BikinginLA

I’ve received reports about a possible bicycling fatality on Barrington Ave in West LA Monday night. 

According to a post on Nextdoor, a bike rider was hit by a driver around 10 pm, between Olympic and Pico Blvds.

Meanwhile, a report on the Citizen app showed police investigating a fatal collision at Barrington and Exposition around the same time. 

So far, I haven’t been able to find any confirmation of the crash, or that someone was killed. The county medical examiner’s website shows just two people killed on the streets somewhere in LA County, but doesn’t indicate where or how they were traveling. 

I’ll keep looking, and tell you if I learn more. Or if you have any information about this, please let me know. 

And in the meantime, let’s just hope it turns out to be a mistake. Which isn’t uncommon where Nextdoor is concerned.

Thanks to Howard Valai and Nick Hooper for the tips.

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A San Diego judge ruled that Chase Richard will stand trial for the hit-and-run death of Ramona resident Michelle Scott as she rode her bike to work October 2nd; he continues to be held on $2 million bond.

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Not all superheroes wear capes.

This little boy in China is his mummy's big hero – he vented his anger at a car that sent his mum flying pic.twitter.com/RtVE1xd5o2

— South China Morning Post (@SCMPNews) December 11, 2019

Although something tells me a bicyclist wouldn’t be seen in the same light if we tried the same thing.

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Ride your bike to deliver cookies to Costa Mesa first responders this Sunday; hopefully, you can manage to deliver more than you eat.

Unlike, say, me.

https://twitter.com/arlis4costamesa/status/1204867078177509376

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Peloton is the news story that just keeps on giving these day.

The actress who played the Peloton Wife blames the expression on her face for the outsized response. Uh, no.

The company has angered some of its customers by cutting prices for digital subscribers, but keeping the more expensive subscriptions for people who use one of their bikes the same.

C|net says Peloton’s $2,245 purchase price and $39 monthly subscription is worth it if you’re a dedicated indoor cyclist.

But who needs Peloton when you can just shove a pair of pedals under your desk?

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‘Tis the Season.

The Salvation Army and Pasadena Rotary Club teamed to give 200 new bicycles and tricycles to local kids as part of their Bikes For Christmas program.

More on the San Diego Chargers of Los Angeles giving new bicycles to one hundred Inglewood elementary school kids.

Carlsbad’s Bikes for the Barrio program donated 110 bikes to underserved children at a local Elementary School.

Over 300 volunteers showed up to build 800 bicycles for kids in San Francisco’s East Bay.

Sixty-seven kids at a Cedar Rapids, Iowa neighborhood mission got new bikes, thanks to a local charity.

An entire North Carolina 3rd grade class got new bicycles thanks to Bikes for Kids.

Florida’s Jack the Bike Man is planning to give away thousands of new and refurbished kids bikes this weekend.

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Sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly. Or selling them.

The owner of a Grover Beach bike shop could be going away for a long time — and deservedly so — after he was charged with sexually abusing a girl younger than 14 years old on several occasions.

Police in Palo Alto are looking for a bike-riding purse snatcher who dragged a woman several feet as she fought to hang onto her bag.

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Still more people are giving to 5th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

So let me offer my sincere thanks to Anne F and Shrak Racing for their generous donations to the fund drive.

Your support helps ensure all the best bike news and advocacy will keep coming your way every day!

And helps keep our elected officials accountable, too. 

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Local

Evidently, supercars are disposable now. The CHP found an upside down fire-engine-red Lamborghini abandoned on Angeles Crest Highway above Altadena, after the driver flipped it and walked away.

I’m not sure what it means when a bigass SUV gets its own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, except that Chevrolet paid someone a shitload of money. Thanks to Evan Burbridge for the heads-up. 

 

State

A San Diego writer stumbles onto a New Zealand man who just finished a 1,750-mile ride from Canada to Mexico in 27 days.

San Diego broke ground on a pair of bikeways through the North Park and Mid-City neighborhoods that will eventually connect with planed protected bike lanes on 30th Street, where some business owners and residents seem to think maintaining parking spaces outweighs protecting human lives.

A San Jose letter writer says she suffers the effects of fossil fuels in the form of pollution when she rides her bike.

A San Francisco woman got a $1,200 bill for failing to return a Lyft bikeshare bike, even though she had gotten a confirmation for its return.

