Tag Archive for bike lanes

Bike lanes slowing fire trucks is an urban myth, celebrate SciFi author Octavia Butler tomorrow & give Egan his damn bike back

November 7, 2025 / / No comments
Day 311 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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It was a quiet bike news day yesterday, so let’s get right to it.

Today’s photo: If they can drive an ambulance on the old beach bike path pre-widening, they can drive a fire truck on or near a bike lane. 

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

No bias here. Firefighters in San Antonio, Texas apparently haven’t gotten the memo, trotting out the persistent urban myth that a proposed road diet and two-way cycle track will slow down their trucks and response times, even though that hasn’t happened in other cities. And those bigass trucks with their massive tires could just drive over the little plastic posts they’ll probably use to separate the bike lanes from the traffic lanes, anyway.

But sometimes, it’s people on two wheels behaving badly.

A Singaporean driver was shocked and appalled to see a pair of teens drafting a semi on a bicycle and an ebike without the “proper gear,” as if a few ounces of plastic and foam would somehow offer protection if they went under a multi-ton tractor trailer. Look, we’ve all seen that scene from Breaking Away, but seriously, it’s not a good idea, with or without a helmet. 

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Local 

Say you’re old without saying you’re old. Former LA City Councilmember Dennis Zine reminisces about “even” riding his bike on city streets delivering the Los Angeles Herald Express and Herald Examiner.

Don’t miss the Octavia’s Pasadena Bike Ride tomorrow, as the Rose City celebrates Pasadena native and noted SciFi author Octavia E. Butler.

 

State

Encinitas is getting rid of back-in parking, widening lanes and ripping out one of the separated bike lanes on Santa Fe Drive, after drivers couldn’t figure out how to manage them.

A 55-year old man was hospitalized with a compound fracture of his tibia/fibula and a fractured femur after he was struck by a driver while riding his bicycle in Pacific Beach Wednesday night; police said he continued straight at an intersection instead of making the required right turn, riding into the path of a driver on the cross street.

The people of Fallbrook have raised more than $1,000 to replace a 34-year old disabled man’s ebike, after he was the victim of a hit-and-run driver who destroyed his bike.

A Santa Cruz man learned he had multiple myeloma, a difficult to treat form of blood cancer, after suffering an apparent rib fracture on a marathon bike ride; 14-years later, he’s back to riding his bike after a being in remission for three years thanks to a cutting edge therapy.

 

National

Bike Magazine recommends their picks for the year’s best bike computers. Although the best bike computer is the one you’ve already got — after you throw it as far as you can so you can just enjoy riding without one. 

Talk about not getting it. A Newton, Massachusetts resident and self-described bike rider complains that new raised bike lanes around a sharp curve make the road more dangerous, because it narrows the roadway on a dangerous corner. Except that forces drivers to slow down, which is kinda the point. 

The kindhearted folks at a sporting goods store in a tiny town in central New York State have given away 7,000 bicycles to kids in need so far this year, just a fraction of the 23,000 bikes they’ve donated since beginning the program.

The bike bus movement has taken over Montclair, New Jersey, with hundreds of kids riding their bikes to school every day.

Drivers who block bike lanes in Montgomery County, Maryland could now be subject to a whopping $60 fine. In other words, a gentle slap in the wallet, if not on the wrist. 

 

International

You’ve got to be kidding. An English man claims he had no idea he struck and killed a man riding a bicycle as he was backing up across the roadway to make a U-turn, insisting he thought he hit a stick — even though he never bothered to stop to see what shattered his rear window before driving away. You know, like any normal person would. 

He gets it now, anyway. A UK Member of Parliament accepted a challenge from local bicyclists to ride a “terrifying” stretch of roadway, so he could understand the need for a new greenway. And he did.

Britpop singer Ed Sheeran is one of us, describing how he crashed a borrowed bicycle while riding down a steep hill, then continued riding to a pub — only to wake up in pain the next morning with a broken rib, elbow and wrist.

Life is cheap in Singapore, where a truck driver got eight months behind bars after pleading guilty to driving without due care and attention for killing a woman who was riding an ebike in a crosswalk, after blaming the victim for not looking for traffic first, before crossing. But at least he lost his driver’s license for eight years.

 

Competitive Cycling

Someone stole the yellow Pinarello bicycle Colombian cyclist Egan Bernal rode on the final stage when he won the 2019 Tour de France.

A bike shop owned by the family of Chilean mountain biking star Martín Vidaurre was also the victim of thieves, who stole bicycles worth the equivalent of $103,000.

If you want to win friends and influence people, don’t suggest privatizing Alpe d’Huez and selling tickets to watch the Tour de France.

 

Finally…

Your new ebike could look like, well, a bike. Well, who wouldn’t ride a bicycle if you’re hunting vampires?

And more proof Mathieu van der Poel is a wheelie good cyclist.

Sorry.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , ,

Better bikeability in Whittier and Pomona, Utah puts 95% of residents near paved paths, and bike lanes reduce near-misses

November 5, 2025 / / No comments
Day 309 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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If you’re reading this, it means I managed to finish today’s post, despite spending all day dealing with a broken pipe under the bathroom sink, which dumped 50 years worth of accumulated inky goo over everything in the cabinet beneath it. 

Good times. 

It also means the icky gunk probably wasn’t toxic.

And if you’re not reading it, why the hell am I writing this?

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It looks like things are getting better in the far reaches of Los Angeles County.

First up is a press release from County Supervisor Janice Hahn, touting the approval of an 8.4-mile, $27 million Complete Streets project in South Whittier, expected to be finished just in time for the ’28 Olympics.

Los Angeles, CA – Today, the LA County Board of Supervisors voted to approve the South Whittier Community Bikeway Access Improvements project, which will bring a total of 8.4 miles of bike lanes as well as street improvements to unincorporated South Whittier, with sections adjoining the cities of Santa Fe Springs and La Mirada. The project will bring bike lanes to within one mile of the Metrolink’s Norwalk/Santa Fe Springs Station.

“We are not only adding bike lanes—we are repairing and expanding sidewalks for pedestrians, adding trees, and improving signage to make our community safer and more accessible for everyone. This project is a major investment in a better quality of life for South Whittier and its neighbors,” said Supervisor Hahn, whose district includes the area. “I’m proud that we’re now a big step closer to making this vision a reality.”

Current view and rendering of improvements to Leffingwell Rd.

The South Whittier Community Bikeway Access Improvements project will install 4.6 miles of Class II bike lanes and 3.8 miles of Class III bike routes, without loss of travel lanes or parking. Additionally, the project will provide pavement resurfacing, installing wayfinding signage, construction of bulb-outs, reconstruction of curbs and gutters, sidewalks, and curb ramps, landscaping medians, removal and replanting of trees, replacing streetlights, and upgrading traffic signals with pedestrian push buttons with audio and vibration devices.

Work is expected to begin next July and be completed by January 2028, with an estimated total cost of $27 million. Funding sources include County road funds, Metro grants, as well as federal funds. Additionally, the City of La Mirada will contribute $67,000 and the City of Santa Fe Springs another $18,000.

Next comes this item from Streetsblog’s Joe Linton, who observes that Pomona is becoming bike friendly, “going above and beyond the basic minimums for safer streets, including bikeability, walkability, accessibility, and transit improvements.”

In the last half-dozen years, the city of Pomona has stepped up efforts toward safer, more multimodal streets. As new light rail arrives, the city is working to calm traffic, and to improve bikeability, walkability, and accessibility.

With about 150,000 residents, Pomona is the 7th most populous city among the 88 cities in L.A. County. More than two-thirds of Pomona residents are Latino; the city is also home to a longstanding Black community. Incomes vary in different neighborhoods, but a significant portion of the Pomona population is working class.

And yes, Pomona is in Los Angeles County, even if many Angelenos west of the 605 might assume otherwise.

It’s a good read, and shows what can be done when city officials actually care enough to make the necessary changes to improve safety.

It also might be worth putting your bike on the A Line and exploring the city yourself.

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That’s how you do it.

Utah’s governor has proposed building a 3,100-mile network of paved, protected bike paths spanning the entire state.

Comparing it to an Interstate Highway system, Governor Spencer Cox said the “Utah Trail Network,” 500 miles of which already exist, would put a safe bikeway within one mile of 95% of the state’s population.

According to Singletracks,

The trail system has been in the works since legislation passed in 2023, allocating up to 5% of revenues from six different taxes to the project, not to exceed $45 million per year. In effect, the project has been funded to the tune of $45 million per year indefinitely…

“The goal is to connect the entire state of Utah with a network of paved trails. The goal is to help people have transportation options so they can choose to walk, bike, or scoot to their destinations without having to get in a car,” Stephanie Tomlin, Trails Division director at UDOT, told ABC4.

There is currently no plan for anything like this here in California.

The closest we have is the California Coastal Trail, which proposes connecting existing bike paths along the Pacific coast from Oregon to Mexico. Which is great for bike touring or casual coastal rides, but does little for bike commuters, or anyone anywhere else in the state.

But maybe there should be.

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No surprise here.

A new London study finds that bike lanes help avoid near-misses while bicycling.

The study, published in published in the Accident Analysis & Prevention journal, used helmet-mounted bike cams to record incidents of near-misses with drivers while riding on the city’s streets.

It examined 94 bicycling near-misses recorded during 317 hours of London commuter footage, gathered by 60 people riding bicycles, while finding —

  • Close passes and conflicts at intersections were the most frequent near-miss types.
  • Near-misses were more common during morning peaks, on roads with 30 mph speed limits and without bicycling infrastructure.
  • Bicycling infrastructure had a protective role but more needs to be done to address close passing and junction conflicts.

According to Road.cc,

One of the study’s senior authors, Nicola Christie, said cycling near misses were often “overlooked” in official statistics as they sometimes go unreported. Calling them “crucial indicators of road safety,” the professor explained that the findings “show that most near misses happen on roads without cycling infrastructure, and that junctions are particularly hazardous.”

