Tag Archive for Bike Month

Chino driver flees with ebike embedded in bumper, Historic South Central Meets Watts CicLAvia, and pledge to bike in OC

May 29, 2025 / / No comments
Day 149 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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Just a quick note. 

I always try to thank people who submit stories, because I truly appreciate the help finding stories I might not otherwise see.  

After hearing from a few people, however, I am changing my policy to identify people just by their first names going forward, in order to protect their privacy. 

I mean, you’ll still know it’s you. But everyone else doesn’t need to.

………

Um, okay.

Police in Chino arrested a woman who drove roughly five miles or more to Montclair with a shattered windshield, and an ebike embedded in her bumper, after fleeing the scene of a hit-and-run crash that left the victim with a head injury.

Police found the woman by tracking an AirTag hidden on the ebike across multiple cities.

What they don’t say, though, is how much time elapsed between the crash and the arrest, and whether the driver would have had time to sober up first.

Because something tells me she might have needed to.

Thanks to Jeffrey for the heads-up.

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Mark your calendar for the next CicLAvia next month, as Historic South Central Meets Watts.

Here’s how a press release describes the open streets event.

6.4-Miles of Open Streets Connecting Historic South Central, Florence, Firestone, and Watts Via S Central Ave and 103rd Street to Enjoy this ‘Pop-Up’ Park for the Day in One’s Favorite People-Powered Way for All Ages and Abilities

On Sunday, June 22; between 9 a.m. – 4 p.m. CicLAvia will celebrate its 61st car-free open streets event catalyzing vibrant public spaces, active transportation and good health through car-free streets. CicLAvia—Historic South Central meets Watts connects historic South Central, Florence, Firestone, and Watts, welcoming everyone of all ages and abilities to enjoy this day-long 6.4-mile pop-up park. Always free, you can enjoy the day,by walking, jogging, biking, roller skating, skating, or simply spectating at CicLAvia. Participants can show up anywhere along the route between 9am-4pm to enjoy the open streets, take the time to explore, and see where the day takes you.

Imagine streets alive with joy, laughter, and the freedom to roam. CicLAvia is a non-profit organization that has been opening streets throughout Los Angeles County for nearly 15 years now. It transforms city streets into a car-free celebration of community, connection, and possibility — places where participants can slow down, connect, and appreciate the city in a new way. CicLAvia is about reimagining our city streets as welcoming spaces for everyone — places for walking, running, rolling, skating, cycling, gathering, and enjoying the moment.

As a nonprofit organization, CicLAvia relies on the public’s support to continue bringing opportunities for meaningful community connections, mindful exploration, and greater understanding across Los Angeles.

CicLAvia—Historic South Central meets Watts includes five (5) hubs filled with plenty of activities and programs along the route. Hubs are walking zones (mandatory dismounts) and meeting points along the route which includes theHistoric South Central Hub located on Central Ave, just south of Washington Blvd.; Jazz Park Hub located at 41nd Place and Central Ave; Florence Firestone Hub located on Central Ave near 61st St; Central Ave Hub located on Central Ave near E. 84th St; and the Watts Hub located on E 103rd St and Success Ave. Hubs offer family-friendly activities, restrooms, free water refilling stations, free basic bike repair, bike parking, places to sit and meet up with friends and family, and first aid. Free pedicab rides are available at each hub’s information booth.

The CicLAvia—Historic South Central meets Watts route is accessible via many different forms of transportation. There is not one place to start or finish. Read more about getting to the route through these links: hubs, Metro, bike rentals, parking for the event, group meet ups: walk/run clubs, feeder rides, bus detours, and help getting to CicLAvia.

(Please note, if you are biking to and from CicLAvia along any streets that are open to cars, it is at the discretion of the individual.)

“South LA is always one of the highlights of CicLAvia’s schedule,” says CicLAvia Executive Director Romel Pascual. “Along South Central Ave, LA’s dynamic culture can be seen in the local businesses and restaurants, community parks, and public art that are on the route. It gives Angelenos the opportunity to see new things, which reminds us of what makes our city a remarkable and special place.

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As long as we’re doing press releases, the Orange County Transportation Authority, aka OCTA, says there’s still time to pledge to ride a bike this month.

While OCTA encourages people to ride all year long, May is National Bike Month, which is also celebrated all month long in Orange County.

OCTA invites people of all ages and abilities to take part in Bike Month, and there’s still time to pledge to ride a bicycle – for commuting, for fun, or for fitness.

This year’s “Every Ride is Your Story” campaign encourages participants to ride at least once during May. Those who pledge online will be entered in a raffle to win a commuter e-bike prize package that includes an Avant Agile Commuter E-Bike, along with accessories including an adult helmet, child helmet, bike lock, and baby seat.

Pledges must be received by the end of the day on Saturday, May 31, at www.octa.net/bikemonth. A winner will be announced in June.

In addition to the Bike Rally, OCTA continues to promote safe cycling habits for all riders, including those using e-bikes. Resources and safety tips are available at www.octa.net/bikeand www.octa.net/ebike.

Orange County offers more than 1,000 miles of bikeways, from beach paths to mountain trails, making it easier than ever to ride safely and explore the region on two wheels. Over the last 15 years, OCTA has invested approximately $437 million in active transportation, including cycling and more than half (54%) of the county’s primary roadways include bike lanes.

Over 80 riders made a 4-mile bike ride from the Orange Metrolink Station to OCTA headquarters for a Bike Rally Wednesday morning to promote active transportation throughout the county.

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No bias here.

The anti-bike New York Post is trying to whip a nonissue into an “explosive” campaign issue, after an ebike rider crashed into a three-year old girl who apparently got out of a double-parked car and darted into the bike lane he was riding in, making a crash virtually unavoidable.

Yet the paper somehow blames the bike lane, and not the driver who double-parked or the dad who didn’t hold her back.

And the result could have been far worse if she had darted in the other direction. But no one seems to be calling for removing dangerous traffic lanes from the roadway.

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

A Lancaster, Pennsylvania man was charged with intentionally crashing his car into a 16-year old boy riding an ebike, after he admitted to intentionally driving into the victim, causing serious injuries.

Seriously? After a British bike rider was struck by a hit-and-run driver who darted in front of him on a roundabout, The Sun can’t seem to figure out who was in the wrong.

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Local 

Metro’s board of directors moved last week to put the planned Southeast Gateway Line underground, leaving them a paltry $10 to $12 billion short. And even that probably wouldn’t result in the green, bike-friendly Alameda corridor shown in the picture.

Ebike dealer Upway is hosting a community bike ride and ebike block party in Redondo Beach on Saturday.

 

State

Former Los Angeles mayor and erstwhile bicycle champion Antonio Villaraigosa is complaining about high gas prices and closing oil refineries. Neither of which could have anything to do with taking more than $175,000 in campaign contributions from the oil industry for his run for governor. Right?

The chief executive officer of the San Diego Youth Services rode his bicycle 500 miles from San Francisco to San Diego earlier this month to call awareness and raise funds for the 55-year old nonprofit.

A Madera teenager got a new, refurbished bicycle after his was stolen, thanks to a program run by inmates at a local penitentiary.

Sad news from Petaluma, where a man riding a bicycle was killed when he was rear-ended by a driver.

 

National

Portland wants residents to help them choose a new tagline to promote bicycling. None of which would have made it past the first round at any decent ad agency.

Singletracks looks at five of the best mountain bike trails in Washington state. Sasquatch sightings optional.

Another teenager has been arrested for the Albuquerque, New Mexico hit-and-run that killed a 63-year-old physicist as he was biking to his job at Sandia National Laboratories last year, making them the fourth juvenile in the stolen car when the kids intentionally steered it into the victim, and posted it on social media.

A Denver, Colorado TV station examines the intersection between May’s Mental Health Awareness Month and National Bike Month, and how riding a bicycle can improve your mental health.

An Austin, Texas woman learned the hard way about reckless ebike riders on the city’s trails. Or one in particular, anyway.

Atlanta’s bike-riding Magnet Man has a new bicycle thanks to fans and supporters who replaced the one he had stolen, enabling him to get back to using his magnet-equipped bike trailer to sweep metal debris off the streets before it ends up in the tires of local drivers.

 

International

Bicyclists in the Cayman Islands are calling for immediate action to improve safety on the streets after an uptick in serious injuries.

What’s the point of living in a haunted Manitoba city if you’re not going to have a bike ride visiting all the ghastly and ghostly sites? Although it really should have been after dark. 

 

Competitive Cycling

Mexico’s Isaac del Toro bounced back from a bad day in the Alps to win Wednesday’s stage 17, extending his lead to 41 seconds, as Richard Carapaz climbed into second.

This is pretty much the definition of a gnarly crash, taken from a New Jersey Cat 3 race.

 

Finally…

That feeling when your AI reporter doesn’t know the difference between a linear park and a sports attraction. Or when a fundraising ride ends in a new bike — and a proposal.

And NFTs once again raise their ugly, scammy and virtually worthless head, this time with a bicycle spin.

Seriously, shame on Pez Cycling for even accepting the sponsored post.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

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

This town ain’t big enough for anti-bike lane columnists, welcome to Bike Month, and the annual Pasadena Ride of Silence

May 1, 2025 / / No comments
Day 121 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025. 

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No bias here.

A columnist for the Los Angeles News Group says the situation on LA streets is best described as a Western, spaghetti or otherwise.

It wouldn’t be about cowboys versus Indians. It wouldn’t be about ranchers versus homesteaders. It wouldn’t be about gold miners versus general store operators.

It would be about drivers versus bicyclists.

“Mister, this road ain’t big enough for both of us” could replace “Eureka” as the official motto of California.

According to writer Susan Shelly, it would pit all those good townsfolk who drive cars, delivery vans, ambulances “and other motor vehicles relied upon for timely transportation,” against a group that “apparently is not in a hurry to get anywhere.”

And the group that is not in a hurry — aka the people on bicycles, joined by transit users — have somehow made it their mission to slow down traffic, something the people who have “to be somewhere quickly” don’t appreciate.

So guess who the bad guys are in this scenario?

Never mind that slowing down traffic improves safety and saves lives for everyone. And it’s not the people on two wheels who are out there killing people like a drunken gunslinger shooting up the town saloon.

She goes on to examine the Measure HLA lawsuit filed by Streetsblog editor Joe Linton over the lack of bike lanes in Metro’s semi-Complete Streets makeover of the Vermont Ave corridor, while misrepresenting the debate over the adoption of the city’s mobility plan in 2015.

There was resistance from some council members to adopting a plan that aimed to slow city traffic on major arteries. But advocates said it was simply “a vision statement” and “an aspirational document.” Bonin said it would “help us get active transportation funds from the state.” Council President Herb Wesson reassuringly told reluctant colleagues, “This is a concept. If you choose to vote on this today, it will not be put in place tomorrow.”

