Just 286 days until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.
So stop what you’re doing and sign this petition to demand Mayor Bass hold a public meeting to listen to the dangers we face walking and biking on the mean streets of LA.
Then share it — and keep sharing it — with everyone you know, on every platform you can.
As of this writing, we’re up to 1,018 signatures, so let’s keep it going! Urge everyone you know to sign the petition, until the mayor agrees to meet with us!
Meanwhile, UCLA is hosting a City-Wide Community Safety Listening Session Event tonight. Which is a good opportunity to demand safer streets, and call for a public meeting with the mayor.
Photo by Maxfoot from Pixabay.
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
No bias here. A self-described “anti-cyclist cyclist” tells his fellow bike riders to just stay in their lane, stop filming lawbreaking drivers, and get other bike riders to clean up their act and stop breaking traffic laws. Because evidently, you’re somehow responsible for the bad behavior of people you’ve never met, as long as they ride bikes.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Over 100 people riding bicycles and motor scooters took over a Boston freeway where bikes are expressly banned on Sunday, forcing drivers to crawl around them as the popped wheelies and swerved in between cars.
………
Local
West Hollywood gave Bird the bird, ending its contract with the e-scooter provider at the end of this month, and leaving Lime the only dockless scooter provider in the city.
Nineteen-year old Panorama City resident Daniel Antonio Garcia has been arrested for the hit-and-run crash that killed 44-year old David Rodriguez in Arleta last August; Garcia was allegedly speeding when he veered right to go around another vehicle, and slammed into Rodriguez’ bike.
Hats off to the Video Production students at Los Alamitos High School, who made a video to help a fellow classmate with cerebral palsy win a new adaptive bike.
Forget ebike vouchers. Long Beach will now allow residents to check out an ebike for up to three months from the city’s new ebike lending library.
State
Some San Diego County bike advocates are demanding changes to the curb-protected bike lane on the South Coast Highway 101 in Encinitas, where Encinitas resident Ryan Currie was found dead after apparently crashing his bike.
A school principal in a disadvantaged South Sacramento neighborhood is calling on people to donate bikes to the school so students can bike to school to attend classes more regularly.
National
Escape Collective takes a deep dive into why modern performance bikes are so damned expensive.
PeopleForBikes wants to have a say new federal rules proposed by the Consumer Product Safety Commission to address ebike injury risks.
Samuel J. Mancini, the former CEO of bicycling brand investors Outdoor Capital Partners, will spend the next 71 months behind bars in a Colorado federal prison, as well as paying $10.5 million in restitution, after being convicted of scamming investors in a Ponzi-like scheme.
A South Dakota orthopedic sports medicine doctor bikes the five-mile daily commute to his office, except for days when he rides the 65-mile commute to his outreach clinic in Sioux Center, Iowa — or 150 miles each way to a clinic in Sioux Falls.
He gets it. US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg opened a new bike path along Rhode Island’s Woonasquatucket River, saying projects that build dedicated lanes for bicyclists are essential to expanding transportation options for commuters.
New York has launched a new ebike safety campaign, telling ebike riders to “Get Smart Before You Start.” Because they apparently assume that a not-very catchy and pretty damn meaningless slogan will somehow cut the city’s rising rate of ebike deaths, even though most occurred on streets without bicycle infrastructure.
International
Fifty-one percent of people on the planet commute by car every day.
The Standard considers the rise of bike cam-equipped vigilante bicyclists targeting London’s lawbreaking drivers.
A trio of British men received sentences of six-and-a-half years, ten years and 25 years behind bars for the fatal stabbing of a man in a dispute over the victim’s stolen ebike. As we’ve said many times before, no bike is worth your life. Or anyone else’s.
Sad news from New Zealand, where business and climate journalist and commentator Rod Oram died when he suffered a heart attack after crashing his bicycle; he was 73.
Competitive Cycling
Road Bike Rider talks with ultra-endurance cyclist Leah Goldstein, who demolished the competition to become the first woman to win the Race Across America’s solo division in 2021.
British Olympic legend Laura Kenny announced her retirement after winning five Olympic golds, seven European titles and 14 World Championships in her 13 year career.
Finally…
When you’re riding a bicycle with a stolen gun tucked into your waistband, stop for the damn stop sign, already. Who needs a bull for a bullfight when you can just mount horns on your handlebars?
And how to take that big step from a balance bike to a pedal bike.
Which hopefully you’ve done by now.
……...
Be safe, and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.
Oh, and fuck Putin
