Let’s start with news from last night’s open house at the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition.
The group appears to be getting back on track again after a disastrous lack of financial oversight under the previous executive director resulted in major cutbacks at the organization.
Pictured here are LACBC Director of Education Colin Bogart, left, and new Executive Director Eli Akira Kaufman, right, honoring outgoing board member — and BikinginLA sponsor — Jim Pocrass for his service to the coalition and the bicycling community.
It was announced at the open house that the LACBC will be receiving a $20,000 grant from this year’s California Climate Ride, which raised over $800,000 dollars for nonprofit organizations that support conservation, climate, sustainability and active transportation.
A representative from Lime also told the people in attendance that the coalition will be the recipient of the funds raised by the Lime Hero program in Los Angeles next year.
So it doesn’t mean their financial problems are over. But they’re off to a damn good start.
Correction: I initially reported that layoffs due to the financial cutbacks resulted in a reduction to just four staff members. However, I’ve been reminded that some of those staff members left on their own. My apologies to Zachary Rynew and any others for misrepresenting the situation.
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Speaking of the LACBC, they’re looking for volunteers to help give out free bike lights next week.
Our next #OperationFirefly will be Wed. Dec. 11, 5-7pm at the Orange Line Metro Station, Sherman Way & Canoga Ave., thanks to support from CM @BobBlumenfield. If you'd like to volunteer to help, sign up here: https://t.co/pYCvFxUIqi #bikeLA pic.twitter.com/Jg44lRDD6H
— BikeLA (@heybikela) December 4, 2019
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Last month, we told you about a 27-year old San Diego man who suffered a life-threatening head injury while ghost riding another bike; neither the bike he was riding nor the other one had any lights after dark.
Sadly, Phillip Young tells me the man died, and was buried last week.
So far, I’ve been unable to find official confirmation of the death. If confirmed, this will be just the fourth bicycling fatality I’m aware of in San Diego County this year.
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LADOT wants your input on what can be done to improve the Valley portion of Sepulveda Blvd tomorrow, which could definitely use it.
Share your ideas on how to make Sepulveda Blvd more safe, beautiful, and accessible to the entire community. Join @MRodCD7 and #LADOT on December 7, at the Sepulveda Vision Workshop between 10 a.m. and noon at the Mission Community Police Station. #MovingLAForward pic.twitter.com/ME6J7NeKbM
— LADOT (@LADOTofficial) December 4, 2019
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At least Metro doesn’t make you put your bike on the roof.
#TLUpdates – Due to an object being caught on the overhead electric wires at St Albans City all lines are disrupted.
Services that operate between St Albans City and Sutton via Mitcham and via Wimbledon will not run.
ℹ️ More information below 👇https://t.co/iYMraBkjSy pic.twitter.com/TtzjWZ37QK
— Thameslink (@TLRailUK) December 5, 2019
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Forget Christmas cookies. What we all need right now is alternative transportation cookies.
Today marked my first foray into sugar cookie territory and I am excited to report that I made it through the wilderness. pic.twitter.com/0XWRzueyRm
— Lucy Bellwood (@LuBellWoo) December 5, 2019
Thanks to Ted Faber for the heads-up.
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The much-loathed Peloton ad is turning out to be the gift that just keeps on giving. At least as far as the press is concerned.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pShKu2icEYw
The actor who plays the husband in the Peloton ad says he was blindsided by the “malicious feedback;” even a friend called him a “symbol of the patriarchy.”
Glamour says leave the lady in the ad alone, because the “intense backlash to the ad says more about us than about Peloton.”
The Atlantic says Peloton doesn’t understand the people who love it most, while Inc. says the only thing worse than the ad was the company’s response to the criticism. Glad I’m not the only one who thought that.
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‘Tis the Season.
A Boise, Idaho bicycle project put out a call for people to donate used bikes, with a goal of giving away 700 bicycles to area kids for the holidays.
Bighearted residents of a Wisconsin town chipped in to buy a new three-wheeled bike for a 20-year old autistic man after the frame broke on the one he used as his only form of transportation.
