Archive for Advocacy & Politics

Despite ebike panic, the real danger comes from drivers; and Manhattan Beach approves likely illegal bike crackdown

My apologies once again for last week’s unexcused absence. 

I’m still struggling to adjust to taking insulin with meals multiple times a day, and relearning what and when to eat. 

Every time I think I have my diabetes figured out, they change my meds and I have to start all over again. 

Last week that resulted in wild, more than 200 point swings in my blood sugar levels, which is over twice the normal range. And which inevitably knocks me on my ass whether I’m too high, or too low. 

But hopefully that’s behind me now, and we can ease back into all the latest bike news. Although it could take me a few days to catch up on everything. 

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He gets it.

The Los Angeles Times’ Ryan Fonseca writes that the recent panic over ebike safety obscures that fact that the real danger stems from cars, and the people who drive them.

Not from the ebikes themselves.

In fact, despite the recent bicycling state of emergency that ensued after 15-year old Brodee Champlain Kingman was killed in a collision while riding an ebike in Encinitas, 88% of ebike crashes since 2020 also involved someone driving a motor vehicle.

Here’s just part of what Fonseca has to say.

I noticed a car-sized hole in much of the media coverage and government response; overwhelmingly, the collisions and injuries and deaths resulted from a car driver hitting a bike rider. But you wouldn’t necessarily know that from reading news articles or government reports.

The focus on young e-bike riders’ safety can obscure the bigger crisis: People driving cars and trucks are killing more people on our roads.

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Manhattan Beach announced a crackdown on bike riders in the beachside city, although they may have gone just a tad too far.

Okay, a lot too far.

According to the city’s website, the new restrictions include —

  • Prohibits riding on City sidewalks, plazas, grass areas, the Strand, parking structures owned or operated by the City, County, or State, and Veterans Parkway.
  • Prohibits riding at speeds over 15 miles per hour on the Marvin Braude Bike Trail (i.e. Beach Bike Path), and maintains the current “Walk Only Zone” on both sides of the pier.
  • Requires wearing of properly strapped helmets for all riders under 18 years of age;
  • Requires riders to use bike lanes where possible, and on streets without bike lanes, to ride close to the right curb or edge of roadway.
  • Requires riders to ride in single file and not more than two abreast.
  • Prohibits riding on the back of a bicycle or e-bike without a seat.
  • Prohibits speeding, racing, or stunt activity.
  • Reaffirms requirements to yield to pedestrians at all times.

The regulations call for a $500 fine for a first violation, $750 for the second, and $1,000 for each additional infraction within one year of the person’s first citation.

Although state law already covers some of these, like requiring bike riders under 18 to wear a helmet, and for bicyclists to use bike lanes on streets that have them, even though they’re allowed to leave the bike lanes for any number of reasons.

However, Manhattan Beach oversteps their authority when tinkering with traffic regulations, which are exclusively the authority of the state, not local governments.

That includes requiring bike riders to ride next to the curb, when state law only requires riding as close to the curb as practicable. They also can’t legally prevent bicyclists from taking any lane that is too narrow to safely share with a motor vehicle, or when traveling at the normal speed of traffic.

Nor can they require bicyclists to ride single file, or prohibit riding more than two abreast in a single traffic lane, which is permitted under state law.

Never mind that the requirements to ride single file and not more that two-abreast are self-contradictory. And those fines are meaningless if they exceed what the state allows for the same violation.

If it’s a violation at all under state law.

It’s also worth noting that the restrictions on sidewalk riding could go out the window if AB 825 passes in the state legislature, which would legalize sidewalk riding statewide, and is signed into law by the governor.

Which is a damn good reason to ask your state representatives to support it.

And if you get a ticket for violating any of the new restrictions on any surface street, get yourself a damn good lawyer.

………

Pasadena’s first protected bike lane is officially open for business.

State Senator and congressional candidate Anthony Portanino joined Pasadena officials in opening the new 1.5-mile Union Street Protected Bike Lane, the area’s first two-way protected bike lane.

Students from all five South Pasadena schools, from elementary through high school, turned out for a bike ride to mark the grand opening of the new Union Street bikeway.

A Pasadena writer celebrates the bikeway’s opening, but expresses concerns that not enough outreach has been done to educate bike riders and drivers about the risks of a two-way bike lane, as well as regretting that the project didn’t include a bike lane on Colorado Blvd, as well.

……..

It’s now been a full two years since California approved what would, and should, have been the nation’s first ebike rebate program.

Which is too damn long to wait.

Instead, we’ve seen countless other cities and states move forward with programs of their own, without the endless delays we’ve had to endure.

But at least they’re finally accepting applications from retailers to participate in the program, so maybe there’s hope.

But don’t hold your breath.

………

Irwindale bike shop Irwindale Cycles may be forced out of business after 25 years, after three men stole 17 bicycles worth $40,000 in an early morning break-in two weeks ago.

A crowdfunding page to help the owners meet business expenses and replace the purloined bikes has raised nearly half of the modest $10,000 goal.

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BikeLA says you, too, can become an LCI.

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

No bias here. A New York bike rider got a summons from the NYPD for riding his bike on the sidewalk when he tried to keep cops from parking on it.

You’ve got to be kidding. After a Florida bike rider was injured in a collision, the local TV station can’t even be bothered to mention that the car had a driver.

No bias here, either. A driver in the UK walked without charges, or even a ticket, despite reversing down a country road at a bike rider following a punishment pass — and running over a dog in the process — after police investigators concluded he probably just wanted to talk with the person on the bike, who was warned not to shout at any drivers in the future. All I can say is they’re damn lucky that wasn’t my dog. 

But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.

A Singaporean bicyclist is being investigated for an alleged road rage attack on a driver’s car, after denting the car’s hood with his fist in response to the impatient driver honking at him.

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Local 

The LA Times considers the challenges Woodland Hills drivers are having adjusting to reverse diagonal parking on Ventura Blvd, which allows for more parking spaces while eliminating the risk of dooring bicyclists. Never mind the risk we face from drivers backing up in the bike lane.

Beverly Hills to planning to install bike lanes on Beverly Blvd, which would connect to planned bike lanes in West Hollywood.

Culver City cops busted a pair of would-be bike thieves who tried to steal a bicycle from a Rite-Aid on Culver Center Drive in broad daylight.

The curvy, 2.4-mile stretch of steep canyon road through the Santa Monica Mountains known as The Snake could reopen in January, after closing to motor vehicles for the past four years due to damage from the Woolsey fire and subsequent mudslides.

 

State

Calbike wants you to take the State Highway Complete Streets Survey.

A jury has been seated in the murder trial of Sergio Reynaldo Gutierrez for intentionally running down and killing 46-year old Riverside resident Benedicto Solanga with his pickup, as Solanga walked his bike with another person; Gutierrez allegedly flipped Solanga the bird as he drove by, then made a U-turn to come back and ram into him.

Someone riding a bicycle in Indio was hospitalized after they were struck by a driver Sunday afternoon.

A new study suggests that fears that a proposed road diet and wide, protected bike lanes on San Francisco’s Grand Avenue could delay buses are unfounded.

Critical Mass returned to Lake Tahoe after a decade, in response to a Caltrans proposal to increase speed limits.

 

National

NPR explains why journalists often use a passive voice to describe crashes, after a listener complains about a headline saying 17-year old fallen cyclist Magnus White was hit by a car, not a driver.

Las Vegas bicyclists installed a ghost bike to honor former Bell, California police chief Andreas Probst, who was allegedly murdered when he was intentionally run down from behind by a 17-year old driver in a stolen car.

A writer for an Apple website used his iPhone to document a 4-day, 253-mile tour of central Minnesota.

