Two people are dead, and another injured, just because some guy felt the need to get behind the wheel after drinking.
Allegedly.
According to reports from KTLA-5 and Ventura’s News Channel 12-3-11, three people were riding their bicycles north in the bike lane on PCH in Ventura County when a pickup driver plowed into them from behind at 50 to 55 mph.
One of the victims died at the scene, while another died after being taken to Ventura County Medical Center; the third victim was transported to the hospital with minor to moderate injuries.
The CHP places the crash around 7:08 pm Thursday, on PCH near Solimar Beach Road, just outside the City of Ventura.
A paywalled story from the Ventura County Star says a 33-year old woman from Bend, Oregon died at the scene, while a 39-year old Ventura man died at the hospital. The injured victim was identified only as a woman.
It’s not clear if they were riding together, or just had the misfortune of all being in the driver’s way. Several witnesses stopped to assist the victims before paramedics arrived.
It’s not known why the driver, identified only as a 24-year old Oxnard man, veered his pickup into the bike lane. He continued north until crashing into a guardrail, coming to rest on the right shoulder.
CHP investigators arrested the driver at the scene on suspicion of felony DUI causing injury, murder and gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated. He’s being held at the Ventura County jail in lieu of $1 million bail, and scheduled for a June 15th hearing in Ventura County Superior Court.
The murder charge suggests this may not be his first DUI offense.
Anyone with information is urged to call the CHP’s Ventura Area Office at 805/662-2640, and reference CAD Log 260611VT0384.
These are the 33rd and 34th bicycling fatalities that I’m aware of in Southern California this year, and the sixth and seventh we know about in Ventura County already this year.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for all the victims and their loved ones.
Before we get started, after a couple of decades, I’ve finally gotten around to designing some t-shirts for this site.
The site is still rough, while I figure out how to do stuff on there. And I only have a few designs up at the moment.
But if you want to check it out, I’d appreciate any feedback on the shirts. And if you see anything you like, I’m offering a 20% discount until it officially launches at the end of this month.
So let me know what you think. Or better yet, send me a selfie wearing one.
The project, which also includes “15 new or relocated bus stops, 10 upgraded crosswalks with flashing beacons and five fully protected intersections,” is expected to be competed in two years.
The city is also raising the speed limits on 24 arterial streets to dangerously high levels, thanks to the state’s deadly 85th Percentile Law.
A representative of the City of Long Beach reached out on Wednesday to say the LB Post had misinterpreted the story, and the city wasn’t raising speed limits on the 24 arterial streets, but merely keeping them the same.
While the teen miscreants are still unidentified — which is surprising, given the clear look we get at one of their tender young faces — the media is responding in predictable fashion, blaming the problem on ebikes.
Tragic news from my bike-friendly Colorado hometown, where a man riding an ebike was killed by a driver in a T-bone collision, just days after his father died of Stage IV kidney disease. Note to 9News — when someone is killed by a driver, it’s a collision, not an ebike crash. And it really doesn’t matter what kind of bike he was on.
“Nearly” every one of the candidates running to replace Rep. Jerry Nadler in Manhattan’s 12th Congressional District supports a two-way bike lane bisecting the island on 72nd Street. I say find the one woman who doesn’t, and let her try to bike across the city without it.
A 51-year old government librarian has spent every day for the last week and a half riding his bicycle to the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC to take a selfie showing Trump still hasn’t taken his name off it, despite today’s deadline to remove it.
Not only did those three men from Argentina make it to Kansas City on time to see their country’s team play in the World Cup after an 11,000-mile bike ride, they even got free tickets to the team’s first game.
He gets it. A British Columbia man says all bikes are good bikes, and if “you are out pedaling and smiling, then it doesn’t matter what you ride.” Which is kinda like all dogs are good dogs, but with wheels.
Seriously? If you have a Canadian-made Carbo folding ebike, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission is urging you to stop riding it and dispose of it immediately because…they were shipped without rear reflectors, and some models don’t have chain guards. Apparently, it’s impossible to add those things yourself.