It was actually an LADOT official blindsiding advocates when she described the 2010 Bike Plan — which was subsumed into the mobility plan — as merely “aspirational,” just days after a successful fight to get it approved by the city council, who passed it with unanimous support.

And Wesson’s comment was a reference to the plan’s 20-year timeline, which meant that it would not have to be put in place right away. But that never meant it wouldn’t be put in place at all.

Shelley ends with a return to the lawsuit over the city’s failure to enforce the requirements of Measure HLA on Vermont, after describing the measure as something put on the ballot by “fuming-mad bicyclists.”

And never mentioning that it passed with overwhelming support from a broad spectrum of voters.

The city disputes that it is obligated to make these changes, but meanwhile, Metro, a countywide agency, is removing a traffic lane on Vermont Avenue to build a dedicated bus lane, enraging the bike-lane people and causing the movie to have an exciting but complicated subplot.

In the final scene, everyone realizes there’s no money for any of it, and the drivers win.

It’s not the bus lanes “enraging the bike-lane people,” as Shelley says. The “bike-lane people” I know are all in favor of a dedicated bus lane.

Instead, it’s the fact that Metro isn’t also building the bike lane that’s called for in the mobility plan, and so required by law under the terms of HLA.

It’s also not true that the money isn’t there.

In fact, the Vermont Ave project is budgeted at a whopping $425 million. And it will cost a lot less to install bike lanes now while the whole street is under construction, rather that going back and installing them after this project is finished.

But why let a couple inconvenient facts like that ruin a good metaphorical screed?

Never mind that the drivers are already winning.

But then, the cowboys in the black hats usually do win until just before the hero saves the town and rides off into the sunset, to beat her metaphor like the dead horse it is.

Photo by Ahmet Çığşar from Pexels. Think of it as a metaphorical columnist suffering from windshield bias driving ever more car traffic.

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Welcome to National Bike Month.

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Bike Month also means it’s time for the annual Pasadena Ride of Silence at the Rose Bowl on May 21st to honor fallen bicyclists.

PASADENA, CA, April 28, 2025 – The cycling community of Pasadena invites the public to join in for the annual Ride of Silence on Wednesday, May 21st, at 6 p.m. This solemn event, now in its 23rd year, honors cyclists who have been injured or killed on public roadways and raises awareness about sharing the road safely.

  The Pasadena Ride of Silence will begin at the Rose Bowl in the north end of Lot I, with registration and check-ins beginning at 6:15 p.m., announcements at 6:30 p.m., and white doves from White Dove Release will be sent off individually to honor the cyclists lost during the last year at 6:50 p.m. At 7 p.m., a police escort will lead cyclists en masse on a slow and silent 7-mile route to Pasadena City Hall, where attendees will observe a moment of silence to honor friends and family lost to traffic violence. The ride will finish at the Rose Bowl with free tacos for all registered participants. 

 The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported that 1,105 cyclists were killed by drivers of motor vehicles in 2022, the highest number ever recorded since the federal government started collecting data in 1975. Experts believe the increase in fatalities is due to several factors: inadequate street designs to include safe lanes for cycling, larger vehicles such as pickups and SUVs, which are deadlier in size and shape, higher horsepower in vehicles, and distracted driving. 

The NHTSA has finalized a new Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard to make automatic emergency braking (AEB), including pedestrian AEB, standard on all passenger cars and light trucks by September 2029. Making this safety feature standard (previously, it was bundled with expensive tech packages) is part of the Department’s National Roadway Safety Strategy to address the crisis of deaths on the roads and hopes to make U.S. roads dramatically safer for drivers, pedestrians, and cyclists alike.

“We ride in silence to honor those we’ve lost, to raise awareness for the safety of all cyclists, and to remind the world that we belong on the road too,” said Thomas Cassidy, Pasadena Ride of Silence organizer. 

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Yep.

That pretty well sums it up.

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

A town in Illinois voted to make things more dangerous by requiring anyone on any type of bicycle to ride single file, reducing visibility of bike riders and encouraging unsafe passing, in a misguided effort to reign in teens on ebikes.

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Local 

NPR picks up the story of DTLA’s bike-riding, chainsaw-wielding tree assassin, and the effect his crimes had on the local community.

 

State

Calbike says bills creating a quick-build bike lane program and creating a bike highways are likely to end up in the Appropriations Committee’s Suspense File, which could lead to an eventual floor vote, or could just provide a way for opponents to quietly kill them.

Streetsblog argues that the California Ebike Incentive Program needed a win after endless delays and the total disaster of the first round of vouchers, and instead ended up with more egg on their face when the website crashed during yesterday’s second round of voucher applications, leading them to cancel the application window.

A new report analyzing state-by-state bike theft data shows California has the nation’s highest rate of stolen bicycles, almost double that of number two Texas.

Irvine is hosting the Orange County city’s second annual CicloIrvine open streets event this Saturday.

New stats have reignited the debate over the curb protected bike lanes on Coast Highway 101 through Cardiff, as a member of the Encinitas Mobility and Traffic Safety Commission reports the 42 crashes since 2020 represent a 400% increase compared to the 14 years prior; however, the chair of BikeWalk Encinitas says there’s no way to know how many lives may have been saved by the barriers.

Life is cheap in San Diego County, where a woman who killed a 71-year old man riding a bicycle while she was fleeing from the Border Patrol with a car full of undocumented immigrants, and driving at twice the speed limit on the wrong side of the road, was sentenced to just three years and five months behind bars — even though she had faced up to 20 years behind bars.

A new volunteer Bakersfield bike patrol trained by the National Ski Patrol will provide security and help to people in need on the Kern River Bike Path.

A Sacramento letter writer says yes, cops should ticket all those dangerous scofflaw bike riders. Never mind that people in cars, trucks and SUVs pose a much greater risk to everyone.

 

National

A new study published in the journal PLOS One demonstrated that both seniors riding ebikes and regular bikes showed improved cognitive function compared to a non-bicycling control group, while the ebike group had more confidence in completing the assigned rides.

Seattle bike riders protested a dangerous bikeway design where a protected bike lane ends suddenly and dumps riders into dangerous traffic, prompting the city to install temporary barriers to protect riders.

This is the cost of traffic violence. Residents of Pleasant Grove, Utah are remembering a nine-year old boy was killed by a hit-and-run driver as he was just trying to cross the street on his bicycle; police later took a man in his 80s in for questioning.

Women behind bars in Idaho are being trained to repair bicycles to donate to people on the outside, and will get a bicycle upon their release.

Sad news from my ostensibly bike-friendly Colorado hometown, where a longtime local bike advocate and the leader of a weekly no-drop ride was killed when he was struck head-on by a motorcyclist who made an ill-advised pass of another motorbike rider close to a curve.

Indianapolis just opened a new bridge with two-thirds of the surface devoted to bicyclists and pedestrians, and just one lane in each direction for cars.

Maine’s Acadia National Park offers 45 miles of forested scenic gravel roads that are closed to cars.

A Boston TV station examines the city’s “simmering debate” over bike lanes, after the mayor ripped out protective barriers on a number of bike lanes because angry drivers found them inconvenient.

 

International

No surprise here. A new study shows that pedestrians and bicyclists are far more likely to be killed by today’s massive, flat-grilled pickups and SUVs, with a 44% higher fatality risk overall, and 82% higher for children.

Road.cc examines the pros and cons of hiding an AirTag or other electronic trackers on your bike to help find it if it gets stolen.

A slideshow features bizarre bicycle designs the writers didn’t think were possible. Thanks to an anonymous source for the link.

Canada’s Banff National Park is extending a spring and fall ban on cars on a section of the Bow Valley Parkway through the park, after a successful three-year pilot program.

A writer for The Guardian says it’s no wonder BBC broadcaster Jeremy Vine has stopped posting bike cam videos, because the rage directed towards bike riders is off the scale — and comments from politicians deliberately stirring up anger to troll for votes don’t help.

A Scottish website recommends eight of the best bike paths in Glasgow, for your next trip to the land of Bobby Burns.

A Greek travel website recommends riding your bike around the Aegean island of Spetses.

Great idea. Our German correspondent Ralph Durham reports seeing traffic lights with the poles illuminated by LED lights on a visit to Izmir, Turkiye, turning the poles red, yellow and green to match the traffic signal.

Here’s another one for your bike bucket list, as Momentum offers everything you need to know about Japan’s Shimanami Kaidō bike route, calling it a paradise for bicyclists.

 

Competitive Cycling

America’s only remaining Tour de France winner confirmed that he’s running for president of UCI, the umbrella organization in charge of bike racing around the world.

Cyclist recounts the complete history of the Pinarello Dogma, calling it the most dominant race bike in modern cycling history.

 

Finally…

Evidently, a sidewalk-level bike lane without noticeable markings is just a sidewalk. Beating your 75-year old neighbor because of where he put his garbage is not an approved use of an ebike wheel.

And now even shopping cart drivers are out to get us.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin. 

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

More on May’s Bike Month, the Radavist says shred lightly, and suspect flees police on the 5 Freeway — on his bicycle

May 2, 2024 / / Comments Off on More on May’s Bike Month, the Radavist says shred lightly, and suspect flees police on the 5 Freeway — on his bicycle
Just 243 days until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.
So stop what you’re doing and sign this petition to demand Mayor Bass hold a public meeting to listen to the dangers we all face on the mean streets of LA.

Then share it — and keep sharing it — with everyone you know, on every platform you can. 

We’re up to 1,129 signatures, so keep it going! Urge everyone you know to sign the petition, until she meets with us! 

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More on this month’s Bike Month.

Metro is marking Bike Month with discounts on Metro Bike memberships — including free rides on Bike Anywhere Day May 16th — along with community bike rides throughout the month. But once again, there’s no mention of actually doing anything to encourage bike commuting on what was formerly known as Bike to Work Day. 

Pasadena posted their schedule for Bike Month activities, starting with next week’s National Bike to School Day. Or as Metro calls it, Wednesday.

New York is marking Bike Month with a new “my bike, my city” campaign to encourage bicycling by “women, girls, transgender and gender-expansive” residents.

May is also National Bike Safety Month, which includes motor bikes as well as bicycles.

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A new short film from The Radavist urges everyone to “shred lightly” through the desert biocrust.

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It’s now 134 days since the California ebike incentive program’s latest failure to launch, which was promised no later than fall 2023. And 35 months since it was approved by the legislature and signed into law — and counting.

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

A Louisiana couple faces attempted murder charges for running down a bike rider with their car, then getting out and brutally assaulting the victim, who suffered significant injuries and severe facial trauma; no word on whether this was a road rage incident or they knew the victim.

No bias here. A Philadelphia man has posted a sign reading “My neighbor is a Karen,” in response to complaints about his 11-year old “bike life” influencer son riding his through the neighborhood popping wheelies and zipping around on the sidewalks.

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

A 24-year old shooting suspect led LAPD officers on a bizarre chase, weaving his bicycle through traffic on the 5 Freeway, before exiting onto surface streets where he tumbled to the ground after being cut off, or possibly struck, with a patrol car.

