Tag Archive for hit-and-run

San Diego bike rider allegedly murdered by driver, violent/deadly dirty cop tricks, and razing the Wright Bros 1st bike shop

November 29, 2021 / / One comment

We’re off to a rip-roaring start to the 7th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

After just three days, donations are already running well above last year’s record-setting pace!

So let’s keep it up! Your contribution will help fund this site until our sponsors renew in the spring, and ensure SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy keeps coming your way every day.

Thanks to Janice H, Michael S, Robert K, Kim D, Daniel F, Arthur B, Mark J, Joseph B, Andrew G, Theodore F, Megan L, Steven S, Elizabeth T, Jonathan P, Douglas M, Amy S, and Jamie S for their generous donations.

And that’s in addition to Robert L, Eric L, David V, Mitchell G, and Olivia K, who donated even before the official start of the fund drive on Friday.

Give now via PayPal, or with Zelle to ted @ bikinginla.com.

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Police allege a San Diego man may have been murdered by a hit-and-run driver, after witnesses apparently told them the driver deliberately attacked him Thanksgiving morning.

Relatives of 40-year old San Diego father Octavio Mendoza called for additional witnesses to come forward in hopes of catching the driver.

Police are looking for a light-colored, older model Chevrolet Suburban or Tahoe; unfortunately, there’s no description of the driver.

Mendoza is at least the 17th person killed riding a bicycle in San Diego County already this year, perhaps three or four times more than in most years.

It’s also the second time in just two months someone in the city has been accused of intentionally murdering a bike rider with their car.

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This is who we share the road with.

Sometimes, I don’t even know what to say. So we’ll let NBC News start things out.

A New Jersey police officer is accused of fatally striking a pedestrian, taking the man’s body home to discuss what to do, and then returning to the scene with the dead man in his back seat, a prosecutor said Wednesday.

They on on to explain the off-duty cop and his passenger fled the scene without bothering to aid the victim or call for help.

Then this.

They reportedly went back to the scene multiple times before they put Dymka into the Honda Accord. They then went to Santiago’s home, where he, Guzman and Santiago’s mother, Annette Santiago, discussed what to do, Stephens’ office said.

Louis Santiago eventually went back to the scene, and his father, who is a Newark police lieutenant, called 911, officials said.

New Jersey State Police arrived and found Dymka dead in the back seat, the prosecutor’s office said.

Did we mention that he’s a cop?

Yet apparently, despite his training, he still had no idea what to do after killing someone with his car.

At least this time, there should be consequences. The killer cop faces charges including reckless vehicular homicide, desecrating human remains, and official misconduct, along with a raft of other counts.

Meanwhile, his mom and passenger are both charged with conspiracy to desecrate human remains and hindering apprehension, among other varied and assorted crimes.

No word on whether the cop and his passenger were drunk or stoned. But you’d sure as hell hope no sober person would do that.

Let alone a cop.

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

A Tucson woman face charges, apparently for allowing an angry driver to assault them.

And yes, he’s a cop, too.

Aloisi and her daughters were walking across the parking lot after brunch, they said, when a vehicle approached them fast before the driver abruptly stopped.

The driver, a man, waved his arms at them and appeared to be yelling, they said, though his windows were closed. The women waved their arms and yelled back at him. Aloisi has a leg problem that prevents her from walking fast after sitting for a length of time, she said…

“He zoomed into that back parking spot, jumped out of his car, threw his hands up in the air and screamed ‘Just f—ing walk’ at us,” Nicole Whitted said.

They tried explaining that their mother can’t walk fast, but the cop continued advancing towards them, before allegedly chest bumping one of the women and angrily taking her to the ground.

He then took the 62-year old mother to the ground as well, holding her down with an arm across her throat while pinning her daughter down with his knee, shades of Derek Chauvin.

Only the intervention of a bystander ended the ugly confrontation after their attacker identified himself, for the first time, as a cop.

Yet only the daughter he allegedly chest bumped was cited for misdemeanor disorderly conduct.

Meanwhile, the alleged road raging attacker denied everything and placed all the blame on the three women, apparently getting off with a pat on the back.

And shamefully, did it all with his family waiting and watching in his car.

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Some things are just wrong. And others are wrong as hell.

Zoning officials in Dayton, Ohio voted almost unanimously to allow the city to demolish the first bike shop operated by the Wright Brothers, overruling the city Landmark Commission, which voted to preserve the 129-year old building.

I mean, it’s not like those guys went on to do anything important or anything.

As justification, the city bizarrely cited the Florida condo collapse, somehow seriously equating the dangers of the collapse of an occupied 12-story building with the possible fall of the long-vacant two-story shop.

Apparently, irreplaceable historic sites must be a dime a dozen around there. Because they don’t seem to give a damn about this one.

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Metro Bike is offering a pair of specials for Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Black Friday Weekend – 30-Day Pass for $1
USE PROMO CODE: BIKESEASON21
$1 for a 30-Day Metro Bike Share Pass (Regular Price: $17)
Sign up for a 30-Day Pass online at metro.net/bikeshare.
Valid Thursday, 11/25/2021 – Monday, 11/29/2021.

Cyber Monday – Save 50% on 365-Day Pass
USE PROMO CODE: CYBERMONDAY21
$75 for a 365-Day Metro Bike Share Pass (Regular Price: $150)
Sign up 365-Day Pass online at metro.net/bikeshare.
Valid Monday, 11/29/2021 only.

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Zachary Rynew reports progress on an extension of the San Fernando Road Bike Path, but notes there’s still work to be done.

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Apparently, there wasn’t a lot of bikewashing at the Los Angeles Auto Show this year, unlike last year when ebikes made a splash. David Drexler forwards this photo of a Shinola bike, noting it’s the only bicycle he saw at the show this year.

Except for all of the mountain bikes used as props on the backs of SUVs, of course.

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Our German correspondent, Ralph Durham, forwards a photo showing how bike lane detours are handled in a country where bikes, and the people on them, actually matter.

I’m sending you a picture of a short Bike and ped detour in Munich.

This is at the corner of Ludwigsbrucke (over the Isar river) and Steindorfstrasse. It is a major intersection. the bikes heading north and south have a direct path under the bridge and can avoid the issue. If you need to turn onto the bridge or off the bridge you will hit this. This bike path has a counter and records hundreds of thousands of trip per year.

The road is 2 lanes in each direction and there is work being done that directly impacts the pedestrian walkway and the 2 way bike path. So they shut down the two northbound car lanes and retriped for bikes and pedestrians to get around the construction.

A lot of care is put into allowing bikes and pedestrians to avoid direct interaction with motor vehicles when construction impacts roads and sidewalks.

Compare and contrast that with how your town handles it.

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Remember this next time you have to lock your bike up to a street sign or parking meter.

Thanks to Keith Johnson for the heads-up. 

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Over the long weekend, I received an email from a British man, asking me to mention the new foldie developed by his San Francisco brother-in-law — the first folding bike where the wheels fold, too.

We’ve mentioned this one before, but it’s worth mentioning again, since wheels are the biggest size limitation for folding bicycles. And with just one day left to go, the Tuck Bike still has over $42,000 to go to meet their funding goal.

So if you’re in the market for a $1,300 bike that really folds, this is your chance.

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

No bias here. In an interminably long screed, San Diego’s bike-hating OB Rag accuses “extreme” bicyclists of holding sway over area planners for demanding crazy things like stop signs to slow speeding drivers, and not wanting to get killed when they ride.

A British YouTuber and self-proclaimed Voice of Reason offers a bizarre rant, concluding that “supercilious nature is out of control,” and bike lanes — or maybe bike riders — must be banned for the good of the planet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eI–Ep9vbGo&t=56s

An unlicensed Aussie driver was finally sentenced to a decade behind bars after repeatedly bragging to people for nearly ten years about the night she chased down and killed a Hong Kong man who was just riding his bike home from work, after he allegedly flipped her off, getting more racist with each retelling.

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

A bike-riding British man got three year behind bars for snatching a woman’s purse, and leaving her with hip and leg injuries after knocking her to the ground. Which is two years and three months more than a career criminal in the UK got for stealing four bicycles in five weeks, on top of more than 100 prior convictions.

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Local

Streets For All urges you to contact the city council to support completion of the Expo Line bike path by closing the absurd Northvale Gap, which was skipped to appease homeowners on the afore mentioned Northvale Road, who worried criminals would ride their bikes into the neighborhood to steal their stuff. No, really.

Streets For All is also calling on everyone to support a Metro board motion scheduled for Thursday to provide an additional $2 million in open streets funding; current funding allows funding of just less than half of the 27 open streets proposals from around the county.

The student newspaper at Cal State Northridge calls on the university to use surplus funds to develop its own campus-wide bikeshare system.

The massive new Burbank bridge finally opened after 20 months of construction, featuring bike lanes on either side, but only a single sidewalk on the south side of the bridge. Evidently, they couldn’t squeeze in another sidewalk because the needed to make room for three traffic lanes and a freeway onramp lane in each direction.

 

State

The San Diego Reader celebrates all the infrastructure options available for bike riders in the city. Although sharrows are nothing to celebrate.

A Berkeley woman is expected to survive after she was critically injured in a collision while riding her bike; thankfully, she was revived after having no pulse and not breathing when paramedics arrived.

A bike rider was killed in a collision in Moraga Friday morning; unfortunately, no details were available about the victim or the crash.

