Tag Archive for ebike rebates

CA ebike voucher program’s failure to launch, what it takes to make LA bike-friendly, and Hyperloop bites the dust

December 22, 2023 / / One comment

It’s the final weekend of the 9th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

Just three short days to open your heart and wallet, and show your support for SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy.

So thanks to Kurt G and Michael M for their generous donations to keep all the best bike news coming your way every day. 

Now it’s up to you.

We’ve got a long way to go to catch up to last year’s record-setting fund drive — let alone once again top the previous year’s total for the 9th year in a row. 

It’ll be a stretch, but we can do it with your help.

So don’t wait.

Seriously, stop what you’re doing, and donate now!

Because the time to give is rapidly running out.

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As always, we’ll be taking the coming week between the holidays off, so I can have my annual pre-scheduled emotional collapse after making it through another year.

Okay, I’m joking. Sort of.

So please accept my best wishes for warm and wonderful holidays, whatever and however you celebrate. And a heathy, happy and prosperous year to come.

Just be careful riding over the next ten days, when the number of drunks on the road will increase exponentially, and frenzied shoppers and celebrants will be looking for anyone but you.

I want to see you back here bright and early January 2nd.

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If you haven’t already, sign the petition demanding a public meeting with LA Mayor Karen Bass to listen to the dangers we all face just walking and biking on the streets of LA, and city’s ongoing failure to actually do anything about it.

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

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Days left to launch the California ebike incentive program this fall as promised: -1

As expected, the California Air Resources Board once again missed their own self-appointed deadline begin operations this fall — in fact, all their self-appointed deadlines for two years running.

Talk about a failure to launch.

Instead, thousands of low-income Californians have continued to burn fossil fuels and clog our roads, when they could have switched to cleaner, more efficient ebikes instead — defeating the entire purpose of the program, which was the first in the nation when it passed the state legislature.

And now could end up being one of the last to launch before they finally get it going.

Or maybe if.

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Writing for City Watch, former Los Angeles city planner Dick Platkin considers what it will take to create a bike-friendly LA.

From his perspective, the problem stems from —

Reason 1:  Despite bike plans adopted by Metro, LA County and LA City, Los Angeles has consistently underfunded the construction of a robust bicycle lane network

Reason 2:  There is little effort to follow the official plans, no constant funding to build bicycle lanes, and too much bicycle infrastructure is built to serve new commercial projects, rather than meet actual need

Reason 3:  City proposals to construct new, buffered bicycle lanes on wide boulevards often meet organized resistance by people who don’t want to lose parking or traffic lanes

Reason 4:  Too many proposals for new bikes lanes come from local boosters to build stand-alone bicycle lanes so nearby real estate projects can reduce costly parking requirements

I’d say the problem is more a lack of political will among elected leaders, who listen only to the loudest voices, combined with flushing too much money down the induced-demand toilet that could go to reducing the demand for cars.

But it’s worth taking his thoughts into consideration when we consider how to fight for safer, more complete and livable streets

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Engage schadenfreude now.

Elon Musk’s Hyperloop project bites the dust, after failing to reinvent transit.

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A new book intends to empower women of color to get on their bikes.

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Gravel Bike California returns to Maverick Cycles to go deeper into the dirt around the hills of Whittier.

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‘Tis the season.

An Ohio bike nonprofit donated 137 bike and helmets for local kids in need, and has given away over 1,000 bicycles over the last eight years.

Also in Ohio, an automotive software company continued their six-year tradition of building bicycles to donate to children, many of whose parents are military members.

Forty-four Indiana preschoolers got new bicycles in a holiday raffle, courtesy of the Northern Indiana Hispanic Health Coalition.

A Virginia bike group cooperated with the local Jewish Family Services and a community tool bank to distribute new bikes to families in need.

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

A US judge declared open season on bike riders by federal agents, concluding that the case against an Oregon DEA agent could be dropped because he was performing his official duties when he ran a stop sign and killed an Oregon bike rider.

Bike riders in Queensland, Australia could be subjected to random breathalyzer tests to ferret out people biking under the influence, under a new proposal from the state government.

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

Um, okay. A Greeley, Colorado man got drunk and followed another man on his bike, while somehow swinging a 25-pound propane tank. Something tell me there’s more to this story. And chances are, we’ll never find out what it is, dammit. 

A man in New York’s Tribeca neighborhood had to seek medical attention after he was struck in the eye with a hard boiled egg hurled by a member of a bike “gang.” Although the story never actually uses the word bicycle, so the perp could have been a motorbike rider. 

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Local 

Streets Are For Everyone, aka SAFE, will conduct another die-in on the steps of Los Angeles City Hall on January 27th.

Santa Monica-based Bird has gone belly-up, as the once high-flying micromobility company filed for dissolution in bankruptcy court; the filing comes just days after West Hollywood extended its contract with the company.

An unusually succinct Westlake Village letter writer says bike lanes are a start, but bike riders need protection, not paint.

 

State

Caltrans continues to flush our hard-earned money down the induced-demand toilet, with a $15.7 billion shopping list of highway projects.

Sad news from San Jose, where a bike-riding man was killed when he was right hooked by a van driver turning into a parking lot; he was the 48th victim of traffic violence in the city this year.

 

National

Ebike sales have quadrupled in the US over the past five years. No thanks to California’s moribund voucher program. 

Slate considers how American motor vehicles grew into massive killers on steroids.

Offroad.cc lists the best offroad podcasts that you must follow in 2024. No, judging by the headline, it appears to be mandatory.

Pink Bike uses AI to makes big bike tech predictions, which promptly proceeds to get much of it wrong. But at least they didn’t let the AI write it.

So much for street art. Spokane, Washington removed a guerilla sculpture depicting a woman riding a bicycle up a massive bridge support column.

More on the moron who fled the scene after running down two bicyclists riding on Colorado’s Lookout Mountain while running another rider off the road, leaving one man in the ICU with major injuries; the story makes it sound like two Mustang drivers may have been racing, without actually saying that. A crowdfunding campaign for the most seriously injured victim has raised over $41,000 of the $50,000 goal. You know, in case you have any extra money left over after donating to this site.

A Texas advocacy group speaks out about the pickup driver charged with running down and killing a couple riding their bikes earlier this year, saying “under no circumstances should anyone drive distracted.”

Illinois bicyclists are pondering their next move, after the state Supreme Court made them all second-class citizens by absurdly ruling that bikes are merely “permitted” on the streets without bike infrastructure, but not the intended users.

Streets.mn recommends being safer and more stylish on your bike at night with Reflauro, a new reflective technology devoted by 3M, and made in America by a women-owned company.

Momentum says New York needs more bike lanes like the extra-wide bike lanes on 10th Ave. Don’t we all.

Conflicting data out of New York, where bicycling deaths reached a record high, while pedestrian fatalities are reaching a historic low.

 

International

An 81-year old Brazilian man and his 19-year old son were both killed in a freak crash when the father went looking for his son on his bicycle, and crashed head-on into the son riding home on his motorbike.

The brother of a missing British man fears he may have ingested a poisonous mushroom while foraging in France, while on a long-distance bike tour from Scotland to India.

Maybe there really is a war on cars, as The Guardian says European cities are turning on the car by adopting varied approaches to reducing traffic congestion and pollution; Paris has joined London in having more bicycles than cars during rush hour.

Speaking of once high-flying companies, Swedish inflatable bike helmet maker Hövding has gone belly-up, after a Swedish consumer agency ruled the helmets are unsafe.

Japan’s National Police Agency is proposing fining scofflaw bicyclists up to 12,000 yen for violations such as running red lights or distracted bicycling. Which sounds scary, until you realize that converts to a tad over $84.

 

Competitive Cycling

Hats off to Australia’s Amanda Reid, who became the first paracyclist and indigenous person to be named the country’s cyclist of the year.

YouTube will premier the second season of the Call of a Life Time series next month, “chronicling the highs and lows experienced by key riders in the past year’s Life Time Grand Prix circuit.”

Cycling Weekly considers the silliest cycling rules UCI should do away with. Like a ban on puppy paws, for instance.

 

Finally…

That feeling when no one uses the new bike lanes but Santa. Or when you want an ebike trailer inspired by the hideous Tesla Cybertruck.

And that feeling when you need a lowrider bike inspired by a regional cult-favorite hamburger chain.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , ,

Murder charge in Cervantes hit-and-run, Major Taylor Congressional medal, and bike rider injured in Texas mass shooting

December 7, 2023 / / Comments Off on Murder charge in Cervantes hit-and-run, Major Taylor Congressional medal, and bike rider injured in Texas mass shooting

It’s Day 14 of the 9th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

Sadly, there were no donations yesterday. Which means you now have just 17 days left to help keep all the best bike news and advocacy coming your way every day. 

So seriously, stop what you’re doing and give now!

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Murder.

That’s what a 16-year old boy has been charged with after allegedly intentionally running down a bike-riding man in Long Beach last summer.

The teenager, who hasn’t been publicly named due to his age, is charged with killing 29-year old Leobardo Cervantes in a high speed hit-and-run July 9th.

Cervantes was riding at at the intersection of California Ave and Harding Street in Long Beach when he was struck with the boy’s car, who reportedly used it as a weapon to attack Cervantes.

He died from his injuries two weeks later.

There’s no word on why the boy slammed his car into Cervantes bike, or what evidence led investigators to conclude the act was intentional.

However, it follows a series of similar attacks on bicyclists by teenaged drivers stretching from Huntington Beach to Las Vegas.

The driver was arrested in jail, where he was already being held on other charges.

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Days left to launch the California ebike incentive program as promised this fall: 14

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About damn time.

Major Taylor could finally get the recognition he deserved in his lifetime, 92 years after his death.

The Black cycling champ, who dominated the bike racing world at a time when he couldn’t dine or ride in the same train car with the white riders he’d just beaten, could be honored with a posthumous Congressional Gold Medal.

Illinois Congress member Jonathan L. Jackson will introduce a bill today to honor Taylor, which would make him only the second bicyclist to receive one, following America’s only remaining Tour de France winner.

Let’s hope it’s something our severely divided Congress can actually agree on.

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A person riding a bicycle was lucky to survive the country’s latest mass shooting.

Or make that the second-latest, anyway.

The bike rider was wounded as part of a day-long shooting rampage through the streets of Austin, Texas on Tuesday, which resulted in the deaths of four people, and wounded two Austin police officers, in addition to the bicyclist.

Thirty-four-year old Shane James was taken into custody following a police chase after shooting the cop.

No reason was given for the shootings.

But it’s yet another reminder that cars aren’t the only things killing people on our streets.

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Help clean up the Venice Blvd bike lanes next Saturday.

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‘Tis the season.

Men’s Journal recommends “great gift ideas” for bicyclists, including the kind who don’t go anywhere.

For the second time in four years, a kindhearted 13-year old North Carolina boy gave up his own birthday present to buy a new bicycle for a kid’s Christmas present.

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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 group of New York demonstrators gathered to demand license plates on ebikes, because someone “almost” got hit by someone riding one. Just wait until they hear about cars, which already have plates and hit a hell of a lot more people — and do far more damage when they do.

A Toronto bike lawyer complains about city officials ignoring mounting traffic violence, while prosecuting bicyclists for speeding in a public park.

A 35-year old English driver was sentenced to life in prison for the vehicular murder of a 23-year old man, after driving up on the sidewalk to kill the victim as he sat on his bike, then responding with a laughing face to a post about the victim’s injuries; he’ll have to serve at least 20 years before he’s eligible for parole. Which will be 20 years too soon.