“One of the benefits of using helmet-mounted cameras and voice-activated reporting as we did in this study is that they offer an easy and effective way to gather data on cycling safety, which can be used to evaluate the impact of infrastructure changes and safety campaigns,” she explained.

“This research adds to the growing evidence that cycling infrastructure helps protect cyclists and that Transport for London’s action plan to improve cycling safety is paying off.”

Just more evidence that even painted bike lanes can improve safety.

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

A self-entitled street vigilante was released from a Florida jail, following a viral incident where she got out of her Bentley to confront a bunch of ebike-riding kids for popping wheelies — probably on electric motorbikes, rather than ped-assist ebikes — even though they obeyed her demand to “get off the road” by moving to a nearby bike path, then snatched a phone out of one kid’s hand and threatened to throw it into a canal, before driving off on the bike path. Although it sounds like the judge in this case might be just a tad biased.

Speaking of bias, London’s Telegraph accuses “even bicyclists” of routinely violating a new 10 mph construction zone speed limit in the Islington neighborhood. Which might make sense if every bicycle came equipped with a speedometer, like motor vehicles. Or if bicyclists posed the same risks to others as people in cars.

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

The government council in County Cork, Ireland is considering a 14 mph speed limit for bicycles on a local greenway, accusing “speed merchants…in Lycra just whipping past” pedestrians.

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Local 

At the same time CARB is killing the state ebike voucher program, the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments has launched their own voucher program, offering eligible residents up to $2,000 towards the purchase of a high-quality e-cargo bike. Although you’ll have to find a way around the paper’s paywall if you want to read the story.

Still no justice in Lynwood, where the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors renewed a $20,000 reward for the hit-and-run driver who killed a motorcyclist in a left-cross crash in 2004.

 

State

Over 1,500 people turned out for Saturday’s annual Bike the Coast series of rides in San Diego County, along with a post-ride festival benefiting Bike MS.

San Diego cops plan to use engagement before enforcement in dealing with people illegally riding ebikes on the beachfront bike path in Pacific Beach.

Sad news from Salinas, where a woman riding a bicycle was killed in a right-hook collision with a semi driver, the latest in a long string of local crashes.

 

National

About damn time. Montgomery County, Maryland finally got around to banning drivers from parking, stopping or standing in bike lanes.

 

International

Cycling Weekly offers a bikepacker’s guide to “jaw-dropping” destinations around the world. As long as you don’t consider anything between Quebec and Patagonia part of the world.

Police in Cancun, Mexico arrested a woman for the hit-and-run death of a man on a bicycle, after identifying her car on security video.

A Canadian law professor advocates for the Idaho Stop Law, arguing that requiring bike riders to obey the same laws as motorists creates a false sense of equivalency. Maybe California can finally get an Idaho Stop, aka Stop as Yield, once Gavin Newsom’s veto pen leaves office next year.

Apparently, you can now add Navarra, in Northern Spain, to your bike bucket list.

This is who we share the road with. A pair of Indian men were sentenced to “rigorous” life imprisonment for the road rage murder of another man seven years ago, who shouted at them after they dented his car with their motorbike.

 

Competitive Cycling

USA Cycling has opened their fourth annual online fundraising auction, offering everything from entry to Unbound or the Leadville 100 to Tadej Pogačar’s signed World Champion jersey.

Keep your eyes open for Belgian cyclist Wout van Aert running, not riding, through the streets of Laguna Beach.

Cycling Up To Date hosts a rather pointless debate over whether Tadej Pogačar could still dominate using gear from ten years ago. Because the answer depends entirely on whether everyone else was using that same decade-old tech, too. 

 

Finally…

If you’re looking for a new career as a serial ebike snatcher, try not to take one with a hidden AirTag. Remembering when a bike crash meant With or Without You performed without him.

And the mayor of New York is now one of us.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

More on CARB’s quiet murder of scandal-plagued CA Ebike Incentives, and Metro forgets HLA bike lanes on Sunset busway

November 3, 2025 / / No comments
Day 307 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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Okay, so the Dodgers won, after nearly giving me and everyone in Los Angeles a heart attack. 

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I credit a lifetime of bicycling for maintaining a steady pulse rate throughout the game. How anyone else in this city managed to survive, I have no idea.

And if you’re heading to the victory parade today, for Kershaw’s sake, take Metro.

Or better yet, ride your bike. Just be careful where you lock it up, and how, to make sure it’s still there when the parade it over. 

Meanwhile, today’s photo is a reminder of the total disaster we all endured trying to apply for ebike vouchers earlier this year.

As if any of us actually needed one.  

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The San Diego Union-Tribune’s Jeff McDonald followed-up on the collapse of the California Ebike Incentive Program, in a story that doesn’t appear to be hidden behind the paper’s usual paywall.

After getting a typically non-responsive response from the California Air Resources Board about CARB’s co-opting of the remaining $18 million in ebike voucher funding, McDonald, who has closely followed the story from its very messy beginning to its inglorious end, wrote this.

The state air board did not respond to follow-up questions about the flawed administration of the e-bike program or two investigations into Pedal Ahead, the San Diego nonprofit selected to manage the effort whose website is now suspended…

The San Diego Union-Tribune first reported in June 2024 that the SANDAG e-bike initiative was troubled. Agency officials had begun investigating Pedal Ahead early last year for failing to comply with terms of the grant it had been awarded two years earlier.

At the same time, the Union-Tribune reported, CARB was conducting its own review into Pedal Ahead’s management, and criminal investigators at the California Department of Justice were scrutinizing the San Diego nonprofit.

Yet nothing in CARB’s statement took any responsibility for the failed administration of the program. Or for selecting a highly questionable administrator for the program.

Pedal Ahead founder Edward Clancy was deeply involved in an investigation into an alleged bribery scandal involving foreign money donated to San Diego-area politicians by agreeing to wear a wire for the FBI. However, he was not charged with any wrongdoing himself.

Then again, people who co-operate with investigations in order to land bigger fish often aren’t. Just ask Los Angeles “City Staffer B.”

Again, according to McDonald,

But in his leadership of Pedal Ahead, publicly filed tax returns and Clancy’s own comments raised questions about how the organization accounted for the millions of dollars it received from government contracts.

The nonprofit’s revenue and expenses reported on federal tax returns did not always match publicly announced contracts. Clancy told the Union-Tribune that $1 million Pedal Ahead collected was in a bank despite not being included in declared revenue.

“Funding is in a money market account, per contract requirement to yield interest that goes back into the program,” he said in a 2024 email. “To date, there is additional approximate $34,000 earned.”

Finally, writing in a very deadpan, journalistic voice, McDonald concluded,

General accepted accounting principles do not allow nonprofits to withhold revenue or spending from their public tax filings.

Which is putting it mildly.

Yet no one at CARB has ever taken responsibility for orchestrating this massive shitshow, instead sweeping it under the rug by co-opting the funding and just shutting the whole damn thing down.

Nor, to the best of my knowledge, has anyone ever asked them to.

Full disclosure, McDonald reached out to me for a comment on Friday, but I didn’t see his email until after Friday’s game, and I apparently responded too late for his deadline.

But this is what I would have said.

This is an extremely car-centric decision that defeats the entire purpose of Ebike Voucher Program, which was to provide viable alternatives to driving to reduce pollution and traffic congestion. The fact is, there is no such thing as a clean car; even an entirely electric car has to get power somewhere, and still contributes to particulate pollution from brake and tire wear. This also discriminates against older and disabled people who can no longer drive and need a viable transportation option. Simply put, there is nothing good about this extremely short-sighted decision.

In retrospect, I may have sounded a tad miffed. When I intended sound miffed as hell.

I have repeatedly called for an investigation into this program. But if anyone has actually looked into it — whether the legislature that approved it, the governor’s office, or the state attorney general — not one word has leaked to the public.

Instead, everyone seems to have simply gone along with CARB’s attempt to quietly kill the whole program, and hope no one noticed.

We have, though.

We have.

Meanwhile, a project manager with the Sacramento Area Bike Advocates politely rips into them, too.

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Maybe one lawsuit isn’t enough for them.

Just months after Metro was sued for violating Measure HLA by not including the bike lanes called for in the Los Angeles Mobility Plan 2035 on their makeover of the Vermont Ave corridor, the county transit agency appears to be making the same mistake on Sunset Blvd.

According to a little noticed item in last week’s Metro Community Relations Newsletter, the agency is planning to build bus lanes on the busy boulevard, while once again ignoring bike lanes called for in the Mobility Plan.

Get involved and hear about the changes coming to Sunset Bl—virtually!
Metro is planning improvements to make travel along Sunset Bl faster and more reliable. The project will improve a 4.3-mile stretch from Vermont Av to Havenhurst Dr by adding bus priority lanes for Metro Line 2 on weekdays during peak hours. Each day, about 20,000 riders travel this segment, and the priority lanes will make their trips faster and more reliable. In addition, the project will benefit over 111,000 residents and nearly 60,000 jobs located within a 10-minute walk of the corridor. Join us for a virtual community meeting on Wednesday, November 12, from 6 to 7 p.m. to learn more about the Sunset Bl Bus Priority Lanes Project. You can participate online using this link (Meeting ID: 815 9457 3537) or by phone at 213.338.8477. Visit the project website to learn more: metro.net/sunsetbl.

The project runs 4.3 miles along Sunset, threading through West Hollywood, Hollywood and East Hollywood, while the Mobility Plan calls for four miles of painted, unprotected bike lanes along the corridor, in addition to bus lanes and pedestrian enhancements.

So let’s all applaud Metro for taking the long-overdue step of building bus lanes on Sunset. But maybe we could gently nudge them towards keeping the city’s bike lane promises, too.

Speaking of which, Joe Linton, who seems to be everywhere these days, reminds us about that virtual meeting to discuss the project on the 12th of this month.