There’s a special place in hell for whoever left a 15-year old Stockton boy sprawled in the street after slamming into his bicycle, apparently not seeing the group of teens on their bikes directly ahead of him or her after rounding a corner.

 

National

A writer for The Atlantic confronts the deadly myth that human error is responsible for 94% of traffic fatalities — unless that human error is actually committed by the people who design and engineer our roads.

A blogger offers tips on buying an ebike, along with recommendations on what to buy.

Singletracks offers their favorite picks for Cyber Monday deals on mountain bikes and gear.

An author Philadelphia author relates how riding her bike helped her cope with a series of losses during the pandemic, including the death of her mother, who taught her how to ride a bicycle.

A five-year old Louisiana boy is able to ride a bike for the first time, thanks to a dozen people who rode their bikes 108 miles from Baton Rouge to New Orleans, raising $30,000 to buy adaptive bicycles for handicapped kids like him.

In yet another example of keeping a dangerous driver on the road until it’s too late, a “groundbreaking” Florida neurosurgeon faces a vehicular homicide charge for killing a bike-riding triathlete while driving on the wrong side of the road at over four times the posted 20 mph speed limit in a borrowed Tesla; he’s been ticketed at least three times for speeding in the past five years, at speeds up to 112 mph.

 

International

A coalition of 125 community groups rode and rated Toronto’s bike lanes, concluding that nearly half deserved a failing grade. Anyone want to guess how LA’s bike lanes would fare?

It takes a major schmuck to steal an old, rusty bike from a Nova Scotia man, whole he was busy ringing the bell for a Salvation Army kettle.

That’ll teach ’em. After drivers complained about what they consider overly wide bike lanes, English officials threatened to narrow traffic lanes even more if drivers keep causing crashes.

You’ve got to be kidding. A judge in the UK ordered a former professional cyclist into rehab and wished him well following his drunken strong-armed robbery of a 13-year old girl’s bike.

A Irish man graduated at the top of his class as a bicycle mechanical engineer, 18 years after he was blinded in an assault as a teenager; he built his own tandem bike as part of his coursework.

Bike Radar reports on the cutting edge findings from the Science & Cycling Conference in Leuven, Belgium to help you go faster

An Indian district president rode his bicycle to thank voters for electing him to another term, as well as “raise awareness about the environment, simple living and fitness.”

An Indian man was busted for biking under the influence, just a day after a new Kolkata policy went into effect to give breath tests to suspected intoxicated bike riders.

A Philippine mayor was ticketed for riding a bicycle without a helmet, just a year after she signed a bill requiring them.

Philippine bike riders took to the streets to celebrate yesterday’s National Bicycle Day.

Once again, a member of New Zealand’s parliament has ridden her bike to the hospital to give birth, delivering a. healthy baby about an hour later; she also rode her bike to the hospital three years ago to deliver her first child. Thanks to Victor Bale for the link.

 

Competitive Cycling

Cycling Weekly profiles rising American cyclist and college student Megan Jastrab, who won three world titles in 2019 as a 17-year old junior, and took Bronze in team pursuit at the Tokyo Olympics in her first race at the elite level.

 

Finally…

That feeling when your training as a stunt person lets you walk away from a crash with another bicyclist, with nothing more than a bruised pinkie. Making bike thefts stats drop by giving up on reporting it.

And there’s more than one good use for an ebike.

Thanks again to Keith Johnson.

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Happy Chanukah to everyone celebrating today!

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

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

Update: San Diego man murdered by hit-and-run driver in possible intentional crash while riding bicycle in Otay Mesa

November 26, 2021 / / Comments Off on Update: San Diego man murdered by hit-and-run driver in possible intentional crash while riding bicycle in Otay Mesa

Call it murder.

Multiple sources are reporting that a man was killed in a collisionwhile riding his bike in San Diego’s Otay Mesa West neighborhood late Thanksgiving morning.

And it didn’t take long for investigators to determine it could have been intentional.

The victim, identified only as a 40-year old man, was riding near Arey Drive and Picador Boulevard next to the Silverwing Recreation Center when he was run down by the driver of a light-colored SUV around 11:29 am Thursday.

He was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital.

The driver fled the scene without stopping. Police are looking for an older model Chevrolet Suburban or Tahoe; there’s no description available on who was behind the wheel.

There’s also no word on how the crash occurred, or why police determined it was deliberate, although people at the recreation center may have seen the crash.

Every hit-and-run driver who kills someone should face a murder charge. This one actually might, if police can find them.

Anyone with information is urged to call San Diego’s Homicide Unit at 619/531-2293.

This is at least the 58th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the 17th that I’m aware of in San Diego County, which is experiencing by far the bloodiest year in recent memory.

It’s also the second bike rider intentionally murdered by a driver in San Diego in just the last two months.

Update: The victim has been identified by relatives as 40-year old Octavio Mendoza, father of a ten-month old child, with another on the way.

Update 2: San Diego police have finally confirmed the victim’s identity as 40-year old San Diego resident Octavio Mendoza. 

A photo from the scene suggests why investigators initially suspected homicide, as muddy tire tracks suggest Mendoza’s killer jumped the curb and drove across the grass field to chase him down. 

Meanwhile, video from the scene shows his mangled bike lying in the gutter. 

A crowdfunding campaign to pay Mendoza’s funeral expenses has raised just over $6,400 of the modest $12,000 goal. 

Never mind that he leaves behind an eight-month old boy, with a second child on the way, who will never know their father. 

My deepest sympathy and prayers for Octavio Mendoza and his loved ones. 

Thanks to Phillip Young for the heads-up on the updates. 

Category: Injuries and Fatalities / Tags: , , , , ,

DTLA hit-and-run driver abandoned stolen car, US traffic deaths spike in 2021, and $1,500 federal ebike tax credit back in bill

October 29, 2021 / / One comment

More information on yesterday’s hit-and-run in Downtown Los Angeles.

The victim was riding an e-scooter against traffic when she was struck by the driver of a Chevy Spark; the impact threw her onto the sidewalk where she landed head-first.

She was hospitalized in the intensive care unit with severe head trauma, but is expected to survive.

And confirming yesterday’s speculation, the LAPD reports the car was stolen, which explains why the hit-and-run driver fled on foot while leaving the car behind.

An LAPD press release offered this description of the suspect.

The driver who fled was described as a 20- to 25-year-old man, 5 feet, 6 inches to 5 feet, 10 inches tall, weighing between 150 and 175 pounds with a tattoo of unknown writing on the right side of his chest. He was last seen wearing gray pants with a possible camouflage pattern.

Anyone with information is urged to contact LAPD Central Traffic Investigator Diaz at 213/833-3713, or email 36160@lapd.online. Calls made during non-business hours or on weekends can be made to 877/527-3247.

As always, there is a standing $25,000 reward for any hit-and-run resulting in serious injury in the City of Los Angeles.

Suspect photo from LAPD press release.

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Is anyone really surprised that US traffic deaths are up nearly 20% in the first six months of this year?

According to the press release below, that’s the largest six-month increase ever recorded, and the most deaths in the first six months of any year since 2006.

Meanwhile, a new AAA study shows fewer American drivers are running red lights or driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, contradicting fears that stoned driving would spike as more states legalize cannabis.

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At last, there’s a little good news out of Washington, as the latest version of the federal infrastructure bill restores the original $1,500 ebike tax credit, which had been cut to just $750 in a House committee.

The credit would cover 30% of the purchase price of ebikes costing up to $5,000, with a declining percentage above that for bikes up to eight grand.

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The East Side Riders are combining a little Halloween fun with Vision Zero advocacy this Sunday.

There’s also an unrelated ride later in the day for nighttime Halloween partiers.

https://twitter.com/BikeLAredditors/status/1453880029289410562

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Speaking of the East Side Riders, if anyone wonders why I’m such a longtime fan of the bike club, and founder John Jones III, all you have to do is watch this.

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Nice to see the L39ion of Los Angeles cycling team looking beyond bike racing to give back to the community, as they attempt to raise $200,000 to get more kids on bikes, and more bikes in schools.

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Fun video from Phil Gaimon, as he goes riding where the deer and the antelope — and moose and bear — play in Wyoming’s Grand Tetons National Park, which remains one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen.

And yes, I’ve gone swimming in that lake he finds.

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Now we have to worry about getting buzzed from above, too.

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

No bias here. An Encinitas paper continues attempting to blame the victim in the city’s largest legal settlement, as someone who didn’t see the crash insists she was invisible to the driver who hit her bike because of her alleged lack of lights and dark clothing.

Kansas City bike lanes are facing a governmental bikelash, as a city councilmember wants control over what lanes get built — or possibly removed — in her district, despite the city’s previously passed Complete Streets policy.

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

A man on the British Island of Jersey demands action after an ebike rider knocked his 14-year old grandson off his bicycle while passing on a narrow bike path, then left him lying there with a broken wrist while insisting he was too busy to stop.

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Local

Metro’s Regional Connector is expected to open next summer, along with a 700-foot esplanade compete with 40-foot wide walkway and bidirectional bike path.

Shockingly, Los Angeles is among the 25 American cities on track to surpass climate goals set in the 2015 Paris Agreement by 2025, even without doing anything to reduce motor vehicle traffic.

 

State

Streetsblog reports the common theme in the recent California Active Transportation Symposium was the need for planners to actually listen to the bike riders and pedestrians their project will affect. Let’s hope they heard that, because they too often don’t hear us. 

Redlands installs sharrows on a narrow street, even though studies show they’re actually worse than doing nothing.