Zwift, Canyon Bicycles and Pedal Mafia launched a new North American U19 development team, with a goal of putting an American atop the podium at the Tour de France or Tour de France Femmes within a decade.
Finally…
After the Tour, there’s really nothing left but riding across the Mediterranean. If you’re a thrice convicted felon riding a bicycle while carrying illegal drugs and stolen credit cards, put a damn rear light on it, already — and don’t threaten a cop with your slingshot.
Let’s start with a bit of heartbreaking news, after someone stole the ghost bike recently installed for a pregnant mother in Playa del Rey.
According to Streets Are For Everyone Executive Director Damian Kevitt, the bike placed in memory of 35-year old Regan Cole-Graham, a mother of two who was seven months pregnant with her daughter Ophelia, was taken shortly after the ghost bike for Blake Ackerman in West Hollywood was stolen, then recovered a few days later.
Which raises the question of whether someone is purposely removing ghost bikes, or if this is just a strange coincidence.
Only the ghost bike installed for her unborn daughter remains where they were placed.
Cole-Graham and her daughter were killed by an elderly driver on Pershing Drive, where a road diet installed in 2017 was removed months later after backlash from angry motorists, mostly pass-through commuters from Manhattan Beach.
And yes, there’s not a pit in hell deep enough for any lowlife scumbucket who would intentionally steal a ghost bike, as if that’s somehow different than desecrating any other memorial.
A woman inside was just washing her clothes when the SUV came flying in through the door of the business around 6 pm, fatally pinning her against one of the machines.
A witness reported the driver appeared to be an elderly woman, who tried explaining her actions by telling police her foot got caught on the pedal. If true, it adds even more fuel to the burning argument over how old is too old to drive a car.
Either way, it’s more proof that motor vehicles pose a deadly risk to everyone, on or off the roadway.
………
California State Senator Catherine Blakespear will host a 90-minute webinar this evening to discuss solutions to ebike safety, in conjunction with CalBike, PeopleForBikes, Streets For All and Streets Are For Everyone.
Blakespear is the sponsor of SB 1167, a much-needed bill that would clarify the definition of ebikes, and crack down on illegal electric motorbikes being misrepresented as legal ebikes.
Someone let me know how it goes, because I’ll be on a much-needed mental health break today, going to my happy place where cars don’t exist, and the deer and the antelope play.
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
You’ve got to be kidding. Orange County Sheriff’s deputies were called when two teenagers decided to terrorize shoppers in a Foothill Ranch Walmart by riding their ebikes — actually electric motorbikes — up and down the aisles. One more reason why California needs to clarify the definition of ebikes to distinguish them from e-motos and dirt bikes.
A group of Singapore bicyclists were termed “too arrogant to use the lane provided for them,” despite politely riding single file and hugging the fog line — never mind that the bike lane, just the shoulder of the damn roadway — was likely littered with debris, or that there were a series of warning signs next to the bike lane just down the road. Because arrogance is the only possible explanation when people on bicycles do things that drivers don’t understand.
This is how you get change. Hundreds of Chicago bicyclists took part in a “life-affirming” bike ride and die-in in memory of a city Complete Streets planner who was killed in a dooring while riding in a painted bike lane. I’ve never seen that many LA bike riders turn out for any protest or memorial except Critical Mass.
He gets it. An editor for Cycling Weekly says he is very aware of his vulnerability when he rides a bicycle, like virtually every other bike rider, and doesn’t need to be pulled over by the cops for a reminder, when it’s the people in the big, dangerous machines who should be told how vulnerable we are.
A British father and son completed a 400-day, 18,000-mile bike trip around the world, setting Guinness World Records in the process for the fastest bicycle circumnavigation of the world by a father and son, the longest bicycle journey by a father and son, and the most countries visited in a continuous bicycle journey by a father and son.