Mark your calendars: Metro will host a virtual outreach meeting Wed Nov. 12 6-7 p.m. for proposed Sunset Blvd bus lanes through Hollywood & East Hollywood – Vermont to Havenhurst (just west of Fairfax)

— Joe Linton (@lintonjoe.bsky.social) 2025-10-29T19:36:11.823Z

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

A writer for Road.cc puts tongue firmly in cheek, and considers what would happen if the ultra-conservative Reform Party takes the reins in the UK, concluding bikes would make the obvious scapegoat after they get rid of all the foreigners.

No bias here. A Cambridge, England letter writer complained about an election mailer that said “Your vote can save lives,” arguing that bike safety isn’t the only issue facing the city, and two of the three recent bicycling deaths shouldn’t count because they happened on streets with shiny new bike lanes.

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

A 49-year old Singaporean man was lucky to get off with just two months behind bars for blowing through a red light on his bicycle, and killing a 70-year old woman.

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Local 

The Sierra Club spends time with the river channels of Los Angeles, which is where most of our local bike paths are.

Momentum credits Santa Monica resident Caro Vilain for using her clever social media videos for the greater good “to help revolutionize the way we perceive urban cycling.”

 

State

Two Encinitas ebike retailers closed, with one owner blaming a shift to illegal electric motorbikes rather than more traditional ped-assist ebikes.

Join the club. San Diego’s 10 News reports that the city is not making progress towards its promise of zero traffic deaths.

Sad news from Bakersfield, where someone riding a bicycle was killed when they allegedly ran a red light, and was struck by an arson investigator with the Bakersfield Fire Department.

More sad news, this time from Manteca, where a 15-year old boy was killed when he was struck by a train while riding his bike on a railroad trestle across the San Joaquin River, along with a friend who escaped injury.

A 25-year old Stockton man was arrested for allegedly attacking and robbing a 70-year old “elderly” woman as she was riding a bicycle; his getaway was foiled when he tried jumping into the bed of a passing pickup, and the driver apparently wasn’t having it.

 

National

In what may be the understatement of the year, Cycling West says trees make bicycling more pleasant.

Direct-to-consumer mountain bike brand YT Industries USA is the latest bike company to go belly-up, shutting down both its San Clemente and Bentonville locations, four months after its German counterpart declared insolvency.

Someone riding a bicycle was killed by an accused drunk and reckless driver in Las Vegas on Sunday, the 132nd person killed on the streets of the city just this year.

Tragic news from Austin, Texas, where a man was killed, and his two young kids injured, when a hit-and-run driver ran a red light and slammed into the bike they were all riding.

A Maine man known locally as Bicycle Larry is still missing, more than 20 years after he disappeared without a trace while riding his bike.

 

International

Momentum ranks 30 of the world’s most beautiful bicycle routes. None of which are in California, whether by design or omission. 

Bicyclists in Mérida, Yucatán are fighting to keep protective planters on a bike lane, despite calls for their removal from local businesses, who argue they interfere with tour buses and reduce street parking. In other words, kind of like anywhere else. 

A Winnipeg, Manitoba newspaper says it’s never too cold to ride a bike, as long as you’ve got the right gear. I can attest to that, although personal experience suggests it can be too snowy, too wet or just too damn miserable. 

That’s more like it. A Member of Parliament from Oxfordshire, England demanded that funding for bicycle safety be included in the country’s upcoming budget, after a series of collisions in a local town.

British mountain bikers were warned against using unauthorized trails in Coombs Wood, where two young riders were injured at an “accident black spot.”

A 77-year old Frenchman somehow rode his bicycle off the road and fell down a 130-foot ravine, surviving for three days on red wine he had in a shopping bag. Which is a vital safety reminder to always carry some form of booze on your bike. Thanks to Megan for the heads-up. 

Hundreds of bicyclists turned out for Dubai’s annual bike ride.

A group of women in their 20s and 30s are using their bicycles to reclaim the post-apartheid streets of Johannesburg, South Africa, where bicycling is no longer seen as an elite hobby or a last resort for the poor.

Jessica Alba is one of us, exploring Australia’s Gold Coast on a Lime Bike, while wearing a black-on-black Dodger’s cap, as she films her latest movie.

 

Competitive Cycling

Sad news from France, where the oldest living Olympic gold medalist died at age 101; cyclist Charles Coste won gold in team pursuit in the 1948 London Olympics, and served as a torchbearer 76 years later at last year’s Paris Games.

UK cyclist Zoe Bäckstedt, the reigning U23 cyclocross and time trial champion, urges you to “wear a helmet, please,” claiming her’s saved her life in a training crash that resulted in a broken hand and wrist fracture.

 

Finally…

Why bother riding on two wheels when one will do? That feeling when you take the wrong turn out of the airport, and startle the locals by pushing your mud-crusted bicycle out of the forest hours later.

And nothing like letting a David Bowie lyric dictate your next 3,000-mile ride.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

CicLAvia comes to South LA Sunday, anti-bike lane bike commuter, and reality shifts when ebike-hater downloads rental app

September 8, 2025 / / One comment
Day 251 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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Patch offers a reminder about this weekend’s Historic South Central meets Watts CicLAvia.

Included among the highlights are the birthplace of West Coast Jazz, Watts Towers and the former LA headquarters of the Black Panthers.

Which is not a phrase I ever thought we’d use back in the day,

And BikeLA — the former Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, will host a feeder ride to the open streets event.

https://twitter.com/heybikela/status/1963666212887593338

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A year-round London bike commuter says he’s no fan of bike lanes.

His reasoning is that a) they don’t really reduce traffic — either vehicular or on the Tube — since most people stop riding in bad weather, and b) because they’re often blocked for one reason or another.

Then there’s this.

Most British roads still have no cycle lanes, after all, but they’re still very safe for cyclists. In 2023, 24 cyclists were killed and just over a thousand seriously hurt per billion miles cycled in this country. In other words if you cycle a mile, the chance is about one in a million that you’ll be seriously hurt or worse. I’d have to commute every weekday for well over 200 years – without any holidays – before it would be likely that I’d suffer a serious mishap. Even given today’s gloomy pension prospects, I hopefully won’t have to do that.

As for the danger from cyclists, it does exist: but it’s minuscule. We Brits are roughly as likely to be killed by lightning as by a cyclist. We’re noticeably more likely to be killed in an “accident involving cattle”. In a world with cars and carbon monoxide and food poisoning in it – let alone heart disease, cancer and Alzheimer’s – worrying about being killed by a cyclist would be pretty illogical.

It’s only one man’s view, of course, but I consider the fear that many cyclists have of riding among motor traffic to be pretty illogical too. There are some bad and aggressive drivers out there to be sure, but that’s true of cyclists too, and in fact most drivers in my experience are safe: sometimes even friendly.

He’s right. But wrong.

I made a pretty similar calculation some time back, too.

In 2009, Americans took 4 billion trips by bicycle.

How safe is bicycling? Cyclists suffered in an estimated 52,000 injuries in 2009; making your odds of returning home safely from any given ride nearly 77,000 to one; the chances of surviving any given ride were over 6.3 million to one in your favor.

On the other hand, people do get injured — or worse — riding a bicycle.

So while the odds of completing any given ride safely are astronomically in your favor, they’re still odds. Which means there’s always a chance of losing, infinitesimally small though it may be.

And the whole point of bike lanes is to improve all our odds of getting home in one piece.

He also makes another mistake common to experienced bicyclists.

You may feel comfortable riding in traffic, just like I did for years. But bike lanes aren’t for those of us who feel confident mixing it up with motorists.

They’re for the people who don’t.

Bike lanes — particularly protected bike lanes — provide space for the overwhelming majority of people who don’t feel safe sharing the same road space with drivers.

Especially with bad drivers, which to be honest, most people are at one time or another. They drink, they speed, they use their phones, and just do stupid stuff.

You know, as people do.

So if you feel comfortable riding in traffic, great. But that doesn’t mean everyone else should, because they don’t.

And won’t.

Meanwhile, a Santa Rosa bicyclist insists our London friend is not the only one who feels that way.

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Another London writer, with tongue planted firmly in cheek this time, says he hates bike riders.

God, I hate cyclists: shooting the lights, ignoring zebras, mounting the pavement, overtaking on the inside, thinking they’re so damned virtuous, being all vegan, pro-Palestine and probably trans, crouched over their racing handlebars like they’re on the Tour de frigging France, in their silly hats with those mincy little shoes, skin-tight shorts disappearing up their bum cracks…

But when he’s on a bike, “the pedal is on the other foot.”

Bloody motorists: fat, entitled, Farage-voting sales reps, slumped in the driving seat like Jabba the Hut, killing the planet with every lazy depression of the gas pedal, oblivious to my presence, distracted by TikTok, missing the light changes, failing to indicate, smoking fags and eating burgers, overlapping into designated cycle lanes, clogging up a city that is perfectly well served by trains and buses…

But one thing we can all agree on, he says, is everyone hates ebikes.

And they’re all drug dealers anyway, and gang members and petty crims, which is why they wear balaclavas and ride with their hoods up. Who cycles with a hood up unless they’re off to bash an old lady or sell heroin to schoolgirls? And if not drug dealers then, worse, they’re Deliveroo and Uber Eats stormtroopers, dispensing poisonous portions of fatty crap to the last few citizens not on Ozempic, feeding the obesity epidemic with cold cheeseburgers their consumers couldn’t be bothered to get up off the sofa and go out and get for themselves; racing to hit the targets they need to make ends meet, unregulated, killing pedestrians to get to the front doors of the people they’re killing with pizzas; a situation I blame, when I’m driving my car, on the illegal immigrants riding the bikes, but, when I’m riding my lefty pedal bike, on the greedy capitalist fat cats at “Big Food”. Farageist or Polanskyite, there’s nothing to love about e-bikes.