A 19-year old Davis woman was critically injured when a driver allegedly ran a red light and slammed into her bicycle.

 

National

Consumer Reports offers tips on getting a good bike fit.

An automotive website says Trek’s new 28 mph Domain+ is more like a motorcycle with pedals than an ebike.

Singletracks says you’ve got to stop and smell the ancient ferns along your way.

Seattle’s Rad Power is now the $329 million behemoth of the ebike world, after the company’s latest round of financing brought in an additional $154 million, passing VanMoof as the best-funded ebike brand.

Zion National Park opened a new 10-mile mountain bike trail developed through a public-private partnership in an effort to spread the impact on the popular park.

It takes a special kind of schmuck to run down an eight-year old Utah kid on a bicycle, then leave him lying in the street without calling for help; fortunately, he wasn’t seriously injured.

The family of a six-year old Michigan boy have filed a $4 million lawsuit against their neighbors, alleging that one of the men shot him when he went to get his bike off the neighbor’s lawn earlier this year.

Harlem World Magazine looks back at the New York neighborhood’s 1896 Bicycle Parade, which was sponsored by the Evening Telegram newspaper.

The NYPD reported closing nearly half of complaints about cars illegally parked in bike lanes in less than 15 minutes, and a quarter of the complaints in less that five minutes — an “implausibly fast” rate that critics say is proof they’re closing the files without responding. In other words, they just don’t care about blocked bike lanes, or the safety of people who use them. Thanks to Victor Bale for the heads-up.

New York has a long way to go to encourage multimodal commutes, with a decided lack of safe bike parking near transit stations. You know they have a problem when the city is compared unfavorably to Los Angeles.

Streetsblog asks why every street doesn’t have a bike lane, after a new report from the New York Department of Transportation shows that painted bike lanes improve safety by 32%, while protected bike lanes cut the risk of injury up to 60%.

The body discovered at the New Jersey HQ of Jamis Bikes we mentioned yesterday belonged to a 43-year old mother who had worked for the company for 20 years; she was allegedly murdered in a hammer attack by a 24-year old coworker who stole her credits cards, then later turned himself into the police.

Atlanta bike cops busted a murder suspect who had been on the run for eight days after he was spotted on a local pathway.

 

International

The BBC looks back at Major Taylor, bicycling’s first Black superstar, and questions why he’s still largely unknown outside of the bike community.

London police are asking anyone who lost a bike recently to contact them after they recovered 20 hot bikes and frames when they busted an alleged bicycle fence. I’ll be happy to take one of the Bromptons if nobody claims ’em.

A Welsh government minister says the country needs to stop the “us vs them” mentality on the streets to improve safety for people on bicycles, astutely adding that some drivers have behavior problems.

Pink Bike explores France’s secret bike parks.

 

Competitive Cycling

The first ever Into The Lion’s Den bike race founded by L39ion of LA’s Williams brothers will roll through the streets of Sacramento tomorrow, with a unique format where teams will represent their home cities.

Italian cyclist Nicola Bagioli is retiring at the ripe old age of 26 to devote his time to making soapstone pottery.

 

Finally…

That feeling when there’s nowhere to park your bike at the world climate conference. Now you, too, can own your very own bespoke bamboo bicycle for the equivalent of just $668.

And why just wear headphones when you can take your piano with you?

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

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

Driver flees on foot after hitting salmon scooter rider in DTLA, and Long Beach teen rideout marred by shoplifting

October 28, 2021 / / Comments Off on Driver flees on foot after hitting salmon scooter rider in DTLA, and Long Beach teen rideout marred by shoplifting

LA’s hit-and-run plague just keeps on going.

The LAPD is looking for a shirtless driver who ran off on foot after crashing into a woman riding an e-scooter in DTLA.

The victim was riding against traffic when she was struck, which means the driver probably wouldn’t have faced any consequences if he’d just stuck around.

Instead, he abandoned his car and fled on the sidewalk, for reasons known only to him at this point. It could be that he was drunk or stoned, the car was stolen, or possibly he was in the country illegally and feared deportation.

Or any one of a number of other possible explanations.

Meanwhile, the victim was hospitalized with a head wound, which means there is an automatic $25,000 reward for the arrest and conviction of the suspect.

https://twitter.com/LAPDCTD24/status/1453466605518614530

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Police ordered a group of 200 to 300 mostly teenage bike riders to disperse Sunday afternoon after they were accused of stealing $300 to $400 worth of alcohol and other items from a Signal Hill Food 4 Less.

The teens were taking part in an organized rideout captured in a pair of videos.

Unfortunately, I’m unable to embed them for some reason, so you’ll have to click through to YouTube to see them. 

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Maybe this will finally get the message across.

Of course, first you need a decent protected bike lane to print it on.

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A writer for Pink Bike attempts to ride every mountain bike trail at British Columbia’s Sun Peaks Bike Park in a single weekend.

Although the bike park may have some competition from a new one in Arkansas next year.

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

An English woman is questioning whether it’s worth it to keep riding her bike after a passenger in a passing car attempted to push her off her bicycle.

A Singapore driver was fined the equivalent of over $2,000 for punching a woman riding a bicycle with her three-year old son, after she slapped his car when he nearly ran them over by forcing his way into the lane she was in.

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

A Louisiana man was busted after he robbed a business at gunpoint, then made a failed attempt at a bicycle getaway.

Police in Mad City, Wisconsin are investigating after a woman on a group ride was punched in the face by an angry man on a bike, who was apparently enraged to find the group on the trail, even though they politely moved right to give him room to pass.

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Local

Streetsblog’s Joe Linton offers suggestions on how to improve the new Hollywood Metro Bike bikeshare, including more safe spaces to ride them and stop hiding the docks in unobtrusive locations.

The worldwide plague of armed bike theft reared its ugly head in Culver City, where a man on a bicycle accused another man of riding a bike that belonged to his friend, then threatened to shoot him if he didn’t give up his bike and walk away.

A man in his 30s was fatally shot while either riding or walking his bicycle in Long Beach, in what police suspect was a gang shooting.

Artist Sandra de la Loza will lead an art workshop and Dias de Los Muertos bike caravan on Saturday, November 6th (scroll down).

Floyd Mayweather is one of us, as the 44-year old boxing great took to his bicycle on the Venice bike path Tuesday evening.

 

State

San Diego announced a $2.5 million program to fix streets in the Rancho Bernardo neighborhood that were damaged by 2007’s Witch Creek Fire, where rutted pavement and potholes posed a particular danger to bike riders and pedestrians.

Now that’s more like it. Santa Cruz is offering rebates up to $400 and zero-interest loans for downtown workers who buy ebikes, as part of a program to encourage alternative modes of transportation to the area.

The director of Berkeley’s transportation department was lucky to escape with a sprained wrist when he was struck head-on by an SUV driver; Farid Javandel was stopped at a stop sign on his bike when the left-turning driver cut the corner and crashed into him.

 

National

Forbes picks their favorite bicycle child seats.

Somehow we missed this one last week, as a new induced demand calculator will help determine just how much traffic will increase when roadways are expanded.

Portland, Oregon is installing painted bicycle crossings at non-signalized intersections, backed by a university study showing the crosswalk-style crossing encourage more drivers to yield to bikes.

An Arizona driver who ran a red light and slammed into a Flagstaff bike parade last March, killing one woman and injuring several other people, now faces multiple felony charges for kiddie porn after police discovered thousands of images on his phone when they got a search warrant to determine whether he was distracted at the time of the crash.

The Waller County, Texas DA promises he’ll make a decision by November 8th whether to charge the coal-rolling teenage driver who ran down six bicyclists who were training for a triathlon last month.

This is the cost of traffic violence. A Minnesota man whose license had been revoked faces a charge of criminal vehicular homicide after killing a 73-year old Catholic priest who was riding his bike on the shoulder of a highway; the 26-year old driver has 10 previous convictions for driving with a revoked license in just the last three and a half years. Just one more example of keeping a dangerous driver on the roads until it’s too late. He should have been jailed and his car confiscated after the second offense. 

More proof that bike lanes work, as the latest round of data from New York’s Department of Transportation shows painted bike lanes reduce the risk of injury to bike riders by nearly a third, while increasing ridership an average of 50%; protected bike lanes reduced injuries as much as 60%.

Talk about a rough year. A celebrity chef has filed suit against the NYPD alleging he was brutally beaten for violating a curfew when he attempted to deliver a pizza for a bicycle delivery service, after losing his restaurant when he caught Covid-19.

A suspect has been taken into custody after a body was discovered in the New Jersey headquarters of Jamis Bikes; no word yet on who was killed or how it happened.

No bias here. After a Louisiana bike rider was injured in a collision, police bent over backward to blame the victim, while the story fails to mention that the pickup that hit him even had a driver.

 

International

No surprise here, as data from around the world shows that bikeshare usage goes up with warmer temperatures until it gets too hot, and wet weather discourages people from riding. In other news, water is wet, the pope is Catholic, and bears defecate in wooded areas.

Vancouver cops are looking for a brazen bike thief who raided an apartment building bike locker by using suction cups to remove the glass door, then used bolt cutters to make off with several high-end bikes.

A 16-year old climate activist is riding a cargo bike 570 miles from her English home to Glasgow for the COP26 conference, to call attention to the climate emergency.

A Welsh man complains about the overly lenient sentence given the driver who killed his bike-riding father, saying she belongs in jail, rather than walking with a suspended sentence after she played the universal Get Out Of Jail Free card by claiming the sun was in her eyes.

