The San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments is teaming with the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG), Active SGV and the California Transportation Commission to open up a second round of funding for ebike vouchers.
A crowdfunding campaign has raised over $700 of the $900 goal to buy a new ebike for an 81-year old El Cajon jokester, who has gained internet fame in a series of viral videos, after the ebike he relied on for transportation was stolen. Which is a damn good reminder that ebikes can provide mobility people long after they stop driving. And for those who should.
They get it. The American Bicycling Education Association calls on the AP to add a section on ebikes to its industry-standard AP Style Book, defining an ebike as having fully operable pedals and an electric motor of 750 watts or less, as well as limited speeds (typically 20–28 mph), suggesting electric motorcycle, electric dirt bike or off-highway electric vehicle for bikes that don’t meet that definition.
February 2, 2026 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Tens of thousands turnout for Unity Rides to honor ICE victim Alex Pretti, and LBPD accused of withholding info on killer driver
Bicyclists in Los Angeles joined people at hundreds of rides around the US, Europe and Australia in honoring VA nurse Alex Pretti over the weekend.
CBS LA offered a brief report one of the Los Angeles rides, taking with Finish the Ride founder Damian Kevitt across from the VA grounds about how Alex Pretti was one of us, as Pretti’s parents said he would have loved the rides.
The LA Timesalso covered the same ride, one of several held in the Los Angeles area, listing the turnout at several hundred. And like CBS LA, also quoted Kevitt.
Damian Kevitt spent Saturday afternoon on a 10-mile bike ride with hundreds of other cyclists, a sticker displaying Alex Pretti’s photo stuck to his jersey
“These are just cyclists, clubs, bike shops and individuals who have come together and said, ‘Hey, Alex was one of us,’ ” said Kevitt, while riding on Broadway in Santa Monica. “He was an ICU nurse, he loved the outdoors, he loved cyclists and he loved cycling.”
However, the paper included their brief coverage of the peaceful Unity Rides in the same story with on a rally to protest ICE in DTLA that was peaceful until it wasn’t, after police declared an unlawful assembly when a relative few protesters refused to leave at the end of the day.
Unsurprisingly, a crowd estimated in the thousands turned out for the Minneapolis ride, riding past memorials for Pretti and Renee Macklin Good, and the VA hospital where Pretti worked, with may participants wearing yellow vests that read “Peaceful observer, don’t shoot.”
Several other rides also made the news, with turnouts ranging from a few dozen riders in small Iowa and Wisconsin towns, to over a thousand in my Colorado hometown.
Galloppa was allegedly struck by 24-year old Ahkeyajahnique Owens as she was driving at an extreme rate of speed on city streets. She’s also accused of running a red light while driving around 100 mph just three months later, killing two more people.
Galloppa’s kin, who live 5,000 miles from Long Beach, allege they were denied all but the most basic information about the two crashes.
They’re asking a judge to order the police to release the information.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Reporters from Le Monde rode their bikes across Cuba, witnessing the resourcefulness of residents as the country bounces from one crisis to another, all while under the watchful eye of state security. But you’ll have to subscribe or find a way around their paywall if you want to read the damn thing.
That’s more like it. A 19-year old New Orleans man was sentenced to nine years behind bars for the drunken, coke-fueled hit-and-run that killed a 36-year old Bourbon Street bartender as he rode his bike home; he was just below the legal alcohol limit a full 12 hours after the crash.
More bad BMX news, this time from Australia, where a 27-year old man died two days after he crashed at a bike park, on his first time riding a BMX; he bled out from internal injuries after refusing to go the the hospital. A tragic reminder to always get yourself checked out after a crash; if the paramedics hadn’t ignored my refusal to go to the ER after the infamous beachfront bee encounter, I might not still be here to write this.
Former Polish cyclist Stanisław Szozda died following a serious illness; he retired at 28 after winning two Olympic silver medals and two World golds, as well as multiple stage wins. The 62-year old Szozda was described as one of the greatest Polish cyclists of all time.
Nineteen-year old Azerbaijani junior cyclist Artyom Proskuryakov was banned for three years for testing positive for meth, following “intelligence-led testing” during September’s UCI junior road world championships in Rwanda. Because any meth head could tell you it does wonders for their performance, right?
