To be honest, I’m pretty wrung out after writing about our third SoCal bicycling death in just three days.
And I don’t have a lot of time left to work tonight after dealing with all that before my last drop-dead deadline to get some sleep — hopefully not literally. So let’s just see how much we can get done, and try to catch up on more tomorrow.
And that includes the photos I promised you from Sunday’s CicLAvia, so I hope you’ll be patient with me for a few days.
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Mark your calendar for at least two more CicLAvias this year, despite Metro’s threats of cutbacks to future events that would only coincide with the World Cup and the ’28 Olympics.
Next up is a return to South LA with Leimert Park meets Expo Park at the end of June.
Streetblog’s Joe Linton offers photos from Sunday’s very busy West LA CicLAvia, including the newly repaired bakery window at the 99 Ranch Market, where an elderly driver killed three people crashing into the building February 5th.
Redditor johnnyshotit has some nice shots, too, while Michael Schneider offers video from the day.
And speaking of Schneider, he spotted a new LA modal filter.
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Police in Santa Monica will conduct yet another of the LA area’s traffic safety enforcement operations targeted at traffic violations that endanger pedestrians and bicyclists today.
The operation will be in force this afternoon and evening, from 2 pm to 8 pm.
As usual, ride to the letter of the law until you cross the city limits, because the cops may be focused on motorists, but they’re legally required to enforce any violations they see, regardless of who commits it.
Meanwhile, today may be your best day to ride a bike on a state roadway, as the CHP begins a 24-hour Maximum Enforcement Period focused on speeding drivers. Unless you can top the posed speed limit on your bike, which was always a personal goal of mine.
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Once again, a driver has deliberately attacked bike riders for the simple crime of being in his way.
This time, the assault came in Cherokee County, Georgia, where a 72-year old man faces charges for deliberately driving into a pair of bicyclists on a 33-mile group ride, after calling 911 and repeatedly honking his horn — even though the next lane was empty and he could have easily just gone around them.
The driver later told sheriff’s deputies “it wasn’t ‘reasonable’ for cyclists to take a whole lane, so ‘he drove into them.'”
“I told him I had video of the incident and offered to show it to him, which he stated he didn’t want to see because he knew he did nothing wrong,” the report says.
Fortunately, no one was seriously injured.
He is now being held without bond on two counts of aggravated assault, hit and run, reckless driving, aggressive driving and failure to maintain a safe distance from a bicycle.
Which is a lot of charges for “not doing anything wrong.”
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UCLA will mark Bike Month with two days of pit stops, and three bike repair days.
Meanwhile, Pasadena announces a full month of Bike Month activities.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Trash collection company Waste Management pinky swears they’re going to stop leaving empty trash bins in the bike lane on LA’s Reseda Blvd.
A 73-year old Wisconsin man faces charges for pointing a gun at a 13-year old boy riding an ebike, after the kid kept riding away when the older man tried to confront him; no word on whether the gun was loaded.
Waymo effectivesly tells London bike riders “screw you,” arguing that it’s just too high a bar to expect their autonomous cabs to keep out of bike lanes, because customers want to be dropped off in them. Although the few times I’ve used one, I can’t recall ever being asked whether or not I want to be let out in a bike lane. I can recall getting extremely carsick, however.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
A Binghampton, New York man faces charges for playing repo man with a baseball bat, beating another man senseless when the victim didn’t pay everything he owed after buying an ebike from him; he then rode off with the bike in question.
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Local
Bike thefts in West Hollywood surged a whopping 250% last year, ten times the increase in shoplifting, though the overall numbers are relatively small.
You’ll now find a new conservation mural facing the Ballona Creek Bike Path on the ima Members Lounge building on Sepulveda Blvd; created by Victor Ving with support from the League of Conservation Voters, the mural calls for protecting our public lands.
State
Streetsblog’s Melanie Curry reviews Calbike’s California Bike Summit in Sacramento last week, with the first installment focused on advice for living with Caltrans.
A Eureka father and son made just their 5th stop at a Major League ballpark in San Diego Monday, after roughly one month and 1,500 miles on the road in their journey to visit all 30 American and National League parks in support of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
A 26-year old Stockton man was lucky to escape injury when a car pulled up next to him as he was riding his bike, and someone fired a gun out the window.
There’s a new king of the hill in San Francisco, where British hillclimb champ Harry MacFarlane set a new KOM for the city’s steepest hill, with a ridiculous 41% average gradient.
Streetsblog says San Francisco’s two-mile linear Sunset Dunes park is an unqualified success on it’s first anniversary, as the city’s traffic safety has improved, merchants are doing better and the park is more popular than ever.
Sacramento’s CapRadio explains why California’s crackdown on ebikes may not solve the biggest safety risks, which are caused by e-motorbikes and dirt bikes, often of questionable legality.
National
Governing writes that ebike regulations are proliferating across the US, while advocates warn “some laws risk over-regulating low-speed bikes while ignoring high-speed e-motos.” No shit.
There’s not a pit in hell deep enough for a Pennsylvania man accused of fleeing the scene after killing a third grader riding a bicycle, while driving under the influence; when police smelled alcohol on his breath after tracking him to his home, he first asked “How can I get a DUI if I have been drinking at my house all day?”, before admitting he’d felt “a bump” while he was driving home.
Heartbreaking news from North Carolina, where a 51-year old man faces multiple charges after he “veered off” a roadway while under the influence of coke, opiates and benzodiazepines, and slammed into a nine-year old boy as he sat on a bike in his own driveway, knocking the kid into retaining wall and severing his leg. Speaking of that pit in hell…
International
Residents of Liverpool, England say they don’t think plans for a five-mile bike lane connecting two other bikeways is popular with locals due to a loss of parking, even though 77% of respondents support it, and 69% say they’ll use it.
Velo looks at “jaw-dropping” custom road and gravel bikes at London’s Bespoked Show.
Bicycling deaths climbed nearly 4% in Germany last year, with over 61% of the victims aged 65 or more, while nearly half involved ebikes.
Katmandu, meet Los Angeles. Asian News Network says bicycling used to be central to life in Nepal, but now it’s done mainly for sport, as “poor infrastructure, unsafe roads, and status-driven attitudes continue to keep cycling from becoming a mode of commuting.”
Competitive Cycling
Tadej Pogačar and French wunderkind Paul Seixas battled back and forth before Pogačar pulled away to wrap up his third consecutive Liège-Bastogne-Liège; Remco Evenepoel settled for third, his day doomed by a badly timed breakaway.
Dutch cyclist Demi Vollering ran away with a solo win at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, demonstrating her mastery of women’s cycling following her uphill victory on Wednesday in Flèche Wallonne.
Tragic news from Spain, where former WorldTour pro Cristian Muñoz died in Spain Thursday night from complications due to a knee infection following a crash at France’s Tour du Jura Cycliste on April 18; the Colombian cyclist was just 30 years old.
More tragic news, this time from Belgium, where U-23 cyclist Milan Bral was killed when he was struck while training for next month’s Gent-Wevelgem under-23 race; Bral is the nephew of Soudal-Quickstep sports director and former pro cyclist Sep Vanmarcke.
Former WorldTour pro Mike Woods asks the burning question we’d all like to know, what the hell happened to North American bike racing in the decade-plus since he competed on the circuit.
Finally…
Your next ebike could be a weird little solar powered, 75 mph car — but yes, you still have to pedal it. If you’re going to try to run down someone on a bicycle, try to make sure it’s not a bike cop first.
And yes, it’s true.
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Be safe, and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.
Oh, and fuck Putin.