From time to time, someone will reach out to me about a bicycling crash, sometimes asking for advice, sometimes just to share what happened.
If I think they should talk to a lawyer, I’ll usually recommend those guys over there on the right side of this page.
Just to be clear, I don’t get any kind of referral fee for that. I recommend them simply because I know and trust each one, and know they all ride bikes themselves, as well as understanding the intricacies of bike law and bicycle crashes.
And I would trust any one of them with my own case if I needed one.
I know there are a lot of other good lawyers out there — as well as the other kind — but I don’t recommend them simply because I don’t know them or their qualifications.
But I would offer one piece of advice.
Okay, two.
One, make sure the person whose name is on the door will be involved in your case. Trust me, it makes a difference.
Second, make sure they understand bike law, how your particular crash happened and why you have a case.
If you’re not comfortable after talking with them, don’t sign anything. Just walk out or hang up the phone, and talk to someone else. It’s your case, and your future, that’s on the line.
………
Oops.
Yesterday I linked to a story about an ebike crackdown in Long Beach. I removed the item after Andrew pointed out that the story was about Long Beach, New York, not the one here. So thanks to him for the correction.
It’s not the first time that has happened, either.
I strongly suggest that one city or the other change its name ASAP to end the confusion.
The project, which also includes “15 new or relocated bus stops, 10 upgraded crosswalks with flashing beacons and five fully protected intersections,” is expected to be competed in two years.
On the other hand, the city is also raising the speed limits on 24 arterial streets to dangerously high levels, thanks to the state’s deadly 85th Percentile Law. Correction: The city informs me that this is incorrect. Those 24 arterials aren’t seeing an increase, but are just remaining at the same speed limit they’re at currently.
………
If you build it, they will come.
A new study from the NYU Tandon School of Engineering examining 72 million New York bikeshare trips found that “protected bike lanes increased ridership after accounting for confounding factors, while painted lanes and sharrows showed no detectable causal effect.”
In other words, more people chose the safety of protected bike lanes, while rejecting paint and sharrows.
Then again, as we’ve said before, the arrows on sharrows are only there to help drivers improve their aim, while painted bike lanes may give us our own space on the roads, but offer no protection from errant drivers.
Then again, those little plastic bendy posts that too often pass for protection in Los Angeles won’t keep anyone out, either.
Crews also will restore historic balustrades, pylons, towers and light poles, with a goal of keeping the bridge’s look consistent while bringing it up to modern safety standards…
A consultant, Psomas, said the redesign will realign ramps and the LA River bike path, while building new bicycle and pedestrian facilities and upgrading drainage systems to protect river water quality. Those changes are designed to improve the connection between Atwater Village, Silver Lake and Los Feliz and the expanding LA River greenway, according to hoodline.com.
The project also aims to improve safety complaints from cyclists who squeeze into narrow shoulders on the bridge.
Although it’s a little disquieting that they chose to rely on Hoodline, rather than a more authoritative source like the City of LA, or even The Eastsider.
The California Air Resources Board appears to be doing Trump’s work for him, approving sweeping changes to the state’s cap-and-trade program that slashes funding for the state’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, just as the president is stepping on the gas to keep dirty fuels in demand. That comes after CARB killed the state’s ebike incentive program, because cars needed the money more than we do.
Good news from Ohio, where the man accused of punching out one man riding a bicycle, then purposefully driving into another before engaging in a lengthy standoff with police, will be held without bail pending trial.
Members of the Vermont/New Hampshire Upper Valley Cycling Club penned a powerful piece about “the unnamed person in North Haverhill,” a bike rider whose death at the hands of a motorist went unmentioned in the local press, as if it wasn’t even a person who died. Which is why I try to cover every bicycling death, because every person who loses their life deserves to be remembered. And every death is a reminder that one is one too many.
New York Streetsblog says a horrific crash on a street where a bike lane was removed at the insistence of local leaders “underscores anew how dangerous the roadway has become.”Too often we forget that bike lanes aren’t just for people on bicycles, but also serve as vital traffic calming measures that improve safety for everyone.