A Buffalo NY writer gets her first new bike at age 70, after a lifetime of bicycling.

Now that’s an open streets event. Thousands of DC-area bike riders turned out to enjoy a whopping 20 miles of carfree streets.

 

International

Momentum highlights North America’s best bike trails, including NorCal’s 25.4-mile Buzz Johnson Trail.

Canadian national park officers shot and killed an aggressive coyote in Nova Scotia’s Cape Breton that had chased people on bicycles, after a second coyote bit a woman when she got off her bike last week.

The National Review offers a photo essay of the decennial Knutsford Great Race on Penny Farthings.

Police in the UK pulled an accused terrorist off a bicycle as he rode along a London canal path, four days after he escaped prison by strapping himself to the bottom of a food delivery truck.

An Indian driver faces murder charges after security cam video shows him intentionally running down a 15-year old bike-riding relative, just because the boy had told him not to urinate near a local temple.

A South Korean bike path may smell of exhaust from the cars speeding by on either side, but its solar panel covering provides power for around 500 homes, as well as shade for the riders using it.

 

Competitive Cycling

Colorado’s Sepp Kuss is just six days from rolling into Madrid wearing the Vuelta’s red leader’s jersey, after making the surprising leap from top domestique for Primož Roglič and Jonas Vingegaard to leading them by more than a minute and a half.

Belgium’s Remco Evenepoel continued to attack on Sunday, seeking a second consecutive stage win after falling out of the overall battle after his disastrous stage 13 ride up the Col du Tourmalet on Friday.

Belgian Wout van Aert won his second Tour of Britain, despite being forced to fight for the win on the final stage.

L39ion of Los Angeles cyclists Kendall Ryan and Ty Magner won the women’s and men’s elite races in the penultimate race of the American Criterium Cup series, but it was American Cycling’s Danny Summerhill who clinched the men’s Crit Cup title.

Instagram users came through for former US crit champ Rahsaan Bahati and his Bahati Foundation by locating his team’s abandoned trailer in Long Beach after it was stolen and ransacked, with $15,000 worth of equipment taken.

Sixteen-year old US national age group time trial champ Gray Barnett got his $12,000 racing bike back after the airline lost it, thanks to an Apple AirTag, which tracked it across the Atlantic.

 

Finally…

When you’re on the run from the cops, try not to run past a boy willing to loan them his bike. Trying out the cheapest ebike on Amazon to answer the burning question, “how bad can it be?”

And The Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards begrudgingly signs autographs for bicyclists riding next to his limo. Thanks to Westside Wheelmen for the heads-up. 

………

Be safe, and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.

Oh, and fuck Putin

Lack of art and infrastructure in Redondo Beach, driver injures 3 Temecula bike riders, and screening Biking While Black

If you’re planning to ride today, remember drivers won’t expect to see you out in the rain.

Or even afterwards if the day turns out to be cold but dry after the overnight rains.

Despite the evidence of their own eyes, too many drivers assume no one would ever ride a bicycle in less than ideal conditions.

So light yourself up. Ride defensively. And even more than most days, assume you’re invisible. Because chances are, you might as well be.

Today’s photo: Bike themed food court seating in Culver City.

………

Dr. Grace Peng offers a thread on Redondo Beach’s lack of safe and secure bike infrastructure.

And art.

Click on the tweets to read the full thread. 

https://twitter.com/gspeng/status/1619808057395134464

………

Seriously, jus how crappy a driver do you have to be to take out three Temecula bike riders at once?

Fortunately, no one was killed this time.

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UCLA’s Lewis Center will host a screening of Yolanda Davis-Overstreet’s documentary Biking While Black a week from tomorrow.

https://twitter.com/lacivilrights/status/1618640923251933185

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The Community Social Planning Council is hosting a free virtual panel discussion tomorrow to discuss ways to reduce minimum parking requirements

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The Bike League is offering a reduced rate to attend their annual Bike Summit in Washington DC this March through the end of this month.

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

No bias here. A Toronto columnist complains about plans to make protected bike lanes on a commercial corridor permanent, saying the city needs to put safety concerns over ideology. But safety for whom? Why should the theoretical slowing of a theoretical fire truck outweigh the very real safety needs of daily bike riders?

………

Local 

Urbanize looks at a plan for the proposed Arts District Metro station, which could include a connection to the LA River bike path once it’s extended through DTLA.

A Claremont letter writer says he opposes the re-installation of red light cams, even though he counts the red light-running drivers on his daily bicycle commute.

 

State

An exploding ebike battery apparently set off a fire that torched a Huntington Beach apartment; a local fire marshal recommended avoiding overcharging ebike batteries, while noting that ebikes are not inherently dangerous.

Oceanside is regaining its sanity, announcing plans for a lane reduction on the Coast Highway 101 from four to two lanes for a one-mile section, as well as installing bike lanes, pedestrian crossing and roundabouts.

Carlsbad’s city council voted to extend the city’s bicycle, ebike and mobility device state of emergency through March 25th.

Bakersfield opened a 2.5-mile, $1.1 million multi-use path and bridge connecting West Bakersfield with the Kern River Bike Path.

San Francisco is reaching out to underserved communities as the city develops its Active Communities Plan, which comes after it already remade its streets by making many of the temporary pandemic-era bike lanes and Slow Streets permanent.

 

National

They get it. A government technology website says ebikes are great for replacing car trips, but they’re only as good as the infrastructure they travel, which is often lacking from low-income neighborhoods.

Maui, Hawaii is now limiting commercial bicycle tours, after the popular rides evidently became too popular, particularly descents of the Haleakalā volcano.

While Orange County is panicking over teenage ebike riders, Hawaii has proposed giving high school students ebike rebates up to $2,000 to help keep more cars off the roads at school times.

A wishy washy Oregon editorial questions whether Oregon should establish an ebike rebate program, without voicing an opinion one way or another — except to say it could result in wealthier Oregonians getting some of the money.

A Las Vegas man without a permanent home gives back to the community through near-daily bikeshare rides to deliver homemade sandwiches to the city’s homeless people.

The official route has been announced for this year’s RAGBRAI ride across Iowa, the 50th anniversary of the ride.

Two women in Wisconsin offer advice on riding through the state’s frigid winters. Meanwhile, we’re often told at public meetings that no one would want to ride in a chilly LA winter, where it sometimes gets all the way down to 50°. Brrrrrr.

An Illinois columnist complains about stepping into a linguistic minefield when he referred to the “cross-through” bike his daughter wanted as a girl’s bike, apparently conflating a cross bike with a step-through.

Nashville advocates held a memorial on one of the city’s deadliest streets for the 48 pedestrians and two bike riders killed on Music City streets last year.

A Maine op-ed credits the state’s DOT with providing bike riders and pedestrians with a glimmer of hope by creating the state’s first-ever active transportation plan.

A new Massachusetts law starting April 1st will require drivers to stay four feet from bike riders and other vulnerable road users.

A Jersey City man has filed a $1 million claim against the city, saying he was the victim of a hit-and-run when he was struck by a councilwoman who didn’t bother to stop, after allegedly riding his bike through a red light; she has already been fined $5,000 and lost her license for a year as a result.

 

International

A new backpack takes the Hövding inflatable bike helmet a step further, deploying into an airbag designed to protect your head, shoulders and chest, while automatically dialing 911 in the event of an impact. No word on cost or how much it weighs. 

Londoners are now being offered free e-scooter rides to scrap their older gas-guzzling cars.

A British writer credits a bikeshare tour of the duchy of Cornwall with rekindling his love of bicycling.

