Special Thanksgiving edition open comments

L.A. cyclists have a lot to be thankful for this year.

Like a new police chief and a department who are finally starting to hear our complaints. Along with an extension of the comment period for the new bike plan. And yesterday’s perfect weather that had me watching other cyclists with envy on the way to Thanksgiving dinner.

Unfortunately, I’m not going to have time to write about it, since I’ll be on the run all weekend. Including risking my life by going to Target on Black Friday to pick up a few toys for next week’s El Niño Toy Ride.

So let’s try an experiment.

Rather than go dark all weekend, I’m going to open this up to your comments. Just click on the Reply link below and say anything you want, on any bike topic.

Have a bike to sell or want to report a stolen bike? Have a complaint or high praise for someone? Got some news? As long as it’s even vaguely bike-related and relatively inoffensive, it stays.

Maybe we’ll even get an update from our colorful Kiwi correspondent, as he joins hordes of the spandex-clad in overrunning a small New Zealand town.

So comment away. I’ll try to add some links later this evening.

And if you like it, maybe we’ll make this a regular weekend thing.

……….

Metro is looking for volunteers to for a study of the Orange Line and it’s bikeway. The first entry in the challenge to write an intro to LA’s best bike plan. A Brea woman converts her spare change into bikes for Marine families at Camp Pendleton. Bike Oven and Flying Pigeon host the city’s first bike corral. Pierce Brosnan and sons bike through the ‘Bu. San Diego cyclists install a ghost bike for the killed in recent collision with a police vehicle. A Visalia driver is killed after striking a cyclist, then crashing into a tree. San Francisco finally gets the go ahead to begin work on its long-standing bikeway projects. Bikers and ranchers collide in Colorado’s backcountry. A Kentucky cyclist is just thankful to be alive this year. Now you, too, can have a holder for your decaf Venti Carmel Macciato during your commute. Finally, an award-winning VW ad suggests it’s the ideal car for dooring cyclists.

8 comments

  1. jlyle says:

    If Mary Hanlon Stone decides to run for District Attorney of Los Angeles, she’ll get my vote!

    RSRO (ride safely, ride often),
    Jim Lyle

  2. tracywilkins says:

    We’re in Thanksgiving weekend mode here in Southwest Missouri as well. Thankfully, I’ve avoided the mauls and other madness, but I did get a small ride in today. My wife and a good friend from church are in a women’s beginning running group, and after they ran today, we planned to go to breakfast with Terry and her husband. Since this seemed like a continuation of the gluttony, I decided to meet them there on my bike rather than drive. Hopefully the ten mile round trip counter-acted some of the calories I consumed!

  3. TheTricksterNZ says:

    Thanks for the shout out 🙂

    Anyway this colourful correspondent had a bit of fun. Weather didn’t exactly turn up to the party but it could have been much worse.

    Cracked out a 4hrs 47mins 21 although could have been much quicker (4hrs 30ish) had I been in one of the earlier groups, then again I was nearly late to the startline for my start group as it was seeing we were staying 40mins+ out of town.

    Had a bit of fun with it though, spent most of the day bunch jumping with 4 other guys and we’d always find ourselves at the front of huge bunches doing all the work, so at one stage just to mix things up I let the lads know I was going to pop the speed up about 8k an hour (about 5mph) to just over 40 (so about 25-26mph) and smashed the rest of the bunch off the back and set off to run down the next bunch. Muahahaha! (Yes, I’m a little evil at times)

    So yeah, I thought 655th out of about 5,300 riders in my section wasn’t a bad effort, and about 37mins behind the winner. All in all a good day 🙂

    Didn’t win any spot prizes though 🙁

    Only thing now is though, no more racing until after New Years unless I decide to go do a 130k time trial which knowing the terrain doesn’t sound that appealing.

    • bikinginla says:

      By my calculation, that puts you ahead of about 87% of the riders out there. Sounds like a damn good finish to me.

      • TheTricksterNZ says:

        Sounds about right. Would have been in the top 10% had I got in the right bunch at the start.

  4. ubrayj02 says:

    The LA Draft Bike Plan makes no provision for cyclists on the major thoroughfares in East and North East LA. This despite the MTA’s 2002 study showing that

    “Bicyclists need access to the same destinations as drivers of automobiles. Origin and Destination Survey results show that the most common destinations for bicyclists are concentrated along major arterials, especially in areas with intense commercial activity”

    On N. Figueroa St., in front of the Bike Oven, a “Major Highway Class II” is said to run. This dream highway carries a minimum of 30,000 to 50,000 average daily trips on it, and at peak hours has a Level of Service “D”.

    The reality is that N. Figueroa St. carries a little over 20,000 average daily trips, at a Level of Service higher than D at peak hours.

    The consultants hired by the City of LA to survey N. Figueroa St. noticed this gap between the actual traffic count data on Figueroa St. and what it is “supposed to” carry. Their recommendation (thanks to Stephen Box’s Freedom of Information Act request) as to implement a “road diet”. A road diet is

    “… a treatment given to an urban roadway in which the number of lanes is reduced, and the freed space converted to parking, bike lanes, landscaping, walkways, or medians.”

    In other words, the consultant the city hired used data and engineering principles to recommend bike facilities on North Figueroa Street.

    The Draft Bike Plan rejects this recommendation, and instead N. Figueroa St. has been deemed “infeasible” for a bike lane.

    What the f***. How can the “Green Mayor” stand for this type of stuff? I certainly won’t. I hope you’ll join me and me friends at the Bike Oven in fighting to correct this error in the bike plan.

  5. […] big thanks to bikinginla for is "open comments" post! I never would have written this without the inspiration his blog gave me.] Bookmark the […]

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