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

An LAPD officer was reportedly injured when someone riding with a group of bicyclists allegedly shined an “industrial strength laser” at the cop near LA Live in DTLA; no word on the condition of the officer of if any arrests have been made.

A British man has been jailed for riding his bike, after he rode to a probation meeting despite being legally prohibited from using a bicycle or e-scooter, following multiple assaults against women after riding up to them; he’ll serve 11 months behind bars for violating the ban at least twice.

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Expressionist artistic image of corgi riding a bicycle

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Local 

Families are invited to the free Youth Mountain Bike Demo Days at Santa Clarita’s new Trek Bike Park.

A Santa Monica letter writer complains about concrete curb-protected bike lanes, arguing that the white plastic car-tickler bollards are better because they don’t trap riders and debris in the bike lane. On the other hand, they don’t keep cars out, either. 

 

State

San Diego Magazine gets right to the good stuff, with recommendations on where to grab a cold brew after a hot ride. Or a cold ride, for that matter.

The Bay Area’s BART transit system will now allow people with bicycles to carry their bikes on escalators, and use most train cars starting January 1st; bikes are currently banned from all but the last three cars, and riders are forced to carry them up and down stairs.

Oakland will pay a 57-year old man $6.5 million dollars after he suffered spinal and brain injuries when he hit a seam in the pavement as he rode downhill in a new bike lane; Oakland officials were aware of the dangerous conditions after receiving numerous complaints, but chose to ignore it.

 

National

Now that you can send direct messages on Strava, Bicycling offers advice on how to safeguard your inbox. Good advice, since this could turn out to be just another way to harass female riders, as well as others. Read it on AOL this time if the magazine blocks you. 

Cycling Weekly calls Ass Savers new clip-on mudguard the best $27 bike accessory you can buy.

If you build it, the will come. Bicycling rates increased nearly 150% on weekdays and 50% on weekends in just six months after Seattle installed a new two-way semi-protected bike lane, while walking rates nearly doubled.

A new report from a public-private partnership at the University of Washington provides a road map showing how cities can plan for large-scale adoption of cargo ebikes.

Colorado-based mountain bikemaker Guerrilla Gravity has gone out of business, and is liquidating its manufacturing equipment.

A group of Houston bike advocates turned out to urge the city’s next mayor to build more bike lanes, whoever that turns out to be following a runoff election.

That’s more like it. An Ohio man was sentenced to 12 to 17.5 years behind bars for the drunken hit-and-run that killed a 60-year old man as he was riding his bike on the sidewalk. Yes, the sidewalk.

New York repealed a decade-old law that created needless legal barriers to building bike paths, resulting in unnecessary delays.

After riding mountain bikes for the past 20 years, a Blue Ridge Mountain man says he prefers gravel now that he’s getting up there.

A Florida bike shop gave a 40-year old man a new bike after his was destroyed by a hit-and-run driver.

 

International

If you build it, they will come, too. London bicycling rates are up 20% compared to pre-pandemic times, after the city went on a massive bike lane binge.

A pair of Scottish craftsmen are teaming with bikewear brand Endura to recreate the world’s first pedal bicycle.

Four years of the Black Unity Bike Ride brought Brits out to ride for racial justice.

A British website examines the anatomy of the successful Stop Killing Cyclists campaign as a model for other protests.

A new German company is on a mission to make bike cargo trailers cool again.

Bike ridership rates have nearly doubled in Estonia’s capital city over the past year, with bike riders now accounting for nearly ten percent of traffic at some city intersections.

I want to be like him when I grow up. An 89 year old New Zealand man has put over 12,000 miles on his ebike since buying it four years ago. Another reminder of the benefits ebikes can have for elderly people, who might not be able to ride regular bikes. 

 

Competitive Cycling

Former Tour de France winner, admitted doper and successful cycling team leader Bjarne Riis is finally retired from the sport, and is now living in Switzerland and selling heat pumps imported from Lithuania.

Pink Bike and Scott profile four-time National Champ and 2021 Olympic mountain biker Erin Huck, who manages to combine professional cycling with being mother to a young toddler.

 

Finally…

That feeling when you’re banned for doping from seniors tandem racing. If you’re delivering meth on your bike, stop for the damn stop sign, already.

And now we’re getting somewhere. Grand Theft Auto, the video game dedicated to glorifying vehicular violence, now has bike lanes.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

New report calls traffic cams “underutilized resource,” and just 15 days left to launch CA ebike incentives by fall deadline

December 6, 2023 / / Comments Off on New report calls traffic cams “underutilized resource,” and just 15 days left to launch CA ebike incentives by fall deadline

It’s lucky Day 13 of the 9th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

Which means there are just 18 days left to show your support for SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy.

So thanks to John L and James B for their generous donations to keep all the freshest bike news coming your way every day. 

So what are you waiting for?

Take a moment and give now!

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They get it.

A new report from the Governors Highway Safety Association, in association with State Farm, calls automated traffic cams an “underutilized tool in the fight to reduce dangerous driving behaviors that contribute to more than 100 people dying on U.S. roads every day.”

That’s a lot of associating.

The GHSA offers a list of guidelines for effective automated camera programs, including,

  • Focus on safety: Revenue generated by safety cameras should be used to support program start-up and maintenance costs, with any excess revenue dedicated to traffic safety initiatives such as infrastructure enhancements or increased education.
  • Proper site selection: Cameras should be installed in locations that have crash, injury or fatality data justifying their use, particularly if these incidences involve vulnerable road users. Determining if other countermeasures, such speed calming, could be deployed to address the traffic safety problem should also be considered.
  • Community participation and engagement: Members of the community where the safety cameras will be deployed must be part of the planning and implementation process. Meaningful public engagement that begins early can help bolster public acceptance and trust.
  • Equity: Research has repeatedly confirmed that people of color are disproportionately impacted by traffic crashes and deaths. All decisions about safety camera programs – including public engagement during the planning process, where cameras are placed and how fines are structured – should be viewed through an equity lens.
  • Transparency and accessibility: Jurisdictions should share the data used to inform the decision-making process when considering whether to create an automated enforcement program. Where and when the cameras will be deployed should be highly publicized, so drivers are not caught by surprise.
  • Reciprocity agreements: Jurisdictions should create reciprocity agreements with neighboring states that address out-of-state violators who fail to pay traffic safety camera fines.

A speed cam pilot program was recently approved by the state legislature to enable speed cams in Los Angeles, Glendale and Long Beach, as well as three cities in Northern California.

Meanwhile, Metro recently approved the use of cameras mounted in Metro buses to detect drivers illegally blocking bus lanes.

However, at least in Los Angeles, red light cameras are a no go, after the city council banned them over a decade ago, in response to drivers who didn’t like getting caught breaking the law.

We’ll see how they like speed cams.

And maybe one day Los Angeles will get its collective head out of its metaphorical ass long enough to accept that saving lives is just a tad more important than enabling people to get away with driving dangerously through red lights.

We can hope, anyway.

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After a seemingly endless series of delays, we were promised that California’s seemingly moribund ebike incentive program would finally launch, with a vague deadline of sometime this fall.

But with the holidays rapidly approaching — hello, Chanukah! — time is rapidly running out on the latest promised launch time.

So today we’re launching our own countdown counter marking the days left before the state misses this deadline, too.

Days left to launch California ebike rebate program this fall: 15

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‘Tis the season.

The San Diego Padres gave away over 120 new bikes to third graders at San Diego’s Porter Elementary School.

Police in St. Petersburg, Florida gave away hundreds of bicycles to young kids to spread the holiday cheer.

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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 Los Angeles letter writer responds to LA Times letters editor Paul Thornton’s call for better bike infrastructure for his 46-mile round trip ebike commute by complaining about taking traffic lanes “away from the many who need them for the benefit of the few who consider cars evil,” even though Thornton never expressed any negative comments about cars, or the people who drive them.

No bias here, either. A self-described bike-riding English farmer describes a conflict with a “profusely red-faced, slightly rotund middle-aged man, dressed from head to toe in figure-hugging fluorescent Lycra and a bike helmet, windmilling his arms and frothing at the mouth with rage” while trying in vain not to tip his bicycle, in what Road.cc calls a clearly fictional, or at least exaggerated, account.

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Local 

The Pasadena Complete Streets Coalition will host their Holiday Lights Ride on Saturday, taking a festive bike ride to Christmas Tree Lane’s 103rd Annual Lighting Ceremony and Winter Festival.

The new Puente Creek Bikeway will provide a safer alternative to busy Amar Road through La Puente, Valinda and City of Industry.

Surprising news from REI, which announced plans to close its very busy Santa Monica store due to rising operational costs; the store will shutter on Leap Year Day next year.

Like Malibu, Long Beach’s efforts to reduce traffic deaths is complicated by the fact that one of the city’s deadliest roadways is a state highway, as the city tries to work with Caltrans to improve safety on PCH.

Speaking of Long Beach, the city has started work to install bike lanes on a section of Alamitos Ave, from Ocean Blvd to Seventh Street.

 

State

San Francisco’s director of transportation says people just need more time to adjust to the new, much maligned centerline protected bike lane on Valencia Street, as business owners reacted to complaints about new parking restrictions by demanding the dismantling of the city transportation agency; Streetsblog says the problems stem from design compromises made in an effort to appease everyone.

The San Francisco Standard asks if the city has killed its most important business corridor through significantly scaled back plans for a pedestrianized street that has resulted in no car traffic, but no foot traffic, either.

San Francisco received a $600,000 grant from the US Dept. of Energy to provide ebikes and safety training to food delivery workers, as well as collecting data on food delivery; the funding is in addition to a $2.4 million state grant.

Streetsblog says it’s hard to take promises from Oakland’s mayor to improve safety seriously when one off-street bike path is in such a state of disrepair that it’s unusable.

 

National

A pair of Rutgers University studies show bicycling habits may have permanently changed as a result of Covid, with more people using free time gained from working at home to ride recreationally — although an 11% bump in people riding to work ain’t nothing. As usual, read it on Yahoo if Bicycling blocks you. 

Grand Junction, Colorado will distribute 40 free ebikes to residents earning at or below 80% of the area’s median income, equal to $46,050 per year or less, in an effort to collect detailed trip travel data to share with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

A 52-year old former competitive cyclist stopped in Laredo, Texas on his bike tour from Alaska to the tip of Argentina, with a mission to plant 5,000 trees along the way.

The Army Corps of Engineers is backing off plans to ban bike riders from a popular Fort Worth, Texas trail after the first of the year, and will now look at ways to minimize conflicts between bicyclists and campers.

Continuing our journey through Texas, bicycle advocates in Houston are urging the city to make safety a priority, as it nears a record number of bicycling deaths this year.

NPR discusses Milwaukee’s annual Santa Cycle Rampage, as over a thousand bike riders  rode through downtown dressed as Santa Claus for the 20th anniversary celebration.

A Chicago newspaper recommends three books recounting the writers’ cross-country and global bike rides for your holiday giving. Even if you’re just giving one to yourself. 

You know you have a problem when three bicyclists have been killed at the same Indianapolis intersection in just three years, as the city tops last year’s total for bicycling and pedestrian deaths.

A Harpursville, New York man will serve consecutive sentences of one and a third to four years behind bars after pleading guilty to hit-and-run and gun charges following the death of a 13-year old boy riding his bike on New Year’s Day.

A pair of North Carolina towns are going car-optional, as new bike networks in Carrboro and Chapel Hill encourage residents to get on their bicycles instead of driving.