The prize for Britain’s shortest bike lane goes to the city of Birmingham, which installed a seven-foot bike lane purportedly to improve safety.

Former MMA champ and all-around human train wreck Conor McGregor is one of us, as he insists he could have been killed when a driver hit his bike while riding in Ireland.

A travel site lists nine reasons bicyclists will fall in love with Ireland, from Galway to Guinness. I cold sum it up in one — it’s Ireland. 

A local bike club donated 70 bicycles to 12 schools in Ghana to help students get to class without being too tired to study, though the Chief of Boko — ie, head of education — warned the students not to use the bikes to road aimlessly. Because the last thing you’d want to do is ride a bike just because it’s fun, right?

Concerns are rising about the effect of Japan’s new helmet mandate on the country’s bikeshare systems; Yokohama’s BayBike system will experiment with loaning out bike helmets, with just three helmets available for its 178,000 registered users. Yes, 3.

A bill in the Philippine Senate would create a nationwide bike lane network.

A pair of Aussie university professors ask the difficult question of “what do cyclists wan,” and mostly get it right, from safe infrastructure to bicycling as the new normal. Although they somehow leave out donuts, coffee and beer.

 

Competitive Cycling

There may be hope for American pro cycling yet, as Neilson Powless claimed his third pro victory and first of the year with a solo breakaway in Sunday’s Grand Prix Cycliste de Marseille.

Colombian cyclist Egan Bernal talks about last year’s near-fatal crash, as the 2019 Tour de France champ says people thought he was dead after riding his bike into the back of a parked truck during a training ride.

American pro Ayesha McGowan says she’s finally ready to race after uterine fibroids derailed her first year on the WorldTour.

 

Finally…

That feeling when you pedal the entire length of the East Coast on one wheel, instead of two. Dear Abby says no, you don’t have to touch a sweaty bike rider.

And nothing like mistakenly crediting your ancestor with inventing the bicycle, as if merely inventing the treadle bike wasn’t good enough.

………

Be safe, and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.

Oh, and fuck Putin, too.

 

The world is on fire, and LA is lighting the match — demand the bike and bus lanes they promised us this afternoon!

Let’s go back to yesterday’s lead item.

As you’ll recall, we directed your attention to this afternoon’s 3 pm meeting of the LA City Council Transportation Committee, which will take up proposals for so-called Complete Street makeovers on Highland, La Brea and Culver.

Or rather, make that Incomplete Streets.

Because according to Streets For All’s Michael Schneider, there are currently no plans for bike lanes in any of the plans, despite what was promised in the 2010 bike plan, which was then downgraded, but still retained, in the city’s mobility plan.

Instead, the references to “bikeway striping” contained in the Highland Ave and La Brea Blvd plans probably just means sharrows, at most.

In other words, another attempt by city officials to thin the herd, with arrows conveniently painted on the street to help drivers improve their aim when they come up behind us.

In the 2010 bike plan, both Highland and La Brea were key components of the vaunted Backbone Network, designed to provide people on bicycles with the same sort of convenient and efficient cross-city routes drivers have long come to expect.

But in the mobility plan, which we were told would directly incorporate the already approved bike plan, they were instead downgraded to Tier 3 bike lanes, meaning they’re not likely to be built before the plan expires in 2035.

Or ever, in all likelihood.

The truth is, the city never had any intention of actually building them, now or in the foreseeable future. Despite adopting them by a unanimous vote of the city council.

Just another example of city officials lying to the second most vulnerable group of people on our streets.

And absolutely shameful at a time when California and our world is literally on fire, and despite the future ambassador to India mayor proposed Green New Deal to save the planet.

Yeah, good luck with that.

Because if we don’t have the political will to stripe a slightly inconvenient bike lane, we’re sure all hell not going to make the tough choices needed to make a significant dent in LA’s carbon footprint.

To make matters worse, the proposed La Brea Complete Street was supposed to include a dedicated bus lane. But city staffers have proposed removing that, apparently because they don’t want to inconvenience the people in the highly inefficient, planet destroying cars.

The future — and all of us — be damned.

We need to let the council that sharrows aren’t good enough, and we want the damn bike lanes they promised us. Along with a dedicated bus lane on La Brea’s busy transit corridor.

And every other major transit corridor, for that matter.

And we want them now. Not some far off hazy date in the future when no one is likely to object, which will probably never come.

Because we can no longer afford to surrender our streets, our world, and our lives at the altar of the motor vehicle.

………

Speaking of Streets For All, Schneider has forwarded instructions on how to comment this afternoon, along with a comment template to put into your own words.

Although personally, while I agree with comment below, I think it’s much too mild. I’m mad as hell, and I plan to let the councilmembers know that.

And I plan to demand action on the Highland bike lane, as well as a bus lane on La Brea, which could be shared by anyone on a bike brave enough to let a bus driver run up his or her ass.

Because it’s long past time to stop accepting their mealy-mouthed environmental promises, and demand that they start living up to them.

Starting right effing now.

Motion: build a “Complete Street” on La Brea by ignoring the Mobility Plan’s bus lane

Committee: Transportation

If you can call in and make public comment live, the meeting is on Tuesday, August 17 at 3pm. Call 1 669 254 5252, use Meeting ID No. 161 750 5079#. Press # again when prompted for participant ID. Once admitted into the meeting, press *9 to request to speak.

You are commenting on Item 11 (La Brea bus lane) – talking points below

If you can’t call in live -> 

Public comment link: https://cityclerk.lacity.org/publiccomment/?cfnumber=17-0950-S2

Template (please customize in your own words and be sure to enter your city and zip code at the end):

Dear City Council,

I am very discouraged that in 2021, with the UN telling us that we are facing a climate catastrophe, my City Council is building what they call complete streets that don’t include facilities for buses or bikes. We cannot meet our climate goals without including realistic alternatives to the car – and electric vehicles are neither a silver bullet, nor will they come quickly enough to dramatically reduce emissions.

Specifically as to the “complete street” you are considering building on La Brea, you mention in the report that the street has a bus lane per the 2035 Mobility Plan. However, you then go on to say that you are suggesting we ignore our own plan, and rebuild the street without the bus lane. I do not want my tax dollars to only go to car infrastructure, it is time we think about multi modality. I ask that if you proceed with the La Brea project, that you build the bus lane as is intended in the City’s own Mobility Plan, and further that you instruct the Bureau of Engineering to follow the mobility plan going forward. It is no longer an option to ignore it. Our planet is counting on your leadership.

Thank you,

[YOUR NAME]

[YOUR CITY AND ZIP CODE]

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Streets For All has also provided instructions and templates to comment on proposals to curb illegal street racing and exhaust noise at tomorrow’s Public Safety Committee meeting.

Motion: to re-design streets to prevent illegal street racing

Motion: to crack down on illegal exhaust noise.

Committee: Public Safety

If you can call in and make public comment live, the meeting is on Wednesday, August 18 at 330pm. Call 1 669 254 5252, use Meeting ID No. 161 586 7607#. Press # again when prompted for participant ID. Once admitted into the meeting, press *9 to request to speak.

You are commenting on Item 8 (re-design streets to prevent illegal street racing) and Item 10 (crack down on illegal exhaust noise) – talking points below.

If you can’t call in live ->

Street racing issue:

Public comment link: https://cityclerk.lacity.org/publiccomment/?cfnumber=21-0870

Template (please customize in your own words and be sure to enter your city and zip code at the end):

Dear City Council,

Our streets in Los Angeles are designed like highways – they are extremely wide, and when drivers feel like they have a wide open road, they tend to drive faster. Street racing has become a particular problem in the city, taking advantage of our street design. I am highly supportive of the City re-designing streets to discourage bad behavior by drivers – including street racing. Specifically, I encourage the city to narrow lanes, add bus and bike lanes (these interventions can also calm speeding cars down), and add other things like speed tables and speed bumps, chicanes, and the timing of traffic lights that doesn’t allow for uninterrupted speeding traffic.

