No information is available on how the wreck occurred, and there’s no description of the driver or the suspect vehicle.
A street view shows a wide, four lane roadway on Limonite, with a an un-striped residential street on Lucretia; they meet at a T-intersection controlled by a traffic light. None of which means anything without knowing what happened.
This is 57th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the seventh in Riverside County.
It’s also the third fatal hit-and-run involving a SoCal bike rider in the past week, and the fifth in just the last five weeks.
Update: KABC-7 reports Holmes was an aspiring minister, and had gotten up early to minister to day laborers at a local Home Depot.
The station places the site of the collision on Limonite, less than a half mile west of Lucretia, rather than at the intersection itself. After he was struck from behind, other drivers comforted him as he lay dying after the driver fled the scene.
A gofundme page has been established to help pay for his funeral expenses; as of this time, it has raised a little over $1,100 of the $5,000 goal.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for Forrest Holmes and his family and friends.
September 6, 2016 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Morning Links: Stolen bike recovered through Bike Index; OC rider critically injured; cyclist jailed for riding in traffic
LA may have seen its first stolen bike recovered through Bike Index.
According to the Beverly Press, when LAPD detectives arrested a suspect on weapons charges last month, they recovered a bicycle they believed to be stolen.
After checking the Bike Index stolen bike registry — the same one you’ll find right here on this site — they were able to identify the owner and return the bike.
The story also notes the department recommends Bike Index as “a valuable tool for reuniting owners with stolen bicycles.”
It’s good the see the LAPD is checking the listings, and recommending it. And even better that a hot bike has finally made its way back home because of it.
But don’t wait until it’s too late.
Register your bike for free with Bike Index now, so you’ll have all the information available in an instant if anything should ever happen to it.
Think of it as the cheapest anti-bike theft insurance you can get.
And as this shows, one of the most effective.
Just to be clear, this site receives no compensation for hosting or promoting the Bike Index registry, financial or otherwise. Just the satisfaction of helping stolen bikes get back to their rightful owners.
Leonie Mckenna reportedly was in critical condition with major trauma, including head injuries, after a driver rear-ended the couple as they rode together on newly opened La Pata Avenue Saturday morning; her husband, Kevin B. Mckenna, was less seriously injured.
The 57-year old cyclist is charged with delaying traffic by riding in the middle of a traffic lane, preventing drivers from passing, not once, not twice, but eight times since 2012.
He was released from jail after posting bond in February, after apparently spending seven months behind bars without being convicted of a crime — for a damn traffic violation, no less — on the condition that he not ride a bicycle.
Never mind that bike riders are taught to ride in the traffic lane to avoid the door zone and debris on the shoulder, while increasing visibility and preventing unsafe passes.
Whether he was riding safely and legally, or took taking the lane to a dangerous extreme remains to be determined. But there is something seriously wrong when a simple traffic violation results in a single day in jail, let alone months.
And let alone without a conviction.
Although he’s clearly no saint; he also faces charges for threatening the staff of the DA’s office with a rock and several knives last year.
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Like any good serial, some bike stories keep revealing new twists and turns as they go on. And on.
Eighty-nine-year old former New York Mayor David Dinkins insists he had no idea he hit a bike rider as he rushed his wife to the hospital, and returned to the scene as soon as someone told him about it. He swears the rider hit him, rather than the other way around. Which seems strange; if he didn’t even know it happened, how could he know how it happened?
Meanwhile, former Top Gear host Jeremy Clarkson says it was extremely rude of Vine to selfishly ride safely outside of the door zone, blocking the poor angry driver from whatever imaginary emergency she most likely wasn’t rushing to.
Santa Monica police say to prevent theft by locking your bike in a well-lit and populated area, and secure it with a U-lock. Although that didn’t help one guy, even though he was able to buy it back after it was stolen.
Columbus OH is the latest city to ditch Share the Road signs for the much clearer Bikes May Use Full Lane signs. Although drivers are often confused when the signs go up, thinking they give riders new rights, rather simply clarifying the rights we already have.