January 26, 2026 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Mayor Bass, City Council no-shows up for traffic deaths die-in; and how can LA build a subway if it can’t fix poop spray?
People are dying to stop people from dying on the mean streets of Los Angeles.
“We’re out here today because the city of Los Angeles signed Vision Zero as a directive in August 2015 to prioritize saving lives on our roads — to achieve zero traffic fatalities by 2025,” said SAFE founder and executive director Damian Kevitt, who lost his right leg in a violent traffic incident in 2013. “Not manage or reduce [them] but eliminate traffic fatalities. We are a decade later and we are at 290 traffic fatalities. … It’s a 26% increase in traffic fatalities since the start of Vision Zero…”
“The city has tools, it’s just not using them,” Kevitt told The Times. “In 2024, voters approved measure HLA by a two-thirds margin. It requires the city must follow its own mobility plan … to make roads safer for cyclists, for pedestrians, for better transit.” He also cited state measure AB 645, which in 2023 authorized a pilot program for speed cameras in a handful of California cities including Los Angeles, as “a tool the city could be implementing — it’s speed safety systems.”
In a perfect illustration of just how unserious the city is about ending traffic deaths, CD 13 Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez was the only member of the city government who bothered to show up.
But hey, Mayor Karen Bass issued a statement.
No, wait. Her office did.
Apparently Mayor Bass had better things to do.
Mayor Karen Bass’ office said in a statement that Bass, who took office in December 2022, “has made street safety a priority by accelerating the implementation of hundreds of new speed humps, signage and intersection treatments which help ensure drivers are traveling slowly and with control near schools. Vision Zero started in 2015 and requires intensive coordination across departments.”
The office pointed to Bass’ October 2024 executive directive to facilitate street repairs, clean parks and infrastructure and city services enhancements ahead of the 2026 World Cup and 2028 Summer Olympic Games in L.A.
So, evidently, we need a World Cup or Olympic Games to justify saving human lives.
Oh, and clean parks.
Got it.
Kevitt had one parting comment for The Times: “Don’t use the word traffic ‘accident’ when writing about this,” he said.
“In the road safety arena, it’s ‘crash’ or ‘collision,’” he said. “ ‘Accident’ implies non-responsibility. It’s just an ‘oops.’ But when you’re driving drunk or distracted, that’s a choice. If you hit and kill or severely injure someone, it’s not an ‘oops.’ We’re trying to say: This is preventable.”
There’s a lot more to the article, and it’s worth a few minutes to read the other comments from people who have lost loved ones. Or fear exactly that.
Particularly since the Times appears to be the only media source that even bothered to cover it.
Evidently, our deadly streets are no more important to the people who report on them than they are to the people we elect to fix them.
Looks like the joke’s on us.
Because nothing will ever change until city leaders care enough to do something about it.
And the media, and the people, care enough to hold them to it.
Then again, my beloved Broncos finished a broken ankle and a snow storm short of the Super Bowl, too.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
No bias here. A Scottish city lived up — or maybe down — to its reputation as “hostile to anyone outside of a car” by scrapping plans for a bike lane through the town center because it would put the “economic vitality” of the town “at serious risk” due to the loss of six whole parking spaces. Yes, six. Never mind that studies have repeatedly shown sales go up when protected bike lanes go down.
LAistexamines Long Beach’s Vision Zero failure, as traffic deaths in the beachside city climb to their highest level in a decade. Although the public radio website may require your email address to read it.
What a long, strange trip it wasn’t. A local leader of San Francisco’s World Naked Bike Ride was arrested when he and several other people showed up naked for a tribute to the Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir, in the mistaken assumption their bare bodies would be seen as a tribute to the band.
I want to be like him when I grow up. A 94-year New Zealand man who survived the Holocaust in Nazi-occupied Holland will attempt to set a new age-group hour record, after already exceeding the record time on his own.
January 20, 2026 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Press conference today with arrested DIY crosswalk painter, and European train definitions exclude disability bikes
Welcome back from the three-day King Day holiday weekend.
I hope your weekend was better than mine, and you got to ride in that perfect January weather, while the rest of the country froze their asses off.
I still haven’t recovered emotionally from writing about that one, and can’t even imagine what they’re going through.
Let’s hope this week is a little better. Okay, a lot better.