Thank you,

[YOUR NAME]

[YOUR CITY AND ZIP CODE]

Cracking down on illegal exhaust noise:

Public comment link: https://cityclerk.lacity.org/publiccomment/?cfnumber=20-1267

Template (please customize in your own words and be sure to enter your city and zip code at the end):

Dear City Council,

In my part of Los Angeles, I am kept awake by illegally loud exhaust noise. While I enjoy being in an urban environment, I didn’t sign up for living on a racetrack. California law limits motorcycles and vehicles to 80 decibels, and yet I often hear cars and motorcycles well beyond that. People seem to drive with these illegally modified exhaust systems with impunity. While I do not wish to see more armed police officers doing traffic enforcement, I ask that the city clamp down on the shops performing these illegal exhaust modifications. Solving this problem will create a more livable city.

Thank you,

[YOUR NAME]

[YOUR CITY AND ZIP CODE]

………

We’ll be back on Wednesday with our usual Morning Links to catch up on anything we missed today.

I wanted to make sure you got this in time to take action this afternoon. Because a couple dozen comments will be easily ignored.

A couple hundred won’t be.

Noted safety advocate’s tragic story of friend’s death as they were riding together is compelling — but it may not be true

Due to the time and effort this story has taken, there will be no Morning Links today. We’ll catch up on anything we missed tomorrow. 

Photo by Danny Gamboa.

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It’s not unusual for advocates to disagree about bike and traffic safety.

It’s doesn’t necessarily mean one person is right and the other wrong. And it doesn’t mean we can’t respect one another, or work together on issues where we find common ground.

That’s the position I find myself now, after learning respected safety advocate Pat Hines, founder of the nationally recognized nonprofit youth program Safe Moves, opposes the California Safety Stop, aka Stop as Yield, bill that recently passed the state assembly.

Hines cites a personal tragedy in opposing the bill, when a friend was killed as they were riding together while training.

This is from a recent story from the Sacramento Bee.

For Pat Hines, founder of traffic safety group Safe Moves, this bill is personal.

While training for the 1984 Olympics, Hines and a fellow cyclist, Sue Latham, rode their bikes through an intersection, believing they had enough time to cross. Hines made it across, but Latham was struck and killed by an oncoming vehicle.

Hines tells virtually the same story in this 2013 piece from the Mountain View Voice.

Safe Moves founder, Pat Hines, started the organization in 1983, after her friend, Sue Latham, was killed while the two were riding their bikes together.

Neither of the two were wearing helmets, Hines recalls, “because I don’t like helmets and I had asked her not to wear one either.”

Hines blew through a stop sign and Latham followed her. And while Hines made it in time, Latham didn’t — she was struck by a passing car, which never stopped.

There’s just one problem.

It may not be true.

……….

I confess, I wasn’t aware of Hines’ opposition to AB 122, or the tragedy that spurred her life of advocacy, until a few days ago.

That’s when I received an email from Serge Issakov, a longtime advocate for San Diego bicyclists.

I don’t always agree with him, either. But I always respect him, and his opinion, and make a point of listening to whatever he has to say.

It was Issakov who pointed me to the article in the Bee, and called out the discrepancy in her story.

As the stop-as-yield bill is working its way through Sacramento there have been several articles about it, and several quote cycling safety advocate and former RAAM racer Pat Hines, who opposes the bill, saying that she was once riding with a friend, Sue Latham, who rolled a stop and was hit, fatally. I of course felt empathy for the horror Hines must have experienced as I first read the story in the Sacramento Bee.

He reached out to me after coming across this 2018 article from the LA Daily Mirror historic website, which tells a radically different story about how Latham was killed.

One which did not involve them riding together — or Latham running a stop sign.

In fact, she wasn’t even on her bike at the time.

California Highway Patrol investigators said that [Sue Latham] was apparently kneeling on the side of the highway, trying to unjam the gears on her bike, when a motorist hit her, throwing her 15 to 20 feet in the air, causing massive head injuries and leaving a pool of blood on Pacific Coast Highway. Whoever hit her dragged her to the construction site and partially undressed her to make it appear that she had been raped, and then made a second trip to get her bike, the CHP said. Because she was nearly 6 feet tall, investigators said it might have taken two people to drag her to where she was found.

As Issakov pointed out, two extremely different accounts.

One is a simple, and all too common story, about a hit-and-run that occurred after someone blew a stop, with tragic consequences.

The other, a bizarre tale that strains all credibility.

Except it’s the second version that seems to be true.

………

The story starts to change as you move back in time.

Starting with this 2008 story in the Sahuarita Sun, which cites Hines as saying Latham had run a red light, rather than a stop sign.

Hines told students she started the organization in memory of her best friend, Sue Latham, who died in 1983 when she was hit by a car while riding her bicycle along the Pacific Coast Highway in California. Hines, also on a bicycle, had run a red light, and her friend followed. Latham was thrown 65 feet and died in the hospital three days later.

Hines said she was young at the time of the accident, and reckless about traffic safety.

“There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about my friend,” Hines said.

Note that the story is also off by two years on the 1981 date of Latham’s death.

However, those discrepancies can easily be written off as a simple trick of memory.

More troubling is a 1993 story from the Los Angeles Times, which suggests Hines wasn’t with Latham at all when she was struck.

And again, the story incorrectly sets Latham’s death in 1983, rather than 1981.

She began (Safe Moves) after her best friend was killed on a bicycle Nov. 13, 1983, by a hit-and-run motorist. Sue Latham had been on her way to meet Hines for a morning ride on Malibu’s Pacific Coast Highway.

“The guilt I felt for Sue’s death was overwhelming,” Hines said. “I’d been responsible for her being interested in bicycle riding… I’d told her, ‘Don’t worry, the cars have to look out for us.’ ”

………

But when we go back to more contemporaneous accounts, like this 1982 Associated Press story published in the Santa Cruz Sentinel just over two months after Latham’s death, and archived on the California Digital Newspaper Collection maintained by UC Riverside, the story changes completely.

And the bizarre fake rape story starts to become much more credible.

It was near dawn on a cloudy Sunday morning last fall when Miss Latham set out alone from Santa Monica on a bicycle ride up the scenic highway.

She had moved to Los Angeles just two months earlier from Austin, Texas. Miss Latham, who held a master’s degree in quantum mechanics, seemed to be settling nicely into the Southern California lifestyle. She had joined a swim club and loved to bicycle.

As she pedaled her 10-speed into Malibu on Nov. 15, she apparently developed a problem with the bike and got off to make repairs along the shoulder of the road. As Miss Latham was working, an automobile swerved and struck her, throwing her 15 to 20 feet.

Investigators say the driver, and perhaps another person, got out of the car and dragged her to a site about 100 feet away. They removed her shorts and underpants, shoved her beneath a partially constructed home and drove off. Police say it was an attempt to make Miss Latham look as if she was raped and beaten.

Two days later, in a hospital, Miss Latham died of head injuries and the Malibu office of the California Highway Patrol had a homicide to solve…

The story goes on to describe a billboard campaign and reward intended to find Latham’s killer.

And it mentions Hines, with no suggestion she was with Sue Latham when she was killed.

Pat Hines, a member of the (Santa Monica Swim Club) and a friend of Miss Latham’s, is hoping to boost the reward to $100,000.