International
A Dutch town is putting up 20 kmph speed limit signs — 12.4 mph — on a local bike path, but won’t enforce it. So instead of a speed limit, it’s just a suggestion. Like pretty much all the speed limits here in California.
Huh? A Kuwait appeals court acquitted a Kuwaiti man who killed an “Asian” man riding a bicycle, because the victim had not followed “required safety and security procedures,” negating the negligence required for criminal liability. So, the driver was negligent, but not responsible. Got it.
The 75-year old man now rides a bike with the names of all the victims on the crossbar of his bike. Those who survived, and those who didn’t.
The other survivors plan to join him for a ceremony on Wednesday’s 10th anniversary to remember the five riders who lost their lives, then join him to finish the ride, or meet them afterwards.
The driver, Charles Pickett Jr., was sentenced to a well-deserved 40 to 75 years in prison.
Pickett was convicted on all counts, including operating while intoxicated causing death, operating while intoxicated causing serious injury and second-degree murder.
He’ll be at least 90 years old before he’s eligible for release, which still seems like too soon.
The survivors turned to advocacy following the crash, successfully pushing Kalamazoo and other local town into passing a five-foot passing law, as well as convincing the state legislature to pass a hands-free law.
They’re working now to get the state to expand the definition of a vulnerable road user, which currently doesn’t include bicyclists or horse-drawn buggies.
The crash cost him his leg, and nearly his life, before he was able to free himself.
But it’s a concept I’m very familiar with.
The first ride I took when I was finally allowed back on my bike following the infamous beachfront bee incident was to go right back to the spot where I had crashed, and finish the ride I had planned to take.
The victim was riding a scooter on a bike path in the Point Loma neighborhood when Savannah Monique Taylor crashed into her, dragging the girl with her car until crashing into a steel bench.
Police found an almost empty bottle of booze inside her car.
According to the Peninsula Beacon, the victim’s father brought the girl, Olive Tomasevic, into the courtroom in a stroller so the judge could see her.
“She came close to dying several times because of the defendant’s actions,” said Alex Tomasevic. “This is what life is like for her today. She can’t walk. She can’t use the toilet. She uses diapers. She cannot eat on her own. She has a feeding tube. She can’t bathe herself. She can’t attend regular school. She can’t talk. She can’t crawl into bed…”
“I see a tenacious little girl,” said (Olive’s mother) Leeann Tomasevic. “She gets hours and hours of physical therapy. I watched the toughest of nurses cry when she was not looking.”
Taylor was ironically residing in a sober living facility at the time of the crash.
There’s no word on what she was doing driving on the bike path.
………
My dad landed on Normandy Beach 82 year ago today, beginning an odyssey that would take him through France, into Belgium, skirting the Battle of Bulge and helping liberate a concentration camp, before ending the war Germany with Patton’s troops.
Then they sent him to Okinawa to prepare for D-Day Japan. He would have been one of the first to land, and was told his unit could expect 100% casualties. If the war hadn’t ended, I probably wouldn’t be here.
Although the only time he ever rode a bike in Europe, he borrowed it after getting separated from his unit.
And no, I don’t know if he ever returned it.
Bluesky post
………
Giving a whole new definition to mountain biking.
Bluesky post
………
Always pull over to the side of the road if you’re falling asleep behind the wheel.
Twitter post
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
London’s not-exactly bike-friendly Telegraphblames a new bike lane for a 500% — actually 600% — increase in serious bicycling crashes after a the two-way protected lane was installed, even though that represents a jump from just five to 30 over a five-year period. And even that is meaningless without putting it in context of the increase in ridership from the beginning of the first period to the end of the last.
No bias here. The Santa Clarita Signal reports a man was hospitalized following an ebike crash — but fails to mention in the headline that there was a car involved, or say anywhere that the car presumably had a driver.
