“I’ll live with this the rest of my life. I would give my life for the people I murdered, killed and maimed and everything else and I just want to say I’m sorry,” he said, wiping away tears.
The judge wasn’t having any of it, though.
The judge called Pickett’s apology “woefully inadequate,” saying that until that point, he didn’t appear remorseful for his actions. The judge also pointed out Pickett had many opportunities to stop driving before he hit the cyclists, but didn’t.
Laguna Beach police conducted their annual Road Safety Expo to help stop bike and pedestrian deaths; they focused on the dangers of distracted driving, as well a bicycling and walking skills.
Now hold on, because we’ve got a lot of ground to cover.
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Let’s start with this email I received from danger d.
This Sunday June 10,2018 I was riding through the Balboa Lake Park Recreation area and came across no less than 18 cars parked right in the center of the Class 1 Shared pathway (r.e. Bike Path). I stopped and spoke with one person in their vehicle just parking on the path and explained that they were on a bike path and pointed out how they had just almost doored me but the lady said she saw no path, pointed to the center yellow line and said “I’m just parking behind the other cars!”
At this point I saw a fire department crew across the street and asked them to call parking enforcement, it was 2:36pm. I then called parking enforcement myself and talked to someone who identified themselves as operator 501 and told me someone else had called (the firemen) and that it would be taken care of. So here are the photos at 5:30 pm, 3 hours later, not one citation, no towing, NOTHING!
Obviously the weak plastic pylons which are mostly already run over are of NO use at all as a deterrent and I believe that it is high time that the city put a red curb, or K walls or at the very least some NO PARKING signs up at this location to stop this once and for all as it happens EVERY WEEKEND and as many times as I have called there has been ABSOLUTELY NO ENFORCEMENT AT ALL.
I am not even going to get into the 10 or so cars that I saw WELL into the grassy areas of the park near picnic benches, parked by people who think it’s OK to just drive across the bike path into the grass and park wherever they want! I guess they are correct because our city does NOTHING about this AT ALL.
When will something be done? Where is Vision Zero? City councilmember? Mayor?
This is ridiculous.
Dangerous, too, since it forces riders out into the street where drivers aren’t expecting them.
The law is pretty clear on the subject. CVC 21211 explicitly states that no one is allowed to block a bike path, except under very limited circumstances.
And parking the family car isn’t one of them.
21211.
(a) No person may stop, stand, sit, or loiter upon any class I bikeway, as defined in subdivision (a) of Section 890.4 of the Streets and Highways Code, or any other public or private bicycle path or trail, if the stopping, standing, sitting, or loitering impedes or blocks the normal and reasonable movement of any bicyclist.
Illinois introduces a new public safety announcement, saying we all have to pay attention, especially at intersections, because traffic safety is literally a matter of life and death.
But fails to consider that only it’s only the people in the big, dangerous machines pose a significant risk to others.
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Great video from New Orleans advocacy group Bike Easy, in so many ways.
In just over two minutes, they manage to personalize bicyclists, while showing them as part of the fabric of city.
And making it clear you don’t have own spandex or a fancy new bike — and can carry a trombone while you ride.
Nothing like a little role reversal, with the one on the bike giving the tickets for a change.
Twitter post
Thanks to J. Patrick Lynch for the tip.
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Let’s spend a few moments on the Lime beat.
The company has established a beachhead in Santa Monica, going head-to-head with locally owned Bird. The new Lime-S e-scooters, developed in conjunction with Segway, will cost $1 to unlock and 15 cents per minute of riding time; you can get a $3 credit towards your first ride with the code LIMEWITHLA1.
Meanwhile, a writer for the Guardian questions what the owners of LimeBike were thinking when they programed their scooters to threaten to call the police if they’re not unlocked. Especially in neighborhoods with people of color, who may be just a tad sensitive to that.
Santa Barbara wasted no time running Lime out of town, after the company placed 100 scooters on the sidewalks in the morning, and the city impounded them in the afternoon.
And nice move from Lime, who have partnered with PayNearMe to make their bikeshare bikes available to people without bank accounts or smartphones, providing 100 pedal bike rides for just $5. No word on whether it will work with their scooters, as well.
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It was World Naked Bike Ride weekend around the world, as people stripped down to demand safer streets in —
Who says bike riders aren’t tough? A Denver women is going forward with plans for a 400-mile charity ride from Mount Kilimanjaro across Tanzania to the ocean — despite being the victim of a hit-and-run on Thursday.
New York’s Daily News gets it, saying the state must renew the law allowing speed cameras, double their number and increase the penalties for repeat violators. Meanwhile, speed cameras are illegal in California, and no one is doing anything about it.
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes goes on. Someone has been leaving tacks on a UK bike path, flattening the tires of several riders, including children.