A new Tokyo study proposes an algorithm to rebalance bikeshare docks more efficiently, preventing the problem of too many bikes at some docks and not enough at others.

 

Competitive Cycling

American cyclist Marianne Martin will be formally inducted into the US Bicycling Hall of Fame next week, 37 years after she won the inaugural, short lived women’s Tour de France; the race will return next year in an abbreviated eight stage format.

Cyclist profiles German ultra cyclist Ulrich ‘Uba’ Bartholmoes, who won the first two ultra cycling races he entered two years ago, and has kept winning ever since.

VeloNews talks with the owner of the Israel Start-Up Nation cycling team about the daring cloak-and-dagger rescue operation he set in motion to help Afghan cyclists escape the country.

 

Finally…

Maybe antagonizing bike riders isn’t the best way to get their business. If you think you’ve may have an outstanding warrant and could be carrying weed on your bike, put a damn light on it — and try not to crash into a briar patch.

And it’s probably not the best idea to install a bikeshare station where bikes are banned.

………

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

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

Tennery pleads guilty in Oceanside hit-and-run death, end suffering caused by cars, and riders injured in SoCal crashes

October 25, 2021 / / One comment

It looks like we’ll see justice for fallen bike rider Jackson Williams after all.

Such as it is.

Twenty-four-year old Oceanside resident Bailey Tennery pled guilty to killing Williams on Friday, three months after she left the 27-year old Carlsbad resident dying on an Oceanside street.

Tennery faces just four years behind bars when she’s sentenced for misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter and felony hit-and-run, and will likely serve less than half of that.

Just one more example of California’s failure to take hit-and-run seriously.

Tennery was arrested a week after the crash when a transient person alerted authorities to the damaged car parked at her home.

Let’s hope there’s a reward for a conviction, so at least some good will come from this needless tragedy.

Photo by Sora Shimazaki from Pexels.

………

Powerful opinion piece from NBC reporter Erin Sagen, who writes that we have to stop normalizing the suffering caused by cars.

The threat car emissions pose to the environment gets some attention. But what we Americans are still in total collective denial about is how lethal our car dependency already is. Every year, nearly 40,000 people die in crashes, and at least another 3.3 million are seriously injured. Cars put us in clear, imminent danger every day, especially the most vulnerable and marginalized: Motor vehicle traffic is a leading cause of death for children, well ahead of firearms or drownings. Among adults, Black and brown people are more likely to die or be injured by cars than white people are.

This year so far, 21,450 people have died in motor vehicle accidents, up 17 percent from 2019, according to preliminary estimates by the National Safety Council released last month. More than 2.4 million have been injured seriously enough to require medical attention. Usually when millions of Americans are being killed or injured at these rates, it triggers public outcry, even widespread movements. But when it comes to car accidents, we’ve mostly shrugged our shoulders and accepted the carnage as an unavoidable fact of life.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post explores five myths about highways, including the fallacies that wider roadways move traffic faster, congestion pricing hurts the poor, and gas taxes pay for the roads.

Then there’s this.

Some myths have mysterious origins. This is not one of them. In 2015, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) published a reportabout vehicle crashes that stated “the critical reason, which is the last event in the crash causal chain, was assigned to the driver in 94 percent of the crashes.” That figure, often stripped of its context, has had a long shelf life, particularly among transportation agencies. For instance, in 2019, the North Dakota Department of Transportation published a report claiming that “94% of motor vehicle crashes can be attributed to a preventable human behavior.” Autonomous-vehicle companies frequently cite the statistic — as Waymo does on its FAQ webpage — when touting the supposed safety benefits of their technology.

But laying blame on the driver lets many other parties off the hook — such as transportation engineers who could have created a safer road. For instance, slip lanes at intersections are intended to allow drivers to maintain speed while making right turns. That design can work well in rural areas, but in cities it often places too much onus on a driver, who must monitor her speed, watch for traffic while merging and yield to pedestrians crossing the slip lane at a crosswalk. If a collision ensues, police will find the driver to be at fault, ignoring the engineers who placed her in a dangerous situation…

And our own Michael Schneider looks at America’s disastrous SUV arms race, as vehicles keep getting bigger and bigger, and deadlier and deadlier.

………

A man riding a bicycle was critically injured when he was struck by a driver who swerved into the Oxnard bike lane he was riding in Friday night.

The 19-year old driver claims he was avoiding a tractor-trailer that swerved into his lane when he crashed into the victim, who has not been publicly identified.

Just one more example of a driver crashing into the soft, squishy person instead of a big, hard machine.

………

While we’re on the subject of SoCal bike crashes, I was forwarded a notice of a man apparently run down from behind while riding in a bike lane on Palos Verdes Drive North in Rolling Hills Estates on Saturday.

Initial reports are he seemed to be okay, but let’s keep our fingers crossed anyway.

And maybe push for a protected bike lane on a dangerous corridor where this crap happens all too often.

Thanks to Jim Lyle for the heads-up.

………

Buyer beware.

Shimano is warning that a clearance website purporting to sell their fishing and bicycling products isn’t legitimate. The company is trying to get the shimano-clearance.store website shut down.

But avoid it in the meantime, because there’s no guarantee what you’ll get from the site.

If you get anything.

………

If the goal is to move people more efficiently, cars aren’t always the answer.

Okay, cars are hardly ever the answer.

https://twitter.com/_dmoser/status/1451527580285345816

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The only thing that could make this photo of hundreds of bikes parked at UC Davis in the 1960s seem any cooler is noting who took it.

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Evidently, Monty Python’s Michael Palin wasn’t just the Bicycle Repairman.

He was also one of us.

Nice bike, too.

Thanks to Ted Faber for the heads-up.

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

After a Portland driver decided he didn’t like the barrels blocking his access to a Slow Street, he just moved them out of the way while leaving a passive-aggressive note explaining why they inconvenienced him.

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

A San Francisco woman has avoided charges for running down an 81-year old woman while riding on the sidewalk in violation of local laws; the victim suffered a broken elbow and shattered hip, as well as hitting her head.

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Local

Metro is beginning work on a long-discussed bike and pedestrian corridor connecting Little Tokyo with Union Station, including “crosswalk improvements at 19 intersections, bike/walk esplanades with double rows of street trees and nearly 1.7 new miles of bike lanes.”

Ride your bike to Union Station for a scary good time this weekend.

A 30-year old bike rider was airlifted to a hospital in unknown condition Sunday afternoon after he was injured in Santa Clarita’s Whitney Canyon. That came one day after another rider was airlifted out of Placerita Canyon with a possible broken arm.

 

State

A 31-year old SoCal man went from bike-riding Rialto tagger to one of the creative world’s most in-demand young illustrators.

Hundreds of people turned out to celebrate the completion of the first 3.5 mile segment of the CV Link bike trail in Palm Desert, part of a planned 50-mile loop around the Coachella Valley. Meanwhile, a local TV station wants to know why drivers are using it, too.

The brother of famed 86-year old Bay Area bicyclist Joe Shami, called the legend of Mt. Diablo after riding up the mountain every week for 500 weeks, has filed suit against the city of Lafayette over what he alleges is the poorly designed roundabout where Shami was killed by a driver earlier this year.

 

National

Heartbreaking news from Honolulu, where an 89-year old man died over two weeks after he was run down by a cowardly hit-and-run driver, who left the victim lying in the street. The driver should be charged with murder for making a conscious decision to leave an elderly man to die, rather than get the help that might have saved his life.

The man who has administered Tucson, Arizona’s Pima County for a quarter of a century was critically injured when he was collateral damage in a collision between two drivers while on a weekly group ride.

Denver bike riders have a new curb and bollard protected bike lane to help get into the downtown area; the city is also replacing a painted bike lane where a mother was killed riding her bike two years ago with a new protected lane. Someone mention that last one to Rolling Hills Estates, k?

Life is cheap in Boulder CO, where the hit-and-run driver who ran down former Bicycling writer Andrew Bernstein as he was riding home from a velodrome session two years ago got a lousy two years behind bars, with another two years probation, despite leaving Bernstein paralyzed below the knee in one leg, and dependent on catheters. As usual, you can read the top link on Yahoo if Bicycling block you.

A Nashville advocacy group works with a high school design team to fix a dangerous intersection, including a glow-in-the-dark crosswalk, although it’s oddly described as an art installation.

Residents of the Mott Haven neighborhood of the Bronx rallied to protest plans for a bike lane that would require removing 150 parking spaces in what they claim is a parking-poor area, arguing that they’ll have to park their cars in dangerous areas, and that no one would use it from October to April. So they’d rather make people on bicycles ride on dangerous streets. And maybe they haven’t noticed that many New Yorkers ride their bikes year round.

A 23-year old man from Queens, New York was arrested for the murder of a delivery rider to steal his ebike; the 51-year old immigrant was working to send money back home to his wife and kids in Bangladesh.

 

International

Cycling Tips offers more information than you ever wanted about riding tubeless.

A Toronto writer says the economic and environmental benefits of riding a bike are huge, calling bike lanes integral to the global movement away from cars, while connecting those benefits to the local level.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson reportedly likes the bespoke bike President Biden gave him so much he’s riding it, despite refusing to pay for it as British law requires for an official gift.

Paris Mayor Anne Hildago is making her push for a 100% bikeable, 15-minute city the springboard for her candidacy as the Socialist candidate for President of France, although her campaign is starting with just single-digit support.

