CHP says we have a right to ride Mulholland, going away party for Villaraigosa, and finally, some links

I’m sure you remember the recent collision where everyone was lucky to walk away after a motorcyclist plowed into two bicyclists on Mulholland Highway.

I’m told that the inexperienced motorbike rider, who set events in motion by touching a foot down while leaning into the curve, has received one point against his license. Which he probably shouldn’t use for anything more challenging than riding, very slowly, to the nearest 7-11 and back.

Meanwhile, the CHP has reached out to local motorcycling groups to let them know, in no uncertain terms, that bicyclists have as much right to ride the road on Mulholland as they do. And we’re not going to go away, so they need to deal with it.

Maybe the CHP isn’t so anti-bike after all.

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Family members call for an investigation into the shooting of bike rider Terry Laffitte last month. There seems to be a rash of bike-involved police shootings these days.

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Say goodbye to outgoing Mayor Villaraigosa at a free party at Downtown’s Grand Park this Friday, complete with bike valet — something that became common at L.A. events during his tenure, thanks in part to the LACBC.

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SCSClaremont062213It’s a busy bike weekend, with the first memorial ride for fallen cyclist Chris Cono on Saturday, while CORBA will hold a memorial for former board member Danusia Bennett-Taber this Sunday. KNBC-4 looks forward to Sunday’s lucky 13th L.A. River Ride.

Also Sunday, learn to be more confident on your bike in Long Beach. And the LACBC is working with Metro to offer a series of free bike safety classes this summer.

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Streetsblog’s Damien Newton handicaps the candidates for chair of the city council Transportation Committee. The city council is scheduled to decide the fate of the Spring Street green bike lanes on Friday, June 14th; cyclists and supporters are urged to attend. The first section of the new Wilshire Blvd bus — and yes, bike — lanes are now officially open. Who rents Metro bike lockers and why. Speaking of bike parking, it looks like the Dodgers have finally improved theirs. Better Bike asks if civility is finally coming to the streets of Beverly Hills; probably not. Ride the Ballona Creek bike path to Marina del Rey with C.I.C.L.E., Metro and Walk ‘n’ Rollers on the 29th. Will Campbell offers a timelapse video of the longest game of bike/bus leapfrog ever. Richard Risemberg calls out the lies opponents of the Colorado Blvd bike lanes employed. Boyonabike says that new bike lane is great, but Arcadia is still stuck in a 1950’s auto-only mentality. The Press-Telegram says if bike share can make it in New York, it can make it anywhere — including L.A. And it will get to Long Beach eventually. California’s Coastal Commission will rule on a proposal for an expanded Long Beach bike path next week.

A bike rider is expected to survive after being critically injured in multi-car Buena Park collision, in a story just short enough to make it past the OC Register’s paywall. A 2.5 mile bike lane project in Thousand Oaks will plug the gap in what will be a 13-mile continuous bikeway. Chico could use eminent domain to complete a planned bike path bridge. A San Francisco court rules bicycling is an inherently dangerous activity in dismissing a suit against Strava. How not to make a right turn around bikes. What is it that reactionaries have against bicycles?

The Feds back off that long discredited claim that bike helmets reduce head injuries by 85%. An Arizona woman faces 10 to 25 years after pleading guilty to the drunken death of a college student from San Jose. Dallas pro cyclist Lauren Stephens races on weekends, and commutes to work by bike during the week. Far from being overrun with bike lanes, New York still doesn’t give cyclists their fair share. Is it just me, or is this cycle chic look from the New York Post just a little creepy? Now there’s some rational thinking, as locals call for bike lanes on a proposed I-10 bridge over Alabama’s Mobile River. Bob Mionske says the truth is finally emerging in the Toronto death of bike messenger Darcy Allan Sheppard. VeloNews says only Lance can save cycling.

Finally, it turns out that New York’s bike share isn’t a commie plot after all; it’s really a Nazi-Muslim plot to firebomb the streets of the city to avenge the WWII bombing of Dresden. Who knew? The Wall Street Journal’s Jason Gay says just get on a bike and it will all make sense; I wonder how long he’ll work there once the wicked witch finds out about it. And a Sonoma County writer seems to find great humor in the death, serious injury and possible impotence of bike riders.

Jerk.

6 comments

  1. Tom says:

    re the bike helmet item. Different ways of parsing the data.