 

International

The home of the traditional Christmas Coventry Carol is making like the Grinch this holiday season by banning ebikes and e-scooters from sections of the city center.

Newly released video shows a Northampton, England cop jump out of a police van to commandeer a bystander’s bicycle to chase down a fleeing drug dealer.

Life is cheap in New Zealand, where a drunk and stoned driver got 11 months of home vacation detention for killing a 61-year old bike-riding grandfather, while driving an unregistered car at over five times the legal alcohol limit; but at least he’ll have to pass the victim’s ghost bike every day as he bikes to work, after losing his license for three years.

A Queensland, Australia coroner has opened a cold-case inquest into the hit-and-run death of a 21-year old man riding a bicycle, using a new state law that allows coroners to force witnesses to answer questions, though the answers can’t be used against them in a criminal trial.

 

Competitive Cycling

American pro Neilson Powless says he remains focused on one-day classics, but doesn’t rule out competing for a Grand Tour win one day.

Pro cyclist Tim Merlier rallied to win a beach race in a photo finish after nearly being taken out by the operator of a quad bike.

The family of fallen cyclist Magnus White is creating a nonprofit foundation in his honor, using crowdfunded contributions raised after 17-year old rider was killed by a driver while training for the Junior Mountain Bike World Championships in Scotland.

Conservative media is once again in a transgender panic, after a pair of trans women took first and second at the Illinois State Cyclocross Championships.

 

Finally…

Nothing like mountain biking on a gravel bike. Your next bike could be a 3D-printed Aston Martin.

And there’s something seriously wrong when Santa’s elves aren’t even safe from traffic violence.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

Elderly alleged DUI driver finally charged with killing national Masters champ Ethan Boyes, and Calbike talks ebike incentives

November 30, 2023 / / 3 comments

It’s Day 7 of the 9th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

Thanks to Kathryn R, Kathleen S, Bryan B and Kent S for their generous donations to help keep all the best bike news and advocacy coming your way every day. 

So stop what you’re doing, and join them by giving now!

Besides, how can anyone resist this much AI-created bike-riding corgi cuteness?

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The alleged drunk driver who killed San Francisco cycling champ Ethan Boyes has finally been charged by federal officials.

The 44-year old national masters cycling champ was riding in the Presidio National Park when he was run down by 81-year old Arnold Kinman Low this past April.

Low is set to be arraigned Wednesday on charges of involuntary manslaughter and driving under the influence.

In addition to being an age-group national champ, Boyes held the national record for the “flying start” 500-meter time trial.

His death led to demands for protected bike lanes on Arguello Blvd in the park, where officials have recently narrowed traffic lanes and installed guard rails protecting bike lanes in response.

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Calbike posted video of a panel discussion on How Cities Can Incentivize Electric Bikes at October’s Micromobility America in Richmond, California.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlutblFt-dM

Which is yet another opportunity to mention that California’s ebike voucher program continues to suffer from a failure to launch, over a year after it was originally promised.

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I want to be like him when I grow up.

The latest BMX star on YouTube is just 71 years old. Then again, if he was any younger, he’d probably be on TikTok.

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

Once again, someone riding a bicycle has been intentionally injured by a driver in a stolen car, as security cam video showed a driver in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania deliberately ram a 72-year old man riding a bicycle, who escaped without serious injuries; the driver has been identified, but no word on whether charges have been filed. This appears to be part of a troubling nationwide trend, possibly inspired by a TikTok stolen car challenge.

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

A former British news producer and regular anti-bike crank has turned the tables on BBC host Jeremy Vine, who frequently posts bike cam video of scofflaw drivers, by recording video of lawbreaking bicyclists while out walking.

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Local 

Long Beach will stripe new and improved bike lanes on Alamitos Ave following a slurry sealing treatment scheduled to begin next week.

 

State

San Diego County received a $125,000 state grant to fund bicycle and pedestrian safety programs, ranging from social media campaigns to open streets events.

You can now check out ebikes from the public library in Santa Barbara for up to a week, giving borrowers a chance to try out the city’s e-bikeshare for free.

A San Francisco TV station reports on efforts to put age restrictions on throttle-controlled Class 2 ebikes, as 71% of Bay Area children who suffered bicycling injuries were hurt riding ebikes. Although that stat could just reflect the popularity of ebikes with kids under 18, and says nothing about whether the kids were on ped-assist or throttle-controlled bikes.

For a change, San Francisco Streetsblog says the Bay Area can learn from Los Angeles by imitating the recent Arroyo Fest, which shut down the Pasadena Freeway for a few hours to open it up to people on bicycles and on foot.

 

National

Streetsblog’s Joe Linton examines new bike infrastructure on a visit to Medford, Oregon, including the city’s first two-way protected bike lane.

A “cavernous” Salt Lake City bike shop is the new storefront for a statewide nonprofit dedicated to selling spare parts and refurbished bicycles to “provide self-reliant and independent transportation for people in need.”

The rich get richer. Long Island City in Queens, New York received three new protected bike lanes on Wednesday. Although the guy riding in icy temperatures in the photo is somehow choosing to ride in the buffer, rather than the actual bike lane. 

A New York TV station reassures viewers that ebikes are a safe holiday gift, despite the city’s well-publicized recent rash of ebike battery fires.

Doylestown PA is making a series of popup bike lanes permanent, after receiving “rave” reviews from the public.

Public schools in Florida’s Miami-Dade County are starting a pilot program to build bike lanes to help kids get to class safely in one of the nation’s deadliest counties for people on bicycles.

 

International

Road.cc says a gravel bike could be the ultimate winter bicycle.

Environmental activists in Plymouth, England are fighting plans for a proposed bike path through the center of the city that would require transplanting a half dozen trees that survived a recent “chainsaw massacre,” which saw the city chop down 100 trees earlier this year.

Momentum reports Paris is putting people — and bicycles — at the heart of the city’s ambitious new climate plan. Which is what cities that actually give a damn about the climate do, as opposed to just paying lip service to confronting the climate crisis like a certain SoCal megalopolis we could name.

French residents can now buy or lease a new bucket ebike from their friendly neighborhood Toyota dealer.

The Jerusalem Post offers the 23 best bike charities for 2023.

South Africa’s largest membership-based bicycling organization warned bicyclists to avoid crime hotspots and be careful when riding, as the country has seen a dramatic increase in violent crimes targeting bike riders.

Bicycling says the biggest challenge Italian ultra-adventure bicyclist Omar De Felice faces in his two month solo, unassisted bike ride across Antarctica is his own mind. Unfortunately, this one doesn’t seem to be available anywhere else, so you’re on your own if the magazine blocks you.

 

Competitive Cycling

New York City will host a one-day UCI men’s pro road race next May in conjunction with a previously scheduled gran fondo. But women cyclists need not apply.

 

Finally…

Add Tadej Pogačar’s actual 2023 time trial bike to your holiday wish list. Now you, too, can improve safety by adding a seat belt to your bike saddle.

And nothing like intentionally riding a perfectly good bicycle off a cliff.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

Hit-and-run Ventura County bus driver, US bicycling up — or maybe down, and LA could consider ebike rebate program

October 2, 2023 / / Comments Off on Hit-and-run Ventura County bus driver, US bicycling up — or maybe down, and LA could consider ebike rebate program

Thank you everyone for the kind words for a rough week.

Not to mention the surprising donations in honor of my birthday and/or eye problems last week (see the end of this post). 

I’m still having problems with distance vision, and struggle to see clearly up close. But my eyesight has improved enough to get back to work, so let’s get on with it. 

We’ve got a lot of ground to cover. 

………

Let’s start by catching up on some of the big stories we missed the past week.

***

A hit-and-run Ventura County bus driver faces charges after knocking down a man riding bicycle in a close pass, then running over him and continuing without stopping; the victim somehow survived, but suffered serious lower body injuries.

***

Prosecutors in Las Vegas filled additional charges against the teenagers accused of deliberately running down and killing former Bell, California police chief Andreas Probst; charges against the 18-year old driver include attempted murder, battery with a weapon, leaving the scene of a crash and possession of a stolen vehicle, while the 16-year old who filmed the crash faces murder, attempted murder, and battery with a weapon charge. They both continue to be held without bail.

***

Heartbreaking news from Colorado, where investigators finally found the remains of Suzanne Morphew, who disappeared after going for a Mother’s Day bike ride three years ago; her body was found about 40 to 50 miles from where she was reported missing. There’s no word yet on a cause of death or who may have been responsible. Her husband was originally charged with her murder, but prosecutors dropped the charges after a judge barred most of their witnesses for the DA’s failure to turn over exculpatory evidence.

***

More heartbreak, this time from New York’s Moreau State Park, where an Amber Alert was declared when a nine-year old girl disappeared without a trace while riding her bike alone in the campground, after taking a few laps with some close friends. Her bicycle was later found abandoned where she’d been riding, but there was no sign of the little girl.

***

Life is cheap in Maryland, where the driver who killed American diplomat and mother Sarah Langenkamp as she rode her bicycle shortly after returning from her post in Ukraine walked without a single day behind bars, after the judge imposed the maximum penalty under Maryland law — a lousy $2,000 fine and 150 hours of community service. Meanwhile, the painfully low sentence is putting a spotlight on the leniency of Maryland driving laws. Gee, ya think?

***

A Georgia man is accused of lying in wait for a cycling group to ride past his home and intentionally ramming his car into the bicyclists; the 66-year old driver faces charges of aggravated assault, criminal damage to property, aggressive driving, reckless conduct and terrorist threats.

***

The hit-and-run driver accused of killing 25-year old college cycling champ and Florida State University PhD student Jake Boykin as he was training for Georgia’s Six Gap Century race last month was arrested a short time later, with Boykin’s bicycle still embedded in the grill of his truck.

***

There’s a special place in hell for the hit-and-run driver who left an 86-year old North Carolina man to die alone in the street after running him down on his bike, despite his orange safety vest. The same goes for a Florida hit-and-run driver who killed a nine-year old kid who was riding his bike to a friend’s house.

………

Bicycling is up in the US. Or maybe it’s down.

Or just getting more dangerous.

Inverse argues that the electric vehicle revolution is already here, and looks a lot like an ebike, while PBS discusses the regulatory challenges created by the soaring popularity of ebikes.

Yet despite the ebike boom, the Census Bureau reports that bike commuting rates are down nationwide from pre-pandemic levels, and down nearly 25% from the peak level of 2014.

At the same time, Bicycling cites a different report to argue that more people are riding than ever before, with every metro area of 5 million or more people seeing a 25% increase in ridership over the last four years. Don’t fret if the magazine blocks you, just read it on Yahoo instead. 

And the Associated Press reports that more bicyclists and pedestrians are dying on American roads than ever before, even though cars and trucks are ostensibly safer. The problem is they keep getting safer for people inside the vehicles, while getting ever deadlier for anyone outside of them.

Meanwhile, bicycling deaths fell to the lowest level on record in the UK, even as traffic deaths jumped 10%.

………

Los Angeles could, maybe, see its own ebike rebate program in the not-too-distant future.

………

CicLAvia returns to the Heart of LA a week from this coming Sunday, for the next to last CicLAvia of the year.

This year’s 7.8-mile route runs through LA’s historic core from South Park to Chinatown, then through Little Tokyo across the 6th Street Viaduct to Boyle Heights.

As Urbanize reminds us,

In case you’ve forgotten, CicLAvia is for people-powered vehicles only. That means no electric scooters, electric skateboards, hoverboards, electric unicycles, or motocycles. If you’re on a Class 1 e-bike pedal-assist or a Class 2 e-bike with the throttle powered off, you’re okay. Likewise, Class 3 e-bikes are allowed when pedal-assist is powered off, as are motorized wheelchairs. Learn more here.

