Tomorrow night we’ll find out how great the Venice Blvd Great Streets project really is.
And how far the traffic safety deniers are willing to go to fight it.
LADOT is holding an open house Wednesday night to discuss the project, which is intended to improve safety and create a small town downtown atmosphere in Mar Vista.
If you live, work or ride in the area, you owe it to yourself to attend, and get the real facts on how the project on Venice Blvd is working.
Because if the past is any indication, the people fighting to keep Venice Blvd an auto-centric nightmare will be quick with their own set of “facts” to deny it’s working. And demand the restoration of the traffic lanes that were removed to improve safety and livability on one of the Westside’s key corridors.
Photo of Venice Blvd protected bike lane by Joni Yung.
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Evidently, visibility works.
A new study shows that daytime running lights cut your risk of a collision by nearly half, while wearing hi-viz lowers it by more than a third.
Mark Goodley took a deep dive into the question of daytime lights in a series of popular guest posts over the past several years.
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Local
Neel Sodha reports that buffered bike lanes are now going in on Figueroa next to LA Live as part of the My Figueroa project.
A new bike shop has opened in the North Hollywood Arts District.
The next Metro BEST Ride will visit the Pasadena Arts Center on March 24th.
State
A state appellate court rules that the new law allowing you to cross the street while the walk signal is counting down applies retroactively, which means you might be able to get a refund if you got a ticket for crossing after the countdown began. Thanks to Henry Fung for the heads-up.
San Francisco is re-envisioning iconic Market Street as a complete street.
Interbike will team with the Northstar California Resort in Truckee for a massive bike festival preceding the annual bike trade show this September.
National
Apple Maps now shows bike share locations for 179 cities in 36 countries.
Dockless shared e-scooters looks to be the next mobility trend spreading across the US, including scooters from LimeBike and Santa Monica’s Bird scooters.
A new app allows you to find travel options across most cities, including participating bikeshare systems, ride-sharing and transit.
Colorado Public Radio looks at the debate over allowing ebikes on trails.
An Arkansas paper discovers gravel bikes.
After struggling through his first century ride, a Connecticut man decides he’s going to ride his age until he’s 100.
International
Business Insider looks at the movement to reduce the reliance on cars — or even ban them entirely — in cities around the world. Meanwhile, an Aussie Op-Ed calls for banning car ads, like cigarette ads.
Scandinavian countries are successfully building a bicycling future, despite long distances, cold winters and a lack of infrastructure. And yet, they tell us no one will ever commute by bike in sunny Los Angeles.
A German man is 20,000 miles into an around the world bike tour, after surviving skin cancer and a brain tumor, and realizing he could ride a bike easier than he could walk.
A third person has died during this year’s snake-bit Cape Town Cycle Tour in South Africa, with the death of a ride marshal; two of the deaths, including that one, are being investigated as culpable homicide, similar to a manslaughter charge in the US.
Kiwi bicyclists are planning a protest ride to demand the repeal of the country’s mandatory bike helmet law and allow adult riders to choose whether or not to wear one; clearly, not everyone agrees. A New Zealand mother is credited with the law, after her 12-year old son was paralyzed after being hit by a car.
Adelaide, Australia’s free public bikeshare system could come to an end, the victim of spreading dockless bikeshare systems, despite its remarkably low $60,000 annual cost.
Protected bike lanes have come to the Philippines. If you consider plastic posts protection.
Finally…
Is it the future of public transportation, or just street litter? And no, those aren’t bicycles those squirrels are riding.
I want dockless biking to work and was excited when DC allowed a bunch of companies in the city. But each and every single time I have ridden one from Mobike (the only one I’ve tried so far), the bikes have been complete turds. Bad gears, swiveling seats, etc. Mobike should use the slogan, “If traffic doesn’t kill you, our bikes will.” I’m not asking for a 6K bike experience, but something one step above junk condition would not go amiss.
I don’t know if it was intentional or not, but the place where LA Great Streets usually shows its content is blank (see http://lagreatstreets.org/venice/). How does this work with the decision to remove the protected bike lanes? Maybe the money should be spent on a neighborhood that wants it. I say add 4 more lanes and raise the speed limit to 75, see how they like that. Maybe build a raised freeway through Mar Vista since that’s what they want.
I like that Bicycling Magazine talks up that app so much while providing links to a bunch of other semi-related things in their article but never links to the app itself.