Ms Hines said friends told her that as soon as the emotional impact wore off, people would lose interest. It isn’t true, she said. “I get letters from people all the time”, including from those whose sons and daughters have been killed by hit-and-run drivers, she said. “People are desperate to help.”

“I don’t want to let it get by”, she said. “I don’t want her to become just another statistic.”

………

An even more contemporaneous article from the Austin American Statesman, written just a month after Latham’s death, tells her personal story in much more detail.

And confirms the tragic crime as told by the CHP, rather than Hines’ version of events.

The paper describes Latham as having a genius IQ, and publishing an article on the quantum mechanical study of a particular laser reaction in the journal of a prestigious British academic society, while studying for her masters at the University of Texas.

She was also a talented artist, with her work displayed in a New York gallery when she was just 17.

And she was active in the budding environmental movement of the 1970s, as well as campaigning for the Equal Rights Amendment.

Somewhere along the way, though, her interests shifted to the family business of writing, following in the footsteps of her novelist father and screenwriter sister and brother-in-law.

Which led her to move to Los Angeles to break into the business as a screenwriter and actress. And led to her friendship with Hines, then an advertising director for KRTH-AM.

“I met Sue in a restaurant,” Hines recalled. “I train daily on a bike, and Sue asked me if I knew any places to ride that were safe. I told her LA is really a bad place to ride…cars are everywhere and motorists don’t pay any attention to people on bikes. I said it was important to ride with somebody, and she kind of smiled and said, “I don’t worry about things like that…

The bike route Hines and other friends suggested was the Pacific Coast Highway, but they said the ride should only be undertaken early in the morning when traffic was light, preferably on holidays or weekends.

On the final day of her life, Latham borrowed her sister’s car, and parked behind Gladstones at Sunset and PCH, where she planned to meet the other members of the swim team later that Sunday morning.

Shortly after 7 am, Latham got off her bike on southbound PCH and knelt alongside the road; the CHP suspected she was fixing a mechanical problem.

That’s when the driver, who still hasn’t been caught 40 years later, veered off the side of the road, slamming into her.

Unconscious, and likely clinically dead, she was alone and defenseless against her killer or killers.

What happened next turned the case from a routine traffic accident into a bizarre incident that captured the attention of a city not known for its compassion.

Someone dragged Latham off the roadway, leaving her under a beach house under construction about 30 feet from the highway. Doctors later found sand in her brain.

After the injured woman was hidden from view, someone removed Latham’s shorts and underwear. her bike was concealed behind a nearby construction crane, and her backpack, containing her current journal, was stolen.

Note that there is no mention of Hines, or anyone else, being with her, other than the heartless cowards who took her life and went to extraordinary lengths to coverup the crime.

In fact, the story makes it very clear that, not only was Hines not with her, but wasn’t even aware of her death until the next day.

Outrage. The word comes up frequently in conversations with Californians who knew Latham or who have heard about the case.

One person who uses the word is Hines.

“We must have ridden right past her and not known it,” she said.

Hines said she got back to the restaurant where Sue had left her car about 2 pm that Sunday, but did not notice the Mercedes was still there.

The next morning, unaware of the accident, Hines saw Latham’s car in the restaurant parking lot about 6 am.

“It was still pitch dark,” she said. “I thought Sue might have gone swimming by herself. I ran up and down the beach but I didn’t see her.”

Then, assuming Latham must have been somewhere else, Hines went for a swim herself.

In fact, Pat Hines didn’t even learn about Latham’s impeding death until around 10 am Monday, when someone called the radio station to make sure Hines was okay.

The caller told Hines that an unidentified young woman had been critically injured in a hit-and-run on the Pacific Coast Highway. She had been admitted to Santa Monica Hospital as “Jane Doe.”

I knew it had to be Sue,” Hines said. I called the restaurant and found her car was still there. I called one of her friends and she said she had not seen Sue in two days.

Convinced the woman was Sue Latham, Hines contacted Latham’s brother-in-law.

She and the brother-in-law went to the hospital that Monday, and identified Latham.

Sue Latham died at 10:30 the following night.

………

None of this is to suggest that Pat Hines is intentionally lying.

Maybe, as Serge Issakov suggests, she just needed a compelling story for her advocacy work, and it evolved over time.

But time can play tricks on memory, especially when clouded by grief and survivor’s guilt.

Pat Hines lifetime of work on behalf of bike-riding children has surely earned our respect, and more than a modicum of consideration; there’s no telling just how many young lives she could be responsible for saving.

We also haven’t heard her side of this story. Issakov reached out to her for a reaction, but hasn’t received a response at the time this was written.

And I’m more than willing to post her response if she sees this.

Let’s also not forget that real story is, or should be, that there’s someone out there, living or dead, who’s gotten away with killing an innocent young woman for a full four decades.

But the next time Pat Hines tells the story of how Sue Latham died, whether to oppose AB 122 or any other reason, take it with a grain of salt.

Or maybe a five pound bag.

………

Eid Mubarak to all those observing today’s holiday!

………

Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask

And get vaccinated, already.

Koretz uses one-man rule to kill bike, business and pedestrian friendly Uplift Melrose project

He did it again.

Seven years after CD5 Councilmember Paul Koretz blocked proposed bike lanes on Westwood Blvd, he singlehandedly killed a proposal for a much-needed makeover of Melrose Blvd.

One that had overwhelming community support, both from the general public and Melrose business owners.

A project that could have once again made Melrose the destination street it was decades ago. And one that excited virtually everyone who saw it, with a few notable NIMBY exceptions.

Starting with Koretz himself.

The self-proclaimed environmentalist and climate advocate caved to a NIMBY minority to stop a project that would improve safety on one of LA’s High Injury Network streets, while giving a significant boost to a once-thriving business district that has been in decline for decades.

Kind of like Westwood, where empty storefronts nearly outnumber occupied ones.

Yet in both cases, Koretz personally blocked bicycle and pedestrian improvements that could have revived them.

In this case, he cited his unsupported belief that the project wouldn’t get anyone out of their cars — as he drove the street in his own.

I have done much soul searching, and even driven down Melrose one more time to try and envision the results. Many factors contributed to my decision to not move forward with this process…

I don’t believe that this action will get anyone out of their cars, except for immediate neighbors on short trips who could walk or bicycle. However, it will make it more difficult for potential customers to access Melrose shops by car. The loss of parking could also reduce access by customers, unless the BID is able to cut long-term deals with several locations for large numbers of cars. This is likely to happen, but not a certainty.

I also believe that this will result in a short-term loss of more marginal businesses during construction. Longer term, I think it is likely to raise rents once it is completed, knocking out remaining smaller businesses that give Melrose its charm, for better funded, more chain-like businesses.

Maybe if he actually got out of his car, he could see what wonderful street it could be for walking. Even if it isn’t now.

But bottom line, he makes the anti-environmental, anti-climate choice to keep Melrose a sewer for pass-through drivers, while making it virtually impossible to access the area any other way.

It must be all those boarded up storefronts and Going Out of Business signs that pass for charm in his estimation.

He also ignores the fact that a project like this would once again make the street a draw for people from across the city, and not just out-of-town tourists relying on outdated guidebooks.

Not to mention that the plan actually results in a net increase in available parking, despite the loss of spaces on Melrose itself.

In a must-read story, Streetsblog’s Joe Linton examined the motivations consequences behind Koretz dictatorial decree.

L.A. City Councilmember Paul Koretz has effectively killed Uplift Melrose, a plan to invest in making Melrose Avenue greener, safer, and more welcoming. Uplift Melrose was initiated by the Melrose Business Improvement District and enjoyed broad local support, including from the Mid-City West Community Council and the Greater Wilshire Neighborhood Council.

