November 19, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Study shows bicycling got safer last year, new Beverly Hills protected bike lane, and cops bust Mar Vista bike chop shop
Unfortunately, we’ll have to wait until statistics for 2020 come out next year to know what really happened in the last one; right now, 2019 is the most recent year available.
And it remains to be seen whether things have reverted to previous levels as more traditional traffic patterns have resumed as businesses reopened this year.
But I’d put my money on things being worse, not better.
Graphic by tomexploresla.
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For any of us who remember the bad old days of the Biking Black Hole of Beverly Hills before it unexpectedly got bike friendly, hell has officially frozen over.
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After entirely justified criticism for failing to investigate a bike chop shop being openly operated on a Mar Vista Street, the LAPD discovers it can, in fact, do something about it.
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Once again a bike rider is a hero to man and beast.
The U.S. Departments of the Interior and Transportation announced a plan to draw on funds in the new infrastructure bill to refocus transportation in National Parks on greener options, including expanded bike trails and shared micromobility programs.
Seriously? Virginia considers a wrong-headed plan to ban bikes from in front of the state capitol, forcing crosstown riders to dismount and walk for several blocks, all because a state official has “occasionally seen near-collisions” between people walking and riding bikes in the area. It’s like every collision or near miss inevitably gets blamed on the people on bicycles, as if pedestrians never step out without looking.
London’s mayor warns of major transportation cuts, including cutting back on bike lanes and pausing the city’s Vision Zero program, as the city’s transportation department faces a budget hole equivalent to $1.7 billion.
A board motion submitted LA Councilmember Paul Krekorian, LA Mayor Eric Garcetti, County Supervisor Shiela Kuehl and Pomona Mayor Tim Sandoval proposes a number of changes to the Metro Bike system, in part to address theft of the bikes.
Currently, Metro only has 38% of the total original fleet remaining in operation. Metro Bikes have been targets of theft, and rates of fleet loss ebb and flow as new methods of theft are discovered and addressed. The Metro Bike Share team has increased efforts to recover lost and stolen bicycles but this is not sustaining the fleet and the program does not have an established fleet replenishment strategy. As a result, fewer Metro Bikes are available for use, which degrades the quality of service available to the public.
Although I’d think having nearly 40 percent of the original bikes still in operation after five years is pretty damn good.
Regardless, the five are requesting that the Metro CEO Stephanie Wiggins report back in 90 days on a number of proposed changes, most of which have nothing to do with addressing bike theft.
A. An action plan to stabilize the current fleet size including actions for how to identify, prioritize, and address new mechanisms of theft as they arise.
B. An action plan to address equitable access in the current program and in any future form of the program. This plan shall include recommendations on issues such as serving people who may be unbanked, addressing the digital divide, and keeping fare cost low.
C. A plan to provide uninterrupted service as the next iteration of the program is determined and executed.
D. A plan to convene an industry forum (as was performed for Metro Micro) to bring together academics, cities with existing bike share programs, community stakeholders, and industry experts to provide recommendations on advancing Metro Bike Share beyond the current contract in one of several forms including but not limited to
Continuing Metro Bike Share as a contracted service,
Operating the program In-house with Metro employees,
A private-sector model with financial subsidy provided by Metro.
E. Performing a market survey to identify best practices and business models among existing bike-share systems in the US, and comparable global systems (e.g., Paris, London, Barcelona, Madrid, and Mexico City), and to develop comparative data on subsidy cost per ride, total ridership, size of fleet, vehicle technology, theft and damage loss and prevention, and alternative financing sources like sponsorship and advertising.
F. Recommendations for continuing and evolving the Metro Bike Share program to meet the goals of the agency, with countywide stakeholder engagement and consideration of cost-sharing, with the goal of expanding service area and local participation to all subregions in the County. These recommendations should include eligible local, state, and federal funding sources for capital and operations budgets, as well as legislative opportunities to expand such funding eligibility.
All of these should be positives, if they’re carried out with a clear intention to maintain the bikeshare system and improve service.
Especially finding better ways to equitably serve low income communities.
As it stands right now, there doesn’t appear to be reason for concern. The question will be what form the response takes when Wiggins reports back in February.
That’s when we’ll want to give her recommendations a close look. And make sure the program is moving forward, not back.
But we haven’t even gotten to the suckiest part yet. These days sharrows are deployed as a bad-faith alternative to actually making roads safer for bike riders. In recent years, sharrows have become increasingly popular as cities try to balance calls from safety advocates to install quality bike lanes — you know, so folks feel more encouraged to ride and get killed a little less often — and grumpy motorists who don’t want to relinquish driving lanes or parking spaces for bike infrastructure. To the politicians and engineers stuck in the middle, sharrows seem like a devilishly perfect compromise — a way to placate the pro-car populists while still being able to claim you did something.