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Streets Are For Everyone will host a public press conference at 1 pm today at Kelton Ave and Wilkins Ave in Westwood with founder Damian Kevitt and Jonny Hale of People’s Vision Zero, who went viral when he was arrested for trying to paint a DIY crosswalk when the city wouldn’t.
Instagram post
A press release promoting the event quotes Kevitt as saying,
“The people of Los Angeles want safer roads; they are begging for them. The City has the tools to save lives, but it’s so mired down in bureaucracy, legal red-tape, and fighting lawsuits that it actively prevents simple and effective ways to make roads safer.”
It also quotes Hale,
“We’re not gonna paint every residential intersection, but the same processes that make it hard for us to make roads safer, make it hard for city workers to do their jobs. The city should address this and prioritize street safety and infrastructure.”
Vision Zero failed in this city as much because of the city’s endless bureaucracy as it did for a lack of vision and commitment.
I know it’s the last minute, but maybe a good turnout for this will put some pressure on city officials to do something, or get the hell out of the way and let us do it.
No one should ever go to jail for trying to save lives.
But as usual, failed to consider adaptive bikes and nontraditional bicycles used as mobility devices by disabled passengers.
Unfortunately, once more the absence of diversely disabled people in “the room where it happens” results in continued inequity.
So while this seems to be a compromise, but improvement on the old rules for abled bicyclists, it’s not as good for those riding other types of cycles, particularly disabled people (many of whom need handcycles, trikes, and bikes with seats rather than saddles).
Some will retort this is a compromise and they’ll continue working on it, but (1) I bet they won’t continue working on accessibility & inclusion issues because (2) they probably aren’t working on getting disabled cyclists into the decision making areas of cycle and train advocacy.
And part of the point is that abled cyclists don’t have to do as much work to get answers nor to “prove” their needs.
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Streets For All will host a mobility discussion with city council candidate Faizah Malik, who is challenging CD11 Councilmember Traci Park, on Monday.
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Streetsblog’s Joe Linton demonstrates the danger of slip lanes.
Bluesky post
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Metro will hold a public meeting to discuss the recently released Draft Environmental Impact Report for the Los Angeles River Path Project to close the gap through DTLA, at the Lincoln Heights Community Center this Wednesday.
Bicyclists in Asheville NC are pushing for safer streets in the wake of a collision that killed two men riding bicycles and injured another, when a garbage truck driver drifted onto the wrong side of the road.
That’s more like it. A 35-year old Florida woman agreed to a nine-year sentence for a 2022 hit-and-run crash that killed a 56-year old man riding a bicycle, knocking his body off a bridge and into the river below where he had to be recovered by a Coast Guard crew.
British sprinter Vicky Williamson announced her retirement at 32, despite struggling back from a crash that left her with a broken neck and back, dislocated pelvis and a slipped a disc that knocked her out of the 2016 Rio Olympics.
Day 258 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
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I got a little dose of inspiration yesterday.
My wife, the corgi and I attended the first part of SAFE’s 10th anniversary celebration yesterday evening, before we had to leave for a family commitment.
The nonprofit group known as Streets Are For Everyone was born from Damian Kevitt’s first Finish the Ride, after more than 600 people turned out to ride with him to finish what started out as a pleasant bike ride with his wife, before it was interrupted by a heartless hit-and-run driver.
But in time, it became clear that Kevitt had been struck by the driver of a van while riding on Zoo Drive, and dragged hundreds of feet onto the northbound 5 Freeway by the fleeing driver.
He freed himself from under the van by sheer force of will. And likely survived only because the trailing drivers saw what was happening and stopped to protect him, and because some of those cars has people with medical training, who began treating him at the scene before paramedics arrived.
The odds that he would survive his multiple life-threatening injuries were somewhere between slim and none. But his mother refused to give up and fought for him at every turn. And Damian’s sheer will to live was evident when he told her and his wife that he would one day finish that ride, whatever it took.
In those ten years, Damian has gone from a victim to founder of a successful organization that has spawned other traffic safety groups and shepherded a number of important bills through the state legislature, as well as memorializing victims and calling attention to our most dangerous streets.
He has become someone I truly admire and consider a good friend. And along with Streets For All founder Michael Schneider and Streetsblog’s Joe Linton, he’s one of the first people I reach out to with any bike or pedestrian safety problem that demands a solution.
We are lucky to have people and groups like that fighting for us every day.