He goes on to cite bizarre opposition from representatives of both the police and fire departments.

LAPD Wilshire Area Commanding Officer Shannon Paulson’s August 25 email to Koretz staff states that Uplift Melrose “would undeniably have a direct impact on the ability of PD to respond along this (previously) primary accessway to emergency locations on this stretch of Melrose, as well as… emergencies in adjacent residential neighborhoods.” She asserts that the proposed Melrose lane reduction would “undeniably” create “traffic congestion and delays” on Melrose and “this would also result in more north/south traffic in those nice residential streets north and south of Melrose” where she forecasts “more calls for unsafe speed… and a higher likelihood of vehicle vs pedestrian accidents, stop sign violations, more people feeling not as safe walking their dogs and pushing their strollers on those streets.”

Never mind that the project was still in the early discussion phase, and that most, if not all, of those objections could have been easily mitigated.

She went on to offer this doozy, making her anti-bike windshield bias even more apparent, while broadly dismissing bike lanes all over Los Angeles:

I would also suggest a comprehensive study of the bike lanes. I have seen a lot of money and energy and planning go into some of these bike lanes in the City– which are fantastic for those who use them. But I think in many LA communities the use of these bike lanes have been exceptionally minimal (to almost zero) – this after surrendering very valuable vehicle traffic lanes to create them. I have also been part of conversations regarding their safety, as they design the lanes to be “two way” which results in some dangerous scenarios. I think immediately of the “two way” bike lane currently on Main Street downtown – where you have City Hall employees pulling out of that CH garage near Temple and they look right only as the traditional vehicle traffic on Main St is northbound, yet that bike lane along the curb is two -way. So you have a southbound bicycle coming along at 25 mph crossing them that the driver never see.

Evidently, in addition to being a cop, Paulson is also an expert in traffic engineering and urban planning.

Or at least thinks she is.

And as Linton points out, we’re still waiting for all that money for bike lanes she talks about. Maybe it got diverted into the LAPD’s coffee and donut fund.

As for the objections from the fire department,

Koretz’ staff received Streets L.A. Landscape Architect Alexander Caiozzo’s response to all of the points raised by Getuiza. Caiozzo’s September 3 email emphasizes that the Melrose design represents a “preliminary plan” and, when funding is secured, further refined designs will address all the specific Fire Department concerns.

Never mind that Linton explains that much of the objections raised by the fire department were the result of a fundamental misreading of what was being proposed.

He goes on to point the finger at a self-proclaimed watchdog group that has worked to block progress throughout the city.

One source is the “notorious Nimby” group Fix the City. In 2015, Fix the City filed a lawsuit to block L.A.’s multi-modal Mobility Plan, asserting that the city was “stealing” lanes from drivers, who do not “have the luxury of being able to ride to work on a bike or bus.” The lawsuit was settled by an agreementbetween L.A. City and Fix the City that mandates extensive outreach and analysis before safety improvements can be implemented. Fix the City then uses this agreement to kill safety projects.

The settlement requires the city to evaluate LAFD response times at the station level for all mobility projects of significant scale. If safety improvements degrade LAFD response times, then Fix the City boardmember Jim O’Sullivan waves the settlement around, badgers the city Transportation Department (LADOT) and City Council, and threatens further lawsuits.

Personally, I’d take it a step further, and question whether it’s the soft corruption of campaign contributions and promises of support for the career politician’s next run for office.

Or something worse.

In the aftermath of the Jose Huizar and Englander bribery scandals, any single-handed action like this is immediately suspect. So the question becomes, not just whether someone inappropriately influenced Koretz, but who might have, how and why.

It could be as simple as Linton’s suggestion that Koretz kowtowed to the notorious NIMBYs at Fix the City.

Or it could be something much worse.

The real problem is that Los Angeles has a failed system of government in which each councilmember rules as a king or queen in his or her own district, enjoying near dictatorial power over what gets built, from upscale condo towers to streetscape improvements.

Something we’ll have to change if we ever want to see real progress in the city.

Meanwhile, Mid City West Community Council President Scott Epstein — leader of one of the city’s better neighborhood councils — offers his own insights into the project, and Koretz’ open betrayal of the community.

Bike Talk will be discussing the whole Melrose mess tonight.

Breaking News: Garden Grove bike rider killed in collision with semi driver; 11th SoCal bike death in just three weeks

Too often, we get word that someone had been killed riding a bicycle, but struggle confirm the story.

This time, we have the opposite problem.

According to the Orange County Coroner’s office, a 31-year old man was killed when he was hit by the driver of a semi-truck in Garden Grove just before 6 pm last Friday.

He was pronounced dead at the scene ten minutes later.

Unfortunately, that’s all we know.

No location was given, other than some street, somewhere in Garden Grove. No word on how the crash happened or who was at fault.

And no name or city of residence was given for the victim; that much, at least, should eventually be provided once they notify his next of kin.

Hopefully, the press will finally get around to the story and give us a little more information.

This is at least the 78th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the 13th that I’m aware of in Orange County.

The victim was also the third Orange County bike rider to be killed in the last three weeks, and the 11th SoCal bicyclist killed in what has been a very bloody holiday season.

My deepest sympathy and prayers for the victim and all his loved ones.

Vision Zero is not a fad — and it’s not making our streets more deadly

A traffic safety denying op-ed in the Wall Street Journal claims both. And couldn’t be more wrong.

………

No Morning Links today.

I had planned to take Martin Luther King Jr. Day off, and post some inspirational words to remind us all to treat everyone like our own brothers and sisters, especially in these turbulent times.

But I felt it was necessary to address an op-ed that was inexplicably published in the Wall Street Journal on Saturday, without the apparent benefit of senior editors or fact checkers.

We’ll be back tomorrow with a massive four days worth of links to the latest bike news stories from over the weekend.

Today we’re going to discuss Vision Zero, road diets and traffic safety deniers.

Because sometimes, these people just piss me off.

………

Awhile back, I coined the term traffic safety deniers to describe people who reject the well-established science of traffic safety.

Just like climate change deniers reject the established science behind climate change, for no other reason than they choose not to believe it, or the experts in the field, evidence be damned.

Like lawyer and writer Christopher D. LeGras, who penned a virtually fact free, alternative universe op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, claiming that Vision Zero is nothing but a “road diet fad.” And that it’s having the opposite effect of what is intended, by somehow magically increasing the death toll on our streets.

Or I should say former lawyer, since he apparently gave up his membership in the bar to write full time, resulting in a collection of short fiction published by the small LA-based imprint Rare Bird Books.

Unfortunately, his op-ed reads like a work of fiction, as well.

He starts innocently enough, telling the tale of a 65-year old woman who broke her leg falling on the sidewalk in Mar Vista, suffering a compound fracture. And says it took the fire department paramedics ten minutes to get there, even though the station was just five blocks away.

But in which direction, he doesn’t say.

Yet somehow extrapolates that to blame the road diet on Venice Blvd — and every road diet everywhere else — and Vision Zero in general.

Los Angeles, like cities nationwide, is transforming its streets. In July 2017 the city installed a “road diet” on a 0.8-mile stretch of Venice Boulevard in Mar Vista, reducing four lanes to two and adding bike lanes separated from traffic by parking buffers. The project is part of Mayor Eric Garcetti’s Vision Zero initiative, which aims to eliminate traffic fatalities in the city by 2025. Launched in 2015, Vision Zero is the most radical transformation of how people move through Los Angeles since the dawn of the freeway era 75 years ago.

By almost any metric it’s been a disaster. Pedestrian deaths have nearly doubled, from 74 in 2015 to 135 in 2017, the last year for which data are available. After years of improvement, Los Angeles again has the world’s worst traffic, according to the transportation research firm Inrix. Miles of vehicles idling in gridlock have reduced air quality to 1980s levels.