And as for the rented ones, the Limes and the Forests and the Santanders, they sit at the top of the pyramid of evil: no accountability, no ownership, no investment in the infrastructure, no dog in the fight. Random chancers leaping aboard them helmetless, no notion of the rules of the road, no tax paid, giggly gangs of students on summer evenings riding seven abreast like the Von bloody Trapps, leaving their bikes, when they run out of juice, strewn across pavements and shop doorways, piles of them in broken heaps all over town like dead green horses at the back door of the slaughterhouse. The very end of civil society.

And then, he downloaded the Lime app, and his world was turned inside out like an Escher lithograph.

Seriously, it’s worth taking a few minutes to read the whole thing. Because it might just be the best laugh you have all day.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

A Naples, Florida advocacy group offers sad but necessary advice on how to get away unharmed in a confrontation with an angry driver, including avoiding eye contact, which can be interpreted as confrontational. Just like with angry apes and aggressive subway riders. 

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

Life is cheap in London, where a 45-year old man walked without a day behind bars for breaking a woman’s jaw when he crashed into her while riding his bike on the wrong side of the road; he was fined the equivalent of a “paltry and insulting” $675.

………

Local 

That’s more like it. A 64-year old Long Beach man was sentenced to 30 years to life behind bars for the meth-fueled crash that killed 12-year old Noel Bascon in 2020 as the boy rode his bike across a Costa Mesa intersection with his father; Richard David Lavalle’s sentence was doubled because of his prior criminal convictions, and charged as a 3rd strike. He was credited with over four years time served.

 

State

Sunnyvale City Councilmember Richard Mehlinger suffered a broken left thumb and right wrist when he was struck by a driver while riding his bike; the “staunch traffic safety advocate” said the crash showed the “necessity and urgency” of installing bike lanes.

Around two dozen bicyclists rode with their dogs on a three-mile circuit along San Francisco’s Sunset Dunes on the Dogon’ Bike Ride, organized by comedian Sarah Catz-Hyman.

 

National

A pair of entrepreneurs scored a $200,000 invested on Shark Tank, after a stationary bike ride convinced Kevin O’Leary and another shark they had indeed invented a more comfortable bike seat.

A guest writer for Bike Portland says the city’s greenways won’t be safe until they build them that way.

Dozens of Denver residents rode across the city in search of bagels and matzo ball soup on the city’s annual Jewish Deli Bike Tour.

A 22-year old Ohio man set out on a bike ride in 1973, and was never seen again; his body was finally identified this year, 52 years after he disappeared after last being seen in Cleveland — and 45 years after remains were found in a Whitney, Ontario park, 461 miles away.

Hundreds of people turned out for a protest ride in central Philadelphia to demand better protection for bicyclists, after a 67-year old bike advocate was killed in a collision while riding a bike.

 

International

A Montreal columnist complains about possible plans to close a roadway to motor vehicle traffic, arguing that there’s no need to provoke a battle between bicyclists and drivers when so many of us are both. And yet, the roads are unevenly apportioned overwhelmingly in favor of one over the other.

An English man returned to his home after riding his bike around the world,  arriving back in Cornwall 477 days and 22,300 miles after he left.

Life is cheap in Ireland, where a taxi driver on his way to work walked without a day behind bars for crashing into a six-year old boy riding a bike; he was fined the equivalent of $879 for the crash that left the kid with bruising and a broken arm.

The good news is, the coach of the Paris Saint-Germain soccer team is one of us; the bad news, he crashed his bike and broke his collarbone, and will be out of action after surgery to repair it.

UNESCO World Heritage site Albi, France successfully melded a 19th-century railway viaduct across the Tarn River with a lightweight new bike and pedestrian bridge.

Drew Barrymore says her 12-year old daughter crashed her ebike while riding in the mountains of France, and ended up using her bra as a tourniquet for her badly ripped elbow.

French endurance cyclist Sofiane Sehili’s attempt to set a new record for bicycling across Eurasia ended badly at the Russian border, where he was accused of crossing the border illegally and tossed in jail, just 248 miles short of his destination, and 10,936 miles after setting out from Lisbon, Portugal.

Horrible story from India, where a 40-year old man was stabbed to death and his body dumped in the woods over accusations of practicing witchcraft, after riding his bike to a nearby village for repairs.

 

Competitive Cycling

Danish sprinter Mads Pedersen claimed victory in Sunday’s Stage 15 of the Vuelta a España, while two-time Tour de France champ Jonas Vingegaard remained in the red leader’s jersey, with João Almeida 48 seconds back in second place.

Once again, someone protesting the war in Gaza disrupted the Vuelta, causing two riders to crash when he jumped out from the side of the road waving a Palestinian flag; because of the repeated protests, the Israel Premier Tech cycling team switched to new uniforms without the team name.

Welsh Olympic medalist and 2018 Tour de France champ Geraint Thomas called it a career after Sunday’s final stage of the Tour of Britain, capping his career in his hometown of Cardiff, as the race was won by 22-year old Frenchman Romain Gregoire.

Pre-race favorite Neilson Powless was forced to run with his bike when he suffered a flat in Saturday’s Maryland Cycling Classic; he ended up finishing 18th, well behind eventual men’s winner Sandy Dujardin, while Poland’s Agnieszka Skalniak-Sojka won the women’s race.

Around 70 bicyclists were injured, some seriously, in a mass crash in a German bike race involving more than 1,000 amateur and semi-professional cyclists.

Tragic news from Malaysia, where a 28-year old man was killed in an amateur race when he tried to avoid crashing into a group of riders, falling onto the other side of the road where he was struck by a motorist.

 

Finally…

Nothing like stumbling on a bicycle that’s been rolling in the deep like it was sung by Adele. The mountain bike of the future, as designed by AI.

And motorcyclist pot, meet bike-rider kettle.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: General / Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

How LA’s inaction led to a child’s death, LADOT “improves” safety by restoring parking, and CicLAvia rolls again

August 18, 2025 / / Comments Off on How LA’s inaction led to a child’s death, LADOT “improves” safety by restoring parking, and CicLAvia rolls again
Day 230 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

………

Of course he gets it.

Writing for the Los Angeles Times, Streets For All founder Michael Schneider says fourth-grader Nadir Gavarrete did not have to die in a Koreatown intersection earlier this month.

Nadir Gavarrete was riding an e-scooter along with his 19-year old brother when they were run down by a drunk driver, who was accused of blowing through a stop sign to make a left turn.

A stop sign, and an intersection, that shouldn’t have still been there.

Koreatown is one of the densest parts of Los Angeles — at 44,000 people per square mile, it’s more crowded than most New York City boroughs. Nearly every major street in Koreatown is on the city’s “high injury network” list — the 6% of streets that cause 70% of the traffic injuries and deaths. In other words, L.A. knows how dangerous Koreatown’s streets can be.

As a result, 14 years ago, in 2011, L.A. applied for a federal grant to improve safety along several city streets, specifically choosing to focus on the intersection of New Hampshire and 4th for one of its projects. The city won the grant money and kicked off community meetings to discuss installing a roundabout at the intersection, as well as adding enhanced crosswalks and other safety improvements to the immediate area.

Needless to say, a decade-and-a-half later, nothing has happened, this being Los Angeles and all.

Except for yet another needless death, added to a long and ever-growing list of failure.

What will it take for Los Angeles to have a sense of urgency in actually making our streets safer? We currently spend more on legal settlements to those hurt and killed on our streets than we do on Vision Zero, the city’s half-baked effort to reduce traffic deaths. Since Los Angeles declared itself a Vision Zero City in 2015, with the ultimate aim of having no one killed in car crashes on city streets by 2025, deaths and injuries have only gotten worse. In the last few years we’ve had at least three children hit and killed while walking to school. And yet the city’s leaders — facing a budget crisis, much of it of their own making — perpetually underfund LADOT and street safety in general.

Good question.

It’s worth taking a few minutes to read the whole thing.

Because the more things change in this city of fallen angels, the more they stay the same.

And that’s not a good thing.

………

Good news and bad news, as LADOT announced plans to remove peak-hour lanes on a number of low-traffic streets throughout the city in an effort to improve safety.

The lanes currently prohibit parking during morning and/or evening rush hours, too often turning them into high speed traffic lanes.

However, the bad news is, instead of converting the lanes to full-time bus or bike lanes, the city is restoring parking throughout the day. Which doesn’t actually improve safety for anyone, just trading one problem for another.

LADOT dangles the possibility of converting the lanes to some other, better use at some undisclosed future time. Although given the city’s financial problems — due in large part to those legal settlements referenced above — that day could be years, or even decades, off.

If ever.

LADOT Begins First Phase of Peak-Hour Lane Removal

LADOT has begun implementing the first phase of a citywide initiative to improve safety and access to street parking by removing peak-hour travel lanes and restoring full-time parking. This initiative, directed by the Los Angeles City Council, aims to enhance safety, improve access, and support the City’s long-term mobility goals.

Phase 1 of this initiative focuses on low-traffic corridors, restoring street parking on corridors where traffic volume is below determined thresholds. Future phases will examine higher-volume streets and may propose alternative uses for peak-hour lanes, such as dedicated bus lanes, protected bike lanes, or expanded pedestrian zones. LADOT will conduct outreach and collaborate with community stakeholders as future phases move forward, ensuring that proposed changes align with neighborhood needs.

In addition to providing greater parking availability to support surrounding businesses, these changes are expected to have minimal impact on congestion while improving street safety, with reduced speeding, fewer collisions, and improved visibility for people walking and biking.

The specific corridors selected for Phase 1 of peak-hour lane removal are:

  • Alpine St, from N. Spring to Yale
  • Alvarado St, Northbound, from James M. Wood to 7th
  • Beverly Blvd, from Rampart to Witmer
  • Broadway, Northbound, from 2nd to 1st
  • College St, from New Depot to Alameda
  • Crenshaw Blvd, from Florence to 59th St
  • La Tijera Blvd, Northbound, from Thornburn to Knowlton
  • Melrose Ave, from Vermont to Virgil
  • Nordhoff St, Westbound, from Corbin to Canoga
  • Pico Blvd, Westbound, from Overland to Sepulveda
  • Ventura Blvd, Eastbound, from Farralone to Tampa
  • Victory Blvd, from Lankershim to Clybourn
  • Washington Blvd, from Vermont to Flower
  • Washington Blvd, Eastbound, from Redondo to La Brea and from Wellington to Crenshaw

Thanks to Dr. Grace Peng for the heads-up.

