December 28, 2016 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Update: Hit-and-run driver critically injures Hyde Park bike rider; LAPD fails to send hit-and-run alert or mention reward
Once again, a heartless coward has left a South LA bike rider bleeding in the street.
According to press release from the LAPD, a 35-year old man was riding some sort of motorized bicycle on 48th Street at Ninth Ave in the Hype Park neighborhood around 3:40 Monday afternoon when he was struck by a car driven by an unidentified driver.
The driver had been parked at the eastbound curb when he suddenly pulled out, turning left across the traffic lanes and into the path of the westbound bike rider, in a crash captured by a security cam.
The victim, who has not been publicly identified, was taken to a nearby hospital in critical condition.
There are bike lanes in both direction on 48th, though it appears he was traveling in the through lane at or near the speed of traffic.
Police are looking for a burgundy or red late 1990s Oldsmobile Cutlass four door sedan. The department reports the two people in the car had just left Kenny’s Liquor, where they were captured on security footage.
The driver is described as a male Hispanic, approximately 5 feet 8 inches tall, between 180 and 200 pounds with dark hair. He was seen wearing a gray baseball cap, a gray jacket, white t-shirt, and blue jeans.
The passenger is described as a male Hispanic, approximately 5 feet 8 inches tall, with black hair and a mustache. He was seen wearing a red long sleeve shirt, black pants, and brown shoes.
Anyone with information urged to call LAPD South Traffic Division at 323/421-2500.
Oddly, the press release does not mention the city’s standing reward program providing up to $50,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of hit-and-run drivers; in this case, it provides an automatic $25,000 reward for a collision resulting in a severe injury.
It’s also strange that the LAPD did not use LA’s hit-and-run alert system that was approved by the city council early last year alerting the public to be on the lookout for suspect vehicles. For some reason, the department seems reluctant to use the program, even though it was created for cases exactly like this.
There is also a statewide program that was signed into law last year allowing hit-and-run alerts on state highway signs.
Maybe someday the LAPD will actually use some of the tools available to them to enlist the public’s help to catch people like this.
Update 2: In an LAPD press conference, South LA detectives identified the victim as 36-year old Los Angeles resident Gabrail Hasan, the father of nine kids under 15.
The tattoo artist and vice president of the LA DTM (Doing the Most) Motorized Bike Club remains in critical condition in the ICU following emergency surgery for a crushed aorta.
December 22, 2016 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Update: Bike rider killed in South LA hit-and-run Monday night; one-third of all LA bike fatalities have been hit-and-runs
Yet another heartless coward has left his victim to die on LA streets.
This time in South LA, on one of the city’s most dangerous streets.
According to a press release from the LAPD, the victim was riding east on 33rd Street when he attempted to cross the intersection at Central Ave around 7pm Monday. He was struck by the driver of a dark passenger vehicle headed south in the left lane on Central.
The driver immediately fled the scene, leaving the victim bleeding in the street; he was taken to USC Medical Center where he died of his injuries.
He is identified only as a Hispanic man in his late 40s or early 50s. There’s no word on whether he had lights on his bike, how fast the driver was going or why he couldn’t stop in time to avoid the collision.
A street view shows a four lane street on Central Ave, with an offset intersection controlled only by stop signs on 33rd.
Anyone with information is urged to call LAPD Central Traffic Division Detectives at 213/833-3713.
This comes just 12 days after another rider was killed in a hit-and-run less than a mile away at Central Ave and Washington Blvd; that driver was arrested in Glendale later that day as he tried to hide the damage to his car. And it’s the third fatal bicycling collision on Central Ave in the last three years, each of which involved a driver who fled the scene.
This is the 71st bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the 31st in Los Angeles County. It’s also the 12th in the City of Los Angeles; a full third of those have been hit-and-runs.
Update: Community members have released video showing the actual collision, but be forewarned, it’s very difficult to watch. The driver does not appear to have even slowed down following the crash.
Especially since all the riders are really asking for is to not get killed when they ride through the peninsula.
Like the first letter, from a San Pedro resident, who says governments on the peninsula shouldn’t give in to “the shrill carping of a narcissistic, entitled and noisy minority.”