A New Zealand cyclist says there’s no need to improve streets for bike riders, because the city has lots of parks, and he doesn’t see many bike riders on the roads now. Which may be because there aren’t any bikeways yet.
The BBC talks with pro cyclist Molly Weaver about the crash that led to her depression and a quest for perfection, before her recent decision to withdraw from the sport.
We have a lot of news to catch up on after missing yesterday’s Morning Links.
We’ll get to as much as we can today, and the rest Monday to make sure you don’t miss anything.
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Sad news from the South Bay, where the Easy Reader News reports longtime bike advocate Julian Katz has died of prostate cancer at age 88.
According to the paper,
Katz was a longtime board member of the South Bay Bicycle Coalition and a former Hermosa Beach Public Works commissioner. Fellow coalition board member Jim Hannon recalled Katz as a dedicated public servant who zealously pursued his goals while maintaining a low profile and kindly demeanor. As a member of the coalition, Katz helped ensure passage of the Beach Cities Bicycle Master Plan. Hannon pointed to the installation of sharrows on Hermosa Avenue as a cause Katz pushed for that created immediate benefits.Nice
A memorial ride in Katz honor will leave from the Manhattan Beach Pier at 10 am tomorrow.
You can make a tax deductible donation in Katz honor to support bicycle safety for students at 186th Street Elementary through the South Bay Bicycle Coalition.
LA Mayor Eric Garcetti has pledged a carbon-neutral Los Angeles by 2050. Which won’t be possible without a major increase in bicycling and walking, as well as dramatically increased density. But it sounds nice, anyway.
Unbelievable. An Atlanta bike rider struck by a truck whose driver had been shot in the head, after a man fired warning shots during an argument a block away; fortunately, both victims survived, though the driver is in critical condition.
The war cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes goes on. A Welsh rider was knocked unconscious after someone tied a string at neck height across a bike trail. And no, it’s not a sick prank; it’s a terrorist attack intended to injure or kill innocent people.
Life is cheap in the UK, where a 20-year old driver gets off with community service for killing a bicyclist, despite driving on the wrong side of the road with a clear view of the victim for at least 45 seconds prior to the crash.
A new bill under consideration in Australia would compensate bike riders for injuries suffered in a dooring or a collision with a vehicle, whether moving or parked. Better yet, it’s retroactive to 2014.
No Morning Links today due to today’s breaking news.
I’ll try to catch up tomorrow with a rare Saturday edition; if not, we’ll see you on Monday.
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We finally know a little more about the arrest in the hit-and-run death of Frederick Frazier.
Frazier, known as Woon to his friends, was killed on April 10th as he rode near the intersection of Manchester and Normandie in the Manchester Square neighborhood of South LA.
LAPD officers said she traveling at a high rate of speed at the time of the crash.
Here’s how Streetsblog’s Sahra Sulaiman described it.
From the surveillance footage, it appears abundantly clear that Banks was speeding.
She was also flying through a gutter lane peppered with parked cars along the length of Manchester, meaning that, at the very least, her intent was a self-centered one: to get around other vehicles she saw as moving too slowly. To do so, she was likely weaving in and out of the gutter lane as quickly as possible – there was even a car parked in the lane thirty or forty yards up from where Frazier’s body lay.
She deliberately put herself in a position where her only options were to slow as she approached parked cars until there was an opening in the adjacent lane that she could move into or to intermittently accelerate and weave recklessly at high speed.
According to the police, Banks admitted she was driving the SUV, and told investigators she simply panicked and fled.
Which does not explain why police found her formerly white Porsche Cayenne painted black in an obvious attempt to disguise it, apparently with a brush, when they served a search warrant in Moreno Valley.
Banks called police a few hours after that to turn herself in.
The LA Times reports police are still investigating, and other arrests are possible.
Which seems appropriate, since initial reports indicated there were two passengers in the car, who both failed to come forward after the crash. And there may be others who aided in the cover-up.
Remarkably, Frazier’s mother has forgiven Banks, according to the Times.
“I have compassion for the lady,” Owens said “I can’t imagine what it’s like for her, I can’t imagine what it feels like living with this.
“There’s no good ending to it,” she added.
KTLA reports she had previously said Frazier had Type 1 diabetes, and rode a bike to manage his weight.
“He worked full time and he has a car but he wanted to get his miles in, so he rode his bike,” she said at the time. “He didn’t deserve to die because he rode his bike.”
No one does.
There’s an effort led by some of Frazier’s friends to get protected bike lanes on Manchester — as called for in both the city’s mobility and Vision Zero plans — in response to his death.
But as usual, it only comes after it’s already too late.
Especially for Frederick Frazier’s mother and his pregnant girlfriend.
Police also made an arrest in the intentional hit-and-run that followed the next day.
The LAPD took 19-year old Alana Ealy into custody on May 30th on suspicion of attempted murder following a nearly two-month manhunt.