More kindhearted people, as a New Jersey paramedic went to Walmart to buy a new bicycle for a 10-year girl who had been impaled by the brake handle of her bicycle; the Walmart manager donated a bicycle after hearing the story. This sort of injury happens far too often; there’s clearly a major design defect when children are put at risk by their own bikes.
An 89-year old man now faces up to 30 years behind bars after being convicted in the hit-and-run death of a former pro football player as he rode in a Florida bike lane. Even with good behavior, he could be well over 100 years old before he gets out.
Dublin is ordered to stop work on bicycle projects, after funding is pulled and resources diverted in favor of a massive traffic project. Proving once again that cyclists are second-class citizens virtually everywhere.
Maybe you could wear a disguise. Not only do magpies Down Under attack bike riders they perceive as a threat, they also remember and attack again the next time they see you. And every time after that.
A new bicycling jacket from New Zealand can automatically signal your turns. Manufacturers continue their attempts to improve bike safety by turning us all into cars, instead of expecting people in cars to operate them safely.
September 3, 2016 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Weekend Links: WaPo’s anti-bike drivel, hit-and-run reward fund, and don’t invite cops to see your dope
Somehow, as they see it, the 1,557 bike riders caught running stop lights on DC’s red light cameras equates to the 84,000 drivers who did the same thing.
Never mind that the risk posed by a law-breaking driver outweighs the risk from a scofflaw cyclist by about two tons.
Let alone the sheer absurdity of painting all bicyclists as aggressive and entitled militants based on the misperceived attitudes of a few, projected from behind the windshield. Sort of like accusing every mom driving her kids to soccer practice of being no different than this guy.
It shouldn’t need to be said that everyone should obey the law. And that the safety of everyone on the road depends on the give and take codified in the vehicle code.
Which means stopping for red lights.
Period.
But if you can’t manage that, at least observe the right-of-way so you don’t end up a bug on someone’s windshield, or force drivers to take dangerous evasive actions to avoid you.
The Post used to be a great paper.
But crap like this is just more evidence that Woodward, Bernstein and Graham have left the building.
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David Drexler forwards a reminder from Surf City Cyclery in Huntington Beach about the gofundme account for injured Encinitas cyclist John Abate; the account has raised over $6,400 for a reward to find the hit-and-run driver who ran him down last month.
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No leadership changes in the Vuelta, despite a breakaway that finished half an hour before the peloton, who must have stopped for tea along the way.
Richard Risemberg attends a meet-and-greet for city council candidate Jesse Creed, and comes away convinced Creed deserves your vote if you live in CD5. Then again, considering the alternative is re-electing career politician Paul Koretz, it’s an easy choice.
Nice move from the Sheriff’s Youth Foundation of the LA County Sheriff’s Department, which donated 69 refurbished bicycles to ministers in Watts area to help kids get to school safely.
Bicyclists say the bike lanes on Santa Monica’s new and improved California Incline are indeed a big improvement, though they could be a little wider.
Oceanside responds to residents complaints about a dark underpass on the San Luis Rey Trail with promises to install solar powered lights to help protect nighttime riders.
Consumer Reports lists ten ways to avoid a car crash. None of which include remaining sober, paying attention to the road or putting your damn phone down.
Barring any breaking news, BikinginLA will be taking the rest of the holiday weekend off. So enjoy the weekend, ride your bike, spend time with family and friends, and try to remember this is the one holiday established to honor America’s much maligned working men and women.
And stay safe out there. We’ll see you back here bright and early Tuesday morning.
City Lab writes the problem with Vision Zero is the need for increased enforcement while communities of color are already reeling from it; the story cites the LACBC’s Tamika Butler as an example of being stopped for driving while black.
