BikinginLA

Just 18 days until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025, a decade of failure in which deaths have continued to climb. 

Yet not one city official has mentioned the impending deadline, or the city’s failure to meet it. 

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It’s Day 15 of the 10th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

Thanks to Douglas M, Nina M and Carter R for their generous donations to keep bringing SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy to your favorite screen every morning.

Now it’s your turn. So stop what you’re doing and give now! 

Because I have it on good authority that any donations made today will probably counteract any bad Friday the 13th luck today. 

Unless it doesn’t, of course.

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A 37-year old man suffered life-threatening injuries when he was struck by a driver while riding his bicycle near West Hillcrest Drive and Citation Way in Thousand Oaks Wednesday night, although the local paper makes it sound more like he hit the car.

The victim remained hospitalized in critical condition yesterday.

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The Bike League released their latest rankings of the country’s most bike-friendly states, with Washington moving up to the top spot, followed by Massachusetts, and Oregon slipping to third.

Next up comes California in a surprising fourth place on the list of Bicycle Friendly States for 2024.

Although how that’s possible without excluding Los Angeles, and probably San Francisco, from consideration is kinda questionable.

Meanwhile, the group warns that even the best states aren’t doing enough to protect people riding bicycles, let alone the rest of them.

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AASHTO, aka the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, has released the 5th edition of the industry-standard AASHTO Bike Guide.

The guide provides comprehensive standards for “the planning, design, and operation of bikeways along streets, roads, and highways, as well as on off-street paths in urban, suburban, and rural settings.”

According the organization,

The guide encourages a flexible approach to design bikeways and emphasizes the role of the planner, designer, and engineer in determining appropriate bikeway types and design dimensions based on project-specific conditions and existing and future performance.

It provides information to assist in choosing the appropriate combination of features, design values, and materials to create the design, while considering the context of the project area and surrounding environment, AASHTO said…

Revised chapters include those on bicyclist operation and safety; bicycle planning; design of shared use paths; design of shared lanes and bike lanes; maintenance and operations; and bicycle parking, bike share site location, and end-of-trip facilities.

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Nina Moscol forwards word that The Squeaky Wheel Bike Shop in Palmdale was violently broken into last week when someone smashed a vehicle into the front of the store.

She notes that owners Bob & Shilo Vigil provide support for the local community biking programs in the greater Palmdale area, and the shop is a registered vendor for California’s new ebike incentive program, as well as sponsoring and coaching the local inter-mural youth MTB team.

So if you find yourself in the area, stop in and buy something before the holidays, because they could use the business right now.

And keep your eyes peeled for people selling bikes with prices that seem too good to be true. Because they probably are.

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‘Tis the season.

Longtime Watts philanthropist “Sweet” Alice Harris hosted a Christmas bike giveaway for community kids.

The San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Department hosted a bike giveaway for the 35th consecutive year, donating 200 bicycles refurbished by inmates at the local Honor Farm. So the inmates do all the work, but the sheriff gets the credit? Seems fair. 

Restaurant chain Raising Cane’s donated a total of 400 bikes to the Boys & Girls Club of Harlem, and will host a bike riding clinic for any kids who don’t know how to ride one.

A Savannah, Georgia group gave 170 bikes to kids at eleven of the city’s public schools.

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It’s now 358 days since the California ebike incentive program’s latest failure to launch, which was promised no later than fall 2023. And a full 42 months since it was approved by the legislature and signed into law — and counting.

The program is finally scheduled to launch December 18th, so get your application in; Calbike with host a webinar on Monday to go over the application process.

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

Good question. A Boston op-ed says bike lanes save lives, so why are people still complaining?

Electrek considers the “strange logic” backing the push to require license plate on New York City ebikes; immigrant rights groups are teaming with a hospitality industry nonprofit to fight the bill.

But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly. 

A London woman wants to know why the city is suddenly full of bicyclists charging at pedestrians, after she was knocked down by a bike rider as she was crossing the street; a bike-riding witness told the guilty rider “You’re the kind of prick who gives the rest of us a bad name.”

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Local  

The story doesn’t appear to be posted online yet, but KNBC-4 reports that Walk ‘n Rollers stolen trailer has been recovered, but without the 15 grand worth of bikes and gear they used to teach little kids bike safety; the trailer full of gear was snatched by thieves last month.

Streets Are For Everyone says any donation to the group will be matched dollar-for-dollar right now.

 

State

The State of California claims it invested nearly $13 billion in just the last year to enhance transportation safety, and increase accessibility for people who walk and bike. Although you’d think with that kind of money, the results might be a little more noticeable.

A coalition of over 30 bicycle and active transportation advocacy groups are calling on the state to better regulate illegally operated electric motorcycles, which are often mistakenly called ebikes. Now if they’d just push to reclassify throttle-controlled bikes as electric motorcycles.

A new road diet and parking-protected bike lanes on San Diego’s Rancho Mission Road is raising safety concerns among residents, who claim crashes have increased dramatically since they were installed. However, it’s not unusual for collisions to increase after any change to road designs; what matters is what happens over the long term after drivers adjust to the changes.

Speaking of San Diego, board members for SANDAG, aka San Diego Association of Governments, will discuss whether to increase the budget for a 3.3-mile bike plan at today’s meeting, after estimates came in least 20% higher than expected.

San Luis Obispo finally gets around to rolling out its Vision Zero program, more than eight years after it was approved by the city council, with a goal of eliminating serious collisions by 2030.

Bike riders and local residents in San Carlos are calling for safety changes after a 31-year old Palo Alto woman was killed on a highway overpass, where plans call for a pedestrian bridge that might have spared her life.

The California Coastal Commission signed off the plan to permanently close a section of San Francisco’s Great Highway to motor vehicle traffic

 

National

Bicycling says your stiff neck could be causing the numbness in your hands when you ride. Although the story is locked behind their paywall, so you’re out of luck if the magazine blocks you. 

A writer for Velo lists “five totally random bike events” she wants to do next year, including the “fringey” Speed Project Los Angeles to Las Vegas ultra-endurance race.

An Oklahoma City off-road tri national champ responded to a serious crash that laid her up for a couple years by forming a bike club for the city’s elementary and middle school students.

 

International

People in the South London borough of Merton say you have to be brave to ride a bicycle there, where bike infrastructure lags behind other areas of the city.

They get it. Bicycle Scotland says “Nobody should be allowed near a driving license until they’ve undertaken a comprehensive cycling course” to gain “first-hand awareness of at-risk road users” and how to drive safely around people on bicycles.

An English Parliament member warns of “devastating consequences” if the country doesn’t do more to improve bike infrastructure in rural areas, where riders face added dangers on country roads.

France modified its traffic laws to allow bicyclists to legally ride side-by-side, as well as have additional lights on their bikes, as long as they’re not flashing.

Once again, a driver has somehow managed to plow into a group of bicyclists, this time in Western Australia, where two riders were seriously injured when the driver apparently failed to see the group riding in the same direction.

 

Competitive Cycling

Three-time Tour de France champ Tadej Pogačar rejects calls to slow pro cyclists to improve safety by arguing that “Tech always gets faster – it’s on riders to not do stupid things,” and that “modern bikes break every time you crash.” The problem is that sometimes, so do the people riding them.

Our old buddy Lance offered to give Jake Paul an “ass whooping” when the sometime MMA fighter and former Disney star sort-of but not really challenged the seven-time ex-Tour de France winner to a bike race.

 

Finally…

Who needs a a bike horn when you have a Vietnamese painted frog? When the bike parking is covered, who cares if it stinks?

And when in doubt — or in Toronto — blame it on the bike.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin.