Our terrible, horrible, no good, very bad November is showing no sign of letting up.
Now another bicyclist has been killed on the mean streets of Southern California, the sixth so far this month — an average of just over one every three days.
Both drivers remained at the scene, and neither showed signs of impairment, according to police investigators. There’s no word at this time on the cause of the collision, or who may have been at fault.
Anyone who with information is urged to call the Santa Monica Police Department at 310/458-8427.
However, this is more evidence that Lincoln remains one of Santa Monica’s deadliest corridors, despite a decades-long effort to fix it.
This is at least the 51st bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the 16th that I’m aware of in Los Angeles County.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for Bradley Allen Proudfoot and his loved ones.
I’m told Orange was struck when she was traveling east on 16th Street at San Antonio Ave this Tuesday, after a driver headed west on 16th entered the intersection at the same time and left-hooked her while turning onto southbound San Antonio.
Which means there should be no question who was at fault. And it’s not her.
She reportedly died after being taken off life-support at the Pomona Valley Medical Center this weekend.
You can learn more about Orange in the post below.
This is at least the 50th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the fifth that I’m aware of in San Bernardino County.
How many more there are that we haven’t learned about remains an open question.
Correction: I originally misidentified the victim as Barbara Orange rather than Donna. I apologize for the mistake.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for Donna Orange and her loved ones.
There’s no official confirmation yet, but I’ve received word of a bicycling death in Pico Rivera.
A local resident reports driving past the aftermath of a collision involving a bicyclist on Whittier Blvd at Acacia Ave on Sunday afternoon.
They forwarded a couple photos, which I’ve included below. While they don’t show the victim, that damage to the vehicle is graphic, so be forward if that’s not something you want to see.
In one, you can clearly see a mangled bicycle in the street, 30 to 40 feet in front of a car with a shattered windshield, suggesting the victim was struck at some speed.
He’s identified in the post only as a young man; a commentator describes him as her nephew. But as with anything else on Facebook, that may or may not be accurate.
Unfortunately, that’s all the information we have at this time. So if anyone knows anything, please let me know.
But at least the driver stuck around this time.
Assuming this is confirmed, it is at least the 49th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the 15th that I’m aware of in Los Angeles County.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for the victim and his loved ones.
He was pronounced dead after being transported to a hospital.
At last report, Lackey-Berg was being held on $1 million bail at the Cois M. Byrd Detention Center in French Valley for suspicion of murder.
Unfortunately, that’s all we know right now. There’s no word on how or why the crash occurred, any possible motive, or whether the driver was arrested at the scene.
Anyone with information its urged to call Detective Pedro Aguila of the Hemet Police Department at 951/765-2423.
This is at least the 48th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the seventh that I’m aware of in Riverside County.
Note: There is also a story about this incident on the websites of the Riverside Press-Enterprise, the San Bernardino Sun and Ontario’s Daily Bulletin, but it is hidden behind their draconian paywalls. If you have a subscription to any of those papers, let me know if there’s any additional information we haven’t included here.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for the victim and his loved ones.
To assess the risk posed to cyclists by rigid bollards, DEKRA conducted two identical collision tests at its Crash Test Center in Neumünster, Germany, with a three-wheeled e-cargo bike driven at a speed of 25 km/h (about 15-16 mph), one against a flexible post and the other against a rigid one.
“In the test against the rigid post, there was a strong deceleration [slowing down] that threw the dummy from the saddle towards the handlebars. The bollard buckled and then acted as a ramp. The rear of the bike was lifted up, throwing the dummy off and causing the bike to tip over.”
“In a real-life situation, the person riding the bike would have suffered serious injuries,” Egelhaaf said.
On the other hand, flexible plastic bollards — like the car-tickler bendie posts preferred by LADOT — allowed riders to simply roll over them, with little or no risk of serious injuries.
But flexible bollards also do nothing to keep inattentive or uncaring drivers out of the bike lanes, and are often flattened within weeks, if not days, of their installation.