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Local
Cycling in the South Bay’s Seth Davidson says, despite their protestations, Palos Verdes NIMBYs don’t give a rat’s ass about the safety of cyclists. But they’re welcome to prove him wrong by attending the free Cycling Savvy course next month.
CiclaValley goes riding in the Sierras and hangs out with Justin Timberlake. Best wishes to his mom; good to know she’s going to be okay.
State
More Coronado madness, as a woman is revolted by the idea of a bike/ped path on the Coronado Bridge, and expects little kids to hold their line when biking to school.
A Petaluma man donates 23 bicycles to help victims of the recent Clayton fire in Lake County.
Chico police recover four suspected stolen bikes from homeless camps; two that had been reported stolen were returned to their owners on the spot, while the others were booked as unclaimed property. Always report a stolen bike to the police; one of their biggest complaints is the number of bikes that can’t be returned to their owners because they were ever reported stolen.
Bad news struck close to home at the Denver Post, as a reporter with the paper was killed by a suspected drunk driver while riding or walking her bike in a crosswalk.
A 99-year old member of the Bicycling Hall of Fame passed away in a Chicago suburb last week, five years after her last ride, and 87 years after she bought her first bicycle.
The NYPD blames a salmon cyclist for a fatal collision, even though the driver was speeding. Yes the cyclist was in the wrong, but the driver should share the blame; if he hadn’t been speeding it’s possible he could have avoided the crash or the victim might have survived the impact.
International
Sales of MIPS helmets are booming; they’re designed to reduce the risk of concussion and rotational injuries in a crash.
A bike-riding writer for London’s Evening Standard wonders why bicyclists make some drivers boil with rage. Good question; I suspect we’re just easy targets for people who are already pissed off.
Horrifying assault in the UK, as a gang of bike-riding teenage hooligans beat a Polish immigrant to death after hearing him speak in his native tongue. This is the legacy of all the hate spilled in the recent Brexit campaign.
September 1, 2016 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Morning Links: SD Nobel Prize winner dies on Oregon bike path, homeless bicyclist shot by Santa Ana police dies
He won the prize in 2008 for his work in identifying a green fluorescent protein found in jellyfish that could be used as a biological marker to help illuminate diseases such as cancer and HIV.
No word on how he died, or if he was biking at the time.
Richard Gene Swihart was riding his bicycle near the Santa Ana Civic Center on August 1st when police tried to stop him and he began struggling with the officers. Swihart was shot after allegedly attempting to grab an officer’s gun.
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This is why people continue to die on our streets.
A Cincinnati woman gets 13 years for the hit-and-run death of a popular cyclist; at the time of her arrest, she had ten drugs in her system, a bra full of prescription pills, and a purse filled with syringes and a tourniquet. And was driving on a suspended license, with two previous convictions for driving while suspended. Ohio Bike Lawyer Steve Magas, a friend of this site, questions whether justice was done by the harsh sentence, even though he represented the victim’s family in the case.
Both of these drivers had already shown themselves unable, or unwilling, to get sober and obey the law, and therefore unfit to drive. Yet they were on the roads anyway.
It’s clear that innocent victims will keep dying until authorities finally start to give a damn. And find a way to keep people like this from ever getting behind the wheel.
West Hollywood’s WeHo Pedals bikeshare is now officially a go, though virtually all of the docking stations are centered on the Santa Monica Blvd corridor, ignoring the popular Sunset Strip and other parts of the city.
A self-described longtime San Diego cyclist says he hasn’t seen any increase in bicycling, and the city should stop stealing traffic lanes and parking spaces from those poor, oppressed drivers. He also complains about how awful downtown is to drive in, and how expensive it is to park, never seeming to grasp the obvious solution to both of those problems.
The Denver bike cop who was nearly killed when he was struck by an out-of-control driver finally return to work after nearly 21 months; the driver who hit him was convicted of lying about suffering from seizures on his driver’s license application.
The driver responsible for the drug-fueled Kalamazoo massacre has been found competent to stand trial; he faces up to life in prison if convicted on the most serious charges.