………

A writer for Circling the News was the first to post a report from yesterday’s Culver City meets Venice CicLAvia.

And the first thing they noticed was the bad shape of the road around Venice and Abbot Kinney, saying it was easy to notice if you’re trying to dodge pavement problems.

The second thing seemed to be members of White People 4 Black Lives, several accident attorneys and the Venice High School Cheerleaders handing out free water along the route, the latter as they tried to raise funds.

And yes, it seems a good time was had by all.

Although I had to miss it because of my wife’s health problems, since she still hasn’t bounced back enough to go herself, or to be left at home alone.

Meanwhile, the Militant Angeleno’s guide to highlights along the route was posted too late to link to before the CicLAvia, but you can still check it out to see what you missed.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

No bias here. A 55-year old Miami man claims he was arrested just for touching a police cruiser, as he tried to ride around the patrol car stopped in a bike lane; police claim he intentionally hit the car hard enough to dent it “four to five times.”

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

A 12-year old Singapore girl was hospitalized after she was knocked cold by a 51-year old man on fixie while riding her bicycle; the older man was being investigated for a “rash act causing hurt.”

A Brisbane, Australia writer offers a carrot and stick solution to the problem of scofflaw bicyclists, saying the answer is more bike paths, while forcing bike riders to wear registration numbers.

………

Local 

Two women were arrested for shooting another woman in the arm on Sepulveda Blvd in Culver City earlier this month, in an attempt to steal the victim’s ebike; a search of their apartment also turned up two assault rifles with high-capacity magazines, ammunition and a kilo of suspected cocaine.

 

State

Mark your calendar for September 4th, when the Orange County Transportation Authority will hold a webinar to discuss the OCTA Bikeways Connectivity Study to expand options for bikeways across Orange County.

A mom writing for the Times of San Diego explains how to select the right bicycle for your kids.

California Streetsblog reports on Bike Bakersfield and Calbike teaming up to “flip the script” on a “ludicrous” grand jury report decrying efforts to implement bicycle safety measures.

A local website reports bicycling and pedestrian deaths in Watsonville far outpace the average in Santa Cruz County, and considers four ways to make the city streets safer.

 

National

ABC News says the deadly 85th Percentile Rule that allows drivers to set speed limits with a heavy right foot could finally be on the way out.

Great idea. The White Line — the bicycle safety group founded by the parents of fallen Team USA cyclist Magnus White — put a group of Colorado lawmakers on a bus, and drove them around for a series of mobile town halls to show them the impact crashes have on vulnerable road users.

I want to be like her when I grow up. A Missoula, Montana woman calls a local octogenarian, peacemaker and bicycle evangelist her hero and mentor, the 87-year old woman is known throughout the community for riding around town in a bright vest, with her dog in her basket.

Chicago Streetsblog says yes, the city has a long way to go to become bike friendly, but People For Bikes’ use of it as a poster child for bicycling problems is just a joke.

New York’s Citi Bike bikeshare will now require users to prove they’re over 16 to use the service.

Florida — yes, Florida — is now the first state in the nation to offer ebike education as part of the regular curriculum, at least in some schools.

A 54-year old Miami man riding a bicycle on the city’s deadly Rickenbacker Causeway was killed when he was struck by two kids riding an electric dirt bike.

 

International

Momentum ranks the ten best European city’s for bicycling and the best time to visit, including four French cities, led by Paris.

An op-ed from a Calgary, Alberta bike advocate urges local drivers not to fear road diets, arguing that they can ease the city’s traffic woes.

An expat website explains how to get around the Netherlands by bike like a local.

Here’s another one for your bicycle bucket list, as Travel + Leisure recommends a 560-mile bike trail through France’s Loire Valley, exploring a unique blend of ancient Gaelic history, Renaissance châteaus, and ancient vineyards.

A 65-year old Tallahassee, Florida high school teacher and tennis coach stopped in Madrid, Spain, a little less than a quarter of the way on his attempt to become the oldest person a bike around the world.

 

Competitive Cycling

Remco Evenepoel will now be on the same team as Primož Roglič, as Roglič says he hopes they can do great things together, after the Belgian star signed with the Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe cycling team.

 

Finally…

Your next car could be a bike.

No, seriously, that’s all we’ve got this time. 

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Banning bike lanes for public safety, new armadillos inhabit Adams, and impress visitors with an “enchanted” forest bikeway

August 15, 2025 / / Comments Off on Banning bike lanes for public safety, new armadillos inhabit Adams, and impress visitors with an “enchanted” forest bikeway
Day 227 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

………

It was a light news day yesterday, so let’s get right to it before we all go riding this weekend. 

At least on Sunday, right?

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

You’ve got to be kidding. A New York court has temporarily blocked the city from installing a bike lane in response to a lawsuit from local businesses owners, who alleged it would “compromise public safety, negatively impact local businesses and violate city laws.” Because, of course it would.

You’ve got to be kidding, part two. A Philadelphia judge blocked the city from building loading zones next to a bike lane, after the state passed a law banning drivers from stopping a car in one, as well as blocking any other changes to the street or the bike lanes, including installing protective barriers, in a decision that apparently wasn’t explained.

………

Local 

Streetsblog examines new hard-plastic, reflectorized armadillos marking bike lanes on Adams Blvd and Spring Street.

The Los Angeles Times recommends three hikes to impress out-of-town visitors, including an “enchanted” forest walk on the seven-mile West Fork National Scenic Bikeway, which you could presumably do on your bike, as well.

 

State

Bakersfield bike riders rallied at City Hall to call for safer streets in the wake of a misguided grand jury report prioritizing cars over bike lanes.

Alameda apparently decides drivers matter more than kids by removing barriers on a Slow Street near schools, ostensibly to improve public safety.

An “epic” new bike trail winds 33-miles through the heart of a Napa Valley wine country.

 

National

Momentum says the explosion in micromobility is outgrowing bike lanes, which need to be widened and separated for differing speeds.

An Outside documentary tells true story of 31 everyday American teenagers who shared the journey of a lifetime by biking across the country in 1982.

A Wyoming man shares what he’s learned from a lifetime of bicycling, something his wife calls the “most dangerous sport” he could take part in thanks to cars and the people driving them. Although bull riding, skydiving and boxing would seem a tad risky, too. 

Covington, Kentucky finally got around to building its first bike lane, nearly 60 years after the first bike lane the US was striped in Davis, California.

Boston’s Northeastern University considers whether ebikes can become the next form of mass transportation, and what’s keeping them from rivaling bus, metro and rail networks. Hint: safer streets and fewer drivers, maybe?

Bicycling deaths in Connecticut are up a whopping 200% over a five-year average. Although that amounts to just six deaths, which would be a good month for Southern California.

A 35-year old New Jersey man has ridden nearly 2,000 miles covering every public road in Gloucester County, located across the Delaware River from Philadelphia.

 

International

The Ottawa Citizen examines what it will take to make the city safer for people on bicycles, where the streets prioritize drivers like the rest of Canada.

A 32-year old British man was sentenced to four years behind bars for the “horrendous” speeding, hit-and-run crash that left a bike-riding woman with life changing injuries; he fictitiously reported the car stolen at knifepoint 15 minutes after fleeing the scene.

A judge in the UK ruled that video evidence of traffic violations is both legal and valuable to police, dismissing a retired lawyer’s attempt to sue a “disturbing, caped crusader” bike rider who filmed her using her phone while driving in violating the country’s privacy laws.

A 64-year old disabled man in was killed when he crashed his adult tricycle into a poorly marked bollard blocking the entrance to a UK bike lane.

Traffic safety experts called for a major overhaul of Malaysian roads, warning they prioritize cars and trucks at the expense of everyone else. In other words, just like the streets of Los Angeles, and pretty much everywhere else in Southern California. 

 

Competitive Cycling

Track cyclist Matthew Richardson, who left Australia last year to compete for Great Britain, set a new world record for the flying 200 meters with a time of just 8.941 seconds, smashing the previously unbreakable 9 second barrier.

American Hannah Otto broke one of the world’s best known single-day mountain bike records, setting the new fastest known time for a woman on Utah’s White Rim Trail at 6 hours, 36 minutes and 51 seconds.

On the other hand, British cyclist Charlie Tanfield fell three kilometers — 1.85 miles — short in his attempt to set a new hour record.

Sports Illustrated previews the upcoming Vuelta a España, the 80th edition of the year’s final Grand Tour.

Cycling Weekly says domestiques are probably coming to gravel racing.

Participants in the recent Tour de Big Bear, which combined road, gravel and mountain bike events, ranged from three-years old to 90.

 

Finally…

Probably not the best idea to let your dad play Whack-A-Mole on your expensive carbon frame. Riding a century with that healthy nuclear glow.

And a giving taking a header off your bike a whole new meaning. (Click on this link if the tweet doesn’t embed.)

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , ,

Dangerous streets keep kids off bikes, Canadian bike riders have a right to not get killed, and CicLAvia rolls on Sunday

August 14, 2025 / / One comment
Day 226 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

………

She gets it.

A writer for the Washington Post says dangerous streets make it hard to give kids the freedom they need to roam and explore.

In recent decades, many of America’s roads have indeed become more chaotic: Speed limits are higher; vehicles are (much) bigger; drivers are more aggressive and more likely to be distracted by smartphones. When parents see massive SUVs speeding down neighborhood streets or blowing through stop signs, they might feel less inclined to allow their kids to roam freely on foot or bicycle. And though the number of children injured or killed by cars while walking or riding a bike has fallen steadily since the 1970s, research by the CDC notes that this decline is not because streets are safer, but because fewer kids are out and about in the first place.