So the question becomes whether the risk of falls outweighs the risk posed by motorists and their big, dangerous machines.
I don’t know how to answer that.
The only way to get a actual answer would be to try a real world test on comparable roadways, and measure the rate of injuries on both after six months and a year.
And to the best of my knowledge, no one has done that. Or plans to.
………
This is who we share the road with.
A Santa Monica collision resulted in unexpected tragedy after a pickup driver collided with a motorcyclist on the 1400 block of Cloverfield Blvd, near the Specialized bike shop at Cloverfield and Santa Monica.
Witnesses said a driver seemed to intentionally crash into the victim’s motorcycle, after the motorbike rider waved a gun as the two men argued moments before the crash.
The driver claimed he accidentally hit the motorcycle while attempting to flee from the gunman — then he did flee immediately after the crash, turning a road rage incident into a fatal hit-and-run.
All because video showed a driver correctly slow down behind the recumbent rider to wait for a safe opportunity to pass, before a truck driver slammed on his brakes to avoid running up the driver’s ass, and nearly hit an oncoming car headed in the other direction.
And somehow, they managed to conclude this was all the bike rider’s fault.
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
No bias here, either. A Boston bike commuter says the city’s new bike lanes are a metaphor for the Democratic Party, since they were built to appease a “small, highly vocal minority,” a “depressing number” of whom consider the resulting traffic congestion a benefit, not a trade-off. Tell us you don’t understand traffic calming without saying it.
If you’re going to hate on bicycles, might as well do it poetically, as a British letter writer pens an ode to the local city council’s “absurd” and “crazy” “cycle crusade.”
They get it. A Pasadena study session will consider how to revitalize North Lake Ave and turn it into a Complete Street to make it more inviting to bike riders and pedestrians, as it currently “suffers from excessive space allocated to cars.”
Costa Mesa will host Micromobility America, a trade show for ebike and e-scooter makers, and others in the micromobility industry, this Thursday and Friday.
Sad news from Sacramento, where a 32-year old woman was killed when she was stuck by a driver while trying to ride across the street; naturally, the CHP blamed the victim for riding directly into the car’s path, without mentioning whether the driver may have been speeding or gone through a traffic signal.
Bicycling considers how to say goodbye to the rider you used to be. A lesson I’ve struggled to learn myself. Unfortunately, this one doesn’t seem to be available anywhere else, so you’re on your own if the magazine blocks you.
That’s more like it. An Illinois driver faces up to 61 years in prison for the drugged-driving crash that killed a man riding a bicycle, after he was convicted on four counts of aggravated DUI causing death and one count of reckless homicide.
Life is cheap in Wales, where an 84-year old driver walked without a single day behind bars for killing a bike rider after claiming he just couldn’t see the victim, he was apparently spared jail time by virtue of being old. And once again raising the question of how old is too old to drive, if you can’t even see a grown man on a bicycle.
Cyclist looks back to Connie Carpenter’s — now Connie Carpenter-Phinney — win in the first women’s Olympic road cycling race at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, 40 years before the next American woman would take gold at this year’s Paris Olympics.
Sometimes it seems like they just don’t want us to know how deadly our streets really are.
Far too often, when people riding bicycles in Los Angeles are killed or seriously injured in traffic violence, it never makes the news.
Or even a lousy LAPD press release.
Not even for a hit-and-run, where notifying the public could help identify and capture the suspect — which is why we have hit-and-run alert systems on both the local and state level that somehow never get used.
Yet that was the case yet again last month, when 42-year old Oscar Guardado was killed in a hit-and-run while riding his bike in LA’s West Adams neighborhood.
According to a fundraising page posted by his daughter, Guardado died on October 27th when he was struck by a drunk driver, who fled the scene afterwards; unfortunately, it’s only raised $825 of the modest $7,000 goal for funeral expenses.