French fashion icon Christian Dior’s sister Catherine was a hero of the French Resistance during WWII, riding her bicycle up and down the coast of Southern France to draw maps and gather intelligence.

NPR looks at the roaring success of Barcelona’s Bicibús, or Bike Bus, enabling hundreds of children to safely ride their bicycles to school.

A team of volunteers headed by Hyderabad, India’s Bicycle Mayor is fixing up old, unloved bicycles to pass on to people in need.

 

Competitive Cycling

Horrible racing crash in Spain on Saturday, when a woman ran across the finish line just as a rider was crossing it; both victims were hospitalized in unknown condition. The look of sheer terror on the cyclist’s face is gut Twrenching.

There’s a special place in hell for whoever stole 20 bikes from the Italian cycling team at the world track cycling championships, including a handful of gold track bikes worth nearly $35,000 apiece.

Twenty-seven-year old American Alexis Ryan’s rejoins her sister on the L39ION of Los Angeles cycling team, which also allows her to rejoin founders Justin and Cory Williams, who she rode with on the Major Motion team. Meanwhile, the team has also signed 23-year old American cyclist Ian Garrison, who comes on after two years on the WorldTour.

Cycling Weekly talks with Clay Davies, the first openly gay elite male cyclist in the UK.

 

Finally…

We often have to deal with bearish LA drivers; actual bears, not so much. That feeling when you repurpose bathroom accessories on your handlebars.

And once again, a bike rider is a hero.

https://twitter.com/ImSpeaking13/status/1451703729032515587

………

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

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

Hit-and-run driver severely injures e-scooter rider, support Eagle Rock One Lane plan, and Nobel laureate on a bike

October 15, 2021 / / One comment

The LAPD is looking for a hit-and-run driver who left-crossed a man on an e-scooter in Huntington Park, then fled the scene dragging the dangling rear bumper of her car behind her.

As always, there is a $25,000 standing reward in the City of Los Angeles for any hit-and-run resulting in serious injury.

But be warned before you click on the video.

It clearly shows the crash from multiple angles, and could be very hard to watch.

And you can’t unsee it if you do.

Handcuff photo by Kindel Media from Pexels. Let’s help fit this driver for a pair. 

………

Eagle Rock Forward needs your help to make one last push to get Metro to adopt the livable, Complete Streets option for bus rapid transit on Colorado Blvd in Eagle Rock.

Metro’s “One Lane” option is an evolution of the Beautiful Boulevard plan. It is the ONLY option that:

  • Provides a green street by preserving & enhance existing landscaped medians
  • Supports local businesses by maintaining on-street parking & space for Al Fresco dining
  • Protects school kids by providing additional & safer crosswalks
  • Makes a safer street by reducing speeding on Colorado Boulevard
  • Reduces cut-through driving on residential streets by maintaining space on Colorado for pick-up & drop-off zones
  • Upgrades existing bike lanes to be family-friendly protected bike lanes
  • Provides transit service for Eagle Rock that is attractive and dependable to support existing bus riders and attract new transit riders

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If I found out a Nobel laureate read this site, I’d probably promote the hell out of it, too.

https://twitter.com/may_gun/status/1448786031508025345

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GCN considers how it’s possible for every new bike to be the lightest, stiffest, fastest or most aero.

Or not.

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

No bias here. A proposal before the Massachusetts legislature would “improve” bike safety by fining bike riders as much as motorists for traffic violations, even though bicycles pose a fraction of the risk to others.

No bias here, either. DC’s conservative newspaper suggests the bike lobby is running the city, and forcing anti-car tactics on the unsuspecting driving public by reducing speed limits and improving safety on high risk corridors. And insists some crashes are caused by medical emergencies rather than reckless drivers, and sometimes bike riders might even be at fault. But unlike drivers, reckless bike riders hardly ever kill anyone.

A road-raging farmer in the UK was convicted of attacking a bike rider who followed him home to confront him after a punishment pass, because the man on the bike was riding in the roadway instead of on a separated bike path next to it; he was fined the equivalent of a whopping $146. I know as well as anyone how tempting it is to follow a driver who threatens your safety. But seriously, don’t. Just let it go and get on with your life.

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

London bike riders are caught on dashcam video “recklessly” jumping a red light, even though there wasn’t any cross street, and after waiting for pedestrians to cross.

………

Local

LA Times columnist George Skelton’s windshield bias is showing, as he says Gov. Newsom was right to veto bills that would have legalized jaywalking and stop as yield, calling them nutty bills that would allow people to harass drivers. Nothing like demonstrating you don’t understand the problem before criticizing the solution.

 

State

Santa Maria unveiled a new $900,000 road diet project with protected bike lanes, complete with curbs and car tickler plastic bendie posts.

Bike theft continues to be a major problem at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, where students have lost faith in relying on the police for help.

Tragic news from Santa Rosa, where a 47-year old man faces a slim chance of survival after he was hit head-on by an allegedly stoned driver while riding his bicycle outside town; he was already considered disabled from a previous collision 25 year earlier.

Campus police at Chico State University caught a bike thief in action and busted him as he tried to ride away, then returned the purloined bicycle to its owner. Meanwhile, a “super bike cop officer” with the Chico Police Department is on a mission to recover stolen bikes.

 

National

Great idea. An Albuquerque microbrewery is collecting bike parts for a local community bike shop by offering a discount for each part you bring in — or a free draft for a complete bike.

Several bike companies in New Mexico have joined forces to create a one-of-a-kind bicycle that will be raffled off to benefit an organization that supports transgender rights.

A Colorado bike rider describes a driver making an unsafe pass on the wrong side of the road, nearly hitting him head-on, and well within the state’s three-foot passing distance. And tells the driver to never do that again, because “We don’t need more Ghost Bikes…”

The current owner of a San Antonio, Texas bike shop once owned by a fallen bicyclist struggles to accept the slap on the wrist given the drunk driver who killed him. Cases like this send a clear message that driving drunk and killing another human being is really no big deal. And the lives of people on bicycles don’t matter.

A Dallas writer tries out an Italian robotic bike fit machine, and concludes that a real human can do a much better job.

The New York Daily News takes the outgoing mayor to task for the carnage on the streets and the failure of the city’s Vision Zero, as traffic deaths have risen to the highest level since the program was adopted in 2014.

Frank Ocean is one of us, proudly riding his Van Moof ebike through the streets of New York.

A alleged Pittsburgh bike thief died after police tased him at least five times because he kept getting up to plead that he didn’t do anything. There’s no excuse for stealing a bike. But it shouldn’t call for the death penalty.

A kindhearted Florida cop gave a 13-year old boy his first bicycle, after learning the kid had to walk miles every day to get to and from school. And his mother walked twice as far after walking each way with him, and returning home on her own.

 

International

Cycling News explains the different types of bikes, and offers advice on how to pick the right one for you.

An English man was the victim of a violent bike theft when a group of young thieves attacked him with a metal pipe as he rode along a towpath, stealing his $4,800 Trek mountain bike and leaving him with multiple injuries to his arm, wrist and back.

You’ve got to be kidding. A court in the UK absolved a driver with a long history of speeding tickets of her latest speeding charge, after accepting her claim that she had no choice but to speed to pass a nearly invisible bike rider, whose helmet was the only thing she could see. Because evidently, slowing down until it was safe to pass just wasn’t an option. Never mind waiting until you can actually see who you’re trying to pass. 

A 60-year old British man pled guilty to killing two men riding their bikes when he plowed into them on a straight road with a 60 mph speed limit; the victims owned a company that put on sportives and charity rides.

A writer in Brussels takes advantage of the pandemic to overcome his fears and start riding a bike after 20 years in the city.

 

Competitive Cycling

Prosecutors call for a slap in the wrist for the woman who allegedly caused a mass crash by holding up a sign in the first stage of the Tour de France, asking the court for just a four month suspended sentence.

Podium Cafe looks back to when legendary chanteuse Josephine Baker “sprinkled her stardust” on the pre-war Tour de France. Baker also acted as an Allied spy during the Nazi occupation of France.

Thirty-year old Katie Keough unexpectedly called it a career after more than a dozen years as a pro ‘cross cyclist, most recently competing as a guest rider for LA-based L39ION of Los Angeles.

The first-ever edition of L39ION of Los Angeles founder Justin Williams’ new Into the Lion’s Den cycling race, scheduled for Sacramento at the end of this month, will feature a new format with teams competing for their home cities.

 

Finally…

Nothing like helping a stranger fix his handlebars, only to realize it’s your own stolen bike. How to make your own DIY airless bike tires.

And that feeling when you get in over your head — almost literally — and lose your bike in the process.

………

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

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

Murder charge for Oxnard hit-and-run, bike lane funds stalled in infrastructure bill, and take Metro to Sunday’s CicLAvia

October 6, 2021 / / Comments Off on Murder charge for Oxnard hit-and-run, bike lane funds stalled in infrastructure bill, and take Metro to Sunday’s CicLAvia

Ventura County prosecutors threw the book at the alleged hit-and-run driver who killed a bike-riding boy last week.

Thirty-nine-year old Oxnard resident Julio Sanchez was arrested at his home last Friday, a day after 16-year old Port Hueneme resident Andres Hernandes was run down from behind on an Oxnard street.

Police had found Sanchez’ abandoned car a few hours after the crash.

Sanchez pled not guilty to charges of second-degree murder, gross vehicular manslaughter with prior DUI convictions, leaving the scene of an accident, and vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence.

At last report, he was being held on a half-million dollars bail.