Meanwhile, the Pasadena Star-News looks forward to the upcoming ArroyoFest 2.0 at the end of this month, allowing people to walk and bike on a carfree Pasadena freeway for just the second time in 20 years.

………

Camp Pendleton announced a number of roadway closures for maintenance and construction through October 20th, and will close the base bike path from the Las Pulgas Gate to the southern edge of San Onofre Beach State Park between 6 am to 6 pm from Nov. 27 to Dec. 1.

They will also be blowing things up for the next week, so wear your helmet and keep your head down.

………

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

LA-based former pro Phil Gaimon ran into a road raging schmuck driver while riding on Decker Canyon. Or more precisely, was lucky he didn’t.

No bias here. A columnist for the comically conservative New York Post argues that ebikes are “faster, heavier and more deadly” than other bikes, and that’s it’s time to put an end to them. Aside from the utter impossibility of shoving the genie back into the bottle, there’s currently no data to support that last statement about ebikes being any deadlier. And just wait until someone tells her about the 40,000 people killed by cars every year. 

A Florida driver “reeking of alcohol” accused a bike-riding man of being in the CIA, then made several threateningly close passes before aiming his car at the bicyclist, who managed to jump out of the way just before the driver smashed his bicycle. The man also head-butted a cop as they tried to take him into custody.

No bias here, either. A new bikeway project in an English town has some residents bringing out the torches and pitchforks, with one business owner calling it “woke” and insisting that “proper cyclists don’t need cycle lanes,” while others say it’s creating “mayhem” and “chaos” that makes it difficult for rugby fans to attend matches.

A British road safety group is accused of victim blaming for a new campaign that says “Don’t be like Ted, wear a helmet on your head!”; bike advocates argued they’d be better off campaigning for safer streets. Or maybe be like Ted, because I always have one on my head when I ride; even if I doubt their efficacy in a collision, they come in handy in a fall. 

A self-professed bicyclist writing for The Spectator asks why bicyclists insist on making drivers furious, in column hidden behind the paper’s paywall. As if our mere presence on the plant doesn’t anger some motorists. 

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

Police in the UK are looking for a pair of road-raging, balaclava-wearing ebike riders who slapped and punched a driver who had stopped short to avoid another car, leaving the man with facial fractures; they also stole a cellphone belonging to the driver’s wife when she tried to take their pictures, and smashed one of the car’s windows. But other than that, they were charming chaps, right?

………

Local 

Writing for Streetsblog, Wes Reutimann argues that California’s Active Transportation Program shows the City of Los Angeles is far more successful at applying for grant funding than the county, with bike riders and pedestrians in unincorporated areas paying the price.

BikeLA, the former Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, added UCLA Transportation Planner Emily Han and Transportation and Mobility Communications Practice Manager Reed Alvarado to the nonprofit’s board of directors.

This is who we share the road with. The Santa Monica Daily Press reports a “belligerent,” allegedly drunk — and actively drinking — transient drove onto the Venice boardwalk, traveling several blocks on the ostensibly carfree walkway before striking a pedestrian.

Metro will give 200 households in Santa Monica who own multiple vehicles up to $119.80 per week for five weeks — a total of $599 per household — not to drive one of their cars.

Long Beach will begin rolling out a program to loan free ebikes to 35 local residents for up to three months at a time. The city is also looking for volunteers for its annual bike and pedestrian count.

 

State

Caltrans readies guidance on Complete Streets — as long as you don’t consider highway interchanges part of the street.

Your next ebike could have built-in AI to “enhance the riding experience,” as Taiwan’s Smalo makes its US debut here in California.

Costa Mesa cops busted a bike thief after the bicycle’s owner tracked his own ebike down, and police found it hidden in some bushes.

Despite near-constant reports in San Diego media that no one is using the city’s new bike lanes, a new report shows the city has experienced a 71% increase in bicycling rates over the past four years.

Police in Riverside are looking for the hit-and-run driver who rear-ended a 53-year old man as he was riding his bike to work, knocking him unconscious and leaving him with a fractured cheekbone, wrist injuries and numerous lacerations, including one to his head.

San Luis Obispo is looking at ways to redesign what was supposed to be a trail to the sea, after at least one home owner refused to sell a key piece of land, and a pair of county supervisors opposed using eminent domain to seize it.

The Bay Area’s BART rail system will now allow bikes on almost any car, and allow riders to take their bicycles on station escalators.

Oakland has committed to building a protected bike lane on Lakeshore Ave on the east side of Lake Merritt, though Streetsblog observes it took the dooring death of a four-year old girl to get them to act. Sadly, it usually does. Too much needed bike infrastructure only gets built after it’s already too late.

Sad news from Stockton, where a 60-year old man riding a bicycle was killed by a hit-and-run driver.

 

National

Forbes reports there are now more than 1,450 Bicycle Friendly Businesses in the US.

Trek will now allow you to trade in your old Trek bicycles on the purchase of a new one, in an effort to cut the company’s carbon footprint. And you might need a trade-in to afford the company’s “pricy but feature-rich” new cargo bike.

More sad news, as longtime ABC and General Hospital promo photographer Craig Sjodin was killed by a driver while riding his bike, just one month after retiring; the soap opera ended an episode last week with a memorial slide honoring him. 

A new bike and pedestrian plan for Alaska’s fastest growing area calls for 130 miles of bike/walk paths in the Matanuska-Susitna region — if supporters can find a way to pay for it.

Portland officials backed off a plan to rip out a popular protected bike lane, even if the city’s transportation director has no idea how it was funded.

The 21-year old hit-and-run driver who killed a 63-year old Seattle man as he rode home from work on his ebike last year was sentenced to spend the next four years behind bars. Although most inmates spend considerably less time in jail than what they’re sentenced to.

Colorado Public Radio asks if drivers of larger, more dangerous vehicles should be charged more to pay for new safety projects. Short answer, yes. Longer answer, hell yes. 

There’s not a pit deep enough for the schmuck who stole an 89-year old North Dakota woman’s three-wheeled bike.

Once again, a cross-country bike rider has been killed in Texas, when a 62-year old man riding to raise money for injured bicyclists was struck by a driver after allegedly veering from the highway shoulder into the traffic lane. Even though nowhere in the entire article does it even mention that the truck that hit him even had a driver.

Minnesota’s MinnPost looks back at what’s changed in the five decades since the 1970’s oil embargo-fueled bike boom.

Bill and Hillary Clinton donated ten thousand dollars to a crowdfunding campaign for the former chief of staff to a Manhattan state senator, who suffered a traumatic brain injury in a collision while riding a bikeshare bike last month. Jacob Priley had worked on Hillary’s presidential campaign in 2016; he remains in a coma nine days after the September 22nd crash.

A longtime New York bike advocate is riding an ebike towing signs calling for banning mopeds from the city’s bike lanes.

A New York Streetsblog op-ed insists bicyclists have to throw our own bad apples under the bus, while calling for the return of the city’s Give Respect/Get Respect safety campaign.

The new series The Road Less Eaten follows a pro chef and an indie pop drummer as they ride their bikes through Nashville.

The mother of a five-year old girl killed by a driver while riding her bike through a DC crosswalk with her dad has convinced thousands of people to sign a petition demanding that pedestrian deaths be included in car safety ratings.

A Georgia woman is on a one-mom crusade to build the longest continuously paved bike trail in the US, which would stretch 211 miles from Athens to Savannah.

 

International

Momentum takes a look at the world’s most unique bicycling infrastructure innovations. None of which are in Los Angeles. Or North America, for that matter. 

A writer for Bike Radar says a collision with a driver who was blocking a bike lane has left him angrier than ever about the bicycling culture wars, arguing that we need better infrastructure for bicycling because we don’t have what’s needed to keep us safe.

A Glasgow architecture firm has launched a campaign to gather near-miss data that could lead to rethinking road designs, after a French-American architecture student who worked for the firm was killed riding her bike, less than six months after moving to the city.

London bicycling rates have dropped to near pre-pandemic levels after booming during the Covid lockdowns; advocates blame a return of car traffic, poorly designed bikeways and a lack of government funding.

Former Olympic champion cyclist Sir Chris Boardman called on the government to keep its word, and stick with plans to boost walking and bicycling, after the country’s prime minister complained that drivers feel oppressed.

Bicycle thefts are so bad at one English train station, bike riders are being advised not to use bike racks at the nearly half-million dollar Bike Hub.

A “prolific” British bike thief was convicted after a mother protested outside his home for three days with signs demanding her son’s stolen bicycle back.

A 90-year old man became the oldest person to complete the 1,100-mile ride the length of Britain from Land’s End to John O’Groats; he also finished the ride when he was 75, 80 and 85, so presumably he’ll do it again in another five years.

Formerly car-choked Paris is now experiencing bicycle traffic jams as the mayor’s emphasis on the 15-minute city and expanded bikeways are getting more Parisians out on bicycles. Which should be a hint to both the US and Britain. But probably won’t. 

The Netherlands redesigned a highway to make it safer and greener, including three new 3D-printed bike bridges.

A Berlin, Germany website says the city’s car-centric government has begun rolling back bike infrastructure, as bicyclists fear they’ll be driven off the roads, literally and figuratively.

Ebike sales are booming in Germany, where even automakers are embracing their role in the future of transportation.

Bike Radar looks at Germany’s StVZO bike light regulations, which require bike lights to remain steady and unblinking, and focused downward to avoid blinding other road users.

That’s more like it. Thousands of protestors shut down four key intersections in Milan, Italy, effectively bringing the city to a halt to demand safer conditions for cyclists and pedestrians. Meanwhile, Milan is now requiring blind spot sensors on buses and large trucks in an effort to reduce bicycling and pedestrian deaths.

Hyderabad, India has opened the country’s first solar panel-topped cycle track, with three covered bike lanes covering more than 14 miles.

Once again, the observance of Yom Kippur turned Israel’s roadways into the world’s largest open streets event.

An 84-year old Indian man built his own ebike using discarded laptop batteries, charged by solar panels on his roof, to ride the 19 miles to his parents home.

A writer for China Daily says the country is looking forward to becoming a safer, faster kingdom of bicycles, harking back to its not-too-distant bicycling past.

 

Competitive Cycling

Rumors are flying that Apple will be the next title sponsor of the Jumbo-Visma cycling team. Or maybe Amazon.

In a shameful report from the pro peloton, a quarter of female professional cyclists don’t receive any income.

 

Finally…

Apparently, royalty is no protection from dangerous drivers. That feeling when you find a bicycle carved into an ancient temple built 2,000 years before they were invented.

And when you’re riding your bike holding an open Natty Light in one hand, try to avoid hitting the side of a moving Home Depot truck.

………

A special thanks to Matthew R, Janice H, Steve F, Diane T and our anonymous correspondent for their generous donations to mark my birthday last month, and/or offer support for my vision and diabetic issues, all while helping to bring all the best bike news your way today. 

Normally, I’d add “and every day,” but considering my recent track record, we’ll let that slide for now. 

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

Pasadena Transportation chief to head LADOT, soft launch for CA ebike rebates, and lousy $500 ticket for AZ sideswipe

August 30, 2023 / / Comments Off on Pasadena Transportation chief to head LADOT, soft launch for CA ebike rebates, and lousy $500 ticket for AZ sideswipe

Well, I’m underwhelmed.

Nine months after Karen Bass became mayor of Los Angeles, she finally got around to naming someone to lead LADOT.