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Local 

Pasadena cops will conduct yet another bicycle and pedestrian safety enforcement operation on Friday, ticketing any traffic violations that could put either group at risk, regardless of who commits it. As usual, ride to the letter of the law until you cross the city limits, so you’re not the one who gets written up.

 

State

The South Coast Highway 101 will go carfree for four hours on May 19th, when Encinitas hosts the city’s Cyclovia open streets event.

The City College of San Francisco is going to the mattresses to fight a planned bike lane in hopes of saving a whole 29 parking spaces, along with another nine motorcycle spots. But the city’s transportation agency intends to build it anyway.

Bike East Bay and the Marin County Bicycle Coalition are calling for Bay Area bike riders to turn out to the Bay Conservation and Development Commission board meeting today to save the endangered bike lane on the Richmond-San Raphael Bridge.

A Bay Area TV station profiles Rich City Rides founder and Richmond community advocate Najari Smith.

 

National

CNN lists the best bike accessories, as chosen by “actual cyclists.” Although they don’t clarify what kind of certification process you need to go through to be an actual cyclist, as opposed to someone who just rides a bicycle.

Outside ranks the best road bikes for racing and endurance, selected by a team of experts.

Bike Magazine remembers all the Konas they’ve loved before, as the popular mountain bike maker could be going belly up.

Life is cheap in Las Vegas, where an unlicensed, unregistered and uninsured driver who killed a bike rider last fall could be back out on the streets after just 28 months behind bars, despite the judge saying he “shouldn’t have been on the road” after getting 19 traffic tickets over the past 14 years.

Once again, someone riding a bicycle has been injured in a collision with a cop, this time a Tomball, Texas man in his 70s.

A New Jersey op-ed says proposed legislation requiring even low-speed ebikes to be registered and insured, just like motor vehicles, would unfairly target delivery riders.

Police in Florida arrested an 84-year old hit-and-run driver who fled the scene after killing a 28-year old bike rider. And adding still more evidence to the case against elderly drivers.

 

International

Momentum says you have to see these “stunning and unique bicycle routes” to believe them, ranging from Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh Trail to Europe’s nearly 1,900-mile Danube Cycle Path; the only one in North America is the The Great Divide Mountain Bike Route through the US and Canada.

A 39-year old Toronto bike rider was killed by the driver of a flatbed truck, in an area where the city has long been sitting on calls for safety improvements.

This is why people keep dying on the streets. Over 25% of Scottish drivers have no idea that driving dangerously around bicyclists could result in losing their licenses, or even prison terms.

No bias here, either. A new protected bike lane in the UK is being attacked by motorists as “an accident waiting to happen for pedestrians” — even though it creates a protective barrier between cars and people walking. Then again, it’s in the same city where a woman was fined for riding her bike on a multi-use path.

GCN takes a tour of Ghent, Belgium, to discover how the city cut motor vehicle use in half in just seven years.

 

Competitive Cycling

NBC looks forward to the Paris Olympics with a page of Olympic cycling history, records and results.

 

Finally…

Evidently, having a bike lock makes you a professional protester. Turn your favorite shoes into clipless bike shoes.

And when a high-end Italian bikemaker shows you just how sexist they really are, believe them.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

New automatic braking regs protect peds, Bike Month just a day away, and SaMo and Pasadena honored for best bike lanes

April 30, 2024 / / Comments Off on New automatic braking regs protect peds, Bike Month just a day away, and SaMo and Pasadena honored for best bike lanes
Just 245 days until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.
So stop what you’re doing and sign this petition to demand Mayor Bass hold a public meeting to listen to the dangers we all face on the mean streets of LA.

Then share it — and keep sharing it — with everyone you know, on every platform you can. 

We’re still at 1,128 signatures, so let’s keep it going! Urge everyone you know to sign the petition, until the mayor agrees to meet with us! 

Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay.

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On top of everything else, I’ll be having a small skin cancer today, no doubt a souvenir of decades of riding a bike when they still thought the sun was good for you, and and any lotion you might use was meant for tanning, not screening out dangerous rays. 

So the status of tomorrow’s post is to be determined at this point. Not because of the minor surgery, but whether I’ll survive riding the bus with an effed up shoulder and ribs. 

Hopefully I’ll bounce back and see you in the morning; if not, we’ll be back bright and early on Thursday. 

………

There may be hope yet. Eventually, anyway.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, aka NHTSA, unveiled the final draft of a new regulation to improve traffic safety, requiring every new motor vehicle sold in the US to have forward collision warning, automatic emergency braking and pedestrian detection braking.

According to the AP,

The standards require vehicles to stop and avoid hitting a vehicle in front of them at speeds up to 62 miles per hour (100 kilometers per hour). Also they must apply the brakes automatically at up to 90 mph (145 kph) if a collision with vehicle ahead is imminent.

The systems also have to spot pedestrians during the day and night, and must stop and avoid a pedestrian at 31 mph to 40 mph (50 kph to 64 kph) depending on the pedestrian’s location and movement.

Presumably, any system than can detect pedestrians should be able to protect people on bicycles, although that’s not guaranteed.

Or even required.

Yet another reminder that we remain an afterthought when it comes to safety.

However, the new regulations won’t take effect for another five years. And it will take decades before most older cars with more limited capabilities are off the roads.

It’s predicted the new regs will save just 362 lives each year, less than 1% of the more than 40,000 people killed annually on American roads.

But it’s a start.

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Metro offers a guide to next month’s Bike Month, including Metro Bike discounts for Bike Week, starting May 13th, and free Metro rides for Bike Day on Thursday the 16th. Although what’s missing is any mention of Bike Day activities, or the pre-pandemic Bike to Work pit stops to encourage more people to try bike commuting.

UCLA will observe Bike Month with a series of mobile bike repair services across campus, along with pit stops on Tuesday the 14th, and Wednesday the 15th.

Beverly Hills will mark Bike Month with a series of events, ranging from a month-long commuter challenge and a “May the 4th Be With You” family bike ride to the kind of Bike to Work Day pit stop Metro appears to have forgotten.

Pasadena will also celebrate Bike Month, starting with National Ride a Bike Day this Sunday, the annual Rose Bowl Ride of Silence on Wednesday the 15th, and refreshments at City Hall for Bike to Work Day.

Meanwhile, LAist offers a guide to living carfree in the City of Angels, including how to use your bike for transportation; you can listen to their podcast from last year on the same subject below.

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Momentum lists the 20 best new bike lanes in the US, topped by projects in New York and Redmond, Washington.

Southern California is represented by Pasadena’s Union Street protected bike lane at #6, and Santa Monica’s 17th Street at #16.

And it should come to the surprise of absolutely no one that Los Angeles is nowhere to be found on the list.

As usual.

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Gravel Bike California conducts a little recon for NorCal’s planned 300-mile Great Redwood Trail network.

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It’s now 132 days since the California ebike incentive program’s latest failure to launch, which was promised no later than fall 2023. And 34 months since it was approved by the legislature and signed into law — and counting.

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

No bias here. Sheriff’s deputies in San Marcos will conduct an “ebike safety sweep” on Wednesday afternoon to educate riders on ebike safety, while ticketing any violations committed by ebike riders — including a requirement to ride to the right, which only applies if you’re traveling at less than the speed of traffic. If you do get a ticket, fight it, because an operation specifically targeting ebike riders rather than all road users suggests illegally biased enforcement. 

A road-raging Maryland man faces charges for attempting to run a pair of bicyclists participating in a charity ride off the road with his pickup, then pulling into a driveway and firing three blasts with his shotgun, apparently missing them.

No bias here, either. A writer for Strong Towns says Florida Governor Ron DeSantis isn’t wrong when he says “some activists want to make driving so miserable that people have to abandon their cars,” accusing a “significant percentage of safe streets activists” of being motivated by a hatred of cars and the people who drive them. Never mind that a “significant percentage” of safe streets activists are drivers themselves. 

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Local 

A 38-year old man was shot by an unknown assailant while riding his bicycle in Sun Valley Friday night, calling police after “noticing” he’d been hit by gunfire.

 

State

Irvine will host the city’s first-ever open streets event this Saturday, with a relatively petite 1.66-mile CicloIrvine from 11 am to 4 pm.

An Encinitas paracyclist is looking for donations to help her make it to a qualifier for the Paris Paralympic Games.

San Diego recommends five scenic bike rides, calling the city a bike rider’s paradise. Just remember your ebike won’t be welcome in Mission Bay. 

Good question. A Redwood City writer wants to know what happened to the award-winning plans for the city’s first bike boulevard, which seem to have disappeared without a trace from the list of upcoming projects.

Eureka explains to drivers how to operate their big, deadly machines after a pair of new bikeways currently nearing completion are finished. Because evidently, that whole “licensing and registration” thing they keep insisting should be required for bicyclists isn’t enough to guarantee the people who pass them actually know how to drive already. 

 

National

If you’re looking for a bargain on bikes, parts and accessories, Colorado Cyclist and Planet Cyclery are holding online going out of business sales with up to 30% discounts across the board. But look around and compare prices before you buy, because liquidators often jack up prices before they cut them.

McLaren IndyCar racer David Malukas may be regretting being one of us, because he lost his contract after missing the year’s first four races due to an off-season mountain biking injury.

That’s more like it. An Arizona man will spend at least 12 years of a 14-year sentence behind bars, after pleading guilty to negligent homicide and hit-and-run charges for fleeing the scene after killing a bike rider; he was already wanted on outstanding state and federal warrants at the time of the crash. Which at least explains why he fled.

Autopsy results show a Colorado mom, whose body was found three years after she disappeared on a Mother’s Day bike ride, was murdered “by unspecified means,” and had been injected with an animal tranquilizer used to immobilize wildlife before her death; her husband was initially charged with her murder, but charges were dropped because authorities hadn’t yet found her body.

Christian music star Amy Grant discusses the Nashville solo bicycle crash that took her memory, and nearly her life, forcing her to relearn the words to her own songs while leaning on her faith and family.

 

International

Mathematically challenged website Discerning Cyclist lists five things people get wrong about road bikes, which turns out to be six.

Israeli Occupation War Cabinet minister, and former opposition candidate Benny Gantz is one of us, too, breaking his foot while riding a bike in Southern Israel. But at least he has the freedom to ride a bike, unlike most people in Gaza these days. 

 

Competitive Cycling

Sofia Gomez Villafañe and teammate Matt Beers won this year’s Belgian Waffle Ride in San Marcos on Sunday, with Courtney Sherwell and Caroline Wreszin rounding out the women’s podium, and Alexey Vermeulen and Petr Vakoč finishing second and third for the men.

Bicycling considers how collegiate cycling can save American bike racing. This one doesn’t appear to be available anywhere else, so you’re on your own if they block you. 

British Cycling demonstrates the track bike they hope will carry their athletes to victory in the Paris Olympics. Demonstrating once again that victory in Olympic track cycling depends at least as much on technology as actual talent.