Listening to the inspiring stories from other victims of traffic violence, along with SAFE staffers and volunteers, it coalesced in my own mind just why I do what I do, and what keeps me fighting when our mean streets and uncaring officials continue to drag me down and break my heart.
For the first time in a long time, or maybe ever, I can now sum it up in two simple sentences.
I want everyone who wants to ride a bicycle to be able to ride one, regardless of who they are or where they live.
And I want everyone who leaves home today on a bicycle to get home safely.
That’s it.
I’ll keep fighting for that as long as I have any fight in me. Sometimes I think that day was yesterday. And sometimes I think I’m just getting started.
One other note before we move on.
One of the speakers yesterday described how he was struck by a driver and badly injured just five months after moving to Los Angeles. And yesterday’s CicLAvia was the first time he had ridden a bike in this city since.
It was a reminder just how important CicLAvia and other open streets events like Beach Streets in Long Beach, and Active Streets in the San Gabriel Valley, are to all of us.
Because without them, many people in the this car-choked megalopolis wouldn’t ride bikes again.
Or at all.
Top photo: Damian Kevitt speaking at SAFE 10th Anniversary event.
And it’s important to note that Linton’s lawsuit is a personal matter, unrelated to his work for Streetsblog.
In a very narrow ruling, the judge concluded that Metro could join the suit, but could only focus on the Vermont case, and not any other possible cases.
In the discussion in court, the judge engaged Metro’s lawyers regarding how expansive this case would be. Metro’s earlier filing noted that my lawsuit “attacked” Metro’s authority to build “the Vermont Project and other Metro projects.” The judge asked Metro’s lawyer if it was ok to strike references to other projects, and just focus on Vermont. Metro’s lawyer agreed. Towards the end of the discussion, the judge summarized that this trial would focus on one project on Vermont, and that another day could focus on another project on, for example, Western or Alameda
That’s it for now.
Going forward, Metro will undoubtedly argue that HLA is a city ordinance that does not apply to them as a county agency, while Linton’s attorneys will argue that Metro is working for the city on a city project, on a city street included in the city mobility plan.
It will be interesting to see how this develops from here.
Although I’m not sure if they were more appalled because of the Instagram posts or the gender identity of the person behind them.
I haven’t commented about the shooting here because it falls outside of the scope of this site.
But as someone who lived through the killings of both Kennedys and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., as well as the attempted assassinations of Presidents Ford and Reagan, and the near-fatal shooting of Alabama Governor George Wallace, I can attest that no good ever comes from political violence.
And you can’t kill an idea, good or bad, with a bullet.
Known for high-performance gear and a culture-first approach, the company’s MAAP LaB Los Angeles landed on iconic Abbot Kinney Blvd in Venice, their eighth location outside of Australia.
According to StupidDope, it’s designed to be a creative hub for bicyclists and creatives.
At its heart lies a social coffee bar, an anchor point meant to bring riders together before and after their rides. It’s more than a retail space; it’s a venue where cyclists and Venice locals alike can gather, share stories, and connect over a shared passion for performance and design. This approach reflects MAAP’s “Life Around Bikes” philosophy — a reminder that cycling culture is about more than the ride itself.
They’re not the first to try that approach.
And Abbot Kinney is littered with the gravesites of other high-end bike brands who thought they had a “can’t miss” concept in the ideal location.
“We need to be thinking about this from every angle, from the way we design vehicles, to what safety features are in vehicles, to employing technology like speed cameras across the state in a thoughtful way, to driver’s education,” she (Friedman) said.
Friedman also commended West Hollywood and other cities for implementing safer traffic measures, calling the increase in fatal collisions a “public health crisis.”
Because a public health crisis is exactly how we need to be looking at traffic violence. Just like we should consider gun violence, but don’t.
In both cases.
The paper also quotes Streets Are For Everyone, aka SAFE, founder Damian Kevitt citing a “shocking” increase in traffic violence in the city of just 34,000 people.
Kevitt also cited the problem of drivers fleeing following a crash because the penalties for hit-and-run are more lenient than for DUI.
“That is a huge factor and that is where the law needs to catch up,” he said.
Kevitt added that reducing traffic congestion by adding surface area on streets has not been successful in Los Angeles and that using alternative means of transportation is a more effective way of reducing vehicle congestion.