According to Streetsblog, current Pasadena Transportation head Laura Rubio-Cornejo will become the next general manager of the Los Angeles transportation department, assuming she’s approved by the city council.

Which is pretty much a given in a city where most councilmembers are loathe to rock the boat.

Rubio-Cornejo, who previously led Metro Countywide Planning, replaces underperforming former LADOT and NACTO chief Seleta Reynolds, who left for greener pastures at Metro a year ago.

Despite sky high expectations, Reynolds was largely a disappointment at LADOT, where her hands were tied by risk-averse city officials, and never appeared to have the full backing of former LA Mayor Eric Garcetti.

Whether Rubio-Cornejo fares any better remains to be seen.

But I wouldn’t hold your breath.

Photo from City of Pasadena, via Streetsblog.

………

Still no word on when the statewide launch of the California ebike rebate program will take place.

According to Calbike, San Diego’s Pedal Ahead, which has been chosen to administer the program, announced its long-awaited soft launch.

No, really.

We are currently launching a multi-phase California E-Bike Incentive Project soft launch which includes retailer onboarding and training, community-based organization (CBO) outreach and community engagement, and the website launch. The next one to two months will be focused on retailer and CBO outreach, which will be happening concurrently leading up to the application window opening.

The soft launch will focus on four regions in California and we have already begun introducing the program to local CBOs and identifying retailers in the regions to make sure they are fully supported with the appropriate program support, trainings and resources.

So, at least another month or two before we can expect to see any action outside of a few select, unnamed areas. And before we can start seeing more ebikes replace smelly, dangerous, climate-killing cars here in the late, great Golden State.

Anyone who’s been holding their breath waiting for this is probably dead by now.

………

You’ve got to be effing kidding.

Life is cheap in Arizona, where the driver who sideswiped a bicyclist taking part in a club ride, sending three people to the hospital, walked with a ticket for an unsafe pass carrying a lousy fine of up to $500.

Because evidently, knocking multiple bike riders down like so many bowling pins is just no big deal.

And pretty much legal.

………

Huh?

A writer for an Aussie website calls for mandatory registration and license plates for cyclists.

But not for people riding bikes.

By his standard, if you earn money riding a bike — like delivery riders — you’re a cyclist. But if you just ride to work once a year, or ride to the park with the kids, you’re just riding a bike.

Then there’s this.

If you routinely spend every Sunday morning rolling en masse along a beachside boulevard, pumping the blood as much as you are metaphorically pumping your fist at an imaginary Le Tour stage gate, then you are a cyclist too and you should probably pay for registration.

You’re on the road. You’re using the infrastructure. You are at risk from other cyclists and you are a risk to pedestrians. Plus, I can’t be the only person to have seen riders sail through red traffic lights…

Never mind that people taking part in group rides are usually in the traffic lane, not using bicycle infrastructure.

Or that splitting hairs must be easier down there, as he somehow expects police to tell whether someone on a bike rides every weekend, or just this once.

Or whether that guy riding to the park with his kids may have just finished a fast half century with the club.

Although his primary concern — I say his, since it has a man’s byline, but is so self-contradictory it could easily have been generated by AI — appears to be forcing bicyclists to carry insurance and get some skin in the game.

As with all these adjustments in the way we live our lives, we need the powers that be to arrange a little quid pro quo. Remove vehicle lanes to encourage more bike riders, so why not extend the reach of the third-party insurance that is included with motor vehicle registration to cover you when on your bike? You’ve paid the fee, does it really matter what vehicle you are using?

After all, you can’t drive and ride at the same time…

Plus, if we want less cars and more bicycles, taxation has to come from somewhere. Surely it would be better to recognise a contribution of your bicycle registration than to just have everything else ratcheted up to account for the gap.

It’s likely this piece is nothing more than an effort to create a little controversy to drive traffic to the site, while signaling to car shoppers that they’re on their side.

But they may find out the hard way all those weekend warriors on bikes buy cars, too.

………

The New York Times continues their bizarre anti-ebike campaign, arguing that parents don’t know whether to view the bikes as freedom or danger, as more teens take to them.

For the moment, the power to decide what teenagers may or may not ride falls to a nongovernmental authority: parents. Across the country, they are expressing a mix of enthusiasm, contrition and uncertainty about the trendy mode of transportation.

Some parents who initially embraced e-bikes now say their enthusiasm has waned with news of recent crashes involving teenagers.

Because apparently, no child was ever injured riding a bicycle without a battery.

The question they fail to answer, as they build their anecdotal case, is whether there have been more more, or more severe, crashes on ebikes than would have been expected on regular bicycles.

Unless and until they can provide that, their entire campaign should be seen as nothing more than anti-ebike fear mongering, with the possible exception of calling out the increased fire risk due to lithium ion batteries.

Since regular bikes hardly ever burst into flames.

………

The Los Angeles Bicycle Advisory Committee has now been around for 50 years.

Although it continues to remain strictly advisory, instead of being given the regulatory authority of a commission it should have received years ago.

………

Phil Gaimon responds to the critics, and arms bicyclists with responses to the 1% of hostile motorists who seem to make up most of the commenters online.

………

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

No bias here. Writing for The Spectator, the editor of the Jewish Chronicle says Jeremy Vine’s call for drivers to be banned from overtaking cyclists in major cities is “ridiculous” and “the real problem isn’t motorists but Jeremy Vine himself.” Something even Vine seems to agree with, as he says to take his comments with a grain of salt and stop overreacting to everything he says.

It turns out the Philippine driver who pulled a gun on an unarmed bicyclist is a former cop who left the force after repeated demotions, including one for grave misconduct, yet he complains he’s being depicted as a “bad person” on social media; Quezon City has offered the victim protection if he chooses to pursue a case against the former QC cop.  

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

Two Bakersfield boys saw very different outcomes when police attempted to stop them for riding against traffic; a 13-year old boy who pulled over and waited at the side of the road was released to his mother, while a 14-year old boy who kept riding and popping wheelies had the book thrown at him.

………

Local 

You may now be able to rent a Tern cargo bike for as little as $99 a month, as the Aussie bike leasing firm Wombi announces plans to set up their first US operation in Los Angeles.

Los Angeles plans to implement safety improvements from the city’s “Vision Zero Safety Toolkit” along a two-mile stretch of Hollywood Blvd east of Gower, which saw 56 people killed or seriously injured over the last decade. Although what those improvements will be remains to be seen, likely depending on public feedback.

The LA Times foresees an optimistic paradise of electric and hydrogen-powered vehicles, ebikes and free public transit replaced gas-guzzling cars within 20 years.

 

State

Calbike calls on you to help get a slate of active transportation bills out of the Suspense File in the Senate Appropriations Committee; the bills must move forward by the first of the month or be killed for this year.

The late Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins was one of us, doing some of his best thinking and songwriting on a mountain bike near his Laguna Beach home.

The San Diego Reader questions whether the same man is responsible for two violent bikejackings in the city.

 

National

A Honolulu ER doc rides his bike 21 miles to work every day, rain or shine — and has for over 30 years.

A Houston writer says “there’s something heart-warming about the anarchy of 2,000 people on bikes reclaiming the roads back from cars.”

An Indianapolis woman faces charges for DUI and driving without ever having a driver’s license after she crashed into a man riding a bicycle, leaving the victim with multiple compound fractures, while driving at over three times the legal alcohol limit.

This is the cost of traffic violence, part one. A “cherished” Evansville, Indiana high school music director was killed while riding his bicycle, though the details are unclear.

This is the cost of traffic violence, part two. The Boston-area bike rider killed by a UPS driver Monday afternoon was identified as a respected professor and mentor to graduate students at Tufts University School of Medicine.

As the California legislature continues to appease vested driving interests in an attempt to legalize a speed cam pilot program, New York stats show a 30% drop in speeding violations after their camera program began operating 24/7.

Life is cheap in Pennsylvania, where a driver got just 11½ to 23 months behind bars for severely injuring a man riding a bicycle while driving his pickup truck with inoperable brakes and without insurance.

A new 2-mile ADA-accessible Delaware bike path was funded with $23 million from the new federal infrastructure bill.

This is the cost of traffic violence, part three. Police in Baltimore are looking for the hit-and-run driver who took the life of a “beloved” mother of two as she rode her bike home from work over the weekend.

That’s more like it. A new 42 story, 631 unit Miami residential tower will have more than twice as many bicycle parking spaces as it will spaces for cars.

 

International

Tragic news from the UK, where two men on ebikes were killed by a driver on a “very fast” 50 mph roadway; the driver was arrested on a careless driving charge.

The fiancé of the Scottish bike rider killed by a drunk driver, who then hid his body for three years with the help of the driver’s brother, lashed out at the courts for failing to impose a “proper” sentence on the two men, who received 12 years and five years and three months, respectively.

A British man has defied the odds by learning to walk and eat again, after doctors gave him just 24 hours to live after hitting an embankment on his ebike.

Momentum Magazine visits the world’s longest purpose-built bike and pedestrian tunnel in Bergen, Norway; the Fyllingsdalen is 1.8 miles long and takes approximately 10 minutes to travel by bicycle.

Bicycling reports over 45,000 people rode their bicycles to a Formula 1 race in the Netherlands after the country banned cars from the event; another 55,000 arrived by bus or train. As usual, read it on Yahoo if the magazine blocks you. 

Workers in the Spanish town of Elche are scraping bike lanes off the roads, after the newly installed far-right government adopted a populist, pro-car policy. Which is a warning of what could happen here if we don’t vote for bike-friendly candidates. 

He gets it. A writer from Islamabad, Pakistan says bicyclists aren’t a nuisance, whether you’re talking about kids on bikes or adults riding to reduce their waistlines.

 

Competitive Cycling

His hometown newspaper celebrates James Macdonald’s victory at the recent world road cycling championships, as the 80-year old Williamsburg, Virginia resident topped the 80-84 age group in a 53-mile race earlier this month.

Remco Evenepoel raged about safety at the Vuelta, or the lack thereof, after he was bloodied in a crash with a spectator following his stage three win, saying “It’s the third day in a row and it’s breaking my balls a bit now. I’ve had enough.” Meanwhile, the peloton has finally figured out they’re just pawns in the game.

The home of 22-year old pro cyclist Michel Hessmann was searched by German authorities as part of a doping investigation, after the suspended Jumbo-Visma rider tested positive for a banned diuretic earlier this month. But the doping era is over, right?

The inaugural CRIT Championship will debut in St. Petersburg, Florida this October, the race is the multi-million dollar brainchild of L39ion of Los Angeles founder Justin Williams.

 

Finally…

The street may be open, but it will cost you nearly 85 bucks to bike it. Even stairs are nothing to the world’s fastest pizza delivery rider.

And it took me about five seconds to find the bicycle in this picture.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

CA ebike rebate program now set to launch this fall, and more details on fallen bicyclists Bruce Elliott and Roy Wiegand

August 3, 2023 / / One comment

The California Air Resources Board reports that the state’s ebike incentive program is now expected to finally go live statewide sometime this fall, as the launch date keeps getting pushed back.

But don’t hold your breath.

The program was set to launch at the beginning of this year, then pushed back to the second quarter of the year, before now being set for fall.

Hopefully, they mean it this time.

You can learn more about the program here.

Ebike Photo by Markus Spiske from Pexels.

………

More details are finally available about fallen Redding bicyclist Bruce Elliott, who was killed by a driver during a group ride in Mentone on Saturday.