It’s true, bike riders really do run red lights. DC’s red light camera’s caught 1,557 cyclists running reds over a 16 month period — compared to over 60,000 drivers. So who are the real scofflaws?
Great Britain’s successful Olympic cycling team says the best way to honor them is for the government to invest heavily in creating a legacy of everyday bike riding.
Caught on video: If you’re looking for the definition of a punishment pass, this is it.
It took 14 years to reach a settlement in a case where a road raging driver ran over a then-four-year old girl she rode in a bike trailer pulled by her father. Shockingly, the murderous driver got just two years, despite revving over 200 yards in reverse to asault his victims.
Then again, it’s not just drivers; a bike rider in the UK was punched by a pedestrian in a seemingly random assault; surprisingly, the attacker chose not to hang around until the police to arrived.
A press release from the Azusa Police Department says the driver doesn’t even know when he hit the cyclist, telling the police it happened at an unknown time and location, sometime between Saturday night and Monday morning.
The driver reportedly said the victim’s friends laughed about it, and that he drove off after talking with the rider he hit, who also left the scene. Which seems improbable, given the major damage to his windshield, suggesting a significant impact.
Never mind that someone would have to be pretty wasted to crash into someone and not even know when it happened, let alone where.
Police don’t know if a crime actually occurred, but are asking anyone with information to call the Azusa Police Department at 626/812-3200.
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This is who we share the roads with.
Bike commuter weshigh was the victim of not one, but two dangerous passes from the same driver — the last one just a foot away, in clear violation of California’s three foot passing law.
And adding insult to injury, the driver yelled at him to “get a car, bitch!” when he caught up to him at a red light.
A better solution would be if the driver wasn’t allowed to use one anymore.
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Congratulations to the LACBC’s Tamika Butler on her well-deserved award from the Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professionals for 2016 Professional of the Year – Nonprofit Sector.
“Los Angeles and the entire region are really important right now, not just to the many people that live there but as a national example,” Roberts explained. “What is in the city’s Mobility Plan demonstrates where our nation needs to go, where active transportation is not an after-thought, but a core strategy…LACBC and Tamika are part of writing that important story.”
Then there’s this from another committee member.
“Tamika has challenged the pedestrian and bicycle professional community to grapple with the ways that privilege and structural inequality are embedded in our transportation system and our profession,” wrote Sarah Fine, a member of the APBP awards committee and a planner with the City of Oakland. “We’re all better for it.”
The Hollywood Reporter offers a detailed look at the terrifying attack on a Beverly Hills surgeon, which started when three people in Venice claimed he damaged a bicycle and demanded $150 on the spot.
That’s more like it. An Oregon man gets six years and loses his driver’s license for life for killing a teenage bike rider while visibly drunk. Any conviction for killing another human being while driving should result in the automatic loss of license. Period.
The Detroit News writes about fallen cyclist Karen McKeachie, saying the champion triathlete died doing what she loved. Seriously, if anyone says that about me, I’ll come back and haunt them and their descendants for all eternity.
A Pennsylvania man says he shouldn’t have been driving after using heroin, cocaine and marijuana before getting behind the wheel; unfortunately, it came a little too late for the bicyclist he killed.
Buried in the 3,721 page records of Hillary Clinton’s schedules at the State Department is news that she dedicated a basement shower for employees who wanted to bike or run to work.
Caught on video too: Celebrity is clearly no protection from road raging drivers, as a BBC presenter suffers the wrath of a driver who assaults him and threatens to knock him out for the crime of riding his bike outside the door zone.
Aussie cyclists call for repealing the country’s mandatory bike helmet law, while physicians warn the rate of head injuries could go up. Of course, the only way to find out is repeal, or at least suspend, the law and study the outcome.
A Beijing blog list 16 things that need banning more than the just banned e-scooters, including cyclists who ignore road regulations, and elderly riders who kick their legs over their bikes without looking first to see if other riders are passing.