However, we’re not likely to reduce congestion until people feel safer using other forms of transportation on those congested streets.
Because the hit-and-run alert programs for both Los Angeles and California were copied from Colorado’s successful program, which itself was based on the very successful program patterned after the Amber alert system that originated in Denver.
The only difference is they use it, and we don’t. Which just might have something to do with why Colorado solved every felony hit-and-run in 2022, while only around 20% ever get solved in California.
Or maybe they just care enough to devote the resources necessary to solve them, and the cops and elected leaders out here don’t.
A Hollywood judge will now determine whether a 62-year old Pasadena man will stand trial for killing his wife, dismembering her and stuffing her remains in a suitcase, then taking his bicycle on a train, riding his bike to North Figueroa and setting the suitcase on fire in a Home Depot parking lot, after his attorney questioned the man’s mental competency. Gee, ya think?
Burbank unveiled its draft Safer Street action plan, including plans for traffic calming measures on nine separate streets; you can weigh in at the August 12th city council meeting.
Just like West Hollywood last weekend, nearly 100 people in San Rafael gathered outside City Hall Monday evening to honor a “beloved husband, coach and cyclist” who was killed while riding his bike last month, and demand that the city fix the dangerous intersection where he was was run down by a driver.
A Canadian woman just set new Guinness World Records for the fastest speed on a Penny Farthing by a woman at 25.93 mph, and the fastest women’s one kilometer on a Penny Farthing. But bikes like that have only been around for 150 years, so no big deal.
July 21, 2025 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Car a weapon of mass destruction in East Hollywood, vigil for WeHo bike rider, and Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie and…Pee-wee
Day 202 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
One of those resulted in a conviction for a hate crime after Ramirez sucker-punched an employee at a Whole Foods Market in Laguna Beach, telling an officer it was because the man was Black, and “he hated all Black people,” although the conviction was later overturned on appeal.
But maybe it’s time we ask why people with a demonstrated history of violence are allowed to continue operating a potential multi-ton weapon of mass destruction.
Because until we take cars away from violent felons just like we do guns, tragedies like this will keep happening.
Even the corgi honored a request from the family of Blake Ackerman that everyone wear Hawaiian shirts to the vigil for the fallen bicyclist to remember his love for the islands. Photo by Damian Kevitt,
Ackerman’s fiancé Victoria “Torie” Ball was there representing the victim, since his family chose to mourn in private, in what Streets Are For Everyone founder Damian Kevitt described as “a very emotional time for the family.”
The website reports that West Hollywood Mayor Chelsea Byers and Councilmembers Danny Hang and Lauren Meister attended, along with Culver City Councilmember Bryan “Bubba” Fish.
Unfortunately, no representatives of the City of Los Angeles chose to attend, even though the dividing line between the cities is literally the curb on the north side of the street, with Fountain in West Hollywood and the sidewalk in Los Angeles.
According to Kevitt,
“They (Ackerman’s family) thanked us for the work we’re doing–not only remembering Blake, but making sure this moment leads to real change. It’s about more than what happened. It’s about preventing future tragedies.”
Mayor Byers echoed that sentiment. “We’re here holding a vigil for Blake, who died on Fountain Avenue while riding his bike, and we’re vowing to fight for safer streets in West Hollywood and across the region,” she said. “I’m grateful that a council member from Culver City joined us tonight–it shows this is a regional issue. We’re all fighting for a future where people don’t have to risk their lives just to ride a bike.”
Amen to that.
A poster for another fatal hit-and-run was posted across the street from the Ackerman vigil and ghost bike, for a crash less than two weeks earlier, and just block away.
You can just imagine the lessons learned by future school kids as they admire memorabilia from Alamo legends Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, William Travis, and yes, Pee-wee Herman.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Once again, the LAPD failed to use their hit-and-run alert system, and waited months to tell us a man in his 60s was severely injured when he was struck by a hit-and-run driver, while riding his bicycle in LA’s Pico-Union neighborhood in the early hours of May 28th; there is a standing $25,000 reward for any hit-and-run resulting in serious injuries in the City of Los Angeles.
Nelson Vails, 1984 Olympic cycling hero and the first Black man to win an Olympic medal, says he likes RAGBRAI, aka the Des Moines Register’s Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa, because it’s just a relaxed ride, and not a race.