Photo by Sora Shimazaki from Pexels.

……..

This is what we have to look forward to in the unlikely event Congress ever gets its shit together.

More bike lanes that are clearly separated from streets. More pedestrian-friendly street designs. And more safety features on cars

California and other states are in line for a lot more money to implement such plans, thanks to the $1 trillion infrastructure bill the House is considering.

………

The Source reminds us about this Sunday’s Heart of LA CicLAvia. And encourages you to leave the car at home and take Metro, instead.

With your bike, of course. Or your feet, if you plan to walk it.

………

A series of free online bicycling symposiums will lead into next year’s California Bicycling Summit in Oakland, with leading bike researchers Ralph Buehler and John Pucher discussing Cycling for Sustainable Cities next Tuesday.

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You may have follow a detour if you’re riding the Ballona Creek bike path for the next several days.

But that’s better than the Higuera Street bridge, which will be closed for more than a year.

………

When is a bike lane not a bike lane?

When it’s free protected car parking in DTLA.

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Call it a desire line, as the Department of DIY strikes along PCH in Orange County.

https://twitter.com/jake_gotta/status/1445110045276917766

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If you want to ride a bike badly enough, you can usually find a way.

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

No bias here. Enraged New York drivers see an “extraordinary” plot between Uber and Lyft, and a “militant local bike lane group” to deprive them of their God-given right to free parking by building a protected bike lane. Never mind that the ride-hailing companies support the city’s leading bike advocacy group Transportation Alternatives because bike lanes and safe streets are good for their e-scooter and dockless bikeshare businesses. Or that Lyft manages New York’s Citi Bike docked bikeshare, as well. 

Bizarre story from Ontario, Canada, where a woman allegedly threatened two bike-riding teens with a knife after accusing them of being on her property — even though they were on the sidewalk — then apparently ran them down with her car after they tried to leave.

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

Police in New York are looking for a black-clad bike rider who punched a pedestrian in the face as he rode by, then calmly took $100 out of the man’s wallet before riding off.

………

Local

Ride Metro buses and trains for free today, as well get free Metro Bike bikeshare rides, to celebrate California Clean Air Day.

LA’s cool pavement project expands to NoHo, promising to reduce temperatures on the streets we ride, which can rise to as high as 140°.

The annual Bike It! Walk It! week returned to Santa Monica schools this week to encourage students to get out of their cars, or their parent’s cars, and walk or ride to class.

Long Beach will hold a virtual meeting tomorrow to discuss a $3.7 million infrastructure improvement project on Santa Fe Avenue in West Long Beach, which includes a new bike route.

 

State

The San Diego Reader considers whether OfferUp and Facebook Marketplace could be behind the city’s soaring rate of bike thefts.

A woman who’s been hit by drivers twice while riding on Sunnyside’s 39th Street says stop signs and speed bumps aren’t enough to tame the city’s drivers, which is why a bike boulevard is needed. Needless to say, some of her fellow residents disagree.

Tragic news from Stockton, where a 13-year old girl was “struck and killed by a vehicle.” Judging by the article, the driver of said vehicle was apparently only coincidently involved.

Life is cheap in San Ramon, where a distracted driver walked with no charges for running down popular NFL assistant coach Greg Knapp as he was riding his bike, despite admitting to looking at his hands-free cellphone.

 

National

Seriously? The US Consumer Product Safety Commission warns about the dangers of micromobility, with e-scooter, ebike and hoverboard injuries up 70% in the last four years, and 71 deaths over the same period. Just wait until someone tells them how many bike riders and pedestrians were killed in the same four years. And it only makes sense that injuries went up since micromobility use has skyrocketed.

Smart Cities says smart cities are beefing up their bike infrastructure in response to the pandemic bike boom. Then again, no one has accused Los Angeles of being a smart city in recent years.

Once again, a science website has concluded that bicycling is better for your overall health than walking. Even if walking ain’t bad.

United Airlines becomes the latest major airline to drop fees to fly with a bicycle, joining American and Delta in making the move.

Electrek examines why ebike sales are increasing 16 times faster than general bicycling. Hint: They’re fun, easy to ride and anyone can do it.

Ford is applying for a patent on a new kind of automated electronic derailleur.

This is the cost of traffic violence. A Las Vegas 4th grade teacher and baton coach was killed while riding her bike to school when a driver blew through a stop sign.

A Denver nonprofit is encouraging bicycling by paying people between 15 and 30 cents per mile to ride a bike this month, for a maximum of $75

Colorado’s legislature has finally figured out the obvious problem with the state’s ridiculous opt-in Idaho Stop, aka Stop as Yield, Law, which allows local jurisdictions to decide whether to adopt it. And leads to confusion when bike riders have no idea when they’ve crossed from one city to another, and whether or not they have to come to a full stop.

A Chicago attorney is offering a reward to find the driver who pulled into a bike lane, where his passenger was caught on camera dooring a passing bike rider.

A Nashville walking and bike advocacy group says a recent deadly scooter crash calls out the need for more bike lanes in the downtown area to meet expanding demand.

Speaking of Nashville, country music star Chris Stapleton is one of us, finding balance by riding a mountain bike during the pandemic.

A seven-year old Long Island boy raised over $4,000 for the heroes of 9/11 by riding his bike 20 miles. And insisted on finishing despite crashing his bike into a thorny fence, saying he wasn’t in as much pain as people on 9/11.

A new study reveals what they describe as the “harrowing safety risks” faced by New York’s app-based delivery riders, with half of riders reporting they’ve been involved in a crash or some other incident.

New York police busted a 14-year old boy for randomly attacking several older Brooklyn residents, including an 81-year old man and a man riding a bicycle.

DC is now requiring e-scooter users to lock their scooters to a bike rack when they’re done, which isn’t likely to improve safety or reduce clutter, while blocking parking access to bike riders who need it.

No bias here, either. After initially fleeing the scene, a Florida hit-and-run driver returned to blame the victim, insisting he didn’t know “why that person was in the road;” fortunately, he was arrested anyway.

 

International

Where to rent a bike on your next trip to Tobago.

Ontario, Canada’s equivalent of the Motor City used to be a bicycling paradise — if you go back 130 years.

After England suffers major flooding, a London cabbie somehow blames bike lanes for causing it. Which doesn’t explain why the streets without them flooded, too.

A man from Jersey spent his pandemic lockdown filming bike rides on routes throughout the British island, allowing bike riders around the world to share his rides from the comfort of their own homes.

Britain’s ongoing gas shortage has led to a 119% jump in bike sales, with sales of commuter bikes up 194%.

British advocates argue that bicycle infrastructure has to extend to rural areas, as well as cities, after a 43% jump in bike deaths on country roads last year.

A writer for the UK version of GQ accepts a challenge to ride the full length of the country, and shares what it was like to cover 970 miles in a week and a half riding from Land’s End to John O’Groats.

More proof life is cheap in Great Britain, where a hit-and-run driver gets a lousy 12 months behind bars for killing the 31-year old daughter of a member of Parliament as she was riding her bike.

Dutch neurologists call on people in the bicycle-riding country to wear bike helmets, despite — or maybe because — virtually no one does, even though Dutch riders suffer roughly 16,500 bicycling brain injuries each year.

France is offering drivers the equivalent of $2,975 to trade in their old smog-belching cars for clean new ebikes.

High-end Italian bikemaker Colnago says their blockchain cryptosecurity is the solution to bike theft, but you’ll just have to trust them on that. But at least you can trust Yahoo to let you read it if Bicycling won’t.

A trio of Aussie researchers analyzed bikeshare data from 40 international cities to determine where bike riders are most likely to brave the rain and snow, with Dublin, Ireland and Seville and Valencia, Spain taking the lead.

 

Competitive Cycling

Cycling Weekly offers a cyclist’s-eye view of last weekend’s Paris-Roubaix.

Longtime Irish cyclist Nicolas Roche is calling it a career after 17 years in the pro peloton.

There’s more than one way to stop when you don’t trust your disk brakes.

 

Finally…

This may just be the best bike name ever. Who needs rain gear when you can carry a roof with you?

And that feeling when you try to steal the same bait bike twice.

………

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

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

$50,000 reward in Venice hit-and-run death, man killed on 4,000 mile charity ride, and Eagle Rock wants one lane

October 4, 2021 / / Comments Off on $50,000 reward in Venice hit-and-run death, man killed on 4,000 mile charity ride, and Eagle Rock wants one lane

Imagine someone you love traveling across the country to follow her faith and feed the hungry.

Now imagine getting a call from an LAPD detective telling you she’s been murdered by a hit-and-run driver.

Although they probably didn’t use that word.

Then imagine that the police won’t return your calls. And you have no idea what’s going on with a case that seems to be going nowhere, and doesn’t seem to be a priority.

You’ve just put yourself in the shoes of the entire family of fallen bike rider Prynsess Di’Amond Brazzle.

Don’t feel bad if you don’t recognize her name. I only recently learned it myself, confirmed by her relatives.

Brazzle was the woman who was killed by a heartless hit-and-run driver as she rode her bicycle around a Venice intersection this past August.

She’s one of 18 victims of hit-and-run drivers in Southern California this year. And yet another Black bike rider or pedestrian sacrificed on the mean streets of Los Angeles, where people of color die from traffic violence at a rate far disproportionate to their share of the population.

Never mind that Pacific Avenue, the street where she was killed, is on LA’s High Injury Network as one of the deadliest streets in the city. And was scheduled for bike lanes in the city’s long-forgotten mobility plan and 2010 bike plan.