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, traffic fatalities shot up 7.2% nationwide last year, the largest increase since Lyndon Johnson was president.
The total of 35,092 is still significantly lower than 2006, when 42,708 people died on American streets; however, this is the first year to defy the downward trend that has followed ever since.
Authorities say the increase is due at least in part to a 3.5% increase in vehicle miles traveled, which represents the largest increase in VMT in 25 years, spurred by lower gas prices and increased employment.
One in three fatalities involved drug driving or speeding, while one in ten involved distracted drivers.
That works out to an average of 96 people killed in traffic collisions every single day — more than two of whom were traveling by bicycle.
A genuine commitment to implement Vision Zero can’t come soon enough.
Or strongly enough.
………
Today’s common theme is follow-ups to a number of recent news stories.
Cycling in the South Bay writes about the NFL Network’s Heath Evans, one of several recent anti-bike tweeters, who actually had the courage to show up and apologize. And turned out to be a pretty decent guy.
A Toronto bike advocate concludes the Canadian senator who complained bike lanes were turning the city into a third world country is out of touch. To say the least.
Moreno Valley police blame the victim after a teenage bike rider is left lying in the road by a hit-and-run driver, saying he rode through a red light.
Talk about burying the lede. A Thousand Oaks cyclist was apparently chased down and struck by a road raging driver, in a case the police are investigating as an assault with a deadly weapon, although the Ventura County Star insists on treating it as a hit-and-run.
A San Francisco man is under arrest for stabbing two strangers in the head with a screwdriver on a BART train, then making his escape by stealing a bicycling at knifepoint.
Sacramento is planning to make major changes to downtown streets to improve safety for bike riders and provide transportation alternatives in anticipation of a boost in population.
In a strange case from Minnesota, a man on an motorized-assist bicycle was the victim of a fatal hit-and-run; a similar bike was found at the same location the next morning, but police suggest it’s just a coincidence. Evidently, people in Minnesota just happen to leave bicycles like that lying around for no apparent reason all the time.
Officials in Matamoros, Mexico, and Brownsville, Texas are planning to link the cities with a cross-border bike path. Maybe they can build a tunnel through Trump’s wall if he gets elected.
An English city belatedly realizes that they didn’t actually ban bikes from eleven streets, but only restricted the hours bicyclists could ride in pedestrianized areas. And can’t decide on who’s supposed to enforce it.
Now that’s more like it. Japan is considering requiring car makers to include safety features to protect bike riders in crashes, including possible changes to the upper parts of vehicles. That’s because bike riders sit higher than pedestrians, and tend to strike the hood and windshield of cars in a crash. Although the better solution is not to hit them in the first place.
KNBC-4 ran a story on Friday about the horrible, terrible, unbearable delays caused by a traffic calming project on Fletcher Road in Glassell Park.
Never mind that it hasn’t even been built yet.
Citing unnamed residents opposed to the project, they then proceed to talk to just one, who is up in arms — not over the project itself — but simply over the start of construction, claiming to have “road diet refugee post traumatic stress disorder”* after having fled from Rowena Avenue following that successful road diet.
Only to find that her drive to her kid’s school is now inhibited by the very start of a project designed to improve safety so maybe her kids won’t have to be driven to school.
This is how a local resident in the area, who prefers not to be named, explained the non-controversy to me.
The Fletcher Streetcape project (a plan first initiated in 2006, by then-Councilmember Garcetti) includes bike lanes, new crosswalks, new curb ramps, benches, 70 trees and a landscaped median in the one mile corridor. A woman who claims to have moved to Glassell Park/Mt. Washington, away from Silver Lake because of the road diet there, was angry when she noticed construction had begun on this project last week.
She posted a rant titled ‘road rage’ on social media site Next-Door about how she had only seen one cyclist in her ten years of driving there, how all cyclists on that street are just headed to the LA River, how she was a cyclist in NYC for 20 years but that she would never ride in LA… she even went so far as to say that the notorious Avenues gang is active in this area, and she worries the DOT didn’t take this into account.
