BikinginLA

Day 308 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

……….

Don’t forget to bike the vote on Prop. 50 today, if you haven’t already.

To make it easy, Metro Bike is offering free half-hour rides; buses and trains are free today, too.

So you’re officially out of excuses.

………

Calbike Executive Director Kendra Ramsey says she knew as early as the middle of last month that the state Ebike Incentive Program was going down the toilet.

According to San Francisco public broadcaster KQED,

But Kendra Ramsey, the executive director of the California Bicycle Coalition (CalBike), said she was told in mid-October that CARB would shift the program’s remaining funds to Clean Cars 4 All, a similar incentive program for electric vehicles.

While she said she felt the conversation was meant to be private, she expected it would be followed by a more formal announcement from the agency.

“That direct communication from CARB never came,” Ramsey told KQED.

I hate to criticize Calbike, which does a lot of good working for safer streets and the rights of California bicyclists.

But shouldn’t that have been a hair-on-fire moment for Ramsey to get word out while we still had a chance to fight this deeply misguided decision?

We don’t know what conversations have taken place behind the scenes. However, throughout the long and twisted history of this program, it has seemed like Calbike wasn’t pushing CARB hard enough to fund and operate the voucher program.

Instead, at least publicly, they have offered a mild response to CARB’s many fuckups.

There comes a time when you have to set your hair on fire to call attention to a problem, and force a response to address it. It seems like that moment never came for Calbike.

The leader of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition wasn’t thrilled with CARB killing the ebike voucher program, either.

“Such a popular program shouldn’t be ended,” said Christopher White, the executive director of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition. “It should be operated well and fully funded because it promises to transform the mobility habits of tens of thousands of Californians to be more sustainable, far safer, [and it’s] far less expensive for the individuals to operate their new vehicles.

Like many transit advocate groups, he said he only found out about the shift in program funds from CalBike.

“It definitely gives the sense that CARB knows that this is the wrong direction to be moving in, to keep it so quiet,” he said.

Unfortunately, I haven’t heard a peep from any other state or local bicycle advocacy groups, other than the Sacramento Area Bike Advocates.

I’ll let you know when, and if, I do.

………

New York could elect its first bikeshare-riding mayor today.

According to Time, which is more website than magazine these days,

In one of his TikTok videos/campaign ads, Zohran Mamdani (suit, tie, no helmet) unlocks a Citi Bike from an Upper East Side dock as someone off in the distance yells “Communist!”

Without missing a beat he replies, “It’s pronounced cyclist!”

In an electoral campaign defined by Mamdani—his youth, that he’s a Muslim, his views toward Israel, and his affiliation with the Democratic Socialists of America—many have missed that Mamdani might become the first New York City Mayor to be a real cyclist, the first Citi Bike Mayor.

Whether or not you agree with his politics, it would be nice to have someone who actually rides a bike, let alone bikeshare, leading America’s largest city.

……….

Speaking of which, it looks like we won’t get to see LA’s mayor ride a bike after all, after the Dodgers pulled out a semi-miraculous win in the World Series.

Karen Bass had bet Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow that the loser would ride a bicycle wearing the jersey of the other team, with the distance determined by the winning team’s margin of victory.

Which means Chow will have to ride five miles wearing a Dodgers jersey.

It would have almost been worth it to see the Blue Jays successfully close out the final game just to see Bass on a bike for the first time since she was elected mayor.

Almost.

………

Local 

Metro Bike is hosting a “fun, safe, and social” 8.1-mile community bike ride November 29th beginning at the Compton & Slauson Metro Station, and returning to the same spot on the A train.

Pasadena is preparing an update to the city’s bicycle laws, defining what an ebike is to conform with California law, while removing an outdated bicycle licensing requirement that is now illegal under state law.

Speaking of the Rose City, the Pasadena Complete Streets Coalition provides a guide to the city’s bicycle resources.

Streetsblog’s Joe Linton offers photos from Sunday’s Active Streets Corazón del Valle in El Monte and South El Monte.

 

State

Circulate San Diego added bike and pedestrian wayfaring signs in Imperial Beach, along with surface decals reminding bike riders to wear helmets.

No surprise here. After a 35-year old driver was charged for the October 22nd hit-and-run that seriously injured a 12-year old El Cajon boy riding a bicycle, it turned out that he had two open charges for evading the police, as well as a failure to appear on one of the charges; family member had encouraged him to turn himself in after spotting blood on his car, but he refused until police caught up with him.

A 43-year old San Luis Obispo bike shop is asking for help from the public to repair damage caused by thieves over the weekend, who attempted to break-in by backing a pickup through the front of the building but were stopped by a security gate.

 

National

No justice in Fargo, North Dakota, where a killer driver walked without a day behind bars for running over a 61-year old university nanoscience engineer as he rode a bicycle earlier this year.

New York Streetsblog says street safety advocates should be displeased that mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani’s has asked NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch to stay on, as the city’s misguided crackdown on bike riders continues.

Horrible news from LaPlace, Louisiana, where a 19-year old driver faces charges for the hit-and-run death of a 66-year old great-grandfather, who body wasn’t discovered for three days after he was killed while walking his bicycle; there’s no word on whether he could have survived if the driver had just called 911.

Florida legislators consider a bill that would make it illegal to modify ebikes to exceed manufacturer specifications, while requiring licensing and registration for electric motorbikes, similar to motorcycles.

 

International

Momentum updates their list of the world’s “coolest and most unique” innovations in bicycling infrastructure. None of which are in Los Angeles. Or in the US, for that matter. 

She gets it. A London writer says forget driverless cars, because she won’t feel comfortable until there are fewer cars on the streets, with or without someone behind the wheel. Although I’m equally impressed she used “fewer cars” instead of the more common “less.”

UK bicycle retailers are selling overpowered electric motorbikes as ebikes, without bothering to tell their customers they can’t be legally used on the streets. It wouldn’t surprise me if that was true here, too. 

British cycling legend Sir Mark Cavendish says our shared ancestral homeland is the “best place to ride a bike in the world.”

In a tragic case reminiscent of Kaitlin Armstrong’s murder of gravel champ Moriah “Mo” Wilson, former French track cycling champ Cindy Morvan was shot and killed in a murder-suicide by the current partner of her former lover; Morvan was just 39, and the mother of two small children.

In more bad news from Europe, the 78-year old uncle of Italian pop star Laura Pausini was killed by a hit-and-run driver while riding his bike on the outskirts of Bologna.

 

Competitive Cycling

Spanish champ Oier Lazkano was canned by the Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe cycling team after he was suspended by UCI over “unexplained abnormalities” in his biological passport. But we’re supposed to believe the era of doping is over, right?

 

Finally…

Don’t ride your bike in Sardinia. If you want to protect your bike from thieves, park it on an inaccessible pillar in the middle of a river.

And that feeling when you test ebikes, but have no idea how to build them.

Thought @ebiketips.bsky.social would enjoy this e-bike image. Not sure what's gone on there…touchreviews.net/we-tested-th…

— Mark Annand (@markannand.bsky.social) 2025-10-30T15:17:58.334Z

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin.