payback in terms of free bike repairs and cheap bikes."

As the business grew, O'Donnell applied for charity status and appealed for funding grants to support CCC. In the last year alone, he has secured funds via more than 10 trusts and foundations. Last month he was delighted to receive a £5000 award from the Gannett Foundation, the charitable arm of the company that owns The Herald. A similar project, Gorbals Recycles, in part based on the CCC blueprint, has also been given a start-up boost thanks to a second Gannett grant of £4500. This scheme will launch in January.

"With awards being given to both projects, it means that two needy areas in Glasgow will benefit from my bicycle recycling idea," says O'Donnell. "I'm absolutely over the moon about this."

But his mission does not stop there. As well as offering free advice to another two off-shoot projects, which are about to be launched in Kilmarnock and the Pollok area of Glasgow, O'Donnell is keen to expand to include a wider recycling message, educating locals about environmental issues.

"While bikes and cycling are environmentally friendly in themselves, we also have a recycling element to our business, which gives us an opportunity to spread the word on green issues, too," says April O'Donnell, now one of a five-strong team of paid staff at the CCC, which includes mechanics and drivers. (The scheme also has 20 volunteers.) "In 2002 we set up our own community recycling plant and now we also have a facility to teach groups of school children on site about how we collect, sort, process and sell glass bottles and aluminium and steel cans. We have found this really helps to get the message of the importance of recycling across to the community."

Year on year, the amount of cans and bottles brought in for recycling at the Drakemire Drive outlet has grown. O'Donnell estimates they now receive and process about 50 tons of waste annually. There has also been a rise in the number of old bikes being donated.

"As word gets round about what we are trying to do, people are coming from further and further away and in greater numbers with their old bikes," he says. "We have a range of adult bikes now. I think that, for many people, it's a relief to be able to clear these old bikes out of their sheds and garages and know that they are being put to good use."

Last week Kirsty Noon revisited CCC, this time with Aiden's discarded Action Man bike under her arm. "I thought someone else's child would be able to make good use of this smaller bike so I'm donating it for free," she says. "And I'm going to tell all my friends about this great project. Knowing that we'll always be able to afford bikes for our kids, no matter how fast they grow out of the old ones, is absolutely brilliant."


Pedal power picks up momentum
Another Glasgow recycling project to receive a Gannett Foundation award is Gorbals Recycles. Launched in 2004, the community project aims to recycle bottles, cans and textiles.

Part of their charity enterprise is a second-hand clothing shop, and now Gorbals Recycles plans to incorporate a bike repair and refurbishment branch into their business.

Project co-ordinator Moyra Lindsay says: "Our original aim was to generate money for the community via local recycling. Over the last three years this side of the business has grown and grown, and Gorbals Recycles now has offices, a shop and five paid staff members. Now we will be able to expand much quicker thanks to the £4500 from the Gannett Foundation."

Following advice from Jim O'Donnell at Community Can Cycle, the Gorbals project will follow a similar blueprint to the Castlemilk scheme, offering free bike repairs to all local residents, as well as selling donated and refurbished bikes.

Lindsay adds: "We have been able to take on a mechanic who Jim trained and we're planning to buy a stock of repair tools and spare parts, so we hope to be up and running early in 2008. We already have a waiting list for refurbished bikes. I am convinced this project will be another success story."

Visit Community Can Cycle's website at www.communitycancycle.org.uk or call 0141 630 1015. Call Gorbals Recycles on 0141 420 3573.


Could the Gannett Foundation help your cause?
The Gannett Foundation is the charitable arm of the company that owns The Herald's publishers, Newsquest Media Group.

Each April and October, grants totalling approximately £1m are distributed by the foundation to community groups that operate in areas where Newsquest publishes. The Gannett Foundation supports innovative projects addressing issues such as neighbourhood improvement, youth development, education, help for disadvantaged communities and environmental conservation.

Applications for grants are put forward by publications based in the areas concerned.

Any registered charity interested in applying should contact Margaret Morrison at The Herald, by e-mail to margaret.morrison@theherald.co.uk or by calling 0131 302 7005.