A memorial service will be held at 2 pm this Sunday at The University of Redlands Memorial Chapel for the well-loved phys ed teacher, who was also captain of Don’s Bikes Race Team, and mentor to bicyclists with Big Wheel Coaching.

Elliott’s family requests contributions to a crowdfunding campaign in lieu of flowers, with the funds to be split between the nonprofit Bikes for Kids Foundation and Grand Teton National Park. At this writing, it has raised over $9,400 of the modest $12,500 goal.

You can read more here.

………

While we’re on the subject, SF Gate has more details on the crash that killed popular Burbank musician and long-distance bicyclist Roy Wiegand in Monterey County Saturday afternoon, in what was a very bad weekend for SoCal bike riders.

Wiegand was riding alone after his riding partner had turned back, when he was right hooked by a 25-year old pickup driver while riding in the designated bike lane in the same direction.

He was on the last leg of his 2,500-mile Roy’s Ride fundraising ride to benefit the Navaho Nation, and bring clean, running water to impoverished households on the reservation.

The campaign has currently raised more than $35,000, easily topping what had originally been a $25,000 goal.

There’s no word on any charges for the driver, even though the CHP said the driver made an “unsafe” turn.

Which is putting it mildly.

………

Don’t hold your breath waiting for congestion pricing on Los Angeles roadways, as numble reports we still have four years to go before we’re likely to see anything.

………

Calbike has completed a year-long search by hiring active transportation and land use professional Kendra Ramsey as the group’s new executive director.

A member of the American Institute of Certified Planners, Ramsey comes to the organization from Sacramento civil engineering firm GHD, where she served as Active Transportation Project Manager, “developing innovative mobility options, Complete Streets plans, and corridor studies for local and regional agencies throughout the state.”

Let’s hope she finds her footing fast, because we definitely need help.

………

The New York Times continues their anti-ebike campaign, asking if California should regulate the bikes because teenagers are dying on them.

Unfortunately, though, teenagers get killed on regular bikes, too.

The question left unasked by the Times and other news outlets — let alone unanswered — is whether they’re getting killed or seriously injured at a higher rate on ebikes than on regular bikes.

Until the Times can answer that question, it’s all just noise.

………

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

It’s finally happened. A 16-year old Las Vegas boy was killed when he struck a wire booby trap, possibly set by a homeless man, while riding with his older brother and friends. Various booby traps have been set on roadways and trails around the world, but to the best of my knowledge, none have been fatal — until now. Let’s hope that whoever set the trap faces a murder count, if not terrorism charges. 

………

Local 

The Los Angeles City Council unanimously approved a $60 million contract with Metro for the design and construction of the Los Angeles River Valley Bike Path Project, including a new 13-mile segment of the LA River bike path connecting to the existing path in Griffith Park.

Streetsblog reports a new SGV Greenway project is under construction along the Big Dalton Wash in the unincorporated community of Vincent, between Covina and Irwindale; the 3-mile Vincent Community Bikeway is expected to open next year.

NHL referee Dan O’Rourke is scheduled to set off today on a 2,400-mile bike ride from Santa Monica to Chicago along old Route 66, to raise money and awareness for the National Federation of the Blind. Thanks to Megan Lynch for the tip.

The Manhattan Beach city council is urging the police to crack down on scofflaw ebike riders.

 

State

The Los Angeles Times reports that communities around the state are launching ebike and other green transit programs, as Long Beach prepares to open a 40-bike ebike lending library.

Calbike offers advice on how to talk back to the seemingly inevitable bikelash to virtually any bicycling proposal or news story.

Patch says a Temecula bike advocacy group is leading the way in creating harmony on city streets.

Sad news from Modesto, where a 79-year old man was killed in a hit-and-run while riding his bike; police booked the driver on charges of felony hit-and-run causing death and vehicular manslaughter, after she originally stayed at the scene before denying any involvement and driving off.

No surprise here, as San Francisco lowers the speed limit on several streets to 20 mph to improve safety, but drivers keep speeding, anyway.

 

National

Vice considers the best bike bags for your next ride.

Streetsblog says a new book explores America’s revenue-focused approach to traffic policing, including that traffic fines have “no discernible relationship to public safety,” while harming people of color and other vulnerable people.

Arizona bike riders remembered fallen bicyclist Karen Malisa on what would have been her 62nd birthday; she was one of two people killed, and 19 others injured, when a pickup driver plowed into a group ride in Goodyear, Arizona in February. Meanwhile, the driver still hasn’t been charged six months later.

A 22-year old New Mexico man will spend the next 20 years behind bars for fatally shooting another man after trying to steal his bike at a bus stop, and the 43-year old victim tried to fight back.

Colorado’s governor responds to the death of rising 17-year old cyclist Magnus White by reminding everyone to drive safely and yield to people on bicycles. Good advice, regardless of the circumstances. 

The New York Times examines the practical effects of the VanMoof bankruptcy filing, after the company ceased to exist virtually overnight, leaving owners of the Dutch ebikes unable to get repairs and unsure if the bike’s app-based software will continue to work.

A New York program is training formerly incarcerated people to work as bike mechanics for the city’s Citi Bike bikeshare, working with the Brooklyn DA’s office to recruit members of marginalized communities; the bikeshare program is experiencing record breaking ridership despite rumors of a sale.

Former President Trump is being arraigned today on conspiracy charges, but all Fox News seems to care about is President Biden going for a leisurely Delaware bike ride instead of hanging his head in shame over his son’s alleged misdeeds.

Robert Pattinson is one of us, as the Twilight actor goes for a bike ride around his New York neighborhood. But would it kill him to look like he’s actually enjoying it?

 

International

Three young British men face murder charges in the hit-and-run death of an ebike rider, even though police are still looking for their car.

Three people were hospitalized and several others treated at the scene after seven bike riders collided during the World Police and Fire Games in Winnipeg, Canada.

 

Competitive Cycling

In yet another tragic reminder of the dangers of race motos, four people were hospitalized after TV motorcycle crashed into fans with just over three miles to go Wednesday’s fifth stage at the Tour of Poland.

Australian road cyclist Rob Stannard will miss this week’s world championships in Glasgow, after he was provisionally suspended for an alleged doping violation from five years earlier.

Eritrean cyclist Biniam Girmay was reportedly denied a visa to travel to Scotland for the cycling world championships, but it didn’t matter because he withdrew from the race after crashing in last weekend’s Clasica San Sebastian.

Bicycling offers an update on the condition of Dutch cyclist Amy Pieters, who suffered a severe brain injury on a training ride with the Dutch national team two years ago, and still faces a very long road to recovery. As usual, read it on Yahoo if the magazine blocks you. 

Pro basketball star Kevin Durant is now a part owner of the new National Cycling League, joining a number of current and former NBA and NFL players.

 

Finally…

Who needs shift levers when your bike could respond to voice commands? No, you don’t owe a reward to the person who stole your bike.

And yes, Tour de France bikes are different from what you ride.

And cleaner, too.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

A call to rejoin the fight in Fullerton and LA County, what CA’s bike rebates could be, and tips for your first cargo bike

July 25, 2023 / / Comments Off on A call to rejoin the fight in Fullerton and LA County, what CA’s bike rebates could be, and tips for your first cargo bike

Okay, I screwed up this time. 

In the words that follow, I called in BikeLA, the former Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, to step up and help this writer for the Fullerton Observer, and other bicyclists in the area, with their campaign in support of plans for a lane reduction on Associated Road. 

In my mind, I mistakenly placed Fullerton in the tangle of cities in Southeast Los Angeles County. 

It’s not, of course. 

Fullerton is in Northern Orange County, on the other side of Buena Park. Which I should know, having written about the city several times — let alone being there more than once. 

I stand by my call for BikeLA to step up and resume its role as LA County’s leading bicycle advocacy organization. But any criticism, real or implied, for not taking a direct role in Fullerton is off base, and I apologize. 

He gets it.

A writer for the Fullerton Observer calls for improving safety on Associated Road by removing two traffic lanes between Bastanchury and Imperial, allowing for wider bike lanes and several feet of painted buffering.

But warns it’s not likely to happen without wide support, particularly from the city’s bicycling community.

Only property owners on Associated Road received notice of the meetings on this issue. Almost all were opposed to the project, primarily to the parking and the fear that it would result in homeless and student parking.  Two Councilmembers supported the opponents, while Councilmember Charles opposed the parking but supported the lane removal. Mayor Jung did not speak directly to the issue, but at a later meeting, in response to some comments that decisions seemed to have been made behind closed doors, he stated that it would come back for a vote.

That is yet to happen. Thus the issue remains open. In the meantime, staff has stopped working on this proposal. Since it involves only paint and the road re-construction is going forward from now until November 20, time remains to determine the ultimate lane configuration.

He goes on to call for people to sign a petition supporting the lane reduction, which doesn’t even have 40 supporters as of this writing.

And ends with this.

The Council majority would prefer to see this go away, even though there is no shortage of bicycle riders in Fullerton. Over 1000 turned out for a July 4 ride on Wilshire. Not so many readily turn out for Council meetings, contact their members, or sign petitions. Nor is there an active bicycle or road safety advocacy group in Fullerton at the moment.

If you wish to weigh in on this proposal (pro or con), you can contact the Council at Councilmembers@cityoffullerton.com, Or you can show up for public comments at Council meetings on the 1st and 3rd Tuesday of each month at 5:30.

It has long been a problem, not just in Fullerton, but throughout LA County to get the bicycling community involved with their local government, and to stand up en masse to demand safer streets.

For nearly two decades, the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, now rebranded as BikeLA, led the fight, often working behind the scenes with government leaders, but able to marshal a significant turnout at council meetings when needed.

But now they’re needed — desperately — in Fullerton, and elsewhere throughout LA County.

As a former board member of the organization, I’ve withheld any criticism for some time now — especially knowing the dire straights the previous Executive Director left them in when he left the group at the brink of financial disaster after leaving the country.

I know the current board and leadership of BikeLA have worked hard to bring the organization back to health, financially and otherwise.

But it’s time they got back into the fight.

They have long since been supplanted as the county’s primary voice for bicycle advocacy by groups like Active SGV, SAFE and Streets For All.

Yes, some chapters of BikeLA have continued to be active in their local communities over the past few years.

But those chapters, and individual members, need to light a fire under the the current leadership, and urge them to once again step forward to lead the fight for bicycle access and safer streets.

And become, once again, the advocacy organization we all need them to be.

Because Fullerton is literally crying out for help.

And the rest of us aren’t far behind.

Photo from Pexels.

………

This is what California could have, if it ever rolls out its long-delayed, vastly underfunded ebike rebate program.

………

Arleigh Greenwald, better known as Bike Shop Girl, offers a Twitter thread with tips on buying your first cargo bike.

Although you’ll have to click through to read it, and may not be able to if you don’t have a Twitter account, since Elon keep changing the damn site rules every five minutes, along with the name.

https://twitter.com/bikeshopgirlcom/status/1683655598691287041

………

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

The US Army Corps of Engineers is closing a popular lakefront roadway near Fort Worth, Texas to bike riders and pedestrians, citing “hundreds” of safety incidents over the past three months. Because evidently, people are much safer with cars zooming by than people walking or riding bikes.

No bias here. A Cambridge, Massachusetts city council candidate says she won’t sign a pledge to keep building bike lanes, because some people can’t ride a bike, and even people who ride bikes sometimes drive cars.

Police in England are looking for the person who pushed a man off his bike and into a river; the victim was okay, but his bike was lost in the water.

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

A Virginia man faces charges after he allegedly crashed his bike into a car, then fired a shot at the driver. Seriously, violence — especially gun violence — is never the answer, though I suspect there may be some dispute over just who hit who. 