Basically, she was able to incite lots of hate which prompted over 100 replies, some of which agreed with her and some which pointed out for all her complaints about supposed “congestion,” the goal is safety.
The irony is that she moved out of Silver Lake because of the road diet, but now drives back there daily to take her kid to school. And of course, she ignores the fact that the street she was using as a speedway is home to two schools.
KNBC is undoubtedly patting themselves on the back for getting this “controversy” out there, when they should be hanging their heads in shame for taking such a negative view of such a badly needed project to improve safety for everyone, not just people on bicycles.
Maybe next time they could wait until it’s finished before pushing any more complaints out onto the public.
*Not a recognized psychiatric disorder
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If you were assaulted by an SUV driver while riding at the intersection of Lucille and Griffith Park Blvd, contact weshigh, who may have a photo of the vehicle; he says the same driver nearly ran over him and his wife as they walked in a crosswalk.
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There’s a new leader in the Vuelta, as the Tour of Spain is now being led by a Spaniard. Riders competing in the race call it insanely hard, as the projected leaders fear showing their hand too soon.
A San Marcos street in a former industrial area has been reborn as a 1/3 mile complete street with broad sidewalks, bike lanes, angled parking and new landscaping fronting the area’s new apartment buildings.
Be grateful you only have to take off your shoes to go through airport security. An Indian paracyclist says he was humiliated when he was forced to take off his prosthetic leg.
As a former member of the LACBC board, I can honestly say this honor is richly deserved. No one does more on a daily basis to make this city safer and more equitable for everyone who rides a bike.
And she notes that even though bicyclists have been highly critical of her, online comments when cyclists are killed or injured are far more hateful. Even though the local press is desperately trying to turn her into the victim.
Meanwhile, a columnist for the Charlotte paper says he doesn’t feel sorry for the driver, and the whole thing could have been avoided if she just hadn’t acted like an idiot. And adds that the TV station that interviewed her was irresponsible in painting her as the victim.
Hats off to 16-year old Inglewood cyclist Rafael Solorzano, who won two gold medals in the Junior Track Cycling National Championships in Trexlertown PA this month, for team sprint and team pursuit.
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It’s happened once again. An Estonian cyclist was forced to withdraw from the Vuelta after he was hit from behind by a car for another team; his team director stressed that it was a complete accident, rather than the result of careless driving. Which doesn’t make it better; motor vehicles don’t belong on course during bike races.
Beverly Hills encourages everyone to walk or bike to tonight’s free Next Night celebration on South Beverly Drive. Never mind that there are no bike lanes to get you there, and nowhere to park your bike if you do.
Santa Monica police will conduct another of their periodic bike and pedestrian safety enforcement operations this Monday. You know the drill; ride to the letter of the law until you leave the SaMo city limits so you’re not the one who gets a ticket.
A Redlands boy passes it forward after police recover his stolen bicycle, donating the bike police offers gave him to replace it to another child.
Just one day after San Francisco Streetsblog wrote about a vital bike bridge that was blocked with homeless encampments, the city cleared them out, while denying any connection to the story.
Despite being required to avoid drugs as a condition of his measly $5,000 bond for killing a bike rider while driving salmon and apparently under the influence, a Wisconsin man was sent back to jail for using heroin and faking a drug test with a bottle of freshly purchased urine.
Fox News commentator and prospective New York mayoral candidate Bo Dietl becomes just the latest politician to pander to bike haters by promising to rip out the city’s bike lanes his first day in office.
An arrest has finally been made in the fatal shooting of an Atlanta teenager who confronted two men over the theft of his sister’s bicycle.
The mayor of Montreal calls for changes to the highway safety code following a series of collisions involving bicyclists, while the opposition accuses him of not doing enough to protect riders.
