Morning Links: Still more new bikes for good girls and boys, and real Long Beach UPS workers deliver by bike

‘Tis the season.

Forty-five Clovis CA kids get bikes refurbished by local prison inmates.

Middletown CA’s Bike Angel has given 980 bikes to victims of September’s Valley fire, with another 600 to go.

A former pro football player teams with his brother to give bikes to deserving children in the Houston neighborhood where he grew up.

Texas police team up with Santa Clause to deliver 20 bikes to children in foster care.

PA law enforcement personnel pitch in to buy an adaptive bike for a disabled child.

Meanwhile, cycling Brit Santas ride to demand funding for safe bikeways.

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Local

No, those weren’t fake UPS workers stealing packages in Long Beach, they were actually making their deliveries by bicycle. But despite what the story says, it’s not only in Long Beach.

A Glendale letter writer says there’s a safer alternative route for bicyclists to bypass the Mariposa bridge, where riders are now required to walk their bikes across. Although walking across a dirt horse and pedestrian bridge seems pretty damn safe to me.

Santa Monica police bust a one-man crime wave in the process of stealing some bikes.

 

State

This is why you let the police handle it. A pair of San Diego men were stabbed in the back when they tried to recover a bicycle after it was stolen from the brother of one of the men.

Bizarrely, that wasn’t the only bike stabbing in San Diego, as a 45-year old rider was stabbed several times after colliding with a pedestrian.

The threat of bicycle theft is one of the biggest deterrents to bike riding, in Salinas or anywhere else; a new study from a Canadian university shows half of all riders have had a bike stolen, while one in five have lost at least three. One solution may be micro tagging. A better solution is increasing the penalty for bike theft to make it worth prosecuting.

A Brazilian tourist hit by an out-of-control San Francisco tour bus is making a full recovery, though he’s going to have a nasty scar on his head.

Sacramento is planning a 4.5 mile rail-to-trail conversion on an unused railroad corridor.

 

National

A transportation researcher says bicycles can be a huge part of fighting climate change. But it will only work if more people feel safe riding them.

Honolulu businesses blame a parking protected bike lane for a drop in business.

For once, the punishment fits the crime. A homeless Portland man who bragged of being the king of bike thieves has been sentenced to two and a half years in prison, and will need permission and a receipt to possess a bicycle after his release.

A Montana town is planning to develop a bike camp to host bike tourists.

A Savannah GA writer says a proposal to ban bikes in a park will force riders onto dangerous streets, and waste already scarce police resources enforcing it.

A Florida man faces charges a year and a half after a fatal, drunken hit-and-run, after his ex-girlfriend recants a claim that she was behind the wheel.

 

International

London’s Boris Bikes will be fitted with a Blaze laser light that projects the image of a bicycle on the roadway 16 feet ahead of the rider.

A UK site offers 10 questions every cyclist must answer. Which actually apply only to the subset of roadies who want to go really fast, like I used to.

The 2017 Tour de France will kick off in Dusseldorf.

New graphene-infused tires from Italy’s Vittoria will harden while riding straight, and soften when accelerating, braking or turning for better traction and control. No wonder the inventors won the Nobel Prize.

The Guardian says the new one-meter passing law in an Aussie state will be met with anger even while it saves lives. Meanwhile, one group says the state’s new requirement to carry ID while riding will make it an international laughing stock.

A New Zealand paper says it’s too early to criticize a new cycletrack when the lanes haven’t even been painted yet.

Singapore gets its first on-road bike lanes, but only on a resort island.

 

Finally…

No retirement plan? Try operating a London pedicab, where one rider tried to charge $894 for a half-hour ride. If you really want to lose weight, get off your bike and start dancing.

And is it really that impressive when Harrison Ford mounts a mountain bike atop his Mercedes?

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It’s the last two days of the BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive. Thanks to George Wolfberg, Ralph Durham, Vanessa Gray, and Lois Rubin for their generous support.

Who could turn down a face like that?

Evidently, Santa’s reindeer are getting shorter this year. But seriously, who could turn down a face like that?

2 comments

  1. David Wolfberg says:

    The article says Harrison Ford’s car is a Volvo but the wheels sure look like Mercedes. I’m just gonna call it the Millennium Bike-on.

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