Former Tour de France champ Geraint Thomas blames UCI boss David Lappartient and race organizers for half of the crashes in pro cycling, saying that level of carnage wouldn’t be accepted in any new sport. Although someone should tell him about all those people flooding ERs with pickleball injuries. 

 

Finally…

Now you, too, could host your very own bicycle museum, assuming you own a vacant building somewhere in the Twin Cities. Your next bike could have a very cool looking Bugatti frame, handcrafted from a design created by Ettore Bugatti himself 115 years ago.

And who needs to ride a bike, when your bike can ride itself?

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Thanks to David V for his generous donation to help support this site, and keep all the best bike news and advocacy coming your way every day. 

Or every day my internet works and I’m not too banged up to do it, anyway. 

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

Beverly Hills marks bike month, bike/ped bridge plans safe for now, and prosecution rests in Tour de Palm Springs murder case

May 9, 2023 / / Comments Off on Beverly Hills marks bike month, bike/ped bridge plans safe for now, and prosecution rests in Tour de Palm Springs murder case

Chances are, if you’ve been here awhile, you’ll recall how I used to call Beverly Hills the Biking Black Hole for its complete lack of biking infrastructure.

Not to mention what was, at best, an antagonistic attitude towards bikes on the city’s behalf.

But clearly, things have changed.

They may still have work to do — hello, BHPD! — but Beverly Hills has made a number of improvements on the streets.

And on the city calendar.

………

I’ve heard from a number of people with insider knowledge of the situation with the new George Wolfberg Park, and the proposed bike/ped bridge over PCH, in the past 24 hours.

It looks like funding for the bridge is secure for now, and officials are moving forward with a required feasibility study, a relative handful of anti-bike NIMBYs notwithstanding .

So I’m told the best course of action, for now, is to hold off on contacting the state senators we listed yesterday.

Or if you still want to reach out, thank them for securing funding for the project.

Maybe George is still busy guiding things and stirring the post from the afterlife.

………

The prosecution has rested in the trial of Ronnie Ramon Huerta Jr.

Huerta is facing a murder charge for the alleged stoned driving death of Mark Kristofferson during the 2018 Tour de Palm Springs, while driving at speeds up to 100 mph.

Without a driver’s license.

He also faces charges for severely injuring Huntington Beach resident Alyson Lee Akers in the same crash, who has been left with lasting injuries.

………

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

Virginia bike advocates are panning a plan to allow bikes on a bridge over the Potomac, labeling it “ludicrous,” “unconscionable” and “malpractice,” and predicting no one would use it if it goes forward. Then again, maybe that’s the point. 

No bias here. A British pub owner says he’s being punished by “unreasonable demands” to stop blocking a shared bike/ped path in front of his establishment with his advertising signs.

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

Scottish forestry officials say people who ride mountain bikes, kayak or camp outside of approved areas are a menace to wildlife.

Ireland’s rail authority says people who ride bicycles, skate or scoot on train platforms are showing a “disregard for everyone else.”

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Local 

LA’s KABC-7 takes a deep dive into the problem of how to make car-centric Southern California safer for people on bicycles, including the ever-popular problem of disconnected bike lanes to nowhere.

The Mark Bixby Memorial Bicycle and Pedestrian Path on the new Long Beach International Gateway Bridge will officially open on Saturday, May 20th. Maybe we can just unofficial shorten that unwieldy title to “the Bixby.”

 

State

Visit California takes a Power Trip to NorCal for some “surf, mountain bike and culinary shenanigans.” They must have lost my invitation, because I’m usually all in on shenanigans of any sort.

San Diego’s Port commission is considering a proposal to ban pedicabs, ebikes and e-scooters from the city’s Embarcadero and Seaport Village.

Santa Barbara bike riders discuss how to improve safety and courtesy on the city’s State Street promenade, where bike allegedly reach speeds up to 30 mph. Seriously?

Streetsblog’s Roger Rudick says viewing the incredible Paris bike boom makes it clear the Bay Area’s relatively meager efforts are full of merde. Then again, that means Los Angeles os more full of merde than either one.

 

National

Governing says the federal Safe Streets and Roads for All program is accepting applications from cities to improve streets and infrastructure to improve safety.

Consumer Reports considers how to make your ebike last longer. Hint: Stay the hell away from SUVs.

The author of The Art of Cycling recommends seven books that “transcend cycling as mere sport,” and make you want to get out and ride your bike.

Forbes considers the best bike pumps.

Kaitlin Armstrong’s Austin, Texas murder trial for allegedly killing pro gravel cyclist Moriah Wilson has been delayed until October, with no explanation; it had been scheduled for next month.

Employees in a Vermont market went far beyond their usual duties to track down the bicycle stolen from a customer while she was shopping.

A Cambridge, Massachusetts letter writer says getting doored demonstrates why the city needs a bike network and mass transit.

A NY Streetsblog op-ed says center-running bike lanes aren’t as good as proponents suggest. Which may be the understatement of the year.

No, Orlando, Florida is not banning Critical Mass, despite a misunderstanding between organizers and city officials.

 

International

Segway introduces a new line of mopeds and ebikes for women.

A new survey lists the world’s seven best bike cities. Guess how many are in the US?

An Ontario man is inviting the public to peruse his personal collection or antique bikes dating back to the 1800s, including an exhibition showing the evolution of the bicycle from the 1860s to the 1930s.

Tragic news from New Brunswick, where the CEO of the Canadian province’s Energy and Utilities Board died suddenly while riding his bike.

London introduces a plan to boost the use of e-cargo bikes. They could have used one on Saturday for the coronation of King Chuck instead of that ornate gilded coach.

Dublin, Ireland is launching an e-cargo bike rental service targeted to people who don’t drive.

No bias here. Critics are blasting an Oakley ad campaign featuring a French downhill mountain bike champion, who is modestly naked except for his sunglasses, bizarrely comparing it to the Bud Light campaign featuring a transgender influencer that has infuriated some on the right.

An Indian man has been sentenced to a year behind bars for killing a 64-year old Singapore man riding a bicycle, after failing to give way at an intersection, and somehow convincing his passenger to take the blame.

The Daily Mail debates whether drivers in Queensland, Australia are allowed to cross a double yellow line to pass someone on a bicycle. Yet they oddly fail to ask anyone in a position to actually, you know, know.

 

Competitive Cycling

Australia’s Michael Matthews edged out Mads Pedersen and Kaden Groves in a mad sprint to the finish in Monday’s 3rd stage of the Giro, while pre-race favorite Remco Evenepoel extended the overall lead he’s expected to hold for the next three weeks.

US military cyclists will complete in the 25th annual Armed Forces Cycling Classic in Arlington, Virginia next month, with events ranging from kids races to an invitational pro-am race.

No bias here. Retired Olympic cyclist Inga Thompson wants pro cyclists to adopt the anti-racist gesture of taking a knee to “save women’s sports” from trans athletes. In other words, she wants to use a gesture intended to support oppressed minorities to further oppress another oppressed minority. Which is just wrong, regardless of whether or not you approve of trans women competing in women’s sports.

 

Finally…

You know your bike lanes suck when they have to be pre-cleaned to avoid breaking the street sweeper. When you’re reporting from the Netherlands, it only makes sense to build your broadcast studio on a cargo bike.

And feel free to celebrate National Masturbation Month this month, along with National Bike Month.

But preferably not at the same time.

……….

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

Oh, and fuck Putin, too.

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

Road rage rises on the mean streets of LA, LACBC Bike Month ride, and Streets For All plans June virtual Happy Hour

May 27, 2022 / / 2 comments

No surprise here.

Road rage continues to soar on the mean streets of Los Angeles, with reports up 41.4% over the first four months of the year, compared to last year.

And no, that doesn’t just reflect calmer streets during last year’s pandemic slowdown. It’s also a significant increase over the pre-pandemic good old days of 2019.

It’s more than just a simple disagreement between road users, too. As Crosstown explains,

While the concept of road rage makes some think of a driver who gets cut off and responds by shaking a fist, actual incidents are much more serious. The LAPD defines road rage as when a person commits an assault with a vehicle, or other weapon, due to something that occurs while driving. To be classified as road rage, the encounter must, in police parlance, require “willful and wanton disregard for the safety of others.”

Over two-thirds of road rage cases reported last year involved a gun — more than double the number of cases reported in each of the previous two years. As if a multi-tin motor vehicle isn’t weapon enough.

So be careful out there.

You never know who you’re sharing the road with. Or how they’re armed.

Thanks to Ted Faber for the heads-up.

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Lionel Mares forwards photos from last Sunday’s LACBC Bike Month ride, where it appears a good time was had by all.

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Streets For All is hosting another virtual happy hour on June 8th — the day after Election Day — with the vice mayor of Burbank.

And no, that’s doesn’t mean he’s mayor of all the fun stuff.

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Gravel Bike California offers your guide to riding the rocks at May and Kagel Canyons.

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If anyone gets me on their gift list this year, this will do nicely.

https://twitter.com/guggenheimbot/status/1529950461490565120

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GCN offers advice on how to buy a used bike.

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

This is why people keep dying on the streets. A British hit-and-run driver was fined the equivalent of just $526 for a crash that left a bike rider seriously injured, even though he appeared to crash into the victim intentionally.

Police in the UK are looking for three men who got out of a car and beat a man in his 50s after they crashed into his bike.

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

New York police are looking for a masked bike rider who jumped off his bicycle and repeatedly stabbed a man who was walking on the sidewalk; the victim was hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries.

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Local

The Los Angeles Times got four of the remaining candidates for mayor of Los Angeles on the record for their transportation policies, although Kevin de León is the only candidate with an actual transportation platform; billionaire Rick Caruso apparently had better things to do, saying he wasn’t ready to discuss the subject yet, less than two weeks before Election Day.

E-scooter providers Lime, Lyft and Spin have changed their city-mandated programs for low-income riders, reportedly without informing the public first.

 

State 

A 52-year old San Diego man was sentenced to 11 years behind bars, 34 years after his errant shot killed a passing bike rider in the city’s Encanto neighborhood.

Murrieta kindergartners are learning how to ride a bike as part of the All Kids Bike program, with bikes and helmets courtesy of supercross star Ryan Dungey.

Momentum considers the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition’s successful efforts to create the city’s first carfree street. Which compares favorably to LA’s none.

If you build it, they don’t always come. A San Francisco website reports the free bike valet at the city’s Chase Center arena, home of the NBA Warriors, is going mostly unused.

No surprise that New York and Los Angeles lead the nation in bicycling deaths; more surprising is that Stockton and Sacramento County both rank in the nation’s top ten for bicycling fatalities.

 

National

CNN offers suggestions on how to store and secure your bike at home.

The sheriff of New Mexico’s Sandoval County is recovering from a broken back and rib after crashing his mountain bike when he tried to ramp over a rock, and slammed into it instead.

