BikinginLA

Just 110 days left until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025. 

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Hard to believe this is the 17th anniversary of the Infamous Beachfront Bee Encounter that sent me to the ICU, and onto the path that led me here.

Because it was the months I spent confined to home afterwards, recovering from a massive hematoma caused by an even more massive bike crash, that inspired me to start writing about bicycling and advocating for bike safety. 

Maybe someday I’ll tell you the rest of the story from that day, involving one of those deeply spiritual, bright light near-death experiences only other people seem to have.

Then again, you’d probably just think I was fucking nuts. 

And I’d probably agree.

Photo by Pixabay.

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The annual AIDS/LifeCycle Ride is coming to an end after 30 years.

The iconic seven day, 545 mile ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles will roll out for the last time next June, arriving in LA for the end of Pride Week.

Over its three decade lifespan, AIDS/LifeCycle has raised over $300 million for the Los Angeles LGBTQ Center and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, starting when HIV/AIDS was still a death sentence for too many people in this country.

But a decline in both ridership and donations since the pandemic has meant it no longer brings in enough to justify continuing.

According to the NBC Bay Area TV station,

“Especially after the last few years, that what’s left after we pay those costs, it doesn’t rise to the level of what we believe in our industry is an ethical way to run a fundraiser,” said Tyler TerMeer, CEO of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation.

So if you’ve been thinking about doing it “someday,” next year is your last chance.

Let’s hope it goes out with the biggest and most successful ride yet.

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Don’t forget tonight’s Burbank City Council Mobility Debate, hosted on Zoom by Streets For All.

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It’s now 266 days since the California ebike incentive program’s latest failure to launch, which was promised no later than fall 2023. And 39 full months since it was approved by the legislature and signed into law — and counting.

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

No bias here. A writer for the Telegraph responds to news of AI-controlled traffic lights designed to give bike riders priority at intersections by saying “entitled cyclists are about to get even more insufferable.”

No bias here, either. After an Irish bicyclist sent video of drivers talking on their phones and parking illegally to the local cops, they responded by mailing a ticket — to him, for jumping a red light.

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Local  

Bike Culver City and Culver City High School’s Green New Deal have been awarded a grant from the Clean Air Coalition of Greater Los Angeles to promote Clean Air Day next month with an Art Design Contest, Pledge Outreach Campaign and an educational bike ride.

 

State

About damn time. Bakersfield authorities publicly identified a 20-year old man who died over a week after he was struck by a driver while riding his bike back in June.

 

National

Momentum ranks the states with the best bicycling routes through US wine regions; needless to say, California comes out on top, with a SoCal shoutout to Paso Robles, but no mention of Temecula.

Your next bike lights could be designed by a truck driver, and look like second set of handlebars.

The Cherokee Nation is accepting applications for next year’s 950-mile Remember the Removal Bike Ride; candidates must be citizens of the Cherokee Nation citizens between 16 and 24 years old.

Now it’s murder. Police in a Seattle suburb are looking for a group of three or four juveniles who severely beat a 56-year old man riding a bicycle last month for no apparent reason, after the victim died in the hospital on Sunday.

Lyft is pulling their dockless micromobility devices out of the Denver market, removing their ebikes and e-scooters even as demand continues to rise — and despite having two years left on their contract with the city.

A Connecticut writer says 9/11 was a perfect day to ride a bike. Except for that whole terrorist thing.

 

International

A group of US and Irish firefighters raised nearly $150,000 with a three day, 225-mile bike ride through the Irish countryside to honor the victims of 9/11, visiting 17 fire stations and finishing at a memorial garden built by an Irish nurse who treated the victims from the twin towers.

Erstwhile country singer Kasey Musgraves is one of us, wrecking her knee by crashing a rented ebike while trying to record a video on a trip to Ireland to kick off her latest tour — and that wasn’t even the worst part of her trip.

In a sentiment that will sound familiar to American bike riders, the head of a Namibian road safety organization complains that a failed bike lane was designed by someone who has never ridden a bicycle.

 

Competitive Cycling

American ultra-endurance bicyclist Lael Wilcox shattered the world record for fastest woman to ride around the world, shaving nearly 16 days off the existing record of 124 days and 11 hours, set six years ago by Scottish cyclist Jenny Graham; Wilcox rode 18,125 miles in 108 days, 12 hours and 12 minutes.

Evidently, setting the record for Tour de France stage wins wasn’t enough, as 39-year old Mark Cavendish considers postponing his retirement once again to return next year.

Triathlon “Megastar” Kristian Blummenfelt has pulled the plug on a four-year plan to win the Tour de France after finishing a disappointing 12th in the recent Paris Olympics, shifting his focus to winning the triathlon in the ’28 Los Angeles Olympics to go with his gold from Tokyo.

 

Finally…

This is what a real bike theft looks like. That feeling when a rightwing riot wrecks the bike racks.

And this may be one reason why people don’t use the bike path.

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Be safe, and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.

Oh, and fuck Putin