Significantly less that 1 percent of the users of PVP roadways are bicyclists, yet they stridently demand that vehicular travelers virtually surrender the roads throughout PVP to them, allegedly for their own “safety.”
The vast majority of bicyclists riding PVP roadways are using them for recreation, while conversely, automobile drivers are commuting, attending to errands or business.
On weekends especially, the critical major PVP arteries are typically clogged by crowds of hundreds of cyclists, often arrogantly hogging lanes and congesting the roadways.
Never mind the obvious contradiction that “less than percent” of road users somehow manage to congest the roadways by the hundreds.
And never mind the ridiculous assertion that everyone in a car has somewhere important to go, while everyone on bikes are just out to have fun and to make life miserable for all those poor, put-upon people in cars, who never, ever drive without some urgent need.
He ends by claiming there are “hundreds, if not thousands” of dedicated bike trails where people could ride rather than forcing riders to deal with odious congestion.
Maybe someone should tell him that congestion is caused by all those people in cars on the road, who wouldn’t be stuck in traffic if they weren’t busy being traffic. Or that all those thousands of miles of bike trails exist mostly in his overly vivid imagination.
Then there’s the following letter, which confirms that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing by citing CVC 21202, which every bike rider should know by heart.
Section 21202 of the California Vehicle Code says bicyclists must ride as close to the curb as practicable. That means cyclists riding side-by-side are breaking the law.
Which is absolutely true, if you ignore the rest of the statute. Especially subsection (3), which lists the many conditions under which the requirement to ride to the right doesn’t apply.
(3) When reasonably necessary to avoid conditions (including, but not limited to, fixed or moving objects, vehicles, bicycles, pedestrians, animals, surface hazards, or substandard width lanes) that make it unsafe to continue along the right-hand curb or edge, subject to the provisions of Section 21656. For purposes of this section, a “substandard width lane” is a lane that is too narrow for a bicycle and a vehicle to travel safely side by side within the lane.
In other words, you don’t have to ride to the right when the right lane is too narrow to safely share with a motor vehicle, while allowing for at least a three foot passing distance, and without having to ride in the gutter and debris that collects on the side of the road.
Which is pretty much every street on the Palos Verdes peninsula, let alone the entire County of Los Angeles.
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A blood drive will be held over the next few weeks for Linda O’Connor, who remains in a coma in critical condition a week after she was struck by an alleged drugged hit-and-run driver while she was riding with a friend in Moorpark.
According to the Ventura County Star, 34-year old Jasmine Duran, the driver who ran her down and tried to hide her car after fleeing from the scene, will be arraigned next month on felony counts of hit-and-run and driving under the influence of drugs.
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‘Tis the season.
Burbank’s Bike Angels lined up 50 bike on the steps of city hall, just part of the 200 refurbished bikes they plan to give away through the Salvation Army and other charitable organizations.
A bighearted Rohnert Park businessman gave out 200 bicycles and helmets to kids from struggling families. And in at least one case, slipped a mother a wad of cash to finish her Christmas shopping after both of her sons received new bikes.
Los Angeles officials unveiled the new and improved Van Nuys Blvd in Pacoima, where one northbound lane was removed to make room for two 0.8-mile bike lanes; only the northbound bike lane is parking protected, while the southbound riders get a small buffer to separate them from motor vehicle traffic.
The LACBC reports on Tuesday’s meeting to discuss completing the missing 12.5 miles of the LA River bike path through the San Fernando Valley.
British cyclist Guy Martin had to give up his attempt to break the record for riding 11,000 miles around the British coast after pulling his Achilles tendon.
December 16, 2016 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Morning Links: SaMo bicyclist injured in hit-and-run, more holiday bike giveaways, and stupid criminal tricks
Santa Monica Spoke’s Cynthia Rose forwards a report that a bike rider was injured in a hit-and-run at 20th and California around 6:30 pm Wednesday evening.
The 30-something victim was taken to UCLA with head injuries and bleeding, but was reportedly conscious following the crash.
No word yet on a description of the suspect vehicle.
The wife of fallen cyclist and teacher Rod Bennett has established a college scholarship in his name for Santa Clarita students who want to study music or music education. It takes a big heart to try to find some good in a tragedy like this by helping others.