Which could mean Los Angeles bears at least some legal responsibility for knowing about the dangers of the street, and failing to fix it.

Prynsess Brazzle had traveled from her family’s Pennsylvania home to Georgia, then west to Los Angeles, believing she had been called by God to feed the homeless.

Only to have her life taken by someone who didn’t have the basic human decency to stop their damn car after slamming another human being early in the morning of August 20th.

Unfortunately, since then, the trail appears to have gone cold.

The only information police have released is a blurry security cam video of a black, large-sized SUV, possibly a Chevrolet Suburban.

That’s despite a $50,000 reward from the City of Los Angeles for information “leading to the offender’s identification, apprehension, and conviction or resolution through a civil compromise.”

So let’s be honest.

Someone out there knows something. Maybe you’ve seen an SUV with a mangled front end. Or heard someone talk about an early morning crash in Venice, or acting strange the next day.

Maybe you’ve got video or other information the police missed.

And maybe you could use a cool 50 grand. Or just want justice for a young mother taken far too soon.

And yes, you can still get the money if you contact the police anonymously.

Meanwhile, a crowdfunding campaign to bring justice for Prynsess Brazzle has raised just $139 of the modest $5,000 goal.

We could easily top that today if everyone who reads this digs in to give what they can. And forwards this piece to anyone else who might be interested in helping.

And keeping their eyes open to bring her killer to justice.

……..

Sometimes I could just cry.

A Wisconsin man was killed while on a 4,000-mile ride to raise awareness of hunger on the Navajo reservation, and raise fund for a mountain biking scholarship.

Twenty-seven-year old Tyler Droeger was nearly 3,000 miles into the ride, when a driver drifted off the roadway and ran him down from behind as he rode on the shoulder of a Utah highway, knocking him into a ravine.

Chances are, he literally never knew what hit him.

It’s heartbreaking to think someone could be trying to do good for others, and still end up a needless victim of traffic violence.

Droeger wrote that, when he began his journey, he “wasn’t even aware of the inequality we have here in our homeland.” And he offered this advice:

“Be good to the strangers you meet. No matter their situation. it could just as easily have been you in those shoes.”

Needless to say, no charges have been filed.

Droeger’s crowdfunding campaign has continued to raise money despite, or maybe because, of his death.

When I first saw the news on Friday, he had raised a little more than double the $4,000 goal.  It’s now over $11,000.

If you have any extra money lying around after donating to Prynsess Brazzle, I can’t think of a better place to put it.

………

Let’s hope CD14 Councilmember Kevin de León is paying attention.

https://twitter.com/topomodesto/status/1444720694554607618

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Great ebike ad from Specialized.

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The Department of DIY strikes again, even if it’s no match for drivers’ love of parking in bike lanes.

https://twitter.com/EntitledCycling/status/1444081188918870020

Maybe they should have just used a more seasonal barrier, like the people below.

………

It’s hard to get past the Wall Street Journal’s draconian paywall.

So you’ll have to settle for this, courtesy of Orange County bike lawyer David Huntsman.

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A British kid can’t use the bike lane during Back to School Week, because it’s full of cars lined up to get gas during the country’s crippling fuel shortage.

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Maybe one day, we’ll finally get to the point where we don’t need ghost bikes anymore.

I only hope we all live long enough to see it.

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

An older Brooklyn man was knocked off his bicycle when he was sucker-punched by a young man, in what appears to be part of a series of similar attacks on elderly people.

A British driver decides if an easily-passed bike rider is going use the roadway, then he’ll drive on the separated bike lane.

Pettiness abounds
byu/Neehigh inIdiotsInCars

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

Police are looking for a man on a purple bicycle who groped a woman on a University of Hawaii campus.

A valet at a Nashville hotel was shot by a bike-riding burglar; fortunately, he was not seriously injured.

Scotland Yard is looking for a bike-riding man wanted for a series of East London sexual assaults, exposing himself and masturbating in public.

………

Local

Disappointing to see the weekly newsletter from CD11 Councilmember Mike Bonin discuss what his office is doing to promote transit and safer streets, without a single mention of bike lanes. Let alone bicycles.

The Easy Reader says ebikes are revolutionizing transportation in the South Bay’s beach cities.

 

State

A rare genetic brain disease robbed a marathoner of her ability to run, but she will still take part in a 220-mile Santa Barbara-to-San Diego ride on her recumbent to raise funds for the Challenged Athletes Foundation’s Million Dollar Challenge fundraising ride.

A triathlete in San Luis Obispo County recalls the red light-running driver that left her with “two shattered collarbones, two broken ribs and horrific memories of the impact,” then fled the scene, leaving her bleeding in the street.

A Fresno bike rider was critically injured after allegedly running a red light; police also blamed him for riding outside the crosswalk, as if bicycles aren’t allowed in the street. Someone should tell the Fresno Bee that the victim didn’t collide with a vehicle, he was struck by a car, which had a driver.

The San Francisco Examiner looks at California’s most significant bicyclist safety initiatives. They may not be the best source, however, since they cite LA’s dusty, nearly forgotten Vision Zero and mobility plans.

Lafayette considers safety improvements for pedestrians and bicyclists after a school crossing guard was killed in a collision last month, but not before heroically pushing school kids in a crosswalk out of the way, sacrificing himself to save them. Thanks to Robert Leone for the link.

 

National

Popular Mechanics recommends the best cheap bikes for beginners. The real surprise isn’t the price of the bikes. It’s that Popular Mechanics is still around.

Las Vegas Raiders fans turn out on their custom, low rider bicycles to show their love for the team.

Good news from Kansas, where searchers found a 13-year old girl who had gone missing on a bike ride.

Shades of the Infamous Beachfront Bee Incident. A Nebraska man crashed his bicycle after a bee got in his bike helmet and began stinging him. Except in my case, they didn’t sting me. And I got hurt a lot worse.

Even in Oklahoma, speeding drivers get the blame for a jump in traffic fatalities.

Chicago finally gets around to installing a road diet and bike lanes on the deadly street where School of Rock drummer Kevin Clark was killed riding his bike, 13 years after another bike-riding man was killed at the same site. This is how Vision Zero is supposed to work, just not so slow.

A Columbus, Ohio newspaper recommends riding the area’s scenic bike paths.

After a man was killed in Mississippi on a cross-country fundraising bike ride from Dover, New Hampshire to San Diego three years ago, his mother is planning to finish the ride, picking up where he was killed; his ride raised over 12 times his original $10,000 goal to help children with cancer.

The New York Times examines the rising carnage on the city’s streets, despite outgoing Mayor De Blasio’s promise to reduce traffic deaths under Vision Zero.

A trio of kindhearted Florida deputies got a new bike for a man after the bike he used for his transportation was stolen.

Kindhearted Fort Lauderdale firefighters replaced a young boy’s bicycle after it was burned in a house fire.

 

International

A Welsh website says life has gotten crazy at local bike shops during the pandemic.

Sponsors are bailing from the UK’s Black Cyclists Network after allegations of bullying and harassment by the organization’s founder.

Even British drivers support a 10 mph speed limit and speed cams to improve traffic problems.

No bias here. As Paris shifts its transportation focus from cars to walking, biking and transit, all the New York Times can see is the “anarchy” of scofflaw bicyclists. Thanks to Andrew Goldstein for the heads-up.

There’s a special place in hell for a retired French police officer who confessed to being a serial killer and rapist in his suicide note; victims included a pair of 11-year old girls, with one victimized after being pulled off her bicycle.

An Indian paper asks if bicycling is safe for women in Chennai, concluding women on long rides face the lack of accessible and clean public toilets and the threat of harassment and discrimination as well as a lack of bike lanes.

 

Competitive Cycling

Italian pro Sonny Colbrelli was the surprise winner of Sunday’s Paris-Robaix on the rain-soaked cobbles; Colbrelli didn’t even expect to finish, let alone win.

Cycling Weekly offers talking points from the race.

Britain’s Lizzie Deignan overcame bloodied hands to win the inaugural women’s Paris-Robaix race, aka Paris-Roubaix Femmes.

Cycling Tips offers a photo essay revealing the “grit and glory” of the women’s Hell of the North, while Cycling News offers their conclusions from the first ever women’s Paris-Roubaix, 125 years after the first men’s race.

Bicycling talks with Ayesha McGowan about her successful fight to become the first Black woman in professional cycling, and her goals to make the sport more inclusive for everyone. As usual, read it on Yahoo if Bicycling blocks you.

 

Finally…

Buy a kid a bike, get free tickets to Tom Brady’s homecoming game. A little skitching will get you a big fine.

And your next bike could be a two-wheel drive, hydraulic-driven, gas-powered bicycle.

………

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

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

Update: 16-year old Port Hueneme boy killed riding bike in Oxnard hit-and-run, 39-year old Oxnard man arrested

October 1, 2021 / / Comments Off on Update: 16-year old Port Hueneme boy killed riding bike in Oxnard hit-and-run, 39-year old Oxnard man arrested

Yet another Southern California bike rider has lost his life to a heartless coward in a car.

Except this time, the victim was just a 16-year old boy.

According to the Ventura County Star, he was riding his bike on Hemlock Street in Oxnard, east of N Street, near the boundary with Port Hueneme around 8:35 Wednesday night, when he was apparently run down from behind by a hit-and-run driver.

The victim, identified only as a Port Hueneme resident, was rushed to Ventura County Medical Center, where he died.