A Singapore bike rider is looking for the man who somehow took offense to being passed on his bike, catching up to him outside a store and repeatedly kicking his bike and wheels while swearing at him, until police broke up the confrontation — but evidently let the attacker go.

………

Local 

Apparently, Metro finally figured out they can waste all the money they want on widening the 605, without having to tear down people’s homes in Latino working class neighborhoods in Downey and Santa Fe Springs after all.

A Streetsblog op-ed from Streets for All’s Michael Schneider and Eli Lipmen of Move LA says it’s time to go bold, and finally make bikeshare a core Metro mobility service instead of an afterthought.

Bizarre attack in Pasadena, where a man pushing a bicycle walked up to another man at a bus stop, pushed the tip of a machete against his abdomen, then slashed a four-inch gash in the man’s leg, before gathering his bike and walking off, all without a single word.

 

State

Police in Huntington Beach are jumping on the ebike crackdown bandwagon, warning, ticketing and/or arresting those who “mis-use” ebikes, while warning that riding over-powered ebikes under the influence could lead to a DUI. Thanks to Oceanside bike lawyer and BikinginLA sponsor Richard Duquette for the heads-up.

A man in his 60s was lucky to apparently escape with minor injuries when he was the victim of a hit-and-run driver while riding his bike in Chula Vista late Monday morning.

San Diego’s SDNews says ebikes are popular and convenient, but also pose dangers, citing battery fires and speeds up to 28 mph — but fails to mention that you can achieve that relatively easily on a good road bike, too. And without the risk it will burst into flames. 

A lithium-ion ebike battery is blamed for setting an apartment on fire in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district.

 

National

A group of 15 Portland bike riders are suing the city for failing to comply with a 52-year old state law requiring cities to build cycling and pedestrian infrastructure whenever a road is reconstructed. Too bad we don’t have something like that on the books here in California. Because there are a lot of cities that need to have the hell sued out of them, starting with a certain SoCal megalopolis I could name. 

This is who we share the road with. A New Mexico woman faces vehicular homicide, DUI, hit-and-run and child abuse charges for fleeing the scene after driving against traffic, hitting a parked car and killing a 70-year old man riding a bicycle, all with her three-year old son in the car.

A Houston TV station reports on a local group using mountain bikes to help teens and their families dealing with addiction and other self-destructive behaviors.

Police in Minneapolis are warning about new bike theft tactics, as thieves are using super glue to jam bike locks so they can’t be opened, then coming back later and cutting the locks. I’ve been told by LAPD officers that’s being used here, too.

A Kentucky man will spend the next ten years behind bars after copping a plea to the hit-and-run death of a bike-riding mother, claiming he somehow didn’t see her despite the flashing lights on her bike, and the man’s she was riding with.

The shameful scourge of sharrows continues to spread, despite studies showing they increase the risk for bike riders, now leaving their dangerous road markings on the streets of Plattsburgh in upstate New York.

Lyft is considering selling off New York’s highly successful Citi Bike bikeshare due to mounting financial problems at the company. Meanwhile, Curbed questions why Citi Bike’s ebikes are always broken, concluding the problem is likely the bikes themselves. Or maybe a financially strapped company is just cutting corners. 

The rich get richer, as NYC’s public realm officer, aka “czar of public spaces,” is building on the city’s recent biking and pedestrian successes by ramping up projects to benefit both.

A 45-year old Pennsylvania man was sentenced to a well-deserved five to ten years behind bars after pleading guilty to the drunken, stoned crash that killed a bike-riding bank manager exactly 1,392 days earlier.

A West Virginia man faces charges of attempted murder, malicious wounding, wanton endangerment, and presentation of a firearm in the commission of a felony for jumping down off his trunk and shooting a passing bike rider in the arm, after screaming at him for some unknown reason.

Unbelievable. A North Carolina woman faces charges for fleeing the scene after running down two bike riders from behind, leaving one man with serious injuries — then trying to coverup her crime by telling investigators she thought she’d hit a deer, and going so far as to place hair from her dog on her windshield to support her story.

 

International

Electrek says the bike industry should refocus on building simple, attractive, and serviceable ebikes following the “shocking” VanMoof bankruptcy.

Canadian Cycling Magazine suggests a half dozen outdated rules for city bicycling that should be modernized.

London officials admitted that a bike lane is causing congestion when buses stop to pick up passengers. In other words, it’s the narrow traffic lanes and lack of bus stops, not the bike lanes, that are the problem. 

A pair of Scottish brothers are about to stand trial for murdering a man taking part in a 104-mile charity bike ride, then hiding his body for months afterwards; they allegedly abandoned the victim after hitting him with their car while driving under the influence, then came back the next day to move his bike and body.

 

Competitive Cycling

Germany’s Liane Lippert captured her first stage win since 2020 on Monday’s stage of the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift, aka the Women’s Tour de France.

Velo offers 21 quick hits in summing up this year’s Tour de France, from a “super” Sepp Kuss to pulling for Cav to make a comeback next year.

Lost in the news from the Tour de France was that upstart American Neilson Powless lost the polka dot King of the Mountain jersey to Italian Giulio Ciccone over the final stages, after pushing the action for much of the race.

Bicycling reports that Netflix’s popular cycling docuseries Unchained will be back for a second season, this time focusing on Tadej Pogačar and the UAE Team Emirates team.  As usual, read it on Yahoo if the magazine blocks you.

 

Finally…

Evidently, winning a Tour de France stage is like getting drunk — especially the next day. The video game-ish future of mountain biking.

And victory is not always to the swiftest, but to those who manage to remain upright.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

Ebikes aren’t motor vehicles under CA law, despite legislator’s call to license riders; and update on CA ebike rebate program

July 11, 2023 / / 2 comments

Yesterday we wrote that Encinitas State Assemblymember Tasha Boerner plans to introduce a bill in the state legislature to require a license to ride an ebike.

The restriction would apparently apply to any kind of ebike, whether ped-assist or throttle-controlled, or any combination thereof.

She announced her intention in an email directed to various people in her district, in response to the Encinitas ebike state of emergency aimed at reducing bicycling injuries, electric and otherwise, in the Northern San Diego County city.

In response, Oceanside bike lawyer and BikinginLA sponsor Richard Duquette forwards a quick state law cheat sheet explaining whether an ebike can legally be considered a motor vehicle requiring a license.

Is an E bike a Motor Vehicle? No.

See CVC  24016(a) discusses “an electric bicycle described in CVC 312.5(a) “equipped w operable pedals and an electric motor of less than 750 watts”. i.e., class 1 through 3 types.

See CVC 24016(b) “A person operating an electric bicycle is NOT subject to the provisions of this code relating to financial responsibility, drivers’ licenses, registration and license plate requirements and an electric bicycle is not a Motor vehicle.”

See CVC 415, which says a motor vehicle is a vehicle that is self-propelled (versus propelled by human power).

So, there’s an argument to be made that a strictly throttle-controlled ebike without operable pedals can be considered a motor vehicle, subject to licensing.

Then again, they already are under California law and require a valid driver’s license to use, though the law is inadequately enforced.

Anything else isn’t. Period.

Then again, all that has already been legislated. California was the first state to develop a classification structure for ebikes and e-scooters, which has been copied and implemented by a significant number of US states.

Click to enlarge

So consider Boerner’s proposed legislation a solution in search of a problem.

One that would create far more problems than it solves, especially at a time when we urgently need to reduce the number of motor vehicles on our streets in response to the climate emergency.

Never mind preventing our streets from grinding to a gridlocked halt due to too many, too large, vehicles.

If she wants to solve that problem, we should talk.

Ebike battery photo by Alex from Pexels.

………

We finally have an update on California’s ebike rebate program, which is still is failure to launch mode, despite earlier estimates that it would go live before this month.

San Diego’s Pedal Ahead ebike loan-to-own program, statewide administrator for the California ebike rebate program, posted this announcement yesterday, backdated to the end of last month.

Click to enlarge

So we’re still waiting, though it sounds like we’re getting closer, and still have no idea when or where the soft launches will take place.

Hopefully we’ll all learn more soon.

………

Streets For All points the finger at Metro’s wasteful highway spending under Measure M, which imposed a half-cent sales tax in Los Angeles County to fund transportation projects.

As they point out, the $10 billion allotted to the highway projects — only a handful of which would accomplish anything other than inducing creating more gridlock through induced demand — would be much better spent on providing safe and efficient alternatives to driving, considering that even so-called green cars are harmful to the environment.

………

Let’s face it.

You could buy a pretty nice bike or two for twelve grand. And you wouldn’t be stuck with an expensive, smelly and inefficient car anymore.

………

Works for me.

I mean, if you have to go, you might as well go in style.

………

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

No bias here. A writer for conservative website Reason says buy your own damn ebike, arguing that there’s nothing to show that ebike rebates increase the number of ebike riders on the streets. Even though Denver’s ebike voucher program has done exactly that. 

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

A bike-riding burglar broke into Bibi’s Boutique on Pico Blvd and made off with the contents of the cash register early yesterday. But at least he was wearing a hi-vis helmet.

A 42-year old Houston man was arrested two weeks after he was charged with felony criminal mischief for smashing a driver’s windshield with a bike lock during a confrontation involving a groups of bicyclists who swarmed the car; the driver has not been charged, despite repeatedly honking and driving through the group ride, as well as pulling a knife because “he felt threatened.”

………

Local 

No news is good news, right?

 

State

A San Diego bike shop owner offers advice on the best kind of bike for every type of bike rider.

A San Francisco website looks at San Francisco’s widely detested Valencia Street centerline protected bike lane pilot project, calling it a compromise that grew from behind the scenes talks, with hope for more radical change down the road.

San Francisco public radio station KQED talks with a mother and educator about the joy of biking with her two young children.

A Sacramento woman talks in depth about quitting her car dependency and going down an anti-car rabbit hole after nearly getting run down by a driver while riding her bike.

 

National

A Streetsblog op-ed from the advocacy manager for America Walks offers five ways you can stand up to demand safer cars and trucks to address the increasing bloodshed on our streets.

The new 2024 Ford Mustang will come with an exit warning device to prevent doorings.

Bicycling highlights the best bike deals from today’s Amazon Prime Day, while Business Wire points out the best ebike buys.

PinkBike conducts their annual field test of “value” mountain bikes. Although they clearly define value a lot differently than I do.

AARP offers seven tips for touring on an ebike, saying don’t get on a battery-powered bicycle before reading it. Most of which you really don’t need to if you have a modicum of experience or common sense. But at least they wait until the penultimate tip before insisting you wear a helmet.

Rad Power Bikes is pulling out of Europe to focus on US sales, in the wake of ongoing problems at the Seattle-based bikemaker, financial and otherwise.

Police in Salem, Oregon sat on video evidence in the March collision that killed a 53-year old woman riding a bicycle in an apparent coverup, failing to turn it over to outside investigators for nearly three months, after earlier failing to disclose that the driver was an off-duty DEA agent.

This is who we share the road with. A 21-year old Yakima, Washington man faces charges for running down a bike rider, snapping his bike in half, before plowing through a chainlink fence and continuing on without stopping; the crash left the victim with broken bones in his thigh, shin, shoulder, arm, wrist and face.

The downside of Denver’s highly successful ebike voucher program is that it hasn’t been successful in spurring sales at local bike shops, with most of the vouchers used with out-of-state companies.