State
San Clemente is ready to open a half-mile extension of Camino del Rio, including buffered bike lanes. Then again, given the usual high OC speed limits, a retaining wall might be more appropriate.
San Diego residents call for a kids’ bicycle park in discussions over a largely undeveloped park in the Tijuana River Valley.
Santa Barbara receives a $7.1 million grant to create two bike lanes that will provide a continuous east-west route across the city. Meanwhile, Los Angeles can’t even manage to create a continuous route from Downtown to the coast.
A Florida bicyclist is suing for multiple broken bones after he was attacked, but not bitten, by a vicious dog. Although the real story is, before he was attacked, the 83-year old rider was training to be a competitive cyclist.
A Brit driver screams in fright as a multiple GoPro-equipped bicycle vigilante catches her taking a selfie behind the wheel. Then again, if I saw that outfit coming my way, I might scream, too.
A new study on how to achieve Vision Zero has won a prestigious international road safety award in the UK; the study concludes the goal of zero deaths is demonstrably realistic, rather than utopian.
After three weeks without bicycling fatality in Southern California, a man lost his life riding his bicycle in South Los Angeles, just below the Arts District.
The man, identified only as 35 to 40 years old, was taken to County-USC where he was pronounced dead at 12:24 pm.
The driver slowed as if he was going to stop, then gunned it to flee the scene.
A witness followed his car and gave the license number to police; the 28-year old driver was arrested in a Glendale parking lot as he was wiping debris off his car. He was booked on suspicion of vehicular manslaughter and hit-and-run.
Anyone with information is urged to call Central Traffic detectives at 213/833-3713.
This is the 70th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the 30th in Los Angeles County; it’s also the 11th in the City of Los Angeles.
Three of those deaths in the city have been hit-and-runs, with seven in the county.
This comes after years of complaints from bike riders about biased enforcement or unfair treatment from sheriff’s deputies involving collisions with buses, unsafe driving or harassment by drivers.
So this may end up being good for LA bicyclists. Or not.
What a schmuck. Former Dutch cyclist Teo Muis received a lifetime ban for injecting his own son with steroids without his knowledge; his 18-year old son’s four year ban has been reduced to two years since he did not know about the doping.
Los Angeles has expanded its cycle hoop bike rack pilot program from Westwood Village to the Hollywood Walk of Fame district, installing 49 racks each capable of holding two bikes on parking meters in the area around Hollywood, Cahuenga and Sunset. However, it’s still illegal to lock your bike to a parking meter without the racks, though that’s rarely enforced. Thanks to LA Great Streets for the link.
A new Atascadero bikeway offers a pleasant ride along the creek. Although someone should tell the local paper the difference between a bike lane and a bike path.
It will cost Chicago $2.5 million in damages after a cop crashed into a commuter train while chasing a bike rider last year for the crime of riding a bike on the sidewalk; the city had argued that the law prohibiting dangerous pursuits only applied to chases involving motor vehicles. My apologies, I lost my record of who sent this one to me. But thank you, anyway.
Once again, a bad bike crash may have saved a rider’s life, as doctors discovered a stage three lung cancer when a Pennsylvania cyclist was being treated for injuries suffered in a collision.
A British driver is asking for a reduction in his nine-year sentence for killing a bike rider while texting behind the wheel, even though he had deleted his last three texts in an attempt to cover up his crime, and dispite eight previous convictions for distracted driving.
It sounds like snake oil, but a Brit triathlete is standing again after suffering multiple fractures in a collision last year, thanks to an “innovative, ground-breaking treatment” that reportedly allows paraplegics to walk again by retraining the nervous system. Thanks to Opus the Poet for the tip.
Once again, a cyclist is a hero, as an Aussie rider drags a homeowner to safety from his burning house, then goes on a 40 mile ride despite suffering smoke inhalation.
It takes a real jerk to leave a kid lying in the street.
Long Beach police are looking for the hit-and-run driver who struck a 15-year old boy Thursday morning as he was riding his bike at the intersection of Anaheim Street and Obispo Ave in the city’s Zaferia neighborhood.
Fortunately, the victim was not seriously injured.