San Francisco is putting bike and pedestrian safety projects on the fast track, but Streetsblog says the new bike lanes still rely on dangerous mixing zones at the intersections.

The North Bay Area is spending $726 million for more induced demand by widening Highway 101 between Petaluma and the Marin County Line. But at least they threw in a bike path.

 

National

Bike Snob’s Eben Weiss has your new style guide for all things bikes, insisting espresso and aero are out, and pour-overs and flannel are in.

Makes sense to me. A writer for Singletracks says don’t spend your money on a new bike, spend it on new experiences.

Year-to-date wholesale bike orders were down in every category except ebikes for the first two months of this year, while bike riding continues to drop among kids, as well. Thanks to Brent Bigler for the links.

A new offroad wheelchair is made from mountain bike parts for lower costs and greater durability.

A new documentary follows five Aussie friends on a 2,600 mile, 30 day ride across the Western US following the route of John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath, with a budget of just $420 for the entire journey.

Add this one to your bike bucket list — a 280-mile loop through Oregon forests and California redwoods.

On January 1st, Oregon will become the fourth state to allow some form of the Idaho Stop Law, allowing bike riders to treat stop signs as yields; however, unlike Idaho, they’ll still have to remain for red lights.

Somehow, my frozen Colorado hometown manages to have a Winter Bike to Work Day, even if it is a week early. But Los Angeles, where it sometimes gets all the way down to the 60s, can’t manage to pull it off.

Chicago will keep a bike lane next the median to avoid doorings, after beating back an alderman’s attempt to move them or replace them with part-time parking.

He gets it. A Rhode Island letter writer says no one is trying to force drivers to ride a bike, just pushing for bike lanes to give people a choice.

An Albany NY writer says buying a bike online after trying it out at the local bike shop, aka showrooming, may not be illegal but it definitely isn’t nice.

This is who — or what — we share the roads with. A New York man was killed when he was pinned between two cars after a Lexus owner used the remote starter to start his car.

A New Jersey op-ed says the state has the money to improve safety on the streets, but what’s lacking is the political will. Which Los Angeles can certainly relate to.

A Richmond VA councilmember says giving up his car for a month inspired a new Streets for All bill, including speed limit cuts, banning parking in bike lanes, and an Idaho Stop Law.

Mississippi bicyclists explain why putting rumble strips along the edge line on the Natchez Trace Parkway is a very bad idea. Actually, it’s a bad idea anywhere people ride bikes.

 

International

Lots of people ride their bikes to college. In Bogotá, Columbia, you can ride your bike for college to study the effects of the city’s sprawl on surrounding environmental zones.

This is who we share the roads with, part dois. A Brazilian man was busted for dressing up like a matronly woman to take the driver’s test for his mother, after she failed three times. Thanks to J. Patrick Lynch for the tip.

Seriously? A Canadian writer says bicycles — electric or otherwise — are not viable alternatives to cars, but velomobiles are. There are a lot of Dutch and Danish riders who might beg to differ.

Bike Biz looks at the bicycling platforms of each of Britain’s political parties in yesterday’s election, won by the Conservatives.

An ambulance arrived 90 minutes earlier than promised for an English bicyclist who broke his hip after clipping a curb. And still took three and a half hours to get there.

A new British survey shows an across the board decline in bicycling for leisure, sport and travel.

Berlin is planning to build eleven Bicycle Expressways connecting the outskirts of the city to the city center. But shouldn’t they be called fahrradbahns?

This is the cost of traffic violence. A New Zealand woman describes the immense loss when her 19-year old daughter was killed riding her bike to work.

Shanghai is automating enforcement, with ebikes required to carry license plates with an embedded RFID chip to automatically ticket riders if traffic cams capture a violation; the system has resulted in 49,000 tickets since July 1st.

 

Competitive Cycling

Heartbreaking. A Rwandan woman describes how her dreams of bike racing were shattered when she got pregnant after being raped by her coach.

LA-based retired pro cyclist Phil Gaimon says being fast is pointless, because there are more important things in life for most bike riders.

American cyclist Tejay van Garderen says he’s aiming for back-to-back Giro and Tour de France races next year.

 

If you’re riding your bike with an outstanding arrest warrant, maybe carrying a coffee table on your handlebars isn’t the best idea.

And everyone can use a little help pedaling.