This pattern, some parents say, can create a self-perpetuating cycle: If drivers are less accustomed to encountering kids on roads, they might be less likely to drive safely around them, which in turn makes parents more anxious and restrictive of their child’s movements.

It’s worth giving the whole story a read.

Because one of the most common refrains from parents is that they would never allow their kids to ride on city streets, in Los Angeles or elsewhere, whether or not they ride themselves.

………

He gets it, too.

In a piece that starts out very tongue-in-cheek before evolving — devolving? — into legalese, a Canadian columnist takes conservatives to task for complaining about a recent court ruling ordering the government not to remove Toronto’s protected bike lanes.

It was judicial activism run amok, they agreed. Canada’s ever-inventive courts had discovered a “right to bicycle lanes.” What next: a right to volleyball courts? Time to invoke the notwithstanding clause, said some.

Well, that was then. When, one week ago, the Conservative government of Nova Scotia, with the province’s forests tinder-dry and fearing a repeat of the devastating wildfires of two years ago, issued a ban on hiking and camping in forested areas, conservatives were again apoplectic.

But the real issue, he says, is whether the government has the right to kill you.

The issue at stake in the bicycle lanes case is disarmingly simple: does the government have the right to kill you? It is not hyperbole but demonstrable, probabilistic fact that banning bike lanes will sentence a certain number of randomly selected Torontonians to death, and cause serious injuries to still more…

That’s also reflected in our Constitution. Section 7 of the Charter does not assert an absolute right to “life, liberty or security of the person” but the right not to be deprived thereof “except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.”

Because removing bike lanes could predictably deprive some people of their “life, liberty or security of the person.”

And likely would.

Which does not mean the government has to build bike lanes. But it does mean the court had a reasonable basis to prohibit the government from removing them.

Nothing in the decision obliges the government to build new bicycle lanes. As such it involves no “positive rights,” which conservatives are right to oppose. It simply requires that before a government takes the extraordinary step of ordering the removal of lanes that have already been built – an action guaranteed to cost some lives and put many more in peril – it ought at least to have some basis in evidence or logic for doing so.

Maybe we should try that same argument on this side of the border the next time someone wants to rip out an existing bike lane here.

………

 

CicLAvia marks its 61st open streets event this Sunday with the 6.75-mile Culver City meets Venice CicLAvia, connecting Culver City, Mar Vista and Venice.

Hard to believe it’s been 15 years since the first one on 10-10-2010. And even harder to believe now that we thought it would never happen when CicLAvia’s founders came to the LACBC, now BikeLA, board to ask for our support.

Meanwhile, KNBC-4 suggests honoring the Venice lifestyle by skating the whole route.

Thousand, a woman-owned Boyle Heights bike helmet-maker, will celebrate their tenth anniversary by giving away 1,000 helmets at their booth at the Mar Vista Hub.

………

The Spring Street bike lanes in DTLA are getting new safety barriers, with enough separation to hopefully prevent the kind of injuries San Diego bicyclists have complained about.

https://twitter.com/LADOTofficial/status/1955736202172092503

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

No bias here. Middlesborough, England is going to spend the equivalent of nearly $3 million to rip out a bike lane derided as “an absolute nightmare” and “exploited by drug dealers,” despite spending just $100,000 to settle injury claims after it went in — and spending $2.3 million to install it just three years ago.

A Dublin, Ireland city counselor accused civic leaders of “pure gaslighting” and treating bicycles “like a child’s toy” by shutting down a popular bicycle route, forcing riders into an “anti-cycling death trap.”

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

British motoring lawyer Mr. Loophole accuses bike cam vigilant Cycling Mikey of using his bicycle as a weapon by pushing it into the path of a driver attempting to illegally drive down a closed roadway, resulting in his bike getting run over and shattered into pieces. So he’s saying it wasn’t a very good weapon?

………

Local 

Streets For All released their August newsletter, including calls for protected bike lanes on Pico Blvd and Alameda Street.

 

State

California is hitting pause on a requirement to install bike parking in new commercial and residential buildings, after the legislature passed a bill delaying the requirement until 2027.

A Monterey County woman says there’s no law against kids under 16 riding an e-scooter or a Class 1 or 2 ebike, but maybe there should be. Actually, there is a law against riding e-scooters without a driver’s license. 

Sad news from Yuba County, where a 60-year old man was killed by a driver while towing a trailer behind his bicycle.

 

National

An op-ed writer in USA Today argues that ebikes are driving him crazy, so we need to make them obey the same rules as drivers. Even though most drivers don’t.

Singletracks offers a guide to the ten best downhill mountain bike trails in Idaho.

Portland’s mayor has called a pause on plans to remove diverters and change the traffic flow on two neighborhood greenways, after the bicycle advisory committee increased pressure on the city.

Police in Houston arrested a 40-year old man in the fatal stabbing of a 77-year old man as he was riding his bike to work; the victim somehow made it to his job site before collapsing, and died at the hospital.

This is the cost of traffic violence. A 70-year old cancer treatment specialist in the Indiana University medical system was killed by a driver while riding his bike on Monday.

A Boston writer explains how she fell in love with her ebike after moving here from France, saying biking every day makes her life better.

Princeton, New Jersey banned right turns on red lights as part of the city’s Vision Zero program. Meanwhile, Los Angeles just tells drivers to carry on. 

Arlington, Virginia is joining the ebike rebate movement, offering vouchers for up to $1650 on the purchase of an ebike. Although those ebikes are about to get a lot more expensive, thanks to Trump’s 30% tariff on goods imported from Asian manufacturers. 

An Atlanta photo exhibition documents one man’s journey to bike every single street inside the city’s I-285 perimeter.

A TV station in Lake Charles, Louisiana unmasks a mysterious man on a Mardi Gras-festooned ebike, who says he rides through the community because “he loves to see people smile.” Although something tells me Adorian Hollywood Flavor probably isn’t his real name. 

A Florida teenager was lucky to survive his first day of school when he was struck by a driver while riding his ebike in a crosswalk, after witnesses teamed together to lift the car off him.

 

International

A recent study ranks Victoria, British Columbia as Canada’s most bicycle-friendly city, edging out Winnipeg and Quebec City.

The 134-year old Cycling Weekly introduces the British nonprofits working to transform the lives of refugees and asylum-seekers by providing them with bicycles.

A clueless Conservative city counselor in the UK questioned why disabled bicyclists can’t simply get off their bikes and push them across a footbridge. Um, maybe because they’re disabled?

 

Competitive Cycling

The Cyclists’ Alliance, the union for women’s cycling, is calling for mandatory, annual screening in the wake of Pauline Ferrand-Prévot’s victory at the Tour de France Femmes, amid comments about her drastic weight loss.

Cyclist offers a preview of the three-stage Tour de Romandie Féminin, which kicks off tomorrow.

 

Finally…

What it’s like to suffer for the sake of science on a ten-mile time trial. That feeling when you stop riding in the year’s hottest month because your cleats are haunted.

And we may have to deal with stampeding LA drivers, but at least we don’t have to worry about getting trampled to death by elephants.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

WeHo: It ain’t the drivers it’s the roads, bike rider busted for being nervous, and maybe LA is better than we think

August 1, 2025 / / Comments Off on WeHo: It ain’t the drivers it’s the roads, bike rider busted for being nervous, and maybe LA is better than we think
Day 212 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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He gets it.

In a WeHo Times op-ed, 23-year old community organizer Nick Renteria argues that the city is one of the most dangerous in the state when it comes to traffic violence.

As evidenced by the recent hit-and-run deaths of Erica Edwards and Blake Ackerman on Sunset Blvd and Fountain Ave, respectively.

But not, he says, because there is something inherently worse about the city’s drivers, but because the streets are “designed facilitate high traffic flow at the cost of our safety.”

And what’s standing in the way of progress isn’t a lack of evidence, it’s inaction.

But it doesn’t have to be that way.

As Renteria says,

Imagine a Sunset Boulevard where people stroll safely beneath the billboards. A Santa Monica Boulevard where outdoor dining isn’t drowned out by speeding cars. A Fountain Avenue where no one has to fear crossing the street or riding a bike.

Imagine a city where Erica and Blake’s deaths are the last. Where we finally say: enough.

We’ve imagined it for years. Now let’s do something about it.

………

No bias here.

Border Patrol officers arrested a man riding a bicycle and questioned his citizenship because he looked “startled and nervous,” even though they were looking for someone else.

After all, why would anyone look nervous when confronted by armed, masked men who may not have worn anything identifying themselves as officers.

The Mexican national now finds himself facing deportation, and charged with a misdemeanor count of assaulting, resisting or impeding officers, because he tried to run away and tried to break free from them.

I probably would have done exactly the same thing if I was confronted by a bunch of armed men in masks.

………

Secret Los Angeles makes it sound like the city is rapidly becoming a carfree paradise.

According to the site, Los Angeles is actively investing in innovations to reduce traffic congestion, ranging from subway expansions to new bikeways, including a new transcontinental high-speed rail expected to ope as soon as next year.

Which really would be a secret.

And speaking of secrets, here’s what they have to say about the state of bicycling in the City of Angeles.

Biking in L.A. is on the rise, with new bike trails and bike-friendly upgrades popping up across the city. From coastal paths to urban corridors like the new Rail-to-Rail route, it’s getting easier, safer, and more fun to explore L.A. on two wheels.

Which is kinda true, depending on just where you look.

Although the impression it gives doesn’t exactly align with the reality most of us experience on the streets.

But, yeah.

Maybe someday it will.

………

Police in San Diego are looking for a hit-and-run driver who left a 62-year-old man riding a bicycle lying in the street with serious injuries.

The crash occurred around 7:25 pm Monday in the Golden Hill neighborhood on the 2400 block of F Street.

The suspect was described as a man in his late 20s or early 30s, driving a gray-colored SUV with black rims and possible front end damage, with a woman in the passenger seat.

Anyone with information is urged to call the Traffic Division of the San Diego Police Depart at 858/495-7823 or call anonymously at 888/580-8477.