More proof cyclists are tough, after Julian Alaphilippe popped his shoulder out crashing his bike on stage 15, popped it back in, and still finished just off the podium — even though he thought he won, except a) two riders finished far ahead of him and the rest of the peloton, and b) Primož Roglič knocked him off the podium in a photo finish.
February 19, 2025 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Collecting bikes for Altadena fire victims, 12 years since crash inspired Finish the Ride, and NY congestion pricing works
Day 50 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
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Hats off to my old friend and former longtime LACBC staffer and volunteer Colin Bogart, who has organized a bike donation program for victims of the Eaton Fire for Pasadena nonprofit Day One.
According to the Pasadena Complete Streets Coalition, the nonprofit is working with the Bicycle Kitchen, the Bike Oven, the Bikerowave, and the Long Beach Bicycle Co-op to collect and repair the bikes, along with local bike shops including Around the Cycle, Pasadena Cyclery, and Trek Pasadena.
The organization has received requests for over 300 bicycles.
So if you have a bike you don’t need, or can help in some other way, drop it off at Day One’s Pasadena office at 175. N. Euclid Ave from 9:30am to 5:30pm Tuesdays, Wednesdays or Thursdays, or by special arrangement 626/657.8744 or colin@godayone.org.
Remarkably, Damian channeled the trauma of the crash that cost him a leg, and nearly his life, into the creation of Finish The Ride and Streets Are For Everyone to fight for safer streets and an end to hit-and-run.
And no, the driver was never found.
Twitter post
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More proof New York’s congestion pricing is working, even as Trump vows to kill it.
Twitter post
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Seriously? A writer for the Boston Globeinvestigates who has the right to public space on the streets, after a mayoral candidate calls for hitting pause on building bike lanes, and can only manage to conclude that bike lanes are the third rail of Boston politics. Even though the law is clear that bike riders have a right to the road, and well-designed bike lanes improve safety for all road users.
As we noted the other day, some people are criticizing a new demonstration bike lane in Santa Clarita, complaining that the flexible plastic bollards separating it from motor vehicles are a form of visual blight, but even the president of the Santa Clarita Valley Bicycle Coalition sympathized with the outcry over the “aesthetic unattractiveness.”
State
Calbike is hosting a webinar this Thursday to discuss creative approaches to funding active transportation infrastructure, as the usual sources threaten to dry up.
SAFE founder Damian Kevitt criticized the city’s Vision Zero program, intended to eliminate traffic deaths, as “an abysmal failure.”
“We aren’t even remotely doing [Vision Zero], so let’s stop trying to fool everyone by saying that we are.” He emphasized SAFE doesn’t oppose Vision Zero, but urges the city to step up and take its program more seriously.
“We need to yell and yell loud and don’t stop yelling… for safer roads” Kevitt urged, leading the assembled crowd in chanting, “Mayor Bass, where’s your plan?”
Maybe if we all sign the petition up at the top, we could do that yelling where she might actually hear us.
The speakers included state legislators and C-30 Congressional candidates Assemblymember Laura Friedman and State Senator Anthony Portantino, as well as Councilmember Nithya Raman.
A handful of elected officials joined the rally. Assemblymember Laura Friedman recounted her long struggles to pass much-needed legislation to allow cities to cap speed limits and to install automated speed enforcement. “Let’s slow people down,” Friedman urged, “let’s take back our streets!”
State Senator Anthony Portantino urged attendees to “turn tears… and pain… and tragedy… into action” for safer streets. L.A. City Councilmember Nithya Raman spoke about her success in implementing bikeways, funding for bus shelters, and more. Raman urged treating the “staggering rise in deaths” as the “public heath crisis that it is.”
Take a few minutes to read the whole thing. Because far too many people are dying on our streets, and the city isn’t doing anywhere near enough to stop it.
I am starting this report with a question that anyone reading this must think about:
How many more Angelenos need to die before we, as a collective city, start treating traffic violence with the urgency it deserves?
In January 2023, Streets Are For Everyone produced its first report, Dying on the Streets of Los Angeles, looking at traffic violence trends, the numbers behind them, and other statistics related to traffic violence in Los Angeles.
The numbers were disturbing. They showed that what was being done to address traffic violence was clearly not working and needed a significant change in action, level of funding, and dedication if our elected officials truly intended to save lives on the roads of Los Angeles. The report laid out four broad steps that needed to be taken. In short, these were:
Cut the bureaucracy by declaring a state of emergency related to traffic violence.
