October 15, 2023 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Update: Bicyclist killed illegally riding bicycle on 405 Freeway in Carson, 7th SoCal bike death in last 10 days
Once again, someone has been killed riding a bicycle inexplicably on a SoCal freeway.
It should be an extra spooky Friday the 13th on the mean streets of LA today, coming just over two weeks before Halloween.
While a little triskaidekaphobia never hurt anyone, it couldn’t hurt to use a little extra caution today, so your ride doesn’t turn into someone else’s bad luck.
And if you see someone in a hockey mask coming your way, maybe ride the other direction just to be safe.
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CicLAvia returns to its DTLA roots this weekend, nearly 13 years to the day after the first one.
However, Sunday’s Heart of LA CicLAvia follows only portions of the original route, traveling 7.8 miles through downtown with stops in Chinatown and Little Tokyo, while adding extensions to South Park, and Boyle Heights and Mariachi Plaza across the new 6th Street bridge.
That will be followed by the year’s final CicLAvia, in South LA on December 3rd, offering a route stretching from Historic South Central to Leimert Park, primarily along Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I see a side trip to Harold and Belle’s in my future.
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Streets For All will follow Sunday’s CicLAvia with an afterparty at a super secret location in DTLA.
Twitter post
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Get in the mood for Sunday’s CicLAvia by helping clean up the neglected Venice Blvd bike lanes.
Which could definitely use it.
Twitter post
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If CicLAvia isn’t your thing, the Burbank Kiwanis club is hosting a bike rodeo on Sunday.
My favorite events are the roadie roping and ebike buck riding.
No bias here. An Ottawa, Canada writer places tongue firmly in cheek, and announces that the country’s bike riders were mortified to learn they’re not “actually allowed to run every red light and stop sign they come across.”Just wait until someone tells him about all those entitled drivers who pick and choose what traffic laws they want to obey.
Governor Gavin Newsom signed two bike bills authored by Burbank state senator and US House candidate Anthony Portantino to require landlords to allow tenants to store and charge ebikes and e-scooters in their apartments, and require Caltrans to appoint an active transportation safety czar. Although it doesn’t require the state transportation agency to actually, you know, listen to them.
A proposed class action lawsuit has been filed against Shimano, Specialized and Trek following the massive Hollowtech crankset recall, alleging that by failing to recall all Hollowtech cranksets, the companies are attempting to limit costs at the expense of consumers. Or maybe the ones they recalled were just the only ones that were defective.
New York announced plans for another 40 miles of protected bike lanes, with two new bikeways in Queens and one each in Brooklyn and the Bronx, as well as a 10-mile protected bike lane on Staten Island between Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge and the Goethals Bridge.
The European Union Court of Justice has officially ruled that ebikes are bicycles, not motorcycles, because they are not exclusively motor driven and don’t require insurance to cover damages. Although that would seem to leave throttle-driven ebikes in question.
October 12, 2023 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Vegas teens plead not guilty to Probst murder, Mo Wilson’s accused killer makes a run for it, and Newsom digs daylighting
The two teens, 17 and 16 at the time of their alleged August crime spree, are accused of at least three hit-and-runs while joyriding in a stolen car, including fatally running down 64-year old Andreas “Andy” Probst from behind as they laughingly filmed the attack.
Ayala and Keys are also accused of deliberately targeting another man riding a bicycle, although apparently he was not seriously injured.
They’re charged with murder, attempted murder, battery and residential burglary, as well as multiple counts of automobile grand larceny and possession of a stolen vehicle.
Armstrong is accused of fatally shooting Wilson last year in a jealous rage, in what she apparently perceived as a love triangle involving her then-boyfriend, pro cyclist Colin Strickland, who had been briefly involved with Wilson.
She had reportedly died her hair and undergone plastic surgery in an effort to change her appearance and hide her identity.
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After wielding his veto pen to strike down bike-friendly legislation, including a bill to allow sidewalk riding throughout the state, California Governor Gavin Newsom actually signed a safety bill yesterday.
Newsom added his signature to Assembly Bill 413, known as the Daylighting Bill, which will ban parking within 20 feet of a marked crosswalk to increase visibility and improve safety for pedestrians, as well as anyone else stopped at or using the intersection.
Which could probably be used to arrange bike commuting rides to find greater safety in numbers, as well.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
We missed this one when I was out of commission with eye problems a couple weeks back, as a driver in a massive SUV attempted to terrorize a velomobile e-recumbent rider in El Cajon, California last month, which was compounded by a lecture from a cop who didn’t know the law.