A Colorado writer considers the growing animosity between drivers and bike riders, insisting “We all kinda hate each other, and by ‘kinda,’ I mean truly and deeply with a passion.”

Colorado Public Radio relates the origin tale of the Iron Horse Classic, when two brothers decided to race each other, one on a bike and the other at the helm of a classic narrow gauge steam engine; this weekend marks the 50th edition of the road race.

Britain’s Daily Mail — not exactly know for its veracity — reports cyclist Colin Strickland has gone into hiding, evidently worried that his fugitive girlfriend will target him next, after allegedly shooting and killing top gravel cyclist Moriah ‘Mo’ Wilson.

The head of Brompton is on a mission to convert New Yorkers to foldies.

A Pennsylvania man is on life support after a man just released from jail knocked him off his bicycle, then beat him with it for two minutes before walking away and leaving his victim for dead.

I want to be like him when I grow up. Fed up with high gas prices, an 85-year old North Carolina man fixed up his bike, and plans to live virtually carfree for the foreseeable future. Even if gas prices there are nearly two bucks cheaper than in Los Angeles.

 

International

A new international database offers nearly 1.6 million geo-located records of bicycle collisions from various cities, states, regions and countries around the world, apparently including Los Angeles, making it easier for researchers to study them.

Here’s another one for your bike bucket list — an easy four-hour ebike ride from Rome to see the 2,500-year old Appian Way and ancient Roman aqueducts.

Survivors of a British endurance cyclist are suing the organizers of a French bike race for the equivalent of nearly a million dollars after the 36-year old man died of heat stroke during the competition.

Copenhagen will introduce Denmark’s first diagonal bike lane to connect bike lanes through a busy intersection.

WaPo examines Ukrainian fighters turning ebikes made in the country into weapons of war.

Sad news from Myanmar, where the 2019 Sony World Photography Awards Winner was killed in a collision; 42-year old Kyaw Win Hlaing was run down when a quarreling couple in a mini-truck rear-ended his bicycle.

 

Competitive Cycling

The popular Belgian Waffle Ride offroad race is expanding into Michigan, for what will be the series fifth event, following races in San Diego, Utah, North Carolina and Kansas.

 

Finally…

Your next bike could have a massive DIY omnidirectional front wheel. Your next ebike could be made by Mercedes Formula E car racing team.

And who says you can’t carry trash on a bike?

Thanks to Jon for the link.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin, too.

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

Able-bodied mtn biker confronts disabled ebike rider, Metrolink helps promote bikes, and redesigning LA’s worst intersections

May 26, 2021 / / Comments Off on Able-bodied mtn biker confronts disabled ebike rider, Metrolink helps promote bikes, and redesigning LA’s worst intersections

A video from last fall has popped up again, causing fresh outrage online.

Justifiable outrage, for a change.

David Wolfberg forwards a story from Boing Boing that picks up a video we posted last September, showing an able-bodied mountain biker complaining about a disabled rider’s adaptive ebike, and demanding to see the rule allowing him to use it on the Indiana trail.

Maybe you’ll remember it.

Lord knows I do.

The story doesn’t end there, though, as reprehensible as this uncomprehending attack on a disabled man is.

Wolfberg also forwards videos revealing the disabled man, Tom Morris, to be a noted endurance athlete and coach.

And yes, going back to the original video, Morris had every right to ride it on the trail according to this piece from Road.cc.

Morris…has since said he has been in touch with Terry Coleman, the deputy director of Indiana’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR), who told him that his bike was perfectly legal to ride on trails.

Morris said: “What I’m on is not an e-bike, it’s an adaptive piece of equipment. And adaptive equipment is allowed on all of the trails throughout all of Indiana. So if you’ve got this equipment, get out and use it, use it in the state parks, use it on these trails.”

Morris also said Coleman told him that the DNR had actually just bought 12 “off-roading wheelchairs”, to give disabled people in the state more access to trails and paths for leisure activities.

So the next time you find tempted to criticize someone else for some infraction, real or imagined, think twice.

Then don’t.

There may be some reason why they’re doing what they’re doing. And it doesn’t really matter whether you understand or agree with it.

Because it’s not your job to enforce the rules, any more than driveway vigilante drivers have the right to enforce their interpretations — or misinterpretations, more often — of bike laws on you.

Try a little empathy and understanding instead.

And maybe make this world a little better for all of us in the process.

Image by Michael Gaida from Pixabay.

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Remember this tweet the next time someone insists Los Angeles isn’t (insert more progressive city here).

https://twitter.com/fietsprofessor/status/1397195715529564172

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Metrolink is teaming with the LACBC to promote bicycling as Bike Month sinks slowly in the west.

Taking Metrolink makes a great way to explore other parts of Southern California by bike, especially with their $10 weekend fares.

And particularly now that it’s getting safer to get back on a train.

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Great thread from 18-year old housing and transportation enthusiast Zennon Ulyate-Crow, who is doing the work LADOT should be doing to reimagine some of LA’s most problematic intersections.

Here’s his latest project, which turns an East Hollywood mess into something we could all live with.

Let’s hope LADOT is already keeping an eye on him, with the promise of a job once he gets his degree.

………

Speaking of LADOT, it seems the ostensibly progressive department ostensibly focused on Compete Streets still hasn’t gotten the message of the mayor’s Green New Deal — that we have to reimagine our streets and how we get around if we’re going to meet the city’s climate change goals, let alone survive.

Or maybe they still have old school engineers on staff who retain their focus on automotive throughput, as an obsolete plan to widen Burbank Blvd rises from the dead.

https://twitter.com/streetsforall/status/1396938808650731520

Meanwhile, Streetsblog’s Joe Linton busts the myths in Metro’s half billion dollar highway budget for next year, saying this is not what Angelenos voted for when they approved Measure M funding.

With auto-centric crap like this is still being pushed by Metro and LADOT, maybe we can’t afford to wait, and need to get Ulyate-Crow working there now.

Or better yet, running it.

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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration wants to instruct you in how to wear a bike helmet.

………

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

No bias here. San Carlos has installed a bicycle dismount zone where people are supposed to get off their bikes and walk them across an intersection to “minimize conflicts between vehicles, pedestrians and bicyclists.” Even though bike riders have every right to just ride across the damn street.

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

A man in Baton Rouge, Louisiana was sentenced to 25 years behind bars for fatally shooting another man who tried to take his bicycle from outside a convenience store.

A Jackson, Mississippi man is on trial for fatally shooting a 14-year old boy in the back after one of the boy’s friends stole a bike from his yard. We all hate bike thieves. But no bicycle is ever worth a human life. 

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Local

Streets For All introduces Destruction for Nada, a much-needed campaign to stop all highway widening in LA County, as Metro considers an induced-demand boosting jump in highway spending at Thursday’s board meeting, along with a proposal to kill the wasteful and destructive $8 billion plan to widen the 710 Freeway. It’s long past time all of Metro’s funding was shifted to transit and Complete Streets.

Speaking of Streets For All and highways, mark your calendar for Wednesday, June 9th, as they host another of their virtual happy hours, featuring Caltrans District 7 Director Tony Tavares.

LAist examines the battle over the Beautiful Boulevard plan to create a livable Complete Street along the route of the planned NoHo to Pasadena Bus Rapid Transit line through Eagle Rock.

 

State

Antioch could build the Bay Area’s first Bicycle Garden, a fully landscaped miniature streetscape within an existing park to teach bicycling skills to kids and adults.

The post-pandemic reopening is raising a debate over the streets of San Francisco, as advocates call for keeping closed-off streets carfree, while drivers insist they need the roads open to get around. That’s a debate that should be happening in Los Angeles, as well, as the city faces an urgent need to reimagine how people get around in order to meet climate goals, and confront the ever-increasing congestion on our streets. But isn’t. 

San Francisco installs the city’s first advisory lane, where bike riders use bike lanes on either side of the street, while drivers in both directions share a single center lane.

Sad news from Northern California, where a man riding a bike in Cottonwood was killed by a hit-and-run driver who just left him on the side of the road to die. As we’ve said before, in cases like that, the driver should face a murder charge once they’re caught for making the conscious decision to let their victim die.

 

National

Marketplace reports on why you should care about the draft update to the MUTCD, the country’s traffic control bible.

The NRDC has rejected the proposed federal highway bill under consideration in the US Senate, calling it a small step when we need a great leap.

Bicycling explains why you should ride your bike for fun more often. As usual, read it on Yahoo if Bicycling blocks you.

An anonymous donor gave a whopping $1 million to purchase land for mountain bike trails on Washington’s Bainbridge Island, as well as conserving land and expanding an existing dog park.

A Chicago man took an “epic” bike ride across Indiana just to dine at the nearest Waffle House. Although the real story is how he was able to make almost the entire trip on offroad bike paths.

The New York Times offers a photo essay examining bike style around the city. These days my only sense of style is whatever will look least humiliating in public.

Island Press introduces Bike Easy, which has played a significant role in the remarkable transformation of New Orleans into a bike friendly — or at least, friendlier — city.

Miami joins the Vision Zero club, as the city announces plans to eliminate traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2030. Let’s hope they take it more seriously than Los Angeles does, like planning to remove bike lanes and sidewalks to widen Burbank Blvd.

 

International

Momentum Magazine offers a primer on the different types of cargo bikes.

An IT professional from a tiny Uruguayan pueblo is now riding a bicycle through Mexico, in the fourth year of his quixotic quest to ride from Uruguay to Alaska.

A Canadian girl got a new BMX bike for being honest enough to return a bike a stranger had given her, after learning it had been stolen. Although the question is why did a stranger give her a stolen bike to begin with.

This is who we share the road with. A British man will spend six years behind bars for intentionally running down and killing another driver in a road rage dispute.

The UK press continues their onslaught of photos contradicting Prince Harry’s claim that he was never he was able to ride a bike with his father, heir-to-the-thrown Prince Charles.

Members of a Dublin bike club testify that a speeding driver rounded a bend on the wrong side of the roadway moments before slamming into a woman who couldn’t get her bike off the road in time; the driver is on trial for her death.

You’ve got to be kidding. When a Welsh bicyclist tried to take video of dangerous drivers to the local police, they threatened to charge him for swearing at the motorists who nearly killed him, instead.

The Air Force Times tells the story of a top secret suicide squad of bike-riding Jewish commandos dropped behind German lines during World War II.

More proof that bicycling pays. A study of bike paths in Helsinki, Finland, shows a gain of the equivalent of $4.41 for every $1.22 spent to place bikeways along major arteries in the city. Then again, they increase property values, too.

 

Competitive Cycling

The BBC questions whether anyone can beat Columbia’s Egan Bernal, saying the pink leader’s jersey is his to lose.

However, Cycling Weekly says the race is far from over, and offers five things to watch for as it enters its final week.

American Joe Dombrowski rode the cycling roller coaster in the just the first week of the Giro, going from winning a stage one day to crashing out the next.