Well, it ain’t necessarily so

Problem is, the road diet on Venice was part of Mayor Eric Garcetti’s Great Streets program. A community driven project that had been in the works since 2015, and had nothing to do with LA’s Vision Zero, which was only announced in August of the same year.

In fact, Vision Zero in Los Angeles was just vaporware until the Vision Zero Action Plan was released in January, 2017 — two years after community groups began work on a Complete Streets makeover of Venice Blvd, and the same year the Mar Vista Great Streets project was installed.

Never mind that the road diet on Venice reduced it from a massive six lanes to a more manageable four, to reduce crossing distances to improve safety for pedestrians and increase livability.

Not two lanes, as LeGras inexplicably claimed.

Then there’s the claim that pedestrian deaths spiked in 2017, two years after Mayor Garcetti announced the Vision Zero program.

But somehow, before any significant work had been done on Vision Zero, because the action plan, and the High Injury Network it’s based upon, weren’t even released until that year.

Not to mention that none of those pedestrians were killed on streets where Vision Zero improvements had already been installed. So rather than being the fault of Vision Zero in some vague, unidentified way, they can be blamed on the dangerous, deadly LA streets that Vision Zero is intended to fix.

Which is about like blaming the vet because your cat got pregnant after he fixed your dog.

And don’t get me started on LeGras’ laughable implication that Vision Zero is somehow responsible for LA’s worsening traffic and air pollution.

Traffic is bad on streets throughout the LA area, including the other 85 or so other cities in LA County that don’t have Vision Zero programs. Let alone on the streets that haven’t seen any Vision Zero improvements at all. Which is most of them.

Oddly, traffic also sucks on most, if not all, LA-area freeways, which have yet to see a single bike lane or road diet.

The reason LA traffic is getting worse is a population that’s growing by an estimated 50,000 a year, with most of the new arrivals bringing cars with them, or buying one as soon as they get here.

Along with countless kids who receive or buy a car as soon as they’re old enough to drive, resulting in four or five cars cramming the driveways of many family homes. When they’re not out helping to cram the streets.

Combine all that with a record number of miles driven in the US last year, as lower gas prices encouraged more people to drive more. Something that’s reflected in dropping ridership on LA Metro, as more people switch from buses and trains to private vehicles — adding to the traffic LeGras complains about.

And no, LA air quality is nowhere near 1980 levels.

Then again, he also seems to confuse normal traffic congestion with gridlock — defined as a situation in which drivers are unable to move in any direction.

If you can get through a traffic light in two or three cycles, or turn in any direction to get out of it, it ain’t gridlock.

It’s traffic.

By my count, that’s six false statements in just two paragraphs. Unfortunately, he didn’t stop there.

Nothing succeeds like the successes of Vision Zero

Like the next paragraph, where he somehow concludes that light rail lines have anything to do with Vision Zero. (Hint: they don’t.)

Or the following one, where he implies that Vision Zero projects in the Big Apple have failed to make significant improvements. Even though, after five years of Vision Zero, and countless road diets and other safety projects, New York traffic fatalities are at their lowest level since motor vehicles took over the streets. And pedestrian deaths are at their lowest level since 1910.

While bicycling fatalities have gone up in New York, that’s more reflective of a massive 150% increase in ridership as more people feel safer on the streets.

And rather than leading to increased traffic congestion, the changes have actually improved traffic flow.

While individual firefighters may complain that bike lanes delay response in emergencies, as LaGras claims, the facts don’t bear that out.

In fact, more fire departments are realizing that safety improvements on the streets reduce the need for dangerous emergency responses. Which means fewer people they have to scrape up off the streets and try to patch back together.

Meanwhile, more enlightened cities are deciding that is better to build fire engines that fit the streets, rather than widen streets to fit the fire engines.

The myth of the Foothill Blvd evacuation disaster

Then there’s this.

During the 2017 La Tuna Fire, the biggest in Los Angeles in half a century, a road diet on Foothill Boulevard the in Sunland-Tujunga neighborhood bottlenecked evacuations. After the fire a neighborhood association voted to go off the road diet. The city ignored the request and instead added another one to La Tuna Canyon Road.

That’s a myth that has been circulating in the anti-road diet, traffic safety denier community for some time.

While the road diet on Foothill has unfairly gotten the blame, the real problem stemmed from the closure of the 210 Freeway further up the road. Traffic backed up from that closure down to, and through, Foothill Blvd — not from Foothill back.

Officials never considered it a serious enough problem to remove the bollards protecting the bike lanes, or to introduce other emergency measures, including contraflow lanes, on Foothill.

I’m told that an engineer involved in the evacuations said that people on Foothill were never in danger. And fire officials said they had no problem getting through.

With or without a road diet, relying on private motor vehicles to evacuate any population center will always be problematic, as cars break down and run out of gas, and fallible human drivers try to squeeze in and turn around without sufficient space to do so.

LeGras is correct, however, that a road diet was implemented on deadly La Tuna Canyon, following the near fatal crash that left Keith Jackson in a coma for three weeks.

One of the few things he got right.

But rather than reducing road space, it merely reduced the amount of traffic lanes in places — leaving exactly the same amount of space available in the event of an emergency as there was before.

He closes this way,

It’s noble to want to make America’s streets as safe as they can be. But government officials shouldn’t impose projects on communities that don’t work, inconvenience residents, hurt businesses and impede emergency responders in the process.

Had he bothered to do the slighted bit of research, he might have discovered that most people like the Complete Streets that result from the implementation of road diets and bike lanes.

And that road diets and bike lanes have proven good for businesses across the US. And Canada, too.

Emergency response times tell the real tale

As for impeding emergency responders, let’s go back to that 65-year old Mar Vista woman with the broken leg.

A ten minute response time in any emergency should be unacceptable. But countless things can take place to delay emergency responders that have nothing to do with road diets.

It took far longer than that for paramedics to arrive when my father-in-law suffered a fatal heart attack. And that was in a residential neighborhood, in the afternoon, before Vision Zero and road diets were a gleam in Eric Garcetti’s eye.

Responders can be delayed by the same sort of traffic congestion you’ll find on any other major street in Los Angeles, with or without road diets or any other form of traffic calming or safety improvements.

Never mind motorists who don’t have the sense to pull to the right like the law requires. Which seems to be the majority of LA drivers these days.

But if there was a significant problem, it would show up in the fire department’s response times. Yet the average response for Mar Vista’s Station 62 is just four seconds slower than the average EMS response for the city as a whole.

Four seconds.

I sincerely hope Renee Khoury’s mother Rebecca recovers completely from her broken leg.

As for Mr. LeGras, it’s probably a good thing he’s not practicing law anymore, if he built his cases on such flimsy, easily disproven evidence.

But I do hope he continues to write.

Judging from this op-ed, he should have a fine future in fiction.

Thanks to Alissa Walker and Felicia G for their help in researching this piece.

Another open letter to Mayor Eric Garcetti and City Council of Los Angeles #CrashCityHall

There wasn’t time to get all the #CrashCityHall letters online last week.

So we’re going to post the remaining letters over the next few days — starting with this powerful post from registered dietician and endurance cyclist Matt Ruscigno, founder of LA’s iconic Feel My Legs, I’m a Racer hillclimb. 

………

Dear Mayor Garcetti and City Council of Los Angeles,

I’m writing to you today as a long-time resident of our wonderful city, a public health expert, and a recent victim of an inattentive automobile driver. That collision left me with 16 broken bones requiring 6 nights in the hospital, a chest tube, and a surgery to install metal plates in my shoulder and collarbone. If I weren’t a skilled cyclist, I would probably be dead.