Reestablish Vision Zero with accountability, transparency, and PURPOSE.
Prioritize lives over the right to speed.
Get real about the magnitude of the problem by funding road safety improvements at a level that might start to make a difference.
Guess how many of those items city leaders actually checked off? No, really, we’ll wait.
And once again, take a few minutes to read the whole thing.
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
You can smell the bullshit a mile away when bike lanes are rejected in the name of safety, as they were in one upstate New York town, although the real reason seems to be preserving parking spaces. Because we all know that human lives are less important than personal convenience.
Miss Manners confronts drama on the bike trail, as a man’s riding companions give him the cold shoulder for taking too long to chat with friends in another group, delaying their group ride.
This is why people keep dying on our streets. A 32-year old man with 19 previous traffic citations agreed to plead guilty to killing 32-year old BMX champ Nathan “Nate” Miller, after prosecutors agreed to a sentence of probation or just one year in prison. Congratulations to Nevada officials on keeping him on the road until he actually killed someone, then letting him loose to do it again.
The allegedly stoned driver who killed two brothers riding with their kids in the annual Spring Tour of St. George bicycle ride escaped with a pair of third-degree vehicular homicide convictions when the jury returned a split verdict; the woman claimed she was shitting on herself as she drove, and didn’t notice the men riding their bikes on the side of the road.
Nashville star Zach Bryan is one of us, riding a tandem with his girlfriend in Amsterdam while high on ‘shrooms and blasting the late Warren Zevon’s Lawyers, Guns and Money on endless repeat. I confess to two out of the three, though how much of that applies to you is entirely a matter of your own personal habits.
New York Magazineconsiders MIPS helmets, and whether you need one. Unlike MIPS, regular bike helmets are designed to prevent fractures, not traumatic brain injuries. So the short answer is yes, if you’re going to wear one at all.
This is the cost of traffic violence. The 68-year old founder of a UK arts and health charity was killed when his bike was rear-ended by a 19-year old driver; he was described as a gifted pianist, talented mathematician, bridge builder and visionary leader.
June 9, 2023 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Metro considers Alameda mobility options, 10th Anniversary of Finish The Ride this weekend, and writers bike the strike
Anyone who has tried to walk or bike Alameda Street south of Union Station in DTLA knows it’s just this side of a traffic choked living hell.
The options range from closing or moving offramps and widening sidewalks, to converting Arcadia Street to a pedestrian walkway and capping the 101 Freeway to create a new park.
Let’s hope our officials have the courage and foresight to make the choice that will most dramatically remake Downtown Los Angeles.
This weekend marks the tenth anniversary of Finish The Ride, which began when Damian Kevitt invited the public to join him in finishing the Griffith Park ride that was interrupted by a hit-and-run driver, who has never been caught.
More than 2,000 “cyclists, runners, walkers, challenged athletes, veterans, first responders, civic and community leaders, and safe streets advocates from across Southern California” are expected to turn out to demand safer streets for everyone.
This year’s event has been divided into two parts, with Finish The Run on Saturday, and Finish The Ride on Sunday.
You’ll also have a chance to meet two highly qualified candidates to replace Adam Schiff in California’s 30th Congressional District, in Laura Friedman and Anthony Portantino.
I’ll let the folks at Finish The Ride take it from here.
Finish The Ride (www.FinishTheRide.org) was founded in the aftermath of a vicious hit-and-run crime in 2013 that saw cyclist Damian Kevitt lose his leg after being dragged under a car from the streets of Griffith Park onto and down Interstate 5 for nearly a quarter mile. A year later, Kevitt was accompanied by hundreds of cyclists, street safety advocates, and community leaders as part of a campaign to raise awareness of an epidemic of hit-and-run crimes in Los Angeles.
Last year participants in Finish The Ride and Finish The Run demanded that Griffith Park be made safer for the tens of thousands who use it weekly for recreation and exercise. As a result, only a couple of months later, a section of Griffith Park Drive was transformed from a road into a closed pedestrian, bicycle, and equestrian path, and 4 million dollars of funding was approved for additional safety renovations across the park.