Cycling Tips introduces Tim Declercq, who they call one of the world’s best domestiques, and who is always at the front of the action.

International politics once again reaches into the sports world, as Germany responds to the hijacking and apparent torture of an opposition journalist in Belarus by pulling out of next month’s Elite Track European Championships in the country. And yes, that’s the right move; hopefully other countries will follow their lead.

Durango, Colorado’s annual Iron Horse Bicycle Classic mountain bike race has proven to be a launching pad for cycling careers, including rising US WorldTour star Sepp Kuss.

 

Finally…

The answer to N+1 could soon be a subscription. Your next ebike could go 40 mph — as long as you’re willing to get a helmet, registration and motorcycle license.

And if your toddler feels left out by the time you spend on your Peloton, just build him one of his own.

………

Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask. 

And get vaccinated, already.

Category: Bicycle Safety, Morning Links / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Happy LA Bike Month, Los Angeles Vision Zero fail, and Damian Kevitt calls for support for school zone speed cam bill

May 3, 2021 / / Comments Off on Happy LA Bike Month, Los Angeles Vision Zero fail, and Damian Kevitt calls for support for school zone speed cam bill

My apologies for Friday’s unexcused absence. 

Just another of the many and varied joys of diabetes, a cruel disease that can take you from feeling okay to passing out in a matter of minutes, for no apparent reason.

And yet another reminder to get yourself checked if you’re at risk, and do whatever it takes to avoid getting it. Because you don’t want this shit. 

Seriously. 

Today’s photo of irresistible cuteness by Tatiana Syrikova from Pexels. 

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Happy Bike Month, Los Angeles.

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Despite — or maybe because of — an up to 70% drop in traffic fatalities, roadway deaths declined just 3% in Los Angeles last year, thanks at least in part to a dramatic jump in speeding as empty streets encouraged drivers to use a heavy right foot.

This is how LAist explained it.

Based on preliminary data reported by the Los Angeles Department of Transportation, 238 people died in collisions last year, compared to 246 in 2019 — a decrease of about 3%.

That slight dip pales in comparison to how sharply car travel fell in greater L.A. and beyond in the early months of the pandemic. Schools closed, many workers stopped commuting to their offices, and local and state stay-at-home orders drastically limited the places and activities we could drive to in our cars.

In mid-to-late March 2020, daily vehicle traffic fell as much as 70%. Last April saw traffic volumes decrease by 30% to 50% compared to the start of the year. Daily driving has been increasing since that historic plummet, but still remain below typical levels, according to city traffic data.

And despite a drop last year, bike and pedestrian deaths are still up over the five years since LA adopted Vision Zero in 2015.

Which isn’t the way it’s supposed to work.

The basic philosophy behind Vision Zero is that humans will make mistakes on the road and crashes will happen, but by redesigning streets to reduce speeding and better protect vulnerable road users, those crashes don’t have to cause severe injuries and deaths. But as the data has shown in recent years, L.A.’s current approach is not working…

While fewer people were killed and seriously injured in crashes overall last year, not all L.A. communities experienced less traffic violence. According to preliminary data compiled by LADOT:

  • The number of pedestrians killed by drivers fell about 12% overall, but increased in some neighborhoods
  • Slightly fewer cyclists were killed last year (15, compared to 19 in 2019)
  • The number of motorcyclists killed in crashes jumped about 45%
  • Motor vehicle occupant deaths were nearly unchanged

Pandemic or not, it’s clear that LADOT’s piecemeal approach to reducing traffic deaths isn’t working.

And it isn’t Vision Zero, by any definition.

The basic philosophy behind Vision Zero is that humans will make mistakes on the road and crashes will happen, but by redesigning streets to reduce speeding and better protect vulnerable road users, those crashes don’t have to cause severe injuries and deaths. But as the data has shown in recent years, L.A.’s current approach is not working.

It’s long past time Los Angeles stopped talking about Vision Zero, and got off its collective ass and did something about it.

Because I’m every bit as tired of writing about fallen bicyclists as you are reading about it. And don’t get me started on all the other people needlessly killed on our streets.

For any doubters out there, yes, ending traffic deaths is possible. If — and only if — we have the political will to make it happen.

Speaking of LAist, just like their parent public radio station KPCC, they survive on public donations.

So open that wallet if you can spare a few bucks. 

………

SAFE founder and Executive Director Damian Kevitt, who lost a leg — and nearly his life — to a hit-and-run driver who was never caught, makes a heartfelt plea to fight for SB 733, which would allow automated speed cams in school zones.

Sadly, California is one of the only nine states that expressly forbids speed safety cameras in school zones. This tool has been available since 1987 and is unquestionably effective. Data in cities across the country, such as New York, Seattle, and Chicago, show that speed safety cameras reduce traffic injuries and fatalities and change driver behavior. More importantly, there are already thousands of schools across the country that currently use speed safety cameras to protect kids, teachers, and parents.

The common sense bill, which would only impact people breaking the law and endangering innocent kids and adults, has been severely watered down by Senate Transportation Committee Chair Lena Gonzalez, a Democrat misrepresenting Long Beach, at least in this case.

As currently written after it was butchered in committee, the law would only allow a pilot project in four schools out of more that 20,000 in the state.

As Kevitt writes,

This is an insult to victims of traffic violence and the coalition of support, especially given the immediate problem and widespread, documented effective use of speed safety cameras across the country.

One of the harder things I have had to do is tell victims of traffic violence — who were emotionally prepared to testify in committee — that this lifesaving bill wouldn’t make it through committee due to political forces that are hard to explain. Why would police unions work to fill a bill that so obviously would help save lives? It is heartbreaking.

But we will pick ourselves up and gain strength. The voices of traffic violence will not be silenced. Safety advocates will not accept that denial of the science. Equity groups will demand accountability. And, in the end, we will save lives.

He urges you, and all of us, to call or email Gonzalez’s office to express your outrage, and demand this life-saving tool to protect innocent lives.

Here’s that link again for her contact information, and sample scripts you can follow.

I’m planning to do it later today. I hope you’ll join me

………

I’ve been remiss in not mentioning the LACBC’s virtual LA Rivers Challenge, which replaces their popular LA River Ride, as the world still struggles to shake off the pandemic.

Join us the entire month of June for a virtual challenge in place of the LA River Ride. 2020 was supposed to mark 20 years of River Ride, but we had to put our beloved event on hold due to the pandemic. We’re making up for it in 2021 by inviting you to 30 days of riding, walking and running the historic waterways of Los Angeles!

The LA Rivers challenge is all about doing the mileage goal that is best for you. Select the goal that excites you, tests your abilities, or that you can do with your family. There is a distance for everyone to ride, walk or run.

Opening March 15th, registration is just $40, but follow up on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram for exclusive discounts. You also have the opportunity to support healthy, sustainable and equitable streets by choosing to fundraise for LACBC while meeting your mileage goals. You can earn great prizes at key fundraising milestones and will qualify for The 2021 LA Rivers Challenge Drawing to win one of our grand prizes TBA! Whatever your contribution, you will be supporting the work of LACBC, as we try to make Los Angeles a safer and more inclusive place to ride, walk and run.

………

This is who we share the road with, part one.

https://twitter.com/chrisgaarder/status/1389034709125001218

Part two.

Part three.

https://twitter.com/ScooterCasterNY/status/1388530188842147848

It’s no surprise that we can’t manage to do anything about man shootings, when we still can’t even do anything about stopping people from using their car as a multi-ton weapon of mass destruction.

………

While we’re on the subject, there’s good news from Maryland, where bike cam video was used to convict a driver for an aggressive punishment pass.

We need to change the law here in California, where police are currently prohibited from ticketing drivers or charging them with misdemeanors unless they actually witness the infraction.

And no, witnessing it on video doesn’t count, for some strange reason.

………

GCN offers advice on how to find good riding routes when you’re new to the area.

And GCN considers one of bicycling’s most vital questions, and one of the last remaining forms of legal doping.

………

I’m all in.

Seriously, we could use this right here in Los Angeles.

And right now.

Thanks to Keith Johnson for the heads-up.

………

A sharp-eyed Megan Lynch spotted LAFD bike paramedics on the red carpet of last week’s Academy Awards.

https://twitter.com/may_gun/status/1388738500556517376

And thanks to Vyki Englert for spotting the LAFD logo on their panniers.

………

Nothing sexier than someone on a bike.

Okay, maybe the right someone.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes is all too real.

Someone sabotaged a beginners bike trail in Scotland with obstacles including tree branches, and fence posts with rusted razor wire, which could seriously injure an unsuspecting rider. Or worse.

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

A murder suspect accused of killing his wife has ridden his bike over 3,000 miles around Denver, despite being on house arrest — and posted it to Strava.

A British man was lucky to walk with a suspended sentence after he was busted with the equivalent of over $2,700 worth of amphetamines when police stopped him as he rode his bicycle with a bloody face; no word on how his face got that way.

………

Local

State Assemblymember Richard Bloom announces his candidacy for County Supervisor, basing his run in part on a 20-year record of advocating for a transit, bike and pedestrian-friendly Westside.

That’s more like it. Pasadena is considering four north-south corridors for bicycle boulevards.

A teenage mountain biker was airlifted from the Santa Monica Mountains after suffering painful wrist and shoulder injuries on Sunday.

A young boy celebrated his eleventh birthday Saturday with a 111-mile ride along the beach bike path from Santa Monica to Palos Verdes and back until he completed a century plus an 11-mile victory lap. When I was eleven, I was happy to ride around the block by myself.

Clearly, Long Beach isn’t afraid of road diets, proposing a lane reduction and bike path for a 1.4-mile section of Spring Street. Unlike a certain megalopolis to the north.

 

State

A 38-year old man in El Cajon suffered serious lower body injuries when he was struck by a driver moments after getting off his bicycle.

San Diego’s SANDAG has received a $12 million grant to complete a seven-mile segment of the Inland Rail Trail from San Marcos to Vista.

Katy Perry and Orlando Bloom take their eight-month old daughter for a ride through Santa Barbara on their massive ebikes.

Apparently, San Jose leaders aren’t afraid of road diets either, or LA’s seemingly inevitable angry driver backlash to them.

You know you’ve got a serious safety problem when two disabled people are killed crossing the same San Jose intersection in a single month.

Why pro cyclists like to train in Sonoma County. Surprisingly, it’s not the wine. Or maybe not just the wine. 

A Redding man calls it a life-changing moment when he wins a new ebike.

 

National

Cycling News considers the best ebikes for under two grand.

Bike Snob’s Eben Weiss offers advice on how to not get your bike stolen.

A British website highlights “four epic cycling adventures that showcase the incredible landscapes of the USA,” starting with a ride down the Left Coast from Seattle to San Diego. My brother did that one just a couple years ago — along with riding to the Northwest from Western Colorado, and back again to Colorado from San Diego.

The American Southwest experienced a bigger bike boom than anywhere else in the world, including Europe and the rest of the US.

