BikinginLA

On a personal note, today marks the 10th anniversary of BikinginLA, which started with a single blog post complaining about the sad state of bicycling in Los Angeles. 

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

Thank you for ten years of reading, and allowing me to do what I love.

And what I can to help make biking in LA just a little safer and more enjoyable for all of us.

………

That public meeting to discuss safer streets in South LA has been moved to tomorrow night, rather than tonight as we mentioned yesterday.

The change in date seem suspicious, since it’s now scheduled for the same time as the march and press conference to demand justice for fallen cyclist and hit-and-run victim Frederick “Woon” Frazier.

However, I’ve been assured by Councilmember Marqueece Harris- Dawson’s office that the original date was a typo, and the meeting was always scheduled for Thursday.

But still.

………

This is who we share the roads with.

An unidentified Twitter user responded to getting cut off by a bike rider by pulling alongside the rider, and pushing him off his bike from a moving car.

He seems very proud of himself, pinning the tweet even though it’s evidence of a crime.

https://twitter.com/DarkestJedi/status/1011620566422441988

Hopefully this tweet will be removed by the time you read this, since it would appear to violate their terms of service.

Let alone an admission of guilt.

………

Local

CiclaValley offers before and after video from a repaving project on Forest Lawn Drive, suggesting the new improvements left bicyclists worse off than before, with a bike lane that narrows to less than a foot in some place.

A webinar will be held to discuss the proposed Hollywood Community Plan, which includes proposed bikeways, from 5:30 to 6:30 pm tomorrow.

Also tomorrow, LA County Commissioner Hilda Solis will host a public meeting to discuss how to make Eastside streets more accessible for pedestrians, bicyclists, buses, and rail users.

The coming Taylor Yard bike and pedestrian bridge is up for an international design award at the World Architecture Festival.

Burbank state assemblywoman Laura Friedman discusses why safe speed limits matter.

 

State

A Fresno couple on a tandem were seriously injured when their wheel disintegrated after hitting a pothole while they were descending at 47 mph.

Lime makes its data-based case for why their e-scooters belong in San Francisco, noting that 60% of users said their ride replaced a car trip.

 

National

Vice offers a list of five things cities can do right now to reduce cyclist deaths. Make that four, since the bicycle-to-vehicle sensor systems they mentioned aren’t available yet.

Save this list of bike-friendly Tucson cafes for the next time you’re riding through town.

Heartbreaking story from Iowa, where a 79-year old woman walking on a bike path with her son was killed in a collision with a speeding bicyclist; the police declined to investigate, and the riders didn’t identify themselves. If that happened anywhere else, it would be considered a fatal hit-and-run.

Oops. Ohio police call off a search for a bike rider who was reportedly struck by a truck on a highway, knocked over a guardrail and into a waterway, when the bike’s owner came back and said the bike had merely fallen off his truck.

A Dallas magazine asks if the city will ever favor neighborhoods over freeways, saying it falls further behind world cities with every mile of asphalt.

Life is cheap in New York, where police refuse to pursue charges against a killer hit-and-run driver, who somehow claimed she had no idea she hit anyone — despite crashing into a mother and daughter with enough force to kill the little girl.

Bicycles ruled DC back in the ’90s. The 1890s.

New Orleans police throw the book at a lightless salmon cyclist who went out for a pack of cigarettes at 4 am, apparently writing up violations for everything they could think of and resulting in a whopping $920 in fines.

 

International

Mounties in British Columbia are on the lookout for a bike rider who sprayed a dog with a chemical irritant after arguing with the dog’s owner.

Police in Edmonton, Canada swarm an intersection to issue warnings when drivers can’t seem to figure out what No Right on Red signs next to bike lanes mean.

A Toronto newspaper spends an hour watching traffic bike and motor vehicle traffic at an intersection, observing 609 traffic infractions and noting that most went through incorrectly, on two wheels or four.

A new study shows that the Mini-Holland bikeways installed in London’s outer boroughs have succeeded in boosting bicycling and walking rates.

Manchester, England begins work on a $661 million plan to install 74 miles of Amsterdam-style segregated cycle lanes crisscrossing the city. Yet the Daily Mail can only envision traffic chaos.

A UK paper looks at British cycling champ Victoria Pendleton, and the bikes she’s designed for the Halfords retail chain.

Caught on video: A group of men described by the local newspaper as “thugs” chased down a pair of 12-year British bike riders, and stole a new mountain bike one of the boys had received as a birthday present just one day earlier.

This is why people continue to die in the UK, as a killer driver walks with just community service after running down a pedestrian while doing 70 mph in a 40 mph zone.

Police in Jerusalem can’t seem to decide if people can or can’t ride their bikes on a street that’s been closed to cars, some telling people they can ride on the sidewalk, and others saying they have to ride in the street. And ticketing riders for both.

An Aussie advocacy group complains about a report linking 15 bicycle and pedestrian deaths to headphone use, noting that studies have shown “bike riders using headphones at a reasonable volume hear much more outside noise than a car driver, even when that car driver has no music playing.”

 

Competitive Cycling

Sad news, as German world sprint and Olympic champion Kristina Vogel is in intensive care after colliding with another rider while training at a velodrome.

 

Finally…

Maybe your bike really is a work of art. Evidently they couldn’t figure out how to install Swedes, so they settled for poles.

And a Los Angeles-based company claims to be the leader in incorporating AI technology into bicycles.

Which will inevitably lead to something like this.