    The WaPo writer quotes Washington Area Bicyclist Association (WABA) board member Jim Titus saying:
    “Studies in the last 20 years have calculated that helmets prevent 10 to 40 percent of head injuries,”

    BTW, WABA opposes mandatory helmet laws and actively lobbies aginst them,
    http://www.waba.org/blog/2013/02/why-marylands-proposed-helmet-law-would-make-cyclists-less-safe

    Contrast to recent NY Time article,

    http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/03/really-the-claim-cycling-is-the-top-sport-for-head-injuries

    ” … 90 percent of bicyclists killed in the United States in 2009 were not wearing helmets. A majority were middle-aged men.
    In New York City, 75 percent of all fatal bike accidents involve a head injury. … Bike accidents contribute to more sports-related head [sports] injuries than any other activity … ”

    Personally, I wouldn’t go around the block with out a helmet. I know several people who would be seriously injured or possibly dead without a helmet — their helmet cracked/split, but their head stayed relatively intact.

    • bikinginla says:

      I’m with you. I never ride without a helmet; the one time I needed mine was in a solo fall on a quiet, off-road path where it probably saved me from serious brain injury.

      I just believe in being very clear on what helmets can and can’t do. Bike helmets are only designed to protect against traumatic brain injury at impacts up to 12.5 mph, and offer little protection against traffic collisions that can typically occur at much higher speeds. And as a recent Bicycling Magazine article pointed out, they aren’t designed to protect against concussion in any way.

      Simply put, while bike helmets offer protection against TBIs, they aren’t the magic talismans many people seem to think they are that can somehow ward off serious injury for anyone who wears one. I frequently note the absurdity of news reports that mention whether the victim was wearing a helmet in situations where one wouldn’t have done any good.

      Mandatory helmet laws appear to reduce injury rates only by reducing the rate of cycling, and make impromptu riding and bike share programs impractical, discouraging many potential cyclists from riding, while offering little overall benefit.

      I can’t support making helmet use mandatory until helmet standards are revised to provide a much higher level of protection against TBIs while also offering significant protection against concussions. Until then, it’s just feel good legislation.

      • Louie says:

        “Mandatory helmet laws APPEAR to reduce injury rates only by reducing the rate of cycling.”

        That’s exactly it.

  2. […] You might remember that dramatic video of a motorcycle hitting a cyclist at “The Snake” on Mulholland Highway. It turns out some motorcyclists gripe quite a bit about the presence of pedalcyclists on “their” highway. The California Highway Patrol has apparently reached out to some of these groups and informed them that cyclists have as much right to the road as anyone else. […]

  3. There has been a lot of repeated misinformation about how many miles of bike lanes New York City installed under transportation commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan. One version is that they installed over 200 miles in three years and another version states almost 300 miles in her tenure.

    The truth is that NYC had installed less than 200 miles of bike lanes in six fiscal years under Janette Sadik-Khan as this NYC gov. pdf shows:

    http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/bikeroutedetailsfy07-fy12.pdf

    It becomes clear after looking at the above pdf that NYC is including sharrows as bike lanes when they make these claims for bike lane miles installed. Sharrows are not bike lanes, they are shared lane markings.

    In this current fiscal year the city of Los Angeles has crushed what perhaps was a record for the miles of bike lanes installed in a fiscal year by any city when NYC installed 62 miles of bike lanes in FY09. LA has installed at least 85 miles bike lanes in this fiscal year and they still have about 3 weeks left to increase that total. If sharrows are included as bike lanes as NYC did in their announcements, then LA has installed almost 200 miles of bike lanes in two fiscal years and that also beats the NYC claim of installing 200 miles of bike lanes in three years.

    Chicago also tried to redefine the meaning of protected bike lanes when they state that buffered bike lanes and barrier protected bike lanes are both protected bike lanes.

    The reason they are doing this is probably because mayor Rahm Emanuel stated that he would install 100 miles of protected bike lanes in his four years in office and now they are likely finding how difficult it would be to fulfill that promise. So, instead of admitting that they are unable to meet that promise they redefined the term protected bike lane.

    Here’s the amount of bikeways that Chicago installed in FY12:

    http://www.chicagobikes.org/pdf/Bikeways2012Report.pdf

    The upside to what Chicago for bicycling is that they are keeping the installation of standard sized bike lanes and sharrows to a very small amount of the total of bikeways with less than 2 miles of these installed last year.

    • gottobike says:

      I just love how invincible I become when wearing a CPSC approved cozy cup on my head. With this simple $100 device, I no longer need to be concerned about speeding traffic, lack of bicycle infrastructure or proper enforcement of law. All I have to do is purchase one of these amazing pieces of equipment every few years and I am completely safe.

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