A Pittsburgh bike drive resulted in 1,200 bikes donated to Toys for Tots.
Charlottesville, Virginia volunteers assembled 600 bike to donate to kids this weekend.
Kindhearted volunteers built 200 bicycles bicycle for at-risk kids in New Jersey.
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Sometimes its’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Baton Rouge, Louisiana police busted a 30-year old man who led them on a foot chase after they tried to stop him for riding salmon while carrying two six packs of beer, then using the cans like mini hand grenades. When they finally caught him, he refused to say where the beer came from, but was happy to tell them about his crack pipe.
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I depend on your support to help keep this site going, and bring you all the best bike news from around the corner, and around the the world.
Along with keeping the foster corgi in kibble.
And safe from tigers.
So please donate to the 5th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive today.
Any donation, in any amount, is truly welcome and appreciated.
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Local
Bloomberg takes a truly horrifying look at distracted driving, including animated graphs that show just how bad the problem is in Los Angeles.
The LA Clippers’ plan to reduce traffic at their proposed arena in Inglewood includes just 93 bicycle parking spaces to serve 18,000 people. Which doesn’t exactly make it sound like they really intend to encourage people to ride to the games, does it?
He gets it. A former LA city planner considers what Los Angeles officials would do if they actually took the climate crisis seriously. And concludes, in part, that they would build out the city’s Mobility Plan and stop encouraging the use of single occupancy vehicles.
State
Caltrans is proposing widening popular Laguna Canyon Road, along with adding bike lanes.
He definitely doesn’t get it. A member of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors is up in arms over plans to spend $90 million to build bike lanes, saying the funds should be spent on highways to reduce gridlock. Maybe someone could explain the concept of induced demand to him. Not to mention sprawl-driven driving.
National
Thieves have hit a dozen Denver-area bike shops, targeting high-end bicycles. Apparently, they’ve finally figured out that it’s easier to steal a lot of new bikes than one or two used ones.
Life is cheap in Indiana, where a 60-year old woman got a net two years behind bars for the drunken crash that killed a bike rider, after prosecutors pled away the DUI count and another felony charge.
An Indiana man faces charges for throwing two bicycles off an overpass onto a busy freeway, after confessing that he was trying to cause a fatal pileup “because he hated everyone.”
A New York bike rider faces up to a year in jail for recklessly killing a 67-year old woman earlier this year, even though the DA almost never charges drivers for the same thing.
Florida bike riders accuse drivers of intentionally targeting them with punishment passes — and have the bike cam videos to prove it. Even if the Orlando news site bizarrely doesn’t include any videos.
International
Now you can wear Rapha even if you’e not going anywhere.
Clearly, they don’t get it. A British Columbia newspaper admonishes bike riders and pedestrians to stop wearing black after dark. But apparently, careless and distracted drivers can just carry on.
No surprise here. A new study from the UK shows that bicycling makes older people happier, even if they aren’t doing the pedaling.
A British start-up wants to reduce London smog by offering deliveries via e-cargo bikes that can carry well over 600 pounds.
China’s Xiaomi is introducing the second generation of their $3,000 QiCycle smart ebike. And dropping the price nearly $2,600.
Competitive Cycling
Peter Sagan says he can see the end of his career coming, but that just motivates him more than scares him.
British track cyclist Vicky Williamson’s career is going downhill, after she made the jump to the country’s bobsleigh team.
Transgender world age group champ Rachel McKinnon says she’s been getting hate mail and death threats ever since Donald Trump Jr threw a Twitter tantrum directed her way.
Finally…
We may have to deal with aggressive drivers, but at least we don’t have to worry about falling off a high wire. We may have to deal with drivers parking in bike lanes, but at least we don’t have a bus shelter right in the middle of one.
And apparently, you can stop waiting for a Tesla bicycle.
https://twitter.com/miszterti/status/1202590024518250496?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1202590024518250496&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Froad.cc%2Fcontent%2Fnews%2F269261-angry-flemish-cyclist-flatly-refuses-pass-stationary-truck-bikes-trains-rush
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