According to the Press-Telegram, the driver, who stopped briefly before fleeing, appeared to be a blond haired, blue eyed male in his 20s. He was driving a newer model sedan, possibly a Honda, with a flat-black paint job with possible damage to the right front turn signal, as well as previous damage to its front passenger-side door.
Anyone with information is urged to call Long Beach police investigators at 562/570-7355.
Meanwhile, the CHP is searching for the heartless coward who drove away after hitting a nine-year old Murrieta boy as he was riding to school Thursday morning; fortunately the boy, the son of a Marine first sergeant stationed at Camp Pendleton, only suffered minor injuries.
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Heartbreaking news, as a genuine American hero died at the VA hospital in Westwood last month.
According to the LA Sentinel, 106-year old Redondo Beach resident Walter Crenshaw, Jr. was the oldest surviving member of the Tuskegee Airmen when he passed away on October 7th.
The paper reports he used to ride his bike to the Santa Monica pier three or four times a week when he lived in the city.
The Tuskegee Airmen were among the best pilots in the air in WWII, despite dealing with relentless discrimination in the Jim Crow South and on the battle fields of Europe; they proved that black men could fly just as well, if not better, than the white pilots they fought with and against.
Their success in the air paved the way for the integration of the armed forces, and for the civil rights battles that followed after the war.
They were heroes in every sense of the word, yet came back to an America where they were second class citizens.
An auto-centric Seattle radio host calls the author of the excellent Seattle Bike Blog “a notoriously hyper-critical bike activist” for saying a proposed eight-lane waterfront roadway should put people first, instead of cars; he insists the plan does put people first because people drive cars.
It takes a major scumbag to leave an Indiana hit-and-run victim to die alone in the street, and an even bigger one to come upon the scene and steal his bicycle as he lay dying.
Quartz says the real reason behind the worldwide bike boom is concern over weight loss. Except in Paris, where web searchers want to know why cyclists shave their legs.
Some news reports have suggested the victim may have been riding without lights, and might have done something that contributed to the crash.
However, no matter what he may or may not have done, street racing is a serious crime with entirely foreseeable consequences, akin to firing a gun down a crowded street. It should not be up to the rest of the world to stay the hell out of the way of dangerous drivers exceeding the speed limit and putting everyone else at risk.
Mike Wilkinson forwards video of a far too close pass in Stanton, which just happened to occur right next to the only parked car on the street.
He notes that, despite the perspective, he was riding outside the door zone. However, in the future, he plans to take the lane where the road narrows there.
If you find yourself jonesing for another ciclovía now that CicLAvia is done for the year, Long Beach hosts the next edition of their Beach Streets open streets event on November 12th.
And the LACBC will host a discussion of traffic laws with representatives of the LAPD, LA County Sheriff’s Department and the CHP, along with BikinginLA Sponsor Jim Pocrass, on November 14th.
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British Cycling confirms allegations that the head of their bike racing program used inappropriate and discriminatory language in telling a female racer to go and have a baby after her contract wasn’t renewed.
After allowing a previous DIY protected bike lane to stay in place, San Francisco’s transportation department wastes little time in removing the latest guerilla installation.
A pair of bike riders are Bay Area heroes, as one retrieves a lost purse left on a bus, and the other leaps off his bike to save the life of a truck driver who’d just been stabbed.
A Vallejo cop hit a bicyclist while looking for a burglary suspect; the rider allegedly went through a red light while wearing all black with no lights on his bike.
A Folsom restaurant owner is collecting funds from the meals he sells to support the family of an Afghan refugee killed by a distracted driver while riding with his son last year.
National
A new report reminds us that homeowners who fight bikeways are just shooting themselves in the foot. Or rather, in the pocketbook.
A new British Columbia study says slow down while riding in urban areas to avoid inhaling toxic air pollution; 9.3 mph is recommended as the ideal speed to avoid sucking in too much smog.
Caught on video: A British driver makes an unsafe pass, then cuts back into his lane just in time to avoid a truck — and barely misses an eight-year old girl.
Innovative approaches to bicycling and walking are leading Africa to a greener future, where four countries are among the world’s most dangerous for bicyclists and pedestrians.
If you think the hit-and-run epidemic is getting worse, you’re right.