Police investigators concluded that he was riding west on Hemlock, and had the right-of-way when he was struck.

The driver’s car was found abandoned less that a mile away near Hemlock and Patterson Road. The 39-year old owner was arrested on suspicion of vehicular manslaughter and felony hit-and-run.

According to an Oxnard police spokesperson, the victim had a headlight and reflectors on his bike, although it was so badly mangled as a result of the crash that police couldn’t tell if he had a taillight.

However, he was not wearing a helmet, as required for anyone under 18 under California law. Although whether that matters would depend on whether he suffered a head injury, and whether his injuries might have been survivable with one.

And that could depend on how fast the driver was going, on a street where residents have long complained about speeding drivers, and have repeatedly requested speed bumps, with no response from Oxnard city officials.

This is at least the 51st bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the sixth that I’m aware of in Ventura County.

At least 18 of those deaths have involved hit-and-run drivers.

Update: The victim has been identified as 16-year old Andres Hernandez, who died of blunt force head trauma.

So his lack of a helmet may be relevant, depending on the speed of the impact. 

His alleged killer, 39-year old Julio Sanchez, was being held on $500,000 bail after pleading not guilty to second-degree murder, gross vehicular manslaughter with prior DUI convictions, leaving the scene of an accident, and vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence.

My deepest sympathy and prayers for Andres Hernandez and all his family and loved ones. 

Category: Injuries and Fatalities / Tags: , , , , ,

Motorists behaving badly, possible parking protected bike lane on San Vicente, and dealing a blow to 85th Percentile rule

September 10, 2021 / / Comments Off on Motorists behaving badly, possible parking protected bike lane on San Vicente, and dealing a blow to 85th Percentile rule

A couple more notes from our anonymous correspondent.

In this week’s edition of Motorists Behaving Badly, accounting for the first thirty minutes after midnight Tuesday morning:

  • A driver rear-ended a CHP officer who’d made a traffic stop on the 105, injuring the officer and totaling a patrol vehicle.
  • On Normandie Ave, a hit-and-runner hospitalized a pedestrian in a marked crosswalk literally in front of Woon’s (fallen bicyclist Frederick “Woon” Frazier) mama’s home.
  • A driver smashed the guardrail at Carmelita Ave & Zaring St (house and occupants remained safe, because a guardrail was installed, probably in hindsight.)

………

Random tangent: My Favorite Lawyer™ Christien Francis Petersen (who got stabby with a reporter at a freedumb rally in HB last year, and then got arrested again for bringing a bunch of unregistered assault weapons to another freedumb rally last April) was arrested recently for hit-and-run (property damage) & DUI. Thrilled to know I’m sharing the road with him!

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In personal news, my Surly was stolen Sunday morning. Probably not by someone late for church.

Also, while nothing major was lost in the Great MacBook Air Inferno of 2021, little scraps of lost info randomly irk me, like the names of the accomplices in the Chillandra Bell (hit-and-run vs ped) case, and the specifics of the altercation in the Victor Manuel Romero case. Aurgh. Also, I cannot find Andrea Dorothy Chan Reyes on the CA Department of Corrections site. I lost my inmate number file, but you don’t actually need one to locate an inmate, and she wasn’t (isn’t?) up for parole until next month.

Photo of driver behaving badly by Artem Podrez from Pexels.

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Mark your calendar for the 18th, when you can sample a proposed parking protected bike lane on San Vicente Blvd.

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This could be the first, long overdue, nail in the coffin of the deadly 85th percentile rule.

Assuming Governor Newsom signs it, the bill would allow local governments to actually lower speed limits starting in 2024, and take the safety of vulnerable road users, such as bicyclists and pedestrians, in setting speed limits.

The bill has widespread support, passing the Senate with just five no’s and five abstentions.

https://twitter.com/WarrenJWells/status/1436102857510449158

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Pink Bike says pump your way to faster trail speed.

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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 Missouri town says a badly worded law bans bikes from the city’s parks, even if it was only intended to prohibit riding on structures; even little kids banned from riding in them.

No bias here, either. A professional driver and self-professed amateur cyclist says many London bike riders have to be protected against their own stupidly, claiming there’d be far more riders killed if it wasn’t for drivers like him. Just wait until someone tells him about the stupid things some drivers do.

A British truck driver will be lucky to keep his job after he was suspended for tweeting that he couldn’t wait to knock down one of those “spandex-wearing fuckers.”

A hit-and-run driver in Kuala Lumpur faces charges for driving off after intentionally crashing into a man on a bicycle, leaving the victim with minor injuries.

And call me crazy, but there just may be more to this story.

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

WTF is wrong with some people? An Illinois college student reported a couple people on bicycles rode up and coughed on her, after claiming one had Covid.

A British Columbia letter writer complains about silent bike riders who whizz by on the sidewalks without warning. He’s got a point. If you’re going to ride on the sidewalk, give pedestrians the right-of-way and a wide berth, and always announce your presence before passing anyone from behind.

………

Local

Take a two-hour guided bike tour of urban art and graffiti in DTLA over the weekend for $19 a person.

Santa Clarita’s Trek Bike Park is adding a number of features to its advanced trail, including an “eight-foot Whale Tail, six-foot kicker ramp, four-foot kicker ramp, 90-degree berm turn and an eight-foot flat wall ride;” it’s expected to be completed by next Friday.

 

State

You’ve got to be kidding. An impasse between the governor and his fellow Democrats in the state legislature means California will miss out on $500 million in funding for active transportation projects, as well as another $1 billion for LA transportation projects for the 2028 Olympics.

LAist examines the recently passed AB 1238, the so-called Freedom to Walk Act, which would eliminate most fines for jaywalking, as well as walking on the wrong side of the street when there’s no sidewalk, noting that the current prohibition disproportionately cracks down on people of color; the bill is sitting on Newsom’s desk waiting for his signature.

Santa Clara is looking for volunteers to serve on the city’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee.

A short two-minute film from the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism explains how to make the unprotected parts of Oakland’s Telegraph Ave safer for people on bicycles.

San Francisco Streetsblog argues that highways wrecked American cities, leveling some of the country’s greatest neighborhoods. And too often, flattening thriving neighborhoods devoted to people of color.

 

National

Bicycling’s Selene Yeager explains how to avoid common bicycling injuries before they knock you off your bike. And yes, you can read it on Yahoo if the magazine blocks you.

A writer for Medium says e-scooters shouldn’t be used, because it doesn’t do any good to go green if you break your neck in the process.

Austin, Texas is halfway through building out a 400-mile connected bicycle network in just ten years. Something Los Angeles could have done by now if it had kept Villaraigosa’s promise to build 40 miles of bike lanes every year.

Another e-scooter maker is getting into the ebike business, with Texas-based GOTRAX introducing a $649 entry-level bike.

Illinois has removed the requirement for local matching funds for roadway projects, eliminating a barrier for building safer streets in poorer communities.

This is the cost of traffic violence. Skins and A Dog’s Prayer actress Kathryn Prescott is in a New York ICU after she was struck by a cement truck while crossing the street on Wednesday, narrowly avoiding paralysis after breaking her pelvis in two places, both her legs, her foot and her left hand, according to her twin sister.

It looks like New Yorkers can get their confiscated bicycles back, after city leaders said “oh no, you didn’t” to the NYPD, slapping the department for cutting the locks off non-abandoned bikes chained to traffic signs.

New York police busted a 21-year old man for assaulting and robbing a 68-year old man in a vicious attack as he was riding a bikeshare bike in Queens.

She gets it. A DC woman says it’s time to stop waging a block-by-block battle against safer streets in the era of global warming.

 

International

More on the international bike parts shortage, as Forbes says the wheels could come off the booming bike industry if it can’t keep up with demand.

Road.cc offers advice on how to build a better bike, with 23 upgrades for your roadie for under the equivalent of $68.

A new book shares the story of a researcher’s 10,201-mile journey by bicycle following the annual monarch butterfly migration from Mexico to Canada. Thanks to Megan Lynch for the link.

An Ontario cop has been cleared of wrongdoing for using his patrol car to block a bike rider fleeing from police; the brakeless rider suffered a broken kneecap crashing into his car.

A British company has introduced combination head and tail lights and bike cams, similar to the popular Cycliq Fly 6 and Fly 12, for the equivalent of $138 for one, or $250 for both.

Bike and scooter riders get blamed for the City of Light’s mediocre walkability score, as a Parisian website argues “a Paris stroll has now become a hazardous balancing act for pedestrians trying to dodge screeching wheels and aggressive bicycle bells.”

Swedish electric vehicle maker Polestar introduced plans for a three-wheeled e-cargo bike for delivery companies, although it’s really more of an oversized scooter.

Tragic news from South Africa, where a driver faces charges of culpable homicide, drunk driving and reckless and negligent driving for running down and killing two men in their 50s as they rode their bikes.

Malaysian social media users tracked down a hit-and-run driver who ran down a bike rider faster than the cops could.

 

Competitive Cycling

Hats off to England’s William Bjergfelt, who at 42 became the second-oldest cyclist to compete in the Tour of Britain — and the first paracyclist, after he was told he would never ride a bike again when his shattered leg was reconstructed with three titanium plates following a head-on by a driver in 2015.

 

Finally…

Nothing like a bike-riding kitty in dark glasses. Is it trading down to leave a stolen bike behind to take a Jeep, instead?

And that feeling when they want to name a bike path after you, but you’d rather pass.

………

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

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