There’s a $1,000 reward offered by Crime Stoppers.

………

A member of the San Francisco bicycling community is being hailed as a hero for sacrificing his life to protect a group of women and children at a Muni stop.

Twenty-eight-year old Colden Kimber was waiting with his girlfriend when he saw a man harassing the group and stepped between them, only to be fatally stabbed in the neck in what was described as a “completely and utterly unprovoked” attack.

Kimber was a member of the city’s Dolce Vita Cycling team and was a skilled mechanic at American Cyclery, while studying kinesiology at San Francisco State University.

The suspect, 29-year old Sean Collins, has been charged with murder; he was already facing charges for vandalism and burglary, as well as resisting an officer.

A crowdfunding campaign has raised over $44,000 of the $50,000 goal to pay for memorials in San Francisco and Kimber’s native Ithaca, New York, and transportation expenses for his family to attend Collins’ trial.

A memorial ride is tentatively planned for Sept. 7 around the Polo Fields in Golden Gate Park.

I’m not crying, you’re crying.

No, wait. Yeah, it’s me.

……….

Gravel Bike California shouts Yreka after riding in NorCal’s Siskiyou County.

……….

Nope, nothing to see here.

Although the only time you’ll see this many people on bikes in Los Angeles is CicLAvia or Critical Mass.

……….

But seriously, how many city’s have a river you can drive in?

………

Thanks to Megan for forwarding this clip showing that comedian Cheri Oteri is one of us.

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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

No surprise here, as the Ontario, Canada government will appeal a court ruling that the planned removal of three Toronto bike lanes violates the country’s constitution, while Canada’s conservative National Post calls out the province’s “activist judiciary” for inventing a right to bike lanes.

Bedford, England has lifted its draconian ban on bike riding through the town center, but only after thousands of people were “aggressively” fined for the simple crime of riding a bicycle; new rules target “dangerous” bicycling rather than responsible riding.

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Local 

Pasadena police will conduct yet another of the region’s bicycle and pedestrian safety operations today; while the purpose is to improve safety for people walking or biking, police are required to enforce any violation that could put either group at risk, regardless of who commits it. So ride to the letter of the law until cross the city limits to make sure you’re not the one who gets written up. 

 

State

California kids under the age of 16 can no longer buy a Class 3 ebike, after Governor Newsom signed AB 965 into law.

A San Diego man has declared a Bike Rebellion, with a new podcast and YouTube series profiling people who have chosen bicycling as their primary mode of transportation.

Bakersfield will add new green bike lanes to the city’s California Ave after a repaving project, while assuring drivers it won’t result in the removal of any traffic lanes.

Eight outdoor experts share their favorite bike rides around the Silicon Valley.

There’s not a pit deep enough for a 29-year old woman accused of hitting a nine-year old Novato boy in an effort to steal his bike, until bystanders stepped in to stop her.

 

National

A Minnesota woman credited a bicycle with saving her life, after a tree crashed through her roof at the exact moment she went outside to get her son’s bike, the tree landing right where she had been moments earlier.

The mayor of La Crosse, Wisconsin took a bike ride with community members on Thursday to talk about transportation and the state of the city. Something no Los Angeles mayor has done since Richard Riordan, unless you want to count Antonio Villaraigosa riding next to me at the first CicLAvia. Or maybe it was the second one. 

Good news from Elmhurst, Illinois, where a nine-year old boy was found safe after going missing while riding his bicycle on a bike path; he was found eight miles away in the nearby town of Glen Ellen.

If you build it, they will come. Bicycling is booming in the Motor City thanks to hundreds of miles of bike paths around Detroit, with cross-border cycling becoming an option later this year.

After the state Department of Transportation put in a new separated bike lane, officials in Tonawanda, New York said they didn’t ask for it and don’t want it, and drivers expressed concern about safety on a street where drivers go ten miles below the 40 mph speed limit.

 

International

A writer for Road.cc describes what he’d do to start bicycling on a tight budget.

Of course not. An English man denies he was responsible for killing a 54-year old woman competing in a cycling time trial while he was driving a commercial van, despite allegedly looking a photos of a family barbecue on his cellphone seconds before the crash, then telling police he never saw her because he was too busy looking for his drink bottle.

Cyclist profiles decorated downhill cyclist James Egercz, the man behind Britain’s Craft Bikes.

Apparently, medieval weapons are back in vogue, after a man in the UK was busted for allegedly threatening another man with an axe to steal his bicycle.

A British writer takes a “mad holiday” in France, combing wine and cheese with “near-death experiences” riding down mountainsides on an ebike.

Evidently, France’s Loire Valley is THE bicycling destination for the coming year. Unless maybe you’d rather take a bicycling vacation at Club Med in the Southern French Alps.

Momentum looks at Trondheim, Norway’s pavement-embedded bicycle lift that pushes bike riders uphill at a steady walking pace, and recommends a handful of hills in North America where it would help encourage more people to ride.

Sad news from South Africa, where a 77-year old man was killed while riding his bike through Cape Town, when he was struck with a bottle by a robber trying to steal his cellphone.

 

Competitive Cycling

French cyclist Maeva Squiban won Stage 6 of the Tour de France Femmes in a 20-mile solo breakaway. Even if Velo wrote yesterday that it happened today, opening up a whole new can of quantum theory.

Apparently, nose strips were the hot performance-enhancing accessory at this year’s Tour de France.

 

Finally…

That feeling when you just happen to get stopped by cops while carrying a section of the US-Mexico border wall on your bike. If you’re going to steal a pro cyclist’s bike, maybe don’t take the one with a Danish flag and his name painted on it.

And apparently, we need to credit Streetsblog’s Joe Linton as the founder and editor of this site, at least according to Google AI.

I mean, who knew?

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Anger boils after deadly WeHo hit-and-run on Fountain Ave, and 79-year old San Diego man injured in crash with bike rider

July 14, 2025 / / Comments Off on Anger boils after deadly WeHo hit-and-run on Fountain Ave, and 79-year old San Diego man injured in crash with bike rider
Day 195 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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A handful of protesters turned out on Friday evening to demand safety improvements on Fountain Ave, following the Thursday night hit-and-run that killed 26-year old Blake Ackerman.

According to WeHo Times,

Local cyclist and advocate Nicholas Renteria organized a grassroots demonstration at the intersection of Fountain Avenue and Gardner Street, where the deadly collision occurred on Thursday, July 10, around 9:47 p.m. According to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, the victim, Blake Ackerman, 26, was riding westbound on Fountain when he was hit by an older-model BMW sedan, which fled the scene. The victim was taken to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where he later died from his injuries.

Anger has built following Ackerman’s death because individuals and advocacy groups have demanded action on the deadly corridor for more than a decade.

Plans have finally begun moving forward over the past few years, but are hung up by the usual demands to persevere parking at the expense of human lives.

As calls for accountability grow louder, local leaders have pointed to upcoming initiatives like the Fountain Avenue Streetscape Project, which aims to improve pedestrian and cyclist safety with measures such as protected bike lanes and wider sidewalks. A community meeting about the project is scheduled for August 19 at Plummer Park.

Renteria hopes awareness leads to action before another life is lost. “This isn’t a fight between drivers and cyclists,” he said. “It’s a fight between people and a government that’s not being responsive.”

In addition to the community meeting next month, plans are underway for a ghost bike to be installed in the coming days.

You’ll know more when I do.

Photo: Streets For All and Measure HLA stickers on a bicycle parked at Lowes Home Improvement in Mid-City LA Sunday afternoon.

………

A 79-year old man was seriously injured when he was struck by a bike rider while walking in a bike lane in San Diego’s Clairemont neighborhood.

The victim was hospitalized with a skull fracture and a brain bleed.

No word yet on what he was doing in the bike lane, or why the bicyclist was unable to avoid him.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

Another Canadian province appears to be going the wrong way, as the provincial government of Alberta is “actively reviewing” bike lanes that have raised the ire of some residents, with the government questioning both current and planned bike lanes that “reduce road capacity.”

Police in Australia are looking for six men who brutally beat a man riding a bicycle in an apparent road rage attack; the occupants of two vehicles chased a pair of bike riders following an argument, before jumping the curb and beating one of the bike riders with baseball bats. The other rider somehow got away.

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

A New York teenager riding an ebike was killed a hit-and-run driver while he was being pursued by police who suspected him of a knifepoint robbery; a 28-year old driver was arrested for the hit-and-run shortly later.

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Local 

Streets For All offered their July newsletter, including news that a total of $7 million has been approved to move forward with necessary technical and environmental clearance work on the proposed extension of the Ballona Creek bike path.

 

State

Police in Huntington Beach busted a bike thief who stole a bait bike valued at over $2,000, enough to qualify for felony charges. Yet the LAPD still won’t use bait bikes, following outdated advice from the City Attorney’s office that it could be considered entrapment

 

National

Bike Magazine recommends a selection of the year’s best bike locks, depending on your needs.

Outside highlights seven of the best bikepacking trip across the US. None of which are in California.

A hit-and-run driver left an Oregon woman lying in a ditch all night after they crashed into her bike sometime Saturday night; she was found by a passerby after 7 Sunday morning suffering from serious leg, facial, and other injuries. The driver should be charged with attempted murder when they find them for making the conscious decision to risk the victim’s life by leaving her there to die. 

Sad news from Nevada, where the founder of Bob’s Bikes died following a battle with prostate cancer; retired mechanic Bob Crane had repaired and given away more than one thousand bicycles for needy kids.

A Wyoming website recommends putting a bell on your mountain bike, as well as shouting and carrying bear spray, to reduce the risk of deadly bear encounters. Mountain lions seem to pose a bigger risk on SoCal trails; I can’t recall a mountain biker mauled by a bear down here, even though we have a lot of ’em. 

Now even the trees are out to get us. Someone riding a bicycle was killed in Urbandale, Iowa when a tree fell on them as they were riding on a trail.