Stats wonk Ed Ryder does a great job of mining the CHP’s SWITRS database; in the past, he’s created detailed charts to help us understand traffic collisions on PCH, as well as in LA and Orange Counties, and around the state.
So when I met with a state legislator to discuss the problem of hit-and-runs recently, I asked Ryder if he could delve into the database once again to show just how big a problem it really is.
And big is putting it mildly.
As his report shows, it’s goes way beyond bad, and it’s only getting worse. Not just here in LA, but nearly everywhere in California.
In fact, from 2004 to now, a driver fled the scene in nearly 20% of all crashes in the state.
After dropping to a low of 17.4% of all collisions in 2011, hit-and-run has made a big comeback, climbing to 19.5% in 2015, and 20% to date in 2016.
Note: It should be noted that the more recent figures are preliminary, since there’s a significant lag time in reporting statistics to SWITRS. And these stats only include death and serious injuries; adding property damage would boost the percentages significantly.
The sheer numbers are staggering, with nearly 300 deaths due to hit-and-run collisions in recent years, and over 20,000 injuries.
As the following chart shows, the costs are huge, not just in terms of human suffering, but in the economic loss to society, as well.
Not surprisingly, Los Angeles County is the state’s overwhelming leader in hit-and-run deaths, with San Diego, San Bernardino and Riverside Counties fighting it out for 2nd place.
Injuries paint an even more dramatic picture, with LA County accounting for over half of all hit-and-runs resulting in injuries.
However, that is partly a function of LA’s sheer size. When you look at hit-and-run collisions as a percentage of population, a much different picture appears.
While LA still leads in injury collisions, it drops to ninth in fatalities.
It’s possible that may be due to better access to emergency care compared to less urban counties like Kern and Tulare, where it could take significantly longer to get to a trauma center following a crash. As well as slower speeds resulting from traffic congestion and lower speed limits in urban areas.
Regardless, it’s clear that hit-and-run is a problem that affects the entire state.
A 46-year old British amateur cyclist has received a four year ban for using EPO, just months after being banned for using another substance. But cycling doesn’t have a cheating problem anymore. Right?
A San Diego cyclist is asking for help remembering what the hell happened to him; he found himself standing bloodied and confused in a Target parking lot two miles away with a cracked skull and multiple facial fractures after going for a bike ride, with no idea how he got there.
Streetsblog looks at how American cities can protect cyclists from deadly trucks. It shouldn’t be left to individual cities or states; the federal government should mandate new trucking standards to improve safety for everyone.
Evanston IL city leaders propose removing a new bike lane from one side of the street to improve safety for motorists. Yes, you read that right; they want to sacrifice the safety of people on bicycles to protect the ones surrounded by a few tons of glass and steel.
A 28-year old New York woman writes in Vogue about learning how to ride a bike as an adult to prepare for a trip to Copenhagen. Yes, Vogue. Evidently, we’ve become stylish.
An Ottawa bike rider was hit by a car while riding in a new bike lane, just hours after it was officially opened. Which is a pretty good sign that a little paint may not be sufficient.
A Canadian city is being sued over an allegedly unsafe bike lane following a collision. Not by the rider who was paralyzed in the crash, but by the driver convicted of causing it by making an unsafe turn.
According to the paper, Marsh attempting to make a left turn from Navajo onto Highway 74 when a westbound car went through the red light and struck his bicycle; he died at the scene.
The driver sped off without stopping. The suspect vehicle is described only as a dark sedan with possible front-end damage to passenger side and windshield.
Navajo Road ends at Highway 74 with a double left turn lane controlled by a red light, while Highway 74 has two lanes in each direction with a painted center divider. The road has a 45 mph speed limit, but its straight-open design could encourage higher speeds, especially at that hour.
This is the 64th bicycling fatality in Southern California this year, and the tenth in Riverside County; that compares with ten in the county for all of last year. Marsh is also the fifth bike rider to be killed in Perris in just the last three years.
My deepest sympathy and prayers for Steven Marsh and all his loved ones.
The driver is described as a male Hispanic, approximately 5 feet 8 inches tall, between 180 and 200 pounds with dark hair. He was seen wearing a gray baseball cap, a gray jacket, white t-shirt, and blue jeans.