A letter from longtime LA-area bike advocate Kent Strumpell says Los Angeles can alter the course of the automobile’s role in climate change, and meet the pope’s call for bold climate action, with the rapid installation of a fully functional, citywide, protected bikeway network. From his keyboard to God’s ear. Or at least the mayor’s.
Trek has launched the industry’s first bicycle trade-in program, accepting used bikes made by the company for trade at their eponymous stores. Which makes me wonder what they’d give me for my first-gen mass production 1980 Trek roadie. For a change, read it on AOL if Bicycling blocks you.
That’s more like it. A 19-year old Richmond, Virginia man was sentenced to spend the next ten years and a month behind bars, after a judge suspended most of a 30-year sentence for plowing into a pair of bike-riding women while driving drunk and stoned, killing one and critically injuring the other.
October 11, 2023 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Newsom’s veto could mean tickets for seeking sidewalk safety, and LA Times calls out California’s roadway climate fail
No surprise here.
Both Calbike and CABO responded to Governor Gavin Newsom’s veto of a bill that would have legalized sidewalk riding on any street without adequate bike lanes.
And needless to say, they came out on opposite sides of the issue.
Calbike, aka the California Bicycle Coalition, decried the veto, arguing that sidewalk riding may not be the best choice, but it’s sometimes the only safe one.
“Is sidewalk riding ideal? No,” said Jared Sanchez, policy director for CalBike. “In a perfect world, most streets would be Complete Streets, with safe facilities for all modes of transportation. But that’s not the reality today, and it will take years to transform every dangerous roadway in California into a safe route for biking. In the meantime, people on bikes must, at times, travel on streets with fast traffic and no bike lanes. By vetoing this bill, the governor has taken an action that will lead to more deaths and injuries of people on bikes.”
While CalBike agrees with the governor’s assertion in his veto statement that building better bike infrastructure is the best way to provide safe spaces for people who ride bikes and that the state has moved in the right direction to create more protected and connected bikeways, infrastructure for safe biking remains woefully inadequate.
Meanwhile CABO — the California Association of Bicycle Organizations — applauded the governor’s veto.
An open letter from Alan Wachtel, Government Relations Director for CABO, pointed out the dangers of bicycling on sidewalks, both for bike riders and pedestrians.
While my organization and I appreciate the author’s intent to improve bicycle safety, this bill would instead have exactly the opposite effect. It would encourage dangerous bicycling habits, and it would constitute a huge step backward in the goal of routinely accommodating bicycle travel everywhere in the transportation network. Unfortunately, the author’s office has repeatedly declined to meet with us even to discuss these issues.
Under existing Vehicle Code §21650(g) (which I helped to draft), bicyclists may already ride on sidewalks everywhere, unless prohibited by the code or local ordinance. AB 825 would eliminate that local power unless the adjacent roadway includes a designated bicycle facility, except for last-minute amendments that provide complicated exceptions meant to protect pedestrians (but that are inadequate to do so).
But AB 825, despite being promoted as a bicycle safety bill, would, on the contrary, also be more dangerous for bicyclists. It relies on and actively perpetuates the misconception that the only safe places for bicycles are designated facilities and sidewalks.
This may be the rare instance where they’re both at least partly right.
CABO is correct that bikes don’t normally belong on sidewalks, where they pose a danger to pedestrians and an increased risk to bike riders, despite the perception of safety.
But it’s also true that a sidewalk can provide a refuge from dangerous roadways lacking safe infrastructure — especially the typical suburban California stroads, where riders often have to contend with speeding drivers exceeding the already high speed limits.
It’s also demanding too much to expect an inexperienced bike rider to take the lane on a busy street filled with impatient and distracted drivers.
It’s unreasonable to ticket someone for putting their own safety ahead of any local restrictions under those, or similar, circumstances.
Or to expect someone on a bicycle to always know when they’ve crossed from one city where sidewalk riding is allowed, to another where it’s prohibited, particularly when the restriction isn’t posted.
Then there’s the problem the bill was originally drafted to address, where police too often use sidewalk riding restrictions as a pretext to stop and search, or merely harass, people of color.
I always encourage people to ride their bikes in the street, both for their own safety, and that of people walking on the sidewalk.
But I understand if they choose not to, as I have myself for short distances, or when faced with dangerous situations on the street.
And penalizing them for making that choice is wrong — as was Newsom’s veto of the bill.
Besides, we all know sidewalks are really just parking spots for entitled drivers.
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The get it.