In short, they are perfect for city officials who care enough about safety to do the very least. There’s only one problem: Sharrows are make believe safety infrastructure.
By now, you probably already know my take.
That sharrows are nothing more than an attempt by transportation agencies to thin the herd, with little arrows painted on the pavement to help drivers improve their aim.
The best you can say is they offer a placemaking guide for people on bicycles, while showing riders where they should position themselves to control the lane.
If they’re placed correctly, that is.
And if riders feel comfortable in the middle of the lane in front of too often impatient and angry drivers.
Instead, you usually see people riding next to them on the right, increasing the risk of unsafe passes. If you see them at all, since many riders seem to prefer other routes that place them in less risk of getting run over.
Which is probably smart. Because as Flax notes, a 2018 study found that sharrows are actually worse than nothing when it comes to safety.
It’s worth taking a few minutes to read the whole thing.
That was followed by this tweet from McSweeney himself, justifying the piece.
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It’s a sure sign you missed the mark when you have to tell people something is funny.
Or when you have to say, no, really, we ride bikes, too.
Because it ain’t satire if it’s not funny.
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When is a protected bike lane not a bike lane?
When it’s a parking lot for government cops.
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Recently retired pro Tejay van Garderen had his own bikes stolen recently while moving to Denver.
So if you’re in the Denver area, keep an eye out for them. And it wouldn’t hurt to watch out wherever you are, because high-end bikes like these could turn up anywhere.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CWOhWQDF4Ka/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CWZGGY5F22B/
According to Jonathan Vaughters, that second bike is the one that put van Garderen in the white jersey signifying the best young rider in the 2012 Tour de France.
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Love this photo that’s the very definition of fin de siècle style and cool.
Here’s what the tweet says, for those of us who are Español challenged.
Bicycles have remained remarkably the same for over 100 years, elegant in their efficiency and simplicity; the look of the cyclists has not changed much either.
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Another reminder of the exceptional efficiency of bike lanes.
A 22-year old hit-and-run driver will now face a murder charge after a preliminary investigation showed he was speeding on his way to work, and high on weed, when he slammed into a six-year old Detroit boy just riding his bike across the street.
Smart move. Montreal is setting up an online reporting system just for pedestrian and bicycle crashes in the downtown area, where most such crashes occur. Something we could use here, where police too often don’t even want to take a report unless someone is seriously injured.
She was speeding on the 25 mph roadway, after turning the wrong way on the narrow, one-lane road, when she rounded a blind corner and smashed into the group of riders.
Six of the victims were seriously injured, with Juan Carlos Vinolo ending up paralyzed from the chest down, as well as suffering a long list of other injuries.
They held the city responsible for 27% of the damages, while state law required the city to pay 100% of Vinolo’s past and future medical bills and lost earnings.
The Times found that the overwhelming majority of bicycle traffic stops conducted by deputies were in areas where people of color make up the majority of the population, and with limited bike infrastructure.
Seven out of ten of those stops involved Latino riders, and 85 percent of the riders stopped were searched by deputies — even though those searches only turned up illegal items eight percent of the time.
Just imagine the outcry if drivers were routinely placed in the back of a squad car while police searched their belongings following a simple traffic stop.
Developing a diversion program allowing bike traffic school in lieu of fines for traffic tickets, which was approved by the state a few years ago, and
Drafting a change to county code to legalize riding a bicycle on the sidewalk in unincorporated areas, although only on non-residential streets without bike lanes.
In addition, the supervisors ordered a review of biased policing of bike riders by the sheriff’s department.
Not surprisingly, though, the sheriff’s department, which has attempted to stonewall virtually every other effort at oversight, had no response.
Granted, these are just proposal to develop new rules, so far. But it’s a big step in the right direction.
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Newly bike-friendly Culver City officially kicks off Move Culver City this Saturday, featuring three new quick-build bus-bike lanes in the downtown area.
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Quite a change from the not-too-distant past when Culver City cops would meet group rides at the city limits, and ticket riders for every real and imagined violation they could find, while they escorted them out of town.
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Streets For All has posted video of last night’s mobility debate between the candidates for LA’s CD13, currently held by two-term incumbent Mitch O’Farrell.
This is who we share the road with. A London woman mistakenly stepped on the gas instead of the brakes, jumped the curb and killed a man walking on the sidewalk, then lied to investigators by saying the man stepped out into the street in front of her. So naturally, the court let her walk without a day behind bars, and took her license away for a whole year.
A member of the UK Parliament says the country’s lax hit-and-run laws give drivers an incentive to flee the scene rather than stick around and get tested for DUI. We have exactly the same problem in California, where lax penalties and minimal enforcement encourage drivers to flee, knowing they’re unlikely to ever get caught, or seriously punished if they are.