It takes a real schmuck to steal $20,000 worth of bicycles from a Dallas Boy Scout camp.

A Texas man is suing a sporting goods store after a bike fell off an upper display rack and landed on his head. Which is not funny at all, except that it is.

A Minnesota town is repurposing an old abandoned bridge over the Mississippi as a bike and pedestrian bridge, 40 years after it was closed to cars.

Celebrate Bike Month with a visit to Ohio’s Bicycle Museum of America, where over 800 bikes are on display, dating back to an an 1816 draisienne invented by Karl Drais that they credit as the first true bicycle. Although not everyone agrees. You can read that second link on Yahoo if Bicycling blocks you, which it probably will unless you’re a subscriber.

New York mayoral hopeful Eric Adams pledges to build another 300 miles of protected bike lanes in the city during his first four years, if he’s elected, an annual rate nearly three times the 28 miles installed last year. Let’s get the candidates for mayor in next year’s LA election to make a similar pledge. And hold them to it.

A crowdfunding page raised $75,000 for a New York delivery worker who was killed when driver went into the bike lane to pass another car, hit the scooter the victim was riding, then went on to hit two parked cars and slam into an outdoor restaurant.

Two men with the same name are fighting back against a cease and desist order from the City of New York to remove their unpermitted dockless ebikes from the streets.

New York police stopped a salmon cyclist, and discovered they had nabbed a hate crime suspect responsible for a rash of anti-Jewish vandalism.

A Florida driver faces charges for intentionally driving off the road to run over a man she knew who was riding a bicycle.

 

International

Your next Subaru could be a single-speed mountain bike. If you live in Canada, that is.

This is how Vision Zero is supposed to work. A deadly Montreal underpass where a woman was killed riding her bike seven years ago now has a bike path with a concrete barrier to protect riders from passing drivers. And the ghost bike that was installed in her honor was removed Sunday to be transferred to a museum, where it will highlight the dangers on the streets.

Former Game of Thrones star Maisie Williams is one of us, as she goes for a London bike ride in a see-through top while filming a new six-part bio-series based on a memoir from Sex Pistols bassist Steve Jones. Sorry guys, they blurred that part out.

A Scottish bicyclist was forced to abandon his attempt to set a new record for the greatest distant ridden in a single week, after suffering a knee injury on the fourth day.

Those e-cargo bike front wheel skids may soon be a thing of the past, as Italian brake maker BluBrake introduces the world’s first ABS, aka anti-lock braking system, designed for electric cargo bikes. Thanks to Thomas Riebs for the tip.

She gets it. Germany’s first professor of bicycle traffic management says cars should give up space to make room for people on bicycles.

Ebike and electric scooter riders will now have to pass a theory test before they’re allowed to ride in Singapore, starting next month.

She gets it. The widow of a Kiwi bicyclist says a single mistake shouldn’t cost someone their life, while opposing jail for the truck driver who killed him.

 

Competitive Cycling

According to Cycling News, 21-year old Belgian cyclist Remco Evenepoel stands suspended between stardom and superstardom since breaking his pelvis at Il Lombardia last August.

Cycling News also examines the omertà in women’s pro cycling, where virtually no one is talking about the shameful poverty wages — or no wages at all — paid to riders below the WorldTour level.

Cyclist talks to pro cyclists about their less-than-favorable reaction to UCI’s new safety rules.

The popular Over the Hump mountain bike race series will make a comeback at Irvine Lake on July 20th.

 

Finally…

That feeling when your ebike has a sidecar. That feeling when the bike lane is blocked by a city bus, whose driver is busy having sex onboard.

And if you’re riding your bike after dark while carrying two bags of meth, put a damn light on it, already.

………

Thanks to Matthew R for his monthly donation to help keep this site coming your way every day; your support is always welcome and appreciated, no matter how large or small. 

Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask. 

And get vaccinated, already.

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

Lee’s office responds to buses in SFV bike lane, Covid-19 claims 2020 LA River Ride, and marking Bike Month by yourself

April 20, 2020 / / Comments Off on Lee’s office responds to buses in SFV bike lane, Covid-19 claims 2020 LA River Ride, and marking Bike Month by yourself

Good news, sort of.

Steven Hallert reports he got a response from embattled Councilmember John Lee’s office to his complaint about Metro buses using a San Fernando Valley bike lane as a layover spot.

Albeit a very noncommittal one.

Mr. Hallett;

Thank you for contacting the Office of Counbcilmember John S. Lee with your concern about the bus layover location on Rinaldi. Your message was forwarded to me for response.

As that is a Metro bus layover location, I initially forwarded your email to them for response.  I do understand your concern. Our Office does work with Metro to evaluate and locate bus layover locations and this locale is no different.  As you may be aware, bus drivers do need to be able to stop along their route to take breaks, etc., and commercial areas adjacent to shopping centers meet their needs exceedingly well.

However, we also consider active transportation as a major part in the first/last mile process in transit so there should be some consideration taken of the existing bike lane impacts. As such, I have asked Metro to evaluate your concerns in an effort to determine if we can mitigate those impacts.

Metro should be responding directly to you shortly.

So that can be read as forwarding the complaint to the responsible department. Or just passing the buck.

We’ll see how Metro responds.

The sign in today’s photo suddenly appeared on my street, even though we’re miles from the nearest bike path. Maybe someone’s just getting ready in case we ever get one.

………

More bad news, as Covid-19 claims another victim.

The LA River Ride.

Below is part of an email from LACBC Executive Director Eli Akira Kaufman last Friday.

We had to make the difficult decision to postpone the 20th Annual Los Angeles River Ride due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our priority is the health and safety of all Angelinos especially the essential workers who are on the front lines of the crisis. We need to stay safe by staying the course. The good news is that we have been working closely with the Autry Museum to reschedule in early June of 2021. This postponement to the same approximate date next year gives LACBC, our sponsors, partners, vendors and participants along with the County of Los Angeles time to recover from the pandemic so we can host a River Ride worthy of it’s 20th Anniversary.

Of course we will honor all of the ride registrations for the new date in 2021! Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me with questions and check out our LA River Ride Reschedule FAQs for additional information.

What he doesn’t say is that this could have a huge impact on the group’s already troubled finances, since the River Ride is the LACBC’s biggest fundraiser every year.

There are many people and organizations that need your help right now.

But try to find a little extra to send the LACBC’s way. Because the group that’s done so much to help everyone who rides a bike in LA County needs our help to get through this coming year.

………

Now there’s a good idea.

Robert Leone forwards a message from the Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition offering an option to celebrate biking next month, even though their Bike Week has been moved to September.

When – May Power

May is National Bike Month and we hope you will engage with our May Power riding program while maintaining proper physical distance from those who are not part of your household.

  • May 1 to 9 is Flower Power week. Please take a picture of flowers you see while riding and post with the hashtag #FlowerPowerSVBC.
  • May 10 to May 16 is People Power week. Take a picture of yourself on your bike and post with the hashtag #PeoplePowerSVBC.
  • May 17 to May 23 is Pedal Power week. Take a picture of your shoe and pedal and post with the hashtag #PedalPowerSVBC.
  • May 24 to May 31 is Wheel Power week. Take a picture of or through your bicycle wheel and post with the hashtag #WheelPowerSVBC.

You may have heard that Bike to Work Day is postponed from May 14 to September 24. However you can still celebrate biking on May 14 by treating it as Bike To Wherever Day! If you are not able to get out and bike on any other day, we really hope you’ll still get out and ride at least on this BTWD!

He also sends a crossword puzzle from Adventure Cycling, if you need a little entertainment off your bike.

Because doing a crossword while you ride may not be the best idea.

………

Today’s common theme is Bicycle Day, commemorating yesterday’s 77th anniversary of the day LSD inventor Albert Hoffman discovered the psychedelic effects of the drug as he rode his bike home in Basil, Switzerland.

Rolling Stone says celebrate the day by taking a trip, though I don’t think they meant on your bike.

The estate of former Grateful Dead frontman Jerry Garcia issued a special limited edition poster to mark the occasion.

Curiously, an Indian website marks the day with ten facts about bicycling. But none about LSD, which is what the day is really about.

………

It looks like local officials are trying to send a granular message that the beachfront bike path is officially off limits.

https://twitter.com/SteveLaRue2/status/1251214661317345282

That looks like the northern section of the path where it reenters Los Angeles, but there’s not enough detail to say for sure.

………

Looks like Finish the Ride is going virtual for now.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes goes on.

Once again, bike riders are under attack, after someone tossed tacks across a popular riding route in southeast London; Road.cc speculated that it may be related to complaints over people continuing to ride during England’s coronavirus lockdown.

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

Police in Selma, California busted a bike-riding parole on an arson spree, who set eight fires in just 30 minutes, for no apparent reason. And may have set more the day before.

It takes a major schmuck to crash into an elderly British Columbia man, then just straighten his handlebars and leave the man lying on the sidewalk.

………

Local

The LA Times says it’s possible walkers and bike riders outnumber drivers right now, and calls on Mayor Garcetti to do the right thing and give Angelenos enough space to walk, run or ride a bike with kids without having to worry about getting run down by one. Although that’s not likely now that the mayor is furloughing thousands of city workers.

Talk about not getting it. An opinion writer for the Southern California News Group demonstrates a clear lack of understanding of induced demand, while supporting sprawl and complaining that Caltrans will no longer fund projects that increase traffic demand. And noting that California “only” accounts for 1% of global greenhouse gases. Yes, she seriously seems to think that a single state accounting for a full 1% worldwide is a good argument.

It’s not your imagination. There’s more traffic now than during the first weeks of the pandemic shutdown.

Bike-friendly Santa Monica City Manager Rick Cole resigned under fire after residents of the city complained about budget and staff cuts in reaction to the sudden loss of tax revenue due to the coronavirus shutdown.

You aren’t required to wear a mask when you ride, unless you’re riding in Beverly Hills, Glendale or Riverside County. But it’s not a bad idea.

A professor at Harvey Mudd College in Claremont calls on California not to ban bicycling as part of the coronavirus lockdown.

Former six-division boxing champ Floyd Mayweather is one of us, repeatedly riding his bike through DTLA with an entourage last week. Seriously, it’s great he’s out on a bike, but maybe save the group rides until the Covid-19 lockdown is lifted.

Reese Witherspoon rides with her scooter-riding son through the ‘Bu. Maybe they ran into Dakota Johnson, who went riding in Malibu with Coldplay’s Chris Martin and his kids.

 

State

The first 22 days of the coronavirus lockdown saved California $1 billion in traffic injury and fatality costs.

Mechanics at a San Diego motorcycle shop are credited with saving the life of a 74-year old man by using a jack to lift an SUV off him after he allegedly rode his bike off the sidewalk into traffic; the victim is hospitalized with multiple broken bones.

The San Diego County Bicycle Coalition is calling on the city to improve safety and relieve pressure on overcrowded sidewalks in response to Covid-19. Thanks again to Robert Leone.