American Lael Wilcox is attempting to break her own record as the fastest woman to ride around the world, and set a new record as the fast human to do it by completing the ride in less than 80 days.
A Texas driver turned himself in for a hit-and-run crash, a day after the victim was found in a ditch after going for a bike ride the night before. Giving the driver plenty of time to sober up if he was under the influence, or come up with an excuse if he wasn’t.
Trump’s plans to redevelop a popular Washington DC public golf course into an upscale “championship-level” course also threatens the city’s iconic Noon Ride, a daily bike ride that brings “wealthy riders perched on $15,000 bikes riding alongside restaurant workers just getting into the sport,” as well as federal workers, law enforcement officers, political operatives and several fitness professionals; L39ION of Los Angeles founder Justin Williams joins in when he’s in town.
She gets it. A British Columbia woman writes that bike lanes are not a luxury, as a previous op-ed writer suggested, but a necessity for her family, who rely on bicycles for all the destinations of their daily life, from work and daycare to school, shopping and all their other activities.
Sad news from New Hampshire, where American road racing and mountain bike pioneer Andy Bishop died after battling stomach cancer; Bishop competed in four editions of the Tour de France in the late ’80s and early ’90s, including for the old 7-Eleven team. He was just 61.
That was the jaw-dropping amount awarded to a Westlake Village family, when a jury found socialite Rebecca Grossman and her former boyfriend, ex-Dodger Scott Erickson, liable for killing eleven-year old Mark Iskander and his eight-year old brother Jacob six years ago.
The Iskander family was crossing a Westlake Village street in the crosswalk when the boys were run down by Grossman as she was allegedly street racing with Erickson after downing margaritas in a nearby bar.
The boy’s mother was able to pull the couple’s youngest son to safety, but could only watch in horror as Grossman plowed into the boys at 73 mph, sending one flying nearly the length of a football field.
Erickson had gone through the intersection moments earlier, just missing the family, and later admitted hiding under some bushes to avoid detection while he watched the investigation into the deaths unfold.
Grossman is currently serving 15 to life after she was convicted of two felony counts of murder, two felony counts of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence, and one felony count of hit-and-run driving resulting in death.
According to the LA Times, the jury awarded the boy’s parents, Nancy and Karim Iskander, a combined $59 million for the loss of Mark, and another $48 million for Jacob’s death. Nancy Iskander was also awarded another $35 million for serious emotional distress, while the youngest son, Zachary, received $34 million for the loss of his brothers.
That may be only the beginning, however.
The jury concluded that Grossman acted with malice and oppression, and Erickson acted with malice, oppression, or fraud. That opens them up to the possibility of millions more in punitive damages, which will be determined in a second phase of the trial.
Whether Grossman and Erickson have that kind of money, or the Iskanders will ever seen any of it, remains to be determined.
The driver, 42-year old Michael Leppelmeier, first stopped his SUV, got out and assaulted a 68-year old man, before tossing the victim’s bicycle into a nearby pond.
Leppelmeier then crossed the double yellow line with SUV and rammed a 72-year old bike rider head-on while driving on the wrong side of the road.
Both victims were hospitalized with serious, but non-life-threatening injuries.
When cops arrived at his home, Leppelmeier came out and threatened them with a knife, but retreated into his house after being tased. He was finally apprehended by SWAT officers after a standoff involving breached windows, teargas and a drone.
Leppelmeier has a criminal record going back more than 20 years, including attempted vandalism, a previous vehicular assault charge, and at least two OVIs — the equivalent of a DUI. He is currently on probation for a two-year old public indecency charge.
A neighbor accused Leppelmeier of calling him a slur, driving by while yelling insults out the window of his SUV, and harassing kids riding their bikes.
Seems like a real nice guy.
Meanwhile, another Ohio man faces charges after an apparently intoxicated episode in which he allegedly shouted racial slurs at a group of kids described as 11, 12, and 17 years old, then got in his truck and drove up on the sidewalk in an effort to run over one who tried to leave on a bicycle.