According to a report by the non-profit Streets Are For Everyone (known as SAFE), the City of Los Angeles saw a record 312 fatalities last year, most of them pedestrians, and tens of thousands more seriously injured. The primary factor in all these collisions was reckless speeding. SAFE has been involved in a massive state-wide campaign to educate about and advocate for the need to reign in reckless speeding to save lives. Part of this campaign has demanded that legislators pass AB 645, a pilot program that would allow the limited use of speed safety cameras in school zones and on the most dangerous roads in 6 cities across the state. Over 1800 have signed a petition to demand that legislators support AB 645. As a result of this campaign, AB 645 just passed the Assembly with overwhelming support (58 to 7).
This year’s Finish The Ride and Finish The Run event brings together people from all walks to continue the call to demand that roads be made safer and reckless speeding be addressed as the public health crisis that it is.
Finish The Ride and Finish The Run is now in its 10th year and will be held over two days – runners and walkers on Saturday and cyclists on Sunday. On Saturday, there will be the usual 5K/10K run/walk and half-marathon run. On Sunday will be the usual 15-mile, 25-mile, 35-mile, and 50 miles rides. New additions to this year’s event are the Los Feliz Neighborhood Council 1K Kids Run and a Puppy Run on Saturday and the Bahati Foundation Metric Century on Sunday.
Saturday, 10 June 2023 – Finish The Run
(1200 runners and walkers expected)
Time: 7:30 AM Griffith Park Half-Marathon starts
8 AM Finish the Run Opening Ceremony with Civic Leaders and other Victims of Traffic Violence speaking (All other events depart following the opening ceremony)
Where: Griffith Park, Crystal Springs Area
4663 Crystal Springs Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90027
Who: Asm Laura Friedman
Councilmember Nithya Raman
Damian Kevitt, Founder of Finish The Ride/Finish The Run and Streets Are For Everyone
Cindi Enamorado, sister of Raymond Olivares, who lost his life in February 2023 at the hands of a driver engaged in street racing.
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Sunday, 11 June 2023 – Finish The Ride
(800 cyclists expected)
Time: 7 AM Olympic Silver Medalist Nelson Nails leads the Bahati Foundation Metric Century and Andrew Jelmert Half Century Ride
8 AM Finish the Ride Opening Ceremony with Civic Leaders and other Victims of Traffic Violence speaking (All other events depart following the opening ceremony)
Where: Griffith Park, Crystal Springs Area
4663 Crystal Springs Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90027
Who: Senator Anthony Portantino
Damian Kevitt, Founder of Finish The Ride and Streets Are For Everyone
Curtis Townsend Sr., who lost his wife, Trina Newman-Townsend, in a hit-and-run on Christmas Eve in 2022.
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Seen on the street: A WGA writer bikes the strike.
David Drexler shares video showing the full length of the new Mark Bixby bike/ped path on the International Gateway Bridge, taken on last month’s opening day.
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Gravel Bike California accepts the challenge of biking the Desert X biennial art installation across the “vast & sandy” Coachella Valley in a single day.
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A UC Davis bike rider is on the hunt for a hit-and-run e-cart driver.
And yes, it’s legally hit-and-run if you just cause someone to fall, even without making contact.
Reddit post
Thanks to Megan Lynch for the heads-up.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on rolling.
Ocean City, New Jersey tabled plans to ban ebikes from the city’s boardwalk, instead creating a committee to study the issue. If they’re anything like Los Angeles, having a committee study something means no one will ever hear about it again.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Pasadena is launching its own ebike rebate program on July 1st, with rebates up to $1,000 for city residents. Meanwhile, Los Angeles hasn’t even discussed any program to get motor vehicles off the streets, with ebikes or otherwise.
Laguna Beach is requiring students to complete an ebike safety course in exchange for a permit to park their bike on campus. Which is a great way to discourage bike commuting, and force people without permits back into cars.
Colorado officially announced their new program to provide ebike rebates for residents earning less than 80% to 100% of their county’s median income. Just the latest city, state or province to provide ebike rebates before California’s vastly underfunded, fomerly-first-in-the-nation program gets off the ground — which should finally happen soon.
Huh? A Columbus, Ohio TV station says many people are priced out of bicycling by the high cost of bikes, even while mentioning a nonprofit shop that sells refurbished bikes for around a hundred bucks. Seriously, cost should never be a barrier to bicycling, when there are countless options for low cost bikes. Or even free ones like the one above.