An editorial from the Los Angeles Times called out California’s transportation policies, arguing that the state’s highway spending doesn’t match it’s climate promises.
Then again, that’s what we’ve come to expect from the auto-centric Caltrans, despite its repeated commitments to Complete Streets and active transportation.
Two recent reports highlight the discrepancy. Regulators have warned that the state needs to slash the amount of miles people drive 25% below 2019 levels to help meet 2030 emission reduction targets. But traffic and car dependence has increased in recent years, according to a report from the progressive advocacy group NextGen Policy.
It’s no surprise why: California continues to spend the bulk of its transportation dollars to maintain and expand car-centric roads and freeways. Instead of doubling down on the existing system that makes it inconvenient and unsafe to travel by bike, foot and transit, California should be spending the bulk of its transportation funding to remake the urban landscape so people have real choices in how they get around.
But that’s not happening. Of the state’s primary transportation funding programs, just 19% of the money has gone to projects that help reduce the need to drive, such as building out bike lanes, sidewalks, rail service, electric buses and affordable housing near jobs, according to an analysis by the Natural Resources Defense Council. These programs are in such demand that the state is regularly forced to deny funding to highly rated pedestrian and bicycle projects.
It’s worth reading the whole piece, because they’re right.
And concludes that it does make a difference, but not as much as you might think.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
A Cambridge, Massachusetts newspaper says a court heard rehashed arguments in yet another lawsuit fighting the city’s separated bike lanes, after the city has already won preliminary injunctions and subsequent appeals in two similar cases.
San Marcos is getting a new eight-acre bike park, including a pump track, perimeter trail and jump lines for beginner, intermediate and advanced riders.
Denver drivers can’t seem to figure out how a traffic diverter works, continuing through on the wide bike lane instead of following the really big arrows on the street directing them to turn. Although the city deserves a lot of the blame for leaving enough room in the bike lane for cars to enter.
A writer for Kansas’ Rider University student paper describes how a bright blue bicycle took him from an awkward 16-year old kid stuck at home during the pandemic, to a bike-riding man about campus.
This is why we need to ban right turns on red lights. A Kansas driver was caught on video slamming into a bike rider, who had waited until it appeared to be safe before crossing in a crosswalk with the light, and was right hooked by the driver after riding off the curb.
Belgian pro Nathan Van Hooydonck says he immediately knew his cycling career was over when he was nearly killed in a car crash after suffering a heart problem while driving; he retired after waking from a coma and being fitted with an internal defibrillator to correct any future cardiac arrhythmia.
Governor Gavin Newsom continued his longstanding tradition of brandishing his veto pen to kill bike-friendly bills passed by the state legislature yesterday.
Including a bill that would have legalized sidewalk riding throughout the state, wherever there’s a lack of bike infrastructure.
His veto message says “most sidewalks are not designed for bicyclists to safely use them, and riding on sidewalks would significantly increase the risk of collisions with pedestrians.” But it doesn’t address the risk to someone on a bike who must ride in fast, heavy traffic except to tout the state’s recent investments in bicycle infrastructure – which are nowhere near enough to meet the need for them. And Newsom ignores the original impetus of the bill, which was to address racial discrimination in terms of who is likely to be stopped for riding on a sidewalk in the first place.
In other words, you’ll continue to run the risk of getting a ticket if you take to the sidewalk to avoid a dangerous intersection, usually with no posted warning whether or where it may be legal or banned.
Meanwhile, people of color will continue to run the risk of police harassment, when cops use it as a pretext to stop people riding on the sidewalk.
Then there’s this.
Twitter post
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
On the plus side, Newsom signed Burbank Senator Anthony Portantino’s bill to require hire a “Chief Advisor on Bicycling and Active Transportation,” aka a bike czar. Although it doesn’t require them to actually listen to whoever gets the job.
And local jurisdictions will now be allowed to mount cameras on city or county owned vehicles to photograph and ticket drivers blocking bike lanes, although there’s no word on whether any actually local government currently plans to do that.
At the same time, your own photos and bike cam video will continue to be legally useless when it comes to enforcing traffic laws and bike lane violations.
Bike Radar offers advice on how to recover mentally from a bicycling crash. My best advice, based on personal experience, is to ride the same route you had planned, which will take you directly past and through the crash site.
Life is cheap in England, where a driver walked without a single day behind bars despite leaving a bike rider with “serious and life-changing injuries,” then getting out of his car to swear at the victim; his victim remains unable to work more than six hours a week, and can’t ride a bike anymore.