Who says bike helmets don’t improve safety? A British bike rider credits his with saving his skull when he was beaten over the head with a bottle by a notorious thug and drug addict.
A group of around 30 Charlotte NC cyclists were riding in a bike lane when they were dangerously buzzed and brake checked by a road raging driver, who proceeded to swear at them and give them the rare double bird when they caught up to her at a red light, all for no apparent reason.
And with her child in the car, no less.
Although she was probably unaware that two of those riders she threatened happened to be off-duty cops.
Oops.
So the riders filed a complaint with the police, while those cops had a nice little chat with the undoubtedly surprised driver.
It was the driver herself, who was said to be working with the police and seeking legal council after alleging she’d been threatened once the story became public.
So instead of focusing on the would-be Dr. Christopher Thompson, the news report approached it from the perspective of how she didn’t deserve to be harassed for what she did.
Which she didn’t.
No one deserves that. Which is why I often withhold the names of drivers accused of criminal acts until they become common knowledge, after seeing the outrage that poured out in the first few days following the Mandeville Canyon brake check — including late night death threats directed at the wrong Dr. Christopher Thompson.
Let alone the person who once politely offered to track down a driver who harassed me and bust his windshield, if not his legs. Or his head.
But while she didn’t deserve the alleged response, let’s not forget she was the one who started it by attempting to threaten, if not injure, a group of people whose only crime was riding their bicycles in the lane designated for just that purpose.
Unlike the LA Rams football stadium coming to Inglewood, the new soccer stadium for the coming LAFC franchise promises to be easily accessible by bicycle, with parking for 440 bikes.
Saturday’s Gravel Trofee #4 offers a gravel grinding grid from the Backbone Trail to the beach.
A Laguna Beach radio host observes that the wife of fallen cyclist John Colvin has forgiven Dylan Thomas Rand-Luby, the 19-year old driver convicted of taking his life. And notes that there hasn’t been another bicycling fatality in the city since, crediting luck, along with a network of sharrows directing riders off PCH.
Not surprisingly, the driver who killed Redlands cyclist Randy Stephenson in Loma Linda while fleeing from sheriff’s deputies has pleaded not guilty to murder charges.
Simi Valley votes to remove ghost bikes and other roadside memorials after just 30 days. After all, why would they want to bum people out by reminding them to drive, bike and/or walk safely?
The UC Santa Barbara student newspaper traces the history of bicycling at the bike friendly university, where musician Jack Johnson met his future wife by locking his bike to hers in his rush to get to class.
A security guard for the Chicago ABC affiliate gets credit for catching a wrong-way, probably drunk driver who tried to flee the scene after running down a bike rider; fortunately, the cyclist wasn’t seriously injured.
It’s not just pedestrians who are at risk from collisions with bicyclists, despite the breathless stories in the press. A New York cyclist was seriously injured going over his handlebars after swerving to avoid a pedestrian who stepped out in front of him while he was riding in Central Park. And in a similar incident, a Texas woman died a month after she was injured going over her handlebars in Central Park, possibly after being cut off by a pedicab.
The New York Times says the death of a 78-year old bike rider shows biking perils persist in the city, as advocates grow angry that the city isn’t doing more to address them.
Road diets can do more than just improve safety; a New Orleans street is being reconfigured in hopes the narrower street and bike lanes will bring life to a crime-ridden neighborhood and encourage businesses to invest there.
A St. Petersburg FL bridge is the latest to be sabotaged by someone throwing tacks in the bike lane; police and DOT officials insist they don’t know anything about it, even though a reporter picked up 30 tacks herself.
A Florida jury deliberates for a whole 10 minutes before giving a bike thief three years for stealing a bait bike. Unfortunately, LA still doesn’t use bait bikes, despite a rampant bike theft epidemic. And most bike thieves here don’t get three days, let alone three years.
If not being able to ride drives you crazy, you may be right. If you’re going to steal your neighbor’s bicycle, don’t ride past her house on it, especially not while she’s filing a police report.
