BikinginLA

This is who we share the road with.

Even people dining on a restaurant patio aren’t safe from cars, after a driver plowed into tables on the sidewalk outside a Boyle Heights restaurant.

At least two three people were injured when a motorist somehow lost control of their SUV and drove onto the sidewalk at Los 5 Puntos near Lorena Street and Cesar Chavez Ave around 3 pm Tuesday.

A woman dining at the restaurant suffered severe leg injuries, while her daughter was shaken but not seriously hurt; a passerby was also injured when the SUV shoved a trash can into him.

Local residents said the intersection is prone to crashes, yet, typically for Los Angeles, nothing seems to have been done about it.

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Apparently, fleeing the scene of a fatal crash is just no big deal anymore.

Consider Kansas, where a 21-year old man walked without a day behind bars for killing a 57-year old man riding a bicycle, after a judge sentenced him to a lousy 36 months probation.

Then there’s Minnesota, where the 70-year old former owner of a popular Minneapolis area restaurant walked without a day behind bars for killing a bike rider with his catering truck, despite getting out to check on the victim, then getting back in his SUV and driving away, leaving his dying victim in the middle of the road.

Which raises the question of why wouldn’t you just drive off after a crash, if the worst you’re going to face isn’t even a slap on the wrist?

Especially here in Los Angeles, where you have a 99% chance of getting away with it, and most non-fatal hit-and-runs don’t even get investigated.

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West Hollywood offers a reminder about next weekend’s Meet the Hollywoods CicLAvia on Sunday, the 19th.

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Encinitas State Senator Catherine Blakespear has posted video of her recent webinar examining the challenges and solutions for ebike safety — which starts with her bill to clearly define ebikes, and prohibits the wink-wink selling of electric motorbikes mislabeled as ebikes.

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Now you, too, can get a real, honest-to-gosh Tour de France bicycle at a discount.

Maybe.

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

Lime has refused to take any responsibility after an underaged boy illegally riding one of their dockless ebikes crashed into a woman in her 60s walking in a pedestrianized London square, resulting in 36 days in a hospital and 18 months learning how to walk again.

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Local 

The Southern California Association of Governments, aka SCAG, invites public feedback on the six-county regional transportation plan. That’s easy. Stop wasting taxpayer money on highways, and invest it all in transit, biking and walking projects that will do more good. 

Los Angeles DA Nathan Hochman warns parents that Orange County isn’t the only place where they could face criminal charges for knowingly allowing their kids to ride an ebike in an unsafe or illegal way that leads to a serious crash.

LA drivers could now get fined a whopping $63 for violating the state’s daylighting law by parking too close to the corner.

Streetsblog’s Joe Linton examines the nearly completed La Crescenta Ave. Bikeway in Glendale. Which looks good, although those white plastic bollards won’t keep anyone or anything out.

Burbank lawyer Adrianos Facchetti is once again asking for nominations for his law firm’s Kids for Bikes program, looking ten local kids between the ages of 6 and 17 who deserved to be honored with a new bicycle, helmet and a t-shirt; they must live within ten miles of the firm’s office at 4444 W Riverside Drive in Burbank.

A South Pas website examines the city’s popular bike bus.

CBS LA, nee KCBS-2, says Santa Clarita’s new $7 million Haskell Canyon Bike Park is already becoming one of the leading mountain bike destinations in Southern California.

 

State

The family of 6-year old fallen bicyclist Hudson O’Laughlin has filed a claim against San Diego, arguing the city should have known that the Pacific Beach sidewalk and street where he was killed by a hit-and-run driver was dangerous.

Bad news from Hesperia, where a 67-year-old man suffered major injuries when he allegedly swerved his bicycle into the side of a pickup driven by an 84-year old Apple Valley man. As usual, a lot depends on whether there were any independent witnesses who observed the crash, because “bicyclists swerving into vehicles” usually means the elderly driver drifted into the bike rider.  

Albany approved an active transportation plan Monday evening, featuring a protected bike lane on one side of the city’s main merchant corridor.

The Napa Valley Register explains when and why bicyclists can take the lane, which even the DMV recognizes is often the safest thing for riders to do. And it’s legal to do in any lane that’s a substandard width, which is most of the right traffic lanes in Southern California, particularly when they allow parking on the right side. 

A Reno TV station reports an ebike rider is in critical condition after a crash in Mammoth Lakes, even though the victim was struck by a driver, and what kind of bicycle they were on didn’t seem to have anything to do with it.