Anyone with information is urged to call LAPD Sgt. Garbiel Nily of the South Traffic Division at 323/421-2500, or call the South Traffic Division Watch Commander after business hours at 323/421-2577.
As always, there is a standing $50,000 reward for any fatal hit-and-run in the City of Los Angeles.
Although the odds of finding the suspect would have been much higher had the department made this announcement in the hours after the crash, rather than weeks later.
Rivera was struck around 6:23 pm Saturday while riding on Mojave Drive, near Village Drive. He was declared dead after being taken to a local hospital.
The driver stuck around after the crash, and reportedly cooperated with the investigators.
As usual, there’s no word on how the crash occurred, or who may have been at fault. There’s also no word on whether the driver was ticketed or arrested.
Anyone with information is urged to call Deputy J. Stroik of the Victorville Police Department at 760/241-2911.
This is at least the 46th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the fourth that I’m aware of in San Bernardino County.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for Manuel Rivera and his loved ones.
“Preliminary information indicates the female driver of the Dodge Caravan was driving southbound on Riverside Avenue and was turning left to go east on Etiwanda and failed to yield, [leading] the black Audi to collide with the Caravan,” Sgt. Smith confirmed to KTLA. “[The collision] caused the Caravan to go onto the northeast corner of the sidewalk, striking the pedestrian.”
The victim, identified only as a 50-year old man, died after being taken to a hospital.
A two-year old boy who was riding in the Audi with his father was taken to the hospital with minor injuries, as was the 32-year old driver of the other vehicle; police planned to arrest her for DUI upon her release.
The station oddly notes that the victim’s bicycle did not appear to have suffered significant damage.
Just the person who had been walking it.
This is at least the 45th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the third that I’m aware of in San Bernardino County.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for the victim and his loved ones.
The bike rider, who has not been publicly identified, died at the scene.
Unfortunately, that’s all we know right now. There’s no word on how the crash happened, or any description of the suspect vehicle or the person responsible.
Anyone with information is urged to call the Riverside Police Department at 951/826-8720, or email RMcHugh@RiversideCA.gov.
This is at least the 44th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the sixth that I’m aware of in Riverside County; however, it appears the first one in the county since early May.
Sixteen of those SoCal deaths have been hit-and-runs.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for the victim and their loved ones.
Sheriff’s deputies found the victim, who hasn’t been publicly identified, on the 1900 block of Jimmy Durante Blvd, just after 10 am.
He was taken to a local hospital, where he died.
There’s no word on how long he may have been there before he was discovered.
Investigators say he appears to have lost control of his bicycle, and wasn’t involved in a collision.
However, there’s no word on why he may have lost control. It’s possible he could have struck a pothole or some sort of obstacle while riding at speed, lost a tire, or been the victim of a too-close pass — which would make it hit-and-run.
There’s also no word on whether he had a cycling computer or Strava account that could shed some light on what happened. So unless investigators find a witness or video of the crash, we may never know the cause.
Anyone with information is urged to call the North Coastal Sheriff’s Station Traffic Division at 760/966-3555.
This is at least the 43rd bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the 11th that I’m aware of in San Diego County.
Update: Longtime San Diego bike advocate Serge Issakov has forwarded a video with a possible explanation for the crash.
Issakov reports the site is at the bottom of a descent with a typical 4% grade, where road bicyclists typically reach speeds of 26 to 30 mph, while a KOM could be somewhere in the 40 mph range.
The typical car-ticker plastic bollards show clear signs of being run over more than once, and would likely have been virtually invisible under the typical Del Mar morning marine layer. Let alone if there was any fog or haze in the morning hour.
But even without hitting the post, cracks visible in the pavement could have easily destabilized the victim. Which could have been enough to send him into the curb or the grate in the gutter, and onto the sidewalk.
And at those speeds, it might not have mattered whether he was wearing a helmet.
All I can say, after watching that video, is I hope the victim’s family has a good lawyer.