Recall supporters have submitted nearly 12,000 more signatures for validation than the required 27,317 to qualify for the ballot.
Which means he could be recalled from office in May, then returned to office the next month, when the larger turnout in the previously scheduled primary election is likely to be more favorable to him than a single-issue recall ballot.
WeHoVille looks at the proposal to install peak hour bus lanes on La Brea Ave, including the brief three-block segment that runs through West Hollywood. Bike riders are allowed to use bus lanes in Los Angeles, though I’m not sure if the same rules would apply in WeHo.
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CityLab reports several American cities, including Oakland and Bakersfield, are experimenting with universal basic mobility programs that subsidize transit, bikeshare and scooters; Los Angeles may follow with a pilot program in South LA.
Some Texas bike riders have reportedly taken to carrying guns on their bikes for protection from “entitled, enraged” drivers. I had a friend in Louisiana who strapped a .22 to his handlebars for exactly the same reason, and reported drivers showed him a lot more courtesy on the roads afterwards.
New York State changed the law two years ago to allow people on bikes to use leading pedestrian intervals to get a safe head start on traffic, but someone apparently neglected to tell one NYPD traffic cop, who continues to illegally ticket riders obeying the law.
More British companies are using cargo bikes to make deliveries to avoid traffic congestion and parking problems, including a London flower shop that replaced its delivery vans with Dutch-made ebikes capable of carrying up to 45 boxes of flowers at a time.
A Welsh man will spend the next six years behind bars after leaving a party “severely drunk” and plowing into a young father riding his bike, while driving over twice the speed limit; the man fled the scene, but returned an hour later pretending to be a friend of the victim, before turning himself in the next day after he sobered up.
An Aussie driver was speeding, driving erratically, and high on crystal meth, amphetamines and cannabis when he ran down a bicycling grandmother last year, then abandoned his car and screaming passengers to flee the scene on foot. But swears he doesn’t remember it because he was sleeping at the time of the crash, and only fled because he panicked.
Instead of finding support for their carbon-free travel, cyclists in some communities face unsafe and unjust conditions. In East Los Angeles, only 1% of streets have bike lanes, meaning cyclists are expected to navigate crowded and often poorly maintained streets. Of course people are going to ride on the sidewalk, even if it’s prohibited, because it’s safer.
Yet that rational decision makes cyclists a target for law enforcement. Nearly a quarter of bike stops in East L.A. were for sidewalk violations, The Times reported. In Lynwood, where there are no bike lanes at all, sidewalk violations account for 16% of stops. In West Hollywood, which is predominantly white, more streets have bike lanes and the city allows bicyclists to ride on the sidewalk in areas with no bike lanes. Less than 1% of bike stops were initiated because of sidewalk violations.
And somehow managed, against all odds, to get them all back.
Never mind that the LAPD told her they don’t bother to look for stolen bikes.
Or the Catch-22 clownshow below when he tried to report the theft to the cops.
Weitz had tried to file a police report online. Because his garage was broken into, he was told, he would have to file in person. But his local LAPD outpost in West Los Angeles is not allowing walk-ins because of COVID-19. So he went to the Pacific Division station on Culver Boulevard but was told he had to file it in West L.A.
“My local lead officer said he would get in touch after I file my police report,” said Weitz, “but I can’t file my police report, so he can’t call.”
The well-connected son of prominent local sheep and goat breeders faces six counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, after initially being allowed to walk free when mommy and daddy reportedly showed up at the crash site.
Meanwhile, the Santa Rosa woman injured in the other recent Texas crash, where a pickup driver ran down three people on a cross-country bike tour and killed a Massachusetts man, is still waiting to fly home.
Metro announced the top-scoring picks for open streets events throughout the county over the next two years, including likely funding for CicLAvia and 626 Golden Streets.
One more reason to love the East Side Riders, as they continue to support, and feed, the Compton community.
And to contribute if you can, financially or otherwise.
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If you’re reading this early enough, you may still have time to join a Twitter town hall calling for zero traffic deaths, in advance of this Sunday’s World Day of Remembrance.
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Meanwhile, Finish the Ride will host a march for safer roads on Saturday, in an early observance of the World Day of Remembrance.
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More proof that bike lanes are more efficient than regular traffic lanes. Regardless of drivers who claim no one ever uses them.
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Taking a tiny approach to urban density in Denver.
And yes, there’s an itty bitty bike involved.
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It’s a pity everyone seemed to forget the hard-earned lessons learned in the first major gas crisis back in the ’70s.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Apparently, even winning the Tour de France isn’t enough to protect against bike thieves, as Geraint Thomas learned the hard way when he popped into a coffee shop while training on the French Riviera.