When a Fallbrook toddler suffers an arm injury in a collision while riding oin a bicycle child seat, you’d think they might actually mention that someone was pedaling that bike. But you’d be wrong.

 

National

Cycling Savvy offers advice on how to stay safe riding your bike during the Covid-19 pandemic, while keeping others safe, too. Hint: ride alone when possible.

The American Prospect says the country is finding solace in bicycling in response to being cooped-up by Covid-19.

1986 BMX cult film Rad is making a comeback in 4k.

Kindhearted Oregon firefighters bought a new bike for a seven-year old boy and his sister, after rescuing the kid when he rode his bike off a 40-foot cliff.

Seattle considers banning cars from 15 miles of streets to make room for people.

Even Jackson, Wyoming is getting a protected bike lane.

New York’s city council intends to overrule the mayor, forcing the city to open a planned 75-miles of streets to bike riders and pedestrians whether or not he likes it. And he doesn’t.

 

International

A new study from the University of Duh shows what any bike rider could have told them — the bigger and busier the road, the more stressful it is to ride.

The World Resources Institute says bicycling provides a critical lifeline during the coronavirus crisis.

London volunteers are turning out in force to deliver food to vulnerable people by bicycle.

An English teenager can ride a bike for the first time after she was fitted with the world’s first medically-certified 3D-printed bionic hand.

Bike thieves continue to target healthcare workers in the UK, as a Scottish nurse got off a 12-hour shift to find someone had stolen his ebike. However, the story is better for an English nurse, who got a new bike from kindhearted strangers within hours of having hers stolen.

An anonymous British garbageman says there are a lot more bicyclists on the road now that the country is under lockdown, claiming he has multiple close calls with riders every day.

The UK has issued new guidelines allowing roads to be closed to cars during the coronavirus crisis.

A Michelin-starred British chef says he’s more successful than ever after switching gears to deliver meals and baked good by bike.

A Dublin bike shop owner is showing support for frontline medical workers battling Covid-19 by offering free repairs.

Everyone else is finally catching up to the story we linked to a couple weeks ago, about pro cyclist Davide Martinelli using his bike to deliver medications to vulnerable residents of his Italian hometown, which doesn’t have a pharmacy. Seriously, I could have easily linked to a couple dozen sources for the same piece. 

Berlin is adding temporary bike lanes to a number of streets through May.

Bengaluru’s bicycle mayor is heading an effort to deliver necessities by bike to elderly people throughout the Indian metropolis.

You can move almost anything on a bicycle. Even the body of a homeless man in India, after no one else was willing to transport him because of his HIV+ status.

Bikeshare is booming in Wuhan, China as the city that sparked the worldwide coronavirus pandemic returns to life.

Aussie bike shops are recruiting new staffers as bike business booms.

 

Competitive Cycling

Former Tour de France winner Geraint Thomas raised the equivalent of nearly $375,000 for Britain’s National Health Service by riding three twelve hour shifts on Zwift. On the other hand, Peter Sagan says he’s a real cyclist, not a virtual one.

Australian domestique Adam Hansen is spending his time off the bike making 3D-printed masks for health workers.

Cycling News says too many questions still remain around the postponed 2020 Tour de France, which is now scheduled to start in late August.

Former pro Alex Stieda, the first North American to wear the yellow jersey in the Tour de France — for a single stage in 1986 — is training for the Gran Fondo World Championships in Whistler, British Columbia this September, aiming for a top three finish in his age group.

 

Finally…

Pro tip: If you’re going to rob a bank, don’t ride away on your bike before you get the money. If you’re riding a bike with a gun tucked in your pants, you’re probably better off just keeping it there.

And maybe don’t post your photo online if it shows you breaking the country’s coronavirus quarantine.

Even if you are the world time trial champ.

………

Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask, already. 

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

OCTA wants your transportation input, San Diego gears up for Bike Month, and a zombie project on Magnolia Blvd

February 21, 2020 / / One comment

The Orange County Transportation Authority wants to know how you get around the county.

And yes, the correct answer is by bike.

OCTA Seeks Community Input on O.C. Transportation Needs

Transportation Needs Assessment Survey is available online and in multiple languages through March

ORANGE – The Orange County Transportation Authority is conducting an online survey to gain better insight into how people living in Orange County are changing the way they get around the county.

The Transportation Needs Assessment Survey is intended to gauge people’s opinions on the current public transit system and help shape future transportation planning in Orange County.

The online survey is part of an ongoing effort by OCTA to reach out to current riders of OC Bus and Metrolink, as well as non-riders, to deliver a balanced and sustainable transportation network for the county and to enhance overall quality of life.

The survey, at www.OCTAsurvey.com, will be online through the end of March. In an effort to engage residents from a variety of backgrounds, the survey is available in English and six other languages, including Arabic, Chinese, Farsi, Korean, Spanish, and Vietnamese.

“Our goal is to ensure all residents have a voice when it comes to transportation needs,” said OCTA Chairman Steve Jones, also the mayor of Garden Grove. “The Transportation Needs Assessment is an opportunity for residents to have a say in local and regional mobility and to ensure everyone is being served.”

The brief survey, which should take approximately 10 minutes or less to complete, asks how residents currently get around Orange County, and seeks suggestions on what can be improved to encourage people to use public transportation or consider active transportation options, such as walking and cycling.

For more information about the OC Bus system, visit www.OCBus.com and take the survey at www.OCTAsurvey.com.

Although I’m still not sure there’s life beyond the Orange Curtain.

Photo by 3888952 from Pixabay.

………

While we’re on the topic of points south, San Diego is already making plans for this year’s Bike Month and Bike to Work Day.

Save the date! The 30th Annual SANDAG Bike to Work Day will be Thursday, May 14, 2020. Online registration will open on March 2. Register by April 12 for a chance to win a $500 gift card to Moment Bicycles!

Interested in hosting an official Bike to Work Day pit stop? Applications will be accepted from March 2–20. Support new and experienced riders throughout the county as they roll by a pit stop to pick up a free t-shirt, snacks, and encouragement.

Be sure to stay tuned to the SANDAG Facebook page to vote for this year’s official Bike to Work Day t-shirt later this month!

For more information about Bike to Work Day, visit the iCommute Bike Month web page.

Needless to say, LA Metro apparently hasn’t given it much — or any — thought, with last year’s page still online., and no mention of events past next month.

Which could go a long way towards explaining why LA’s Bike Month, and Bike to Work Day in particular, have petered out in recent years.

Thanks to Robert Leone for the heads-up.

………

Leone also forwards a busy calendar of events from the San Diego County Bike Coalition, starting with a bike touring weekend and basic road safety class tomorrow.

………

A Twitter thread from Streetsblog makes the case that the proposed widening of Magnolia Blvd in North Hollywood is a zombie project that has somehow lived on, despite a call to narrow the street in the city’s mobility plan.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes goes on. 

Bike riders in Christchurch, New Zealand, face a rising bikelash, as drivers demand that riders need to be educated and wear hi-viz. Or maybe just get the hell off the roads.

………

Local

CicLAvia is starting the year off on the right foot, or maybe wheel, with a six-mile route down historic Central Ave in South LA this Sunday.

Spectrum News 1 profiles LA’s Areli Morales, who relies on Metro Bike bikeshare to support her carfree lifestyle.

The beachfront Marvin Braude Bike Trail is getting a much-needed facelift north of the Santa Monica pier, including widening the path and adding a separate walking path like below the pier, in time for the busy summer riding season.

 

State

Calbike says a change in state law led to the passage of a $90 million bond to fund San Diego bike projects.

A Palm Springs bicyclist wants the city to rip out some recent road diets on arterial streets, saying he prefers sharrows. Unlike most bicyclists and the bike curious, who would rather see some degree of separation from cars, if not protection.

Conejo Valley high school students will be collecting new or used bicycles for Wheels to Africa on March 7th; the Virginia nonprofit ships bikes to Africa to provide mobility for people in need.

 

National

It’s rude to draft a stranger without getting an okay first. But for a woman, it’s downright creepy and scary to have a man on an ebike on her wheel for the entire ride.

Peloton didn’t just offer to give people one of their “like new” stationary bikes in exchange for a Flywheel stationary bikes after winning a lawsuit against their competition. Owners report Peloton plans to brick their Flywheel bikes at the end of next month.

Curbed explains everything you always wanted to know about ebikes, but were afraid to ask; meanwhile Electrek finds five ebikes under a grand.

Portland bike owners can now report stolen bikes online. Which should solve the problem of cops who don’t want to be bothered with writing up a report.

Houston wants bike riders to get creative with rolling two-wheeled artworks for the city’s first Art Bike Parade in May.

A Saint Louis bike rider was run down by a heartless coward who fled the scene in a crash caught on security cam video. Not an apparently driverless El Camino, as the story suggests.

Chicago will now allow parking enforcement officers to photograph drivers who block bus or bike lanes so a ticket can be mailed to the owners, even if they move their vehicles before they can be ticketed onsite.

Massachusetts will finally get a hands-free law for drivers on Sunday. Although studies show even hands-free mode isn’t safe. 

A writer for Gear Patrol rides his first double century, from New York’s Hudson Valley through Vermont.

New York Mayor de Blasio threw his own Department of Transportation Commissioner under the bus, backtracking on a long-delayed bike lane just a day after she had announced it was moving forward.

An op-ed by a pair of “avid” New York bicyclists offers advice on how to how to ride a bike in the city and live to tell the tale.

A Florida sheriff’s deputy in an unmarked car crashed into a man on a bike after the victim allegedly darted into traffic.

 

International

A British man gets a well-deserved four and a half years for using a three-foot samurai sword to steal a bicycle from a 13-year old boy.

A UK website makes their picks for the best bicycling gear of 2020 to get the most out of your ride.

A mountain bike and helmet triggered a search, and hopefully a rescue, after they were left untouched for four days on New Zealand’s Great Barrier Island.

Unbelievable. The allegedly intoxicated man who ran down five Australian bicyclists as they rode in a bike lane was granted bail on a previous drug charge just one day before the crash. Just one more example of authorities keeping dangerous drivers on the road until it’s too late.

This is who we share the roads with. An Australian man was the victim of a vicious ax murder a couple hours after he was involved in a road rage incident.

The coronavirus claimed an indirect victim when an Irish bike rider was killed in a collision in Thailand, after he was prevented from flying home due to travel restrictions imposed as a result of the virus.

 

Finally…

Apparently, accused bike path terrorists are just a tad touchy when you wake them up. Harrison Ford was a dirty, rotten fibber when he denied riding an ebike.

And Aussie road champ Amanda Spratt gets goat bombed.

https://twitter.com/AmandaSpratt/status/1230196465273888768?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1230196465273888768&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Froad.cc%2Fcontent%2Fnews%2F271389-g-says-overall-peloton-standard-has-gone-evenepoel-20-sets-2020-alight-froome

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