Good news from Michigan, where a 13-year old boy has made a “miraculous” recovery after a hit-and-run driver left him with a fractured neck and critical traumatic brain injury; the driver charged with hitting him remains in jail on $25,000 bond.

Kindhearted Ohio sheriff’s deputies gave a boy a new bike for his 11th birthday, just days after someone stole his bicycle.

There’s a special place in hell for the Memphis bike thief who stole a boy’s bike, then shot the kid several times in the foot after the victim spotted him riding his bike.

 

International

A British man was hospitalized with a brain bleed and two broken ribs after he was severely beaten by a gang of teenagers, who hit him with his own bicycle before making off with it.

Shocking news from the Netherlands, where high-flying Dutch ebike maker VanMoof called it quits, at least for now, after apparently burning through more than $200 million in venture capital funding; the company has halted sales and all operations as it tries to secure bridge funding to keep going.

An Indian newspaper says a “tribe” of bicycling tutors, including a successful urologist, is teaching older adults to pedal a path to freedom.

Speaking of India, Conde Nast Traveller directs you to eight guided bicycling tours to travel the subcontinent during the monsoon season.

Singapore ebike riders complain about dangerous drivers, as well as increasingly stringent regulations have increased their risk.

 

Competitive Cycling

The US will send a team of battle-tested Tour de France vets to the world championships next month, with a lineup including includes king of the mountain leader Neilson Powless, near-stage winner Matteo Jorgenson, as well as Lawson Craddock and US road race champion Quinn Simmons.

Road.cc examines the bicycles that have won each stage of the Tour de France so far.

The Belgian Waffle Ride gravel races are changing their entry categories after a transgender woman dominated her competitors last month; classifications will now be limited according to birth sex, with a third Open category open to anyone, regardless of sexual identification.

Cyclist talks with trans cyclist Pippa York, who was the first Brit to win a stage at the Tour de France before she transitioned.

 

Finally…

Who says your bike needs round wheels? Probably not the best idea to flee from the cops while riding under the influence, then tell them to tase you.

And that feeling when your wind tunnel graphic looks more like a bike rider with a massive farting problem.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin.

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

Boerner calls for licensing ebike riders, the untapped power of ebike rebates, and H’wood Blvd remake presumably on track

July 10, 2023 / / One comment

And so it begins.

California 77th District Assemblymember Tasha Boerner, a Democrat from Encinitas, has responded to the Northern San Diego County city’s ebike state of emergency by calling for requiring a license to ride one.

Not for kids.

Not for specific classes of ebikes, like the high-powered, throttle-control ebikes that are really low-powered motorcycles disguised as electric bicycles.

But for everyone.

No matter how experienced you are on a bicycle, evidently. Or whether you’re already a licensed driver, or even hold a motorcycle license.

Let’s hope this was just a badly worded announcement. But this appears to be nothing more than an electrified version of the long-standing, and long debunked, demand that bike riders should be required have a license if we’re going to “share the road.”

You know, just like those grown-up, highly trained and law abiding people in the big, deadly machines.

And it would likely be the first step in a very slippery slope to requiring licenses for everyone on two wheels.

Not to mention it doesn’t do a damn thing to address the ever-increasing size of massive motor vehicles literally designed to do maximum harm to anyone outside of them. Or the people who buy and drive them, too often under the influence, frequently while distracted, and usually while speeding.

But sure, let’s blame kids riding their ebikes to school or the beach, because they’re an easy target. Especially when drivers see them rolling through stop signs they shouldn’t be required to stop for in the first place.

There’s a legitimate argument for providing ebike training, especially for teen riders too young for a drivers license.

And for taking another look at over-powered ebikes that are sold with “wink wink” speed limitation software that is easily hacked to exceed state ebike class restrictions. Or banning the use of pedal-less, throttle-controlled ebikes.

But throwing up a road block to the growth of ebikes is exactly the wrong move when our streets are slowly grinding to a halt due to too many cars in our cities, and our state is literally on fire as a result of extreme conditions fueled by climate change.

We need to do everything we can to get more cars off the roads, and more bikes on them, electric and otherwise.

Not put up legal roadblocks to stop it.

Thanks to BikinginLA sponsor Richard Duquette for the tip. 

Photo by Maxfoot from Pixabay.

………

Speaking of ebikes, Bloomberg’s CityLab examines the untapped power of ebike rebates.

You know, like the untapped power of California’s long-gestating and underfunded ebike rebate program.

Their story is pretty well summed-up by this subhead:

Voucher programs can speed uptake of less-polluting electric bicycles and get more people out of cars. Why are states and cities limiting their effectiveness?

Why, indeed, Assemblymember Boerner?

………

There may be hope yet.

A Twitter conversation over the weekend — yes, Twitter is still a thing, despite the best efforts of Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk — raised the question of whether the plan to remake Hollywood Boulevard is still on track.

The proposal would reduce traffic lanes and parking, while installing wider, walkable sidewalks, bollard-protected bike lanes and outdoor dining areas appears to be moving forward, based on nothing more than the fact that its website is still live.

A lot depends on the council district’s current king, uh, councilmember, Hugo Soto-Martinez, though.

The project was developed by his predecessor Mitch O’Farrell, who used it as an argument for his re-election.

At the time, Soto-Martinez voiced his support for the project. But if he’s done so after his election, I haven’t heard it. And it doesn’t appear to be mentioned on his council website, which is odd for such a significant project.

Given the outsized power Los Angeles councilmembers have to approve, kill or modify any project within their council district, for any reason, his support will be mandatory before any work can begin on the street.

And don’t get me started on the long-standing need for a Times Square-style pedestrian plaza at Hollywood and Highland.

Thanks to Andrew Rudick for the heads-up.

………

Here’s your chance to get in a good bike ride, while you advocate for improvements to South Los Angeles streets.

………

The Los Angeles Times finally printed their story about gravel biking in yesterday’s paper, over a month after it appeared online.

Meanwhile, Cycling Weekly offers tips on how to turn your roadie into a gravel bike.

………

I like it.

………

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

An English motorist faces charges after he was recorded on video using a separated bike lane as his own personal traffic bypass.

A road-raging Scottish cab driver screamed and swore at a bike rider for not using a bike lane that’s less than three feet wide and stops abruptly, before cutting him off and hitting him.

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

Yet another reminder to remain at the scene of a bike crash, as a Toronto bicyclist was hospitalized with life-threatening injuries following a collision with a hit-and-run bike rider. Seriously, you have the same obligation to stay after a crash as drivers do, even if too many of them don’t take it seriously. 

No, smashing the doors of a British grocery store in an attempted armed robbery is not a recommended use for a bicycle.

………

Local 

She gets it. LA Times media columnist Carolina A. Miranda reviews a pair of new books discussing how America’s wasteful parking obsession results in needlessly high housing prices.

Los Angeles is considering mobility improvements in Central LA in advance of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, including new bus lanes, bike lanes and mobility hubs.

CD2 Councilmember Paul Krekorian officially reopened the new and improved intersection at San Fernando Road and Arvilla Ave as part of the final phase of the nine-mile San Fernando Bike Path project.

Walk Bike Glendale begins their Summertime Series of bike rides, starting with a community ride featuring Glendale Mayor Dan Brotman on July 22nd.

 

State

Fountain Valley police are looking for the hit-and-run driver who critically injured a 20-year old Huntington Beach man when he was rear ended while riding in a bike lane in the Orange County city on the 4th of July.

Loma Linda University Medical Center reports a teenager’s life was saved when surgeons discovered a non-cancerous tumor on his spine after he was seriously injured in a collision while riding his bike.

San Francisco bicyclists say there’s no salvaging the centerline protected bike lanes on Valencia Street.

 

National

CBS This Morning takes an in-depth look at America’s unsafe streets and rising pedestrian death rates, and the reasons behind them.

WaPo examines how car brakes and tires are spewing increasing amounts of particulates into the air we breathe, even as tailpipe emissions continue to decrease.

TechCrunch recommends the best ebikes for every type of rider.

A new Utah study shows that only 7.3 percent of suspected serious bike crashes and just 6 percent of fatal bike crashes occurred in or near a bike lane, while a third of bicycling deaths occur at intersections bike riders can’t find a safe way to cross.

This is the cost of traffic violence. The director of the Fargo Marathon was killed when he was struck by a pickup driver towing a boat trailer while he was riding a bike in the North Dakota city; he was described as an avid runner and cyclist, and the general manager of the local ski area.

A couple men in their 60s are recreating their bike ride to the Canadian border, 50 years after they first did it as Wisconsin teenagers.

A Cleveland bike advocacy group took the rare step of advising bike riders not to use a new green bike lane over a local bridge, warning that it ends abruptly after a short distance, dropping bicyclists into a busy shared lane.

Kindhearted Utica, New York cops gave a six-year old girl a new bicycle, after a group of teenagers “borrowed” the bike she got for her birthday just four days earlier, and never returned it.

A New York program is distributing donated bicycles to migrants recently arrived in the city.

 

International

Cycling Weekly considers whether baking soda can make your bicycling performance rise like it does cakes.

An architecture site examines ten cities embracing bicycles as part of their urban planning. None of which is Los Angeles. And only one of which is even in North America. 

Thieves in Montreal cut down a small tree to steal a bicycle locked to it, a reminder not to lock your bike to living things. Like people. Or dogs. 

What Toronto’s new bike-friendly mayor could mean for the city’s bike lanes.

A Welsh father is committed to developing a popular bike park in memory of his son, who died in a mountain bike crash on a trail he built himself.

Police in the UK are facing well-deserved criticism for fining a young mother for “cycling-related anti-social behavior” for riding her bicycle on the sidewalk, rather than risk a dangerously busy street.

British bike advocates are criticizing Northern Ireland’s “shameful” failure to reduce bicycling deaths, as the rate of bicycling fatalities has remained the same over the past decade. Meanwhile, American bike riders would be happy if our rate of bike deaths was anywhere close to ten years ago.

What to pack for your next Irish bikepacking trip.

An Indian teenager amazingly avoided getting crushed when he was struck by a school bus and run over, after his brakes failed riding downhill on a wet street.

A 12-year-old Palestinian boy miraculously walked out of a Jerusalem hospital, after surgeons reattached his head to his neck when he suffered an internal decapitation in a collision while riding his bike.

 

Competitive Cycling

Very disappointing news, as Mark Cavendish’ attempt at breaking the legendary Eddy Merckx’ record for Tour de France stage wins came crashing to a halt when he crashed out of the race with an apparent broken collarbone in stage eight. Cav needed just one win to make the mark his own, in what was to be his final Tour — or is it? And does anyone really care what Lance has to say on the subject?

As the Tour reaches its first rest day, two-time winner Tadej Pogačar continues to make incremental gains, cutting his deficit in the race to just 17 seconds behind leader Jonas Vingegaard on the Puy de Dome, while Canada’s Michael Woods scored the biggest stage win of his career.

Once again, fan interference has caused a crash in the Tour de France, knocking podium contender Simon Yates down in the standings, and sending Steff Kras to the hospital by ambulance, and out of the race.

Velo reports the Dutch Alpecin Deceuninckteam is raking it in with Tour de France primes, while the once-mighty Soudal Quick-Step team languishes at the bottom.

L39ION of Los Angeles continues to dominate the American Crit Cup, as Skylar Schneider and Ty Magner won the elite women’s and men’s races at the Bailey & Glasser LLP Twilight race in Boise, Idaho.

 

Finally…

Who need bass strings when you can use bicycle brake cables? Who needs a horse and buggy when you’ve got an ebike?

And your next bicycle could be made of LEGOs.

………

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

Oh, and fuck Putin.

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