 

National

The American Discovery 250 Relay kicked off on July 4th, with hikers and bike riders passing batons containing a copy of the Declaration of Independence as they traverse the 6,800-mile American Discovery Trail from Point Reyes, California to Cape Henlopen State Park in Delaware.

Members of my college fraternity are biking across the US in both directions for the 33rd straight year to call attention to people with disabilities, with separate teams riding east to west and west to east. Although not my chapter, which was dissolved by the Supreme Chapter a few years after I left, for reasons that were never publicly explained, and which I hopefully had nothing to do with.

Apparently, platinum level status is not guarantee of safety, as a woman riding a bicycle was killed by the driver of a semi while she was trying to get around a street repaving project, on a street in my bicycle friendly Colorado hometown where I used to walk, bike and drive on a regular basis.

A pair of Texas teens have now been arrested for the hit-and-run crash that killed a 43-year old man riding a bicycle — one for fleeing the scene, and the other for lying to the cops to protect the kid behind the wheel.

San Antonio, Texas will open a second round of $1,000 ebike vouchers for lower-income residents. Which compares favorably to LA’s voucher program, which doesn’t exist.

Northwest Arkansas’ Tri-Region E-Bike Incentive Program intends to distribute 5,800 vouchers worth up to $1,200 off the price of an ebike. Which compares favorably to California’s Ebike Incentive Program, which no longer exists because electric cars are more important. 

Sad news from St. Paul, Minnesota where a 67-year old man riding a bicycle was killed in a dooring, yet the driver wasn’t ticketed or arrested. No matter what state you’re in, drivers are required to make sure there’s no one in their way before opening a car door, yet police too often treat it as just another “oopsie.”

There’s a special place in hell for whoever shot a five-year old Detroit boy as he rode his bicycle outside his home.

Anne Hathaway’s production company plans to flip the script, and produce a movie about four young women competing in Indiana University’s famed Little 500 bike race, made famous in Breaking Away, and still the best bike movie of all time. Go ahead. Take my money now.

Vermont mountain bikers are building an ambitious 485-mile multi-use trail known as the Velomont that will span the entire length of the state, and is designed to be accessible to anyone, regardless of disabilities.

A Washington DC website looks back at the cross-country Bikecentennial bike rides in 1976, as several hundred small groups rode across the US in both directions to mark the nation’s bicentennial.

A Virginia news anchor rode his bike across the state to mark the country’s 250th birthday.

 

International

In kind of a strange move, bicyclists and local residents in Edmonton, Alberta came together to protest a plan for a road diet and protected bike lanes, in favor of retaining street parking and settling for painted bike lanes.

Residents of Exeter, England want to reopen a road that was closed to vehicular traffic six years ago, while continuing to retain a “low speed environment” that prioritizes “walking, wheeling and cycling whilst retaining access for two way traffic.” Which could be difficult considering how narrow the street is. 

Wales intends to become a bicycling destination, a goal they think will be helped by hosting the final leg of next year’s UK Grand Depart for the Tour de France. Although it would help if anyone could pronounce the names of the local towns.

An Irish man is on a 2,200-mile fundraising ride around Ireland, in hopes of raising £2,200 — the equivalent of $2938 — or a pound a mile.

A Wisconsin man is riding 8,000 miles across Asia to raise awareness for cancer and transplant treatments.

 

Competitive Cycling

It looks like you’ll see the Russian cycling team compete in the ’28 LA Olympics, after the International Olympic Committee lifted the country’s suspension for invading Ukraine, even though they’re still bombarding Ukraine on a daily basis. Russia, that is. Not the IOC.

Mads Pedersen sprinted to victory on stage 4 of the Tour de France, leading a strong breakaway that survived to the finish line, and put Norway’s Torstein Træen into the yellow jersey with a nearly eight-minute margin over previous leaders Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard, four years after Træen was diagnosed with testicular cancer.

Road.cc examines how Tour de France bikes have changed over the past 32 years. I’ll take that steel frame ’94 Pinarello, thank you.

Visma-Lease a Bike’s black kits demonstrate that fabric matters more than color when it comes to keeping riders cooler in Europe’s excessive heat.

Twenty-two-year old Mexican star Isaac del Toro’s win in stage two of the Tour has his fellow countrymen continuing to think “¿Y si sí?”, or “What if he did?” win the entire race. Although the chances of that happening this year aren’t much better than their World Cup team, unless something drastic happens to team leader Pogačar.

Cycling News considers the eternal question of why do cyclists shave their legs. Maybe they’re all secretly sponsored by Gillette.

 

Finally…

Yellow cards aren’t just for soccer players anymore. Your next ebike could actually be one.

And how to breathe life into a formerly fucked-up bike.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin.