Today is National Walk to School Day.
So if you see kids walking to or from class today, give ’em a figurative pat on the back.
Because actual touching is a big no no. For obvious reasons.
And it’s California Clean Air Day, with free rides on LADOT buses. Not to be confused with Metro buses, which aren’t.
Then again, riding a bike is always free, and even cleaner.
………
Nice piece from Streetsblog’s Joe Linton, who describes a recent family weekend trip biking from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles with his six-year old daughter in tow.
Literally.
Our Weehoo trailer works for longer and less bike-friendly trips. It looks and works like a recumbent bike, and she has pedals but most of the time she doesn’t help much in propelling the bike. She needs to balance, as well – although with her relatively light weight, even if she’s off balance, it hardly affects my balance…
For our three-day weekend trip, we took the Amtrak Pacific Surfliner to Santa Barbara on Saturday morning, and explored a bit there. Then, over the course of Sunday and Monday, we biked back to Los Angeles, riding about fifty miles each day. We didn’t carry camping gear; instead we stayed at a hotel in Santa Barbara and an Airbnb in Oxnard. When we arrived in Santa Monica, we loaded our bikes onto the Expo Line and took Metro home. For what it’s worth, we rode between fifteen and twenty miles in Santa Barbara/Goleta on day 1, 53 miles from Santa Barbara to Oxnard on day 2, and finished the last day after completing 46 miles from Oxnard to Santa Monica.
It’s a nice read, with several good photos.
Maybe it will inspire a two-wheeled road trip for your family.
………
Good news, as the Arroyo Seco Bike Path has finally been reopened.
More or less, anyway, as one segment remains closed due to storm damage.
https://twitter.com/LADOTlivable/status/1179123885582819333
………
CiclaValley’s Zachary Rynew celebrates CicLAvia with his new project Bike Angeles, in advance of this Sunday’s Heart of LA open streets event.
I won’t be riding this time. But I hope to stop by for awhile with my wife, so say hi if you spot us.
Although we may be harder to recognize without a corgi in tow.
………
Once again, someone has given a whole new meaning to walking a bike.
Or maybe the same person, this time outfitting his bike in matching Nikes.
If that looks familiar, it’s because it is. That’s clearly the same bike, even though he’s switched brands.
Maybe it didn’t run right on Adidas.
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes is all too real.
Or in this case, scooters, as a Florida man has been busted for vandalizing e-scooters and cutting their brake lines.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Police in New York are looking for a bike-riding groper who grabbed a woman as he rode past on the sidewalk.
………
Local
Century Blvd is being extended a half mile through Watts for a redevelopment project, including wide painted bike lanes — with a buffer on the wrong side, judging from the photo.
LA/Burbank US Representative Adam Schiff is one of us, as rightwing site Breitbart notes in a surprisingly positive profile.
Kesha is one of us too, as she goes for a casual bike ride along the beach in Venice.
State
California bicycle touring company Wheeltales wants your input on a number of proposed bike tours for the coming year.
A new report says the Coast Highway and Escondido’s Valley Parkway are the most dangerous streets in San Diego’s North County area.
A San Diego heart transplant recipient is riding his bike across the country to Florida to meet the mother of the Navy officer whose death gave him a second chance at life.
An op-ed in Cal Berkeley’s Daily Californian says get off your high horse and onto a bicycle.
National
If you’re looking for somewhere to ride, Outside recommends seven uncrowded national monuments “you’ve never heard of.” Can’t speak for you, but I’ve already been to just under half, let alone heard of them.
After an Idaho bike thief stole a two grand mountain bike, police in Ketchum caught ’em.
A Davenport, Iowa TV station doesn’t know what to make of a tall cargo bike “contraption” ridden by a banjo-playing Pittsburgh man and his dog wandering aimlessly across the US.
Who cares if he had a record. Famed 1930s ’round the world aviator Wiley Post was one of us, saving up to buy the first bicycle in his Oklahoma county when he was just 13.
A Chicago bike thief learns the hard way to look out for new high-def surveillance cameras before going to work.
Who needs a gun when you’ve got a car? A Michigan man was robbed as he rode his bike away from a store after a thief ran into him with an SUV, knocking him off his bicycle and making off with his wallet.
It’s a sad commentary on our streets when an Ohio bike rider isn’t even safe when he’s not on them.
A Jersey City letter writer is convinced that a road diet and parking protected bike lane is a “clear and present danger” to everyone on the street.
No surprise here, as an op-ed in the anti-bike New York Post complains about a ban on cars from a planned bus lane. And naturally, blames the hairy hand of the “bike lobby.”
Maybe in response to the Post piece, someone hacked a New York detour sign to read Cars ruin cities.
Just months after donating a kidney to a total stranger, a Florida PE teacher was critically injured when he was hit by a driver while riding his bike as he trained for a triathlon; a crowdfunding account to help pay his medical bills has raised over $8,000 of the $50,000 goal in less than a day.
International
The maker of Cannondale and Schwinn bikes saw its stock prices plunge 32% to a 23-year low after Trump’s trade tariffs led to the loss of a regular dividend.
Apparently, motorcycle ghost bikes are a thing now. A ghost bike was installed for a Calgary motorcyclist who was killed in a crash; it’s the second one in the city.
James Cracknell blames getting booted from the UK’s equivalent of Dancing With The Stars on the massive brain injury he suffered when he was struck by a driver while on an aborted bike ride across the US, which kept him from learning the steps.
A British two-time suicide survivor is riding his bike through Europe to raise funds and awareness for men’s mental health. If you’re thinking of harming yourself, talk to someone. And if you don’t have anyone you can open up to, pick up the phone. There really are people out there who care.
After his sister was killed in a collision while riding her bike, her brother calls for 10% of Ireland’s transportation budget to be dedicated to bicycling.
A 29-year old Turkish man has been wandering across the country on his bicycle for the last seven years.
An Indian website says everyone is equal on a bicycle, calling bikes the solution to many urban problems.
A Sydney, Australia man confesses that at 37, he’s never learned to drive. But in today’s world, that’s a good thing. And once again, Los Angeles is used as the poster child for what cities don’t want to be.
Aussie motorists freak out because a trio of spandexed bike riders chose not to ride in a narrow protected bike lane, evidently preferring to ride in the roadway.
Finally…
If you’re going to vandalize a locked bike, first make sure it doesn’t belong to an investigator for a law firm. When is a bike lane not a bike lane? When it’s a parking lot for cop cars.
And here’s your chance to get a free bike shop near the base of an Australian mountain range.