Forget the Tour de France. America’s only Penny Farthing bike race rolled for the 11th time over the weekend, with 50 competitors from the US and around the world competing on “wheels are bigger than most 5th graders.”

 

International

A Vancouver Grand Fondo resulted in yet another mass casualty event, as one person was killed and two others injured when a driver somehow plowed into a group of bicyclists.

Police in an Ontario city put bicyclists on a stationary bicycle so they could get a feel for what it’s like to be passed by a driver at the legally mandated one-meter distance (approximately three feet); most felt shaken after the experience, with several wanting the mandatory passing distance increased to two meters. Although it would have done a lot more good to put motorists on that stationary bike, so they would understand just how it feels.

That’s more like it. A drunk and stoned British driver was sentenced to nine years and three months behind bars for killing a 70-year old woman as she walked her bike across the street; his license was already suspended at the time of the crash for a previous DUI, among other offenses.

Cargo bikes dominated the recent Eurobike show, resulting in plans for a separate cargo bike-only show.

Irascible TV celebrity chef Gordon Ramsey completed his first triathlon in over a year in Luxembourg on Sunday, after he was seriously injured crashing his bicycle in June of last year.

The Malay­sian Natio­nal Cycling Federation calls out the lack of sharing on the country’s roads, where bicyclists have the right to ride but “tolerance between cyclists and motor vehicle drivers is declining.”

Bicycling rates are up in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, New Zealand, rising 40% since 2017. But like most American cities, there’s room for even more growth by tapping demand from people who don’t own bikes, or lack confidence to ride them.

 

Competitive Cycling

European road champ Tim Merlier sprinted to victory in Sunday’s ninth stage of the Tour de France to secure his second win of this year’s Tour, after the peloton reeled in Mathieu van der Poel following a day-long breakaway; van der Poel dropped to sixth in the GC standings despite Sunday’s long solo ride, while race leader Tadej Pogačar held onto the yellow jersey.

Pogačar’s chances of wearing yellow in Paris took a hit on Sunday, however, as key domestique João Almeida was forced to abandon, two days after breaking his ribs in a fall.

Tensions are starting to build in the Tour peloton, with Pogačar objecting to feed zone tactics from the Visma-Lease a Bike team that seemed intended to force him to defend the yellow jersey before he wanted; Pogačar was also caught on camera pushing Visma’s Matteo Jorgenson when Jorgenson got in his way, preventing both from getting their bidons.

Italy’s Elisa Longo Borghini repeated as Giro champion after winning last year, securing a slim 18-second margin of victory on the final day, as Germany’s Liane Lippert won the stage in late breakaway.

Australian Sarah Gigante was thrilled just to make the Giro podium after a long and challenging comeback from iliac artery endofibrosis surgery.

Baja California’s Isaac del Toro proved he’s too legit to quit, showing his second-place finish at the Giro was no fluke by winning the 75th Tour of Austria.

 

Finally…

How to stop worrying and love the bicycle. How to play AirTag with a bike thief.

And that feeling when bike riders get buzzed by a cop traveling at twice the speed limit, yet commenters blame the people on the bikes, anyway.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

CTC approves $5 billion for transportation but pittance for bikes & peds, and we’re not even safe at open streets events

June 30, 2025 / / Comments Off on CTC approves $5 billion for transportation but pittance for bikes & peds, and we’re not even safe at open streets events
Day 181 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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When is $5 billion not $5 billion?

When it comes from the California Transportation Commission.

The CTC announced this past week that they are investing that amount to improve road safety, reduce traffic congestion and promote cleaner transportation.

Although that amount drops a lot before they get to the “cleaner transportation” part. And even more before they get to the active kind of clean.

Nearly half of that 5 billion bucks is allocated for crumbling roadways, with another $1.45 billion to improve low-emission freight networks, while nearly $810 million goes to streamline freight movement to reduce truck idling and cut pollution.

You have to get all the way down to the bottom before bikes and pedestrians get a mention. Even then, it’s in the context of $483 million for passenger rail extensions, bike lanes and rapid transit bus systems, along with another $202 million for local rail, transit and pedestrian upgrades.

Which includes things $63 million to add a bridge and wildlife crossing for Riverside County’s Ramona Expressway — along with some bike lanes to help greenwash the project — as well $49 million for EV charging, and $28 million for ultra-fast vehicle chargers.

Oh, and there’s also a relatively minuscule $18 million to improve traffic safety near five Los Angeles schools, most of which will undoubtedly be spent to undo the damage caused by cars, rather than proactively improving biking and walking.

Even though that’s what kids do.

At least the ones who don’t get dropped off in big honking SUVs, pun intended.

Meanwhile, California Streetsblog says the CTC didn’t do anything to dispel the charge it just rubber stamps highway widening, after unanimously approving every highway project before it.

They may have a point.

………

We’re not even safe at open streets events.

Two Pittsburgh PA bike riders were lucky to escape with minor injuries when a woman blew through a barricade blocking streets for the event in her car, striking the first rider with her mirror.

She made a U-turn as bystanders yelled at her, before running down a second woman who heroically tried to use her bike to stop her.

Sheriff’s deputies working safety at the event finally brought the rampage to a halt, but had to bust out the car window to drag her out as she struggled and “became verbally abusive,” yelling racist statements at the cops.

No reason was given for the incident, and there’s no word on whether it was intentional.

But it sure as hell sounds like it.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

A brand new bike path in a Welsh city remains blocked by a gate, which may not swing open for at least another two months.

A British railway operator scrapped plans to scrap bike parking over fears it could be used for a car bomb. Or maybe a bike bomb, in this case.

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

If you’re going to carry an illegal ghost gun with an extended magazine and laser attachment on your bike, try not to crash into a park car like this Connecticut teen.

Nothing like another mountain biker tossing your bike off a wet Whistler, Canada bridge just because you stopped to enjoy the view.

Speaking of videos, an Edinburgh bike rider posted video of a run-in with a pedestrian that begins with the bicyclist running a red light, and ends with him repeatedly telling the other man to fuck off — then is surprised when commenters criticize him instead of the other guy.

………

Local 

Malibu is extending its local emergency declaration addressing traffic violence on PCH, where 23 people have died in 22 crashes between 2018 and 2022, and 170 deaths and serious injuries between 2011 and 2023.

 

State

A 73-year old California man is walking or bicycling 50 kilometers — aka 31 miles — in each of the 50 states in just 50 days to inspire seniors to be more active.

Sad news from Fresno, where a woman was killed when she was run down from behind by a hit-and-run pickup driver, who clearly had to know they hit someone after dragging the woman’s bicycle 120 feet down the roadway.

 

National

If you bought a Bell bike helmet from Target or Walmart, you may have to take it back after a number of models are recalled.

A Utah man is filled with gratitude after finding he could do an entire ride to a downtown meeting on bike paths and bike lanes, 30 years after giving up his regular bike commute due to the risk.

That’s more like it. It’s now illegal for Utah motorists to block or drive in a bike lane, and they must yield to bicyclists riding in one.

Authorities in Montana are on the hunt for a killer grizzly bear who fatally mauled a 38-year old mountain biker on a trail trail just outside Glacier National Park after startling the bear, while his riding companion went for help.

Chicago Streetsblog complains that the city is not one of the nation’s worst cities for bicycling, despite what People For Bikes says, while admitting there’s room for improvement. Meanwhile, Los Angeles has even more room to improve.

NY Streetsblog offers “affidavits” from people who use a threatened Queens bike lane safely and legally, before an expected Tuesday court ruling in a lawsuit to save it, while making it clear the judge is an active contributor to the politician who wants to rip it out.

Lyft magnanimously agreed to stop blaming New York’s Pride celebrations for capping bikeshare ebike speeds at 15 mph, when it actually came in response to a directive from the mayor’s office.

A pair of New York women were both sentenced to six years behind bars for killing a 22-year old man riding a bicycle in New Jersey, even though only one woman actually hit him; both were driving separate cars up to 90 mph in a 50 mph zone, while passing other drivers on the shoulder of the roadway leading up to the crash.

This is how Vision Zero should work. Philadelphia is implementing safety improvements at an intersection where a 50-year old man was killed while riding his bike last month, as local residents say the changes can’t come quickly enough. Wait until someone tells them changes like that take years here in Los Angeles, if ever.

I really want to be like him when I grow up. An 84-year old Pennsylvania man completed the New Wilmington area’s annual Tour de Donut for at least the sixth time, riding ten miles while eating a dozen donuts.

 

International

Nat Geo has advice on where to go for your first gravel-biking adventure in Scotland.

A British writer rides over 400 miles of gravel on a mountain bike, and says he wouldn’t change a thing, despite “going arse over tits.”

Almost as impressive as the 84-year old donut eating man, an 87-year old man completed the UK’s Land’s End to John o’ Groats challenge, riding the entire length of the country in 14 days, while finishing the ride with two broken ribs and six stitches after crashing two days from the finish.

A new survey shows half of Dutch bike riders have ridden after drinking, while half of those admit to riding drunk. Which may pose its own risks, but I still say it’s better than driving under the influence of anything. 

 

Competitive Cycling

American Sepp Kuss will ride this year’s Tour de France, after missing last year’s race with Covid. Let’s hope he got his shot this year.

Twenty-seven-year old French cyclist Eddy Finé was forced to give up the sport after the Cofidis team revealed he has an “abnormality in the iliac artery, a problem that is incompatible with top-level sport,” and had struggled to return despite three operations in six years with the team.

It was national championship weekend in Europe —

 

Finally…

That feeling when you ride your bike from England to Australia without getting wet. Or when Lance just refuses to go away.

And what self-respecting bird wouldn’t rather go by bike?

@randomspotofglitter

Bike rides are her favorite. #getacockatooitwillbefun #moluccancockatoo #cockatoosoftiktok #peachesthemoluccancockatoo #fleetwoodmac #fyp #parrotsoftiktok #birdsoftiktok #lectricebikes #leathersforfeathers #lectricxptrike

♬ Dreams – Fleetwood Mac

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

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