It’s easy to dismiss this as an ‘accident,’ but the statistics on the number of people injured and killed by automobile drivers in Los Angeles paint a different picture. This is a public health crisis. Yet we know how to fix it:

  • Reduce automobile speed limits
  • Invest in infrastructure for cyclists and pedestrians
  • Reimagine public space to focus on people, not automobiles

Los Angeles and California are leading the way in reducing automobile emissions but are falling behind (see London, Bogota, New York, Copenhagen for examples) when it comes to the public health issue of people dying in the streets because automobile speed and convenience is prioritized over human safety.

Los Angeles is a beautiful city with near perfect weather for cycling and walking year round. And we are simply running out of space to store and transport personal automobiles. The benefits of building infrastructure that makes human-powered transportation more accessible are well established:

  • Improved air quality and lower rates of asthma, especially among children
  • Increased physical activity that lowers risk for heart disease, stroke, diabetes and other chronic diseases
  • Fewer automobile collisions that result in injury or death of our most vulnerable road users

The potential to transform our city is awesome, in the true sense of the word, but it won’t be easy. Copenhagen didn’t become a place where 24% of city trips are taken by bike overnight. It took strong leadership and knowledge to re-imagine how city space is used. This isn’t about cyclists versus drivers; it’s about making it easier for more people to walk and bike more often.

The statistics are there: something needs to be done, and soon. We can build on what other cities have done and apply it uniquely in our wonderful city. There are thousands of us here to help, but we need leadership from our elected leaders. There simply isn’t enough space in the city to keep prioritizing automobiles, so the question is, how many more people have to be injured or killed before we start taking concrete steps? I hope we can do this soon as I’d hate to see a single person go through the pain I’ve experienced over the last 5 weeks.

Thank you for your time and consideration,

Matt Ruscigno, MPH, RD

 

An open letter to Mayor Eric Garcetti and City Council of Los Angeles #CrashCityHall

No Morning Links today, as we get ready to #CrashCityHall Friday morning. Hopefully we’ll see you there; if not, I’ll see you back here on Monday.

What follows is my letter the mayor and city council. And we’ll feature some of the late arriving letters next week.

………

May 18, 2018

Dear Mayor Garcetti and the City Councilmembers of the City of Los Angeles,

Howard Beale may have been a fictional character, but he might as well be a citizen of Los Angeles trying to survive on our deadly streets.

Because like many other residents of this great city, I’m tired of living in fear for my own life and the safety of others on the streets and sidewalks of L.A.

And like Beale, we’re mad as hell, and we’re not going to take it anymore.

We live in a city where for too long, the movement of motor vehicles has been prioritized over the safety and movement of human beings. To the point that too many people who drive feel they own the streets, and everyone else has an obligation to get out of their way.

Unfortunately, too many members of our city council seem to agree. If not in their words, then by their actions.

The elected leaders of this city have voted to adopt Vision Zero, but failed to adequately fund it. You’ve adopted the 2010 Bike Plan and Mobility Plan 2035, but failed to build it. You’ve adopted Complete Streets policies, but failed to support them when it came time to put paint on the street.

And you hired one of the leading traffic planners in the United States, but you listen instead to the complaining voices of untrained motorists who don’t want to be delayed for a few moments on their commute. Even if it means saving the life of another human being. Or their own, for that matter.

As Stevie Wonder put it, “If you really want to hear our views, you haven’t done nothing.”

So let’s be perfectly clear.

Many, if not most, of the people you were elected to represent may drive cars. But we are all human beings, some of whom bike, some of whom take transit, and all of whom walk.

And none of whom want to bury a loved one or feel threatened on the streets. Yet too many of us do, every day.

As a human being, I don’t want to see one more needless death or injury on the streets of Los Angeles. As a taxpayer, I don’t want my city to waste one more penny on the needless lawsuits that result.

And as an Angeleno, I want safer and more livable streets for all of us.

When you side with the traffic safety deniers, who like climate change deniers, reject the proven science of traffic safety and urban planning, and insist on their right to drive with the pedal to the metal, you are choosing their convenience over the safety of literally everyone else.

And failing the people who voted you into office, and who you were elected to serve.

The people who have written the letters in this packet, and those who will speak before the council today, are not activists. We are the citizens of Los Angeles, who are sick to death of being treated like second class ones at the expense of motor vehicles.

We know that failure to take action now to build Complete Streets and provide safe, viable alternatives to driving that allow Angelenos to choose to leave their cars at home will inevitably lead to a dystopian, smog-choked and gridlocked future.

Because right now, traffic in Los Angeles is as good as it will ever be, as more and more cars are added to an already built-out traffic grid.

Only you can prevent the inevitable failure of a once-great city by taking action right now to ensure the safe, livable and prosperous Los Angeles we all want.

We understand that takes courage to do the right thing in the face of public opposition. But you weren’t elected to blindly follow the voices of those who scream loudest.

Anyone could do that.

You were elected to lead this city. To carefully examine the issues and make the tough decisions that will benefit your district, and all of L.A.. And make this the city that it can and should be, for all of us.

We are your constituents. We don’t want to be the victims of your inaction.

And we’re not willing to wait one more day for safer streets for our children, parents, families and friends.

So we ask you, today and every day, to have the courage to do the right thing.

We’ll have your back when you do.

Sincerely,

Ted Rogers

BikinginLA.com

Council District 4

………

One more brief note.

This may be the best letter we received for #CrashCityHall, even if it is the shortest.

Dear Los Angeles,

Please be so kind as to stop killing cyclists and pedestrians.

NOW.

Sincerely,
Marvin D
San Diego, CA

Guest Post: The fourth open letter to the Los Angeles City Council #CrashCityHall

Dear Mayor Garcetti and City Council of LA,

In an effort to “be the change you want to see in the world,” I sold my car ten years ago and have since used my own feet, a bicycle, or the transit system to get around.  While the results of this have brought the most rewarding experiences of my life, it has also been a struggle to live without a car in a car’s world.

Drivers are becoming increasingly more distracted, careless, unsympathetic and enraged.  These behaviors cause not only car accidents but the deaths of cyclists and pedestrians, who travel without the protection of metal armor.  Why do drivers feel so entitled to the roads?  Why is this set of traits common in the majority of car owners?  It’s easy to see the answer on the streets – they’re designed specifically for cars.  With lanes designated for driving, turning and parking, there’s often no space left for a bicycle to squeeze through.  And pedestrians must be defensive even when walking through a crosswalk with a walk signal.  Drivers are impatient to share the road when they believe it belongs to them.

Every time you see a cyclist in the streets of LA, please understand the fear we’ve overcome to be there.  Please know that we have been spit at, screamed at, sworn at, had objects thrown at us, been told to “get off the road,”  have had way too many “close calls,” or have lost a fellow cyclist to careless driving or road rage.  And yet we’re still out there.  As pedestrians and cyclists we’ll continue to defend our space on the streets, but we would truly appreciate some help from our representatives.  Please take some steps to create streets that belong to everyone.   A city’s priorities are evident in it’s infrastructure and use of public space.  If you, dear City Council Members, were to add more bike lanes, create some road diets, invest in green spaces instead of parking lots – think of the message you’d send.

Sincerely,

Amanda Gohl

Pico-Union, Los Angeles, CA 90015

………

Join us tomorrow as we #CrashCityHall to demand safer streets, and urge city leaders to have the courage to do the right thing. 

  • Los Angeles City Council
  • Los Angeles City Hall
  • 200 N. Spring Street
  • 10 am