He then threatened to do the same to the other kids if they didn’t believe in God.
Which is a very strange way to make converts.
Finally, he grabbed another child on a different street before walking away.
No word on whether he was attempting to ascertain if that kid was a believer, too.
He is currently on paid administrative leave. Which means he gets to draw his full paycheck while sitting at home watching Wheel of Fortune in his underwear, courtesy of Escondido taxpayers.
Unfortunately, there’s no word on what kind of ebike Illian was riding.
The bill limits “high speed” ebikes to riding in the traffic lane, rather than in bike lanes or bike paths, and requires owners to have a valid driver’s license, title, registration and insurance
Meanwhile, riders of electric skateboards, e-unicycles and high-speed electric scooters would have to be at least 16 years old, with a ridiculous 28 mph speed limit on sidewalks, up to 35 mph on bike lanes, bike paths, and roads with speed limits of up to 35 mph. They are only allowed on roads with speed limits above 35 mph if they have a bike lane.
Which creates a dangerous situation putting pedestrians at risk on sidewalks, and risking the comfort and safety of bicyclists using bike lanes.
Since late votes tend to run Democratic, he could still make the runoff.
Bluesky post
………
LADOT reminds us about this month’s CicLAvia connecting Leimert and Expo parks.
Twitter post
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
A Colorado bike shop promises free ebikes, using a state tax credit, but you may have to wait a year or more. And might not get a bike that actually qualifies for the credit. Then again, you might.
More on the bicyclist tackled by Toronto cops for the crime of running a stop sign, as the case is now being looked into by Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit; the rider’s lawyer says the victim has a concussion after he was violently taken down by multiple cops. Thanks to Megan for the video.
Streetsblog’s Damien Newton says the good news is the good ebike bills are moving forward in the state legislature, and the bad bills are dead for this session. SB 1167 is a much-needed bill redefining and drawing a clear distinction between ebikes and e-motos; also moving forward is AB 1569, to require ebike education in schools before ebikes are allowed on school grounds.
Once again, the mother of a teenaged ebike rider has been arrested, this time in Arizona, for knowingly allowing her 14-year old son to ride the bike without a license — which suggests it was actually an e-motorbike, rather than an electric bicycle. It also raises the question of where the hell these kid’s fathers are, since it’s only mother of teenagers who have been charged so far.
Horrible story from Texas, where a Houston-area man was found dead in a ditch, more than a dozen hours after he set out on a night bike ride; police believe he was killed by a hit-and-run driver sometime during the night. As we’ve said before, drivers should be charged with murder in cases like this, because they made a conscious decision to leave the victim on the side of the road, rather than getting help. And there’s no way of knowing if he might have survived if the driver had at least called 911.
This is why people keep dying on our streets. A Massachusetts man faces charges for killing a man riding a bicycle, after crossing the roadway and hitting the victim head-on — just seven weeks after he was given a summons for fleeing another crash on foot. Which is why drivers should immediately lose their license following any hit-and-run, even if the cop just puts it in their pocket after making the arrest.
Streetsblog credits the thousands of bike riders who turned out for DC’s Ride For Your Life with helping get several key provisions of the bipartisan bicycling Sarah Debbink Langenkamp Safety Act rolled into the latest national transportation bill, the BUILD America 250 Act.
This is who we share the road with. An Aussie cop walked with a two year “intensive corrections order” — like a highly supervised probation — and 500 hours of community service for using his car as a road block to stop an aboriginal teen riding a dirt bike in a bike lane; the kid was killed when he hit an obstruction, and flew into the windshield of the cop’s unmarked car.
Competitive Cycling
The Trans Am Bike Nonstop Race begins Sunday, with about 50 ultra cyclists setting out on what is, in effect, an unsupported time trial along the historic, 4,200-mile TransAmerica Bike Trail from Astoria, Oregon to Yorktown, Virginia. So no, it has nothing to do with Burt Reynolds outfoxing the cops in a Pontiac Trans Am.