Ealy had been caught on video arguing with bicyclists who had blocked the intersection of Manchester and Normandie on April 11th to protest Frazier’s death.
She was then filmed plowing directly into Quatrell Stallings as he blocked the intersection with his bike, and nearly hit a woman as she was crossing the street with her dogs.
Police found her car the next day, but were unable to locate Ealy.
According to Streetsblog’s Sulaiman,
They were able to identify her from images that had been captured of her altercation with cyclists and forensic evidence gathered from the car. But they speculated that she could be hiding in one of several different locations. Ealy was finally located by the Fugitive Task Force on the evening of May 30. According to LASD records, however, despite being charged with attempted murder, she was released on $50,000 bail in the early hours of June 1. No court date has yet been set in that case.
Meanwhile Stallings is still recovering from injuries that include head trauma, a broken leg and ankle, head injuries and surgery to repair his knee.
Sadly, the crowdfunding page to help pay his medical expenses has raised less than $500 of the $20,000 goal.
However, 23-year old Mariah Kandise Banks had already been booked on $72,500 bail after turning herself in last month, so it’s unclear just what police will be announcing.
Banks is scheduled to be arraigned at 8 am tomorrow at the Clara Shortridge Criminal Justice Center at 210 W. Temple Street in DTLA.
Meanwhile, the station reports police have arrested the driver who appeared to intentionally run into Quatrell Stallings as he rode his bike at a street protest over Frazier’s death, the day after Frazier was killed at Manchester and Normandie.
She had gotten out of her car to argue with some of the protesters, before slamming into Stallings and fleeing the scene.
Hopefully, details on that arrest will be announced at the press conference, as well.
Photo of Frederick Frazier’s ghost bike installation by Matt Tinoco.
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A powerful and painful piece from Peter Flax, as he writes about the healing power of an Arizona bike tour when his wife suffered a miscarriage after just a year of marriage.
It’s definitely worth reading. Just make sure you have a tissue or two.
Streetsblog LA is holding its Summer Fund Drive; a donation will enter you in a drawing to win a signed copy of Donald Shoup’s new book Parking and the City. Seriously, give what you can to help support LA’s most important source for transpiration news.
The Agoura Hills Acorn reports on the nearly $12 million settlement in the death of cyclist and entertainment lawyer Milt Olin; a local resident says rather than being punished, the LASD deputy responsible for Olin’s death was rewarded with a transfer.
State
Streetsblog offers a roundup of Tuesday’s California primary election. My sincere apologies to Eban Lehrer, who tried to submit a contrary view to my endorsement of Antonio Villaraigosa for governor, but for some reason, his comment wouldn’t go through. But it didn’t matter in the end, as the former LA mayor fell several hundred thousand votes short of qualifying for the runoff.
A San Francisco bicyclist alleges he was deliberately run down by Lyft driver after yelling at her for talking on a cell phone while stopped in a bike lane; fortunately, he wasn’t seriously injured, though his bike got pretty mangled.
National
Advice on how to look fly on two wheels, on any budget. For once, all the bikes they recommend are under a grand, although I could do without one that would look like a ghost bike if it wasn’t for the red seat and handlebars.
A Vermont ebike owner gets a lesson in how to ride safely. Because even in America’s second least populated state, traffic scares people off their bikes.
A New York Democratic congressman goes full NIMBY in decrying plans for a protected bike lane on a deadly Gotham street, apparently preferring preserving parking over protecting the lives of his constituents.
A British man gets a well-deserved seven years for a drug-fueled rampage that began when he deliberately smashed his van into a man on a bike, then got out and threatened people with an axe, hijacking one car and using the axe to hack a bike lock.
He gets it. A Kiwi writer takes in the view from his neighborhood coffee shop, noting that if the people he sees riding bikes to work drove instead, traffic would get a lot worse. And if more people rode their bikes, traffic would get a lot better.
Yesterday, a friend and long-time supporter of this site texted me to say she was in the back of an ambulance on the way to the emergency room after getting hit by a driver.
Fortunately, she wasn’t seriously injured, and was sent home with a large hematoma and assorted scrapes and bruises.
She’s one of the safest and most conservative bike riders I know, and someone who always rides with a helmet and hi-viz. Yesterday the helmet came in handy; the hi-viz, apparently not so much.
I don’t have any details yet.
But this is just one more reminder about the dangers of LA streets. And that it’s already long past time to do something about it.
A Santa Cruz work skills program that teaches high school students to work as bike mechanics for class credit is slowly spreading across the US, with programs at schools in Colorado and Minnesota, and throughout California.
Treehugger says people who walk, bike or ride scooters aren’t fighting over a cookie, as London’s former cycling chief said, we’re fighting over crumbs.
Another great piece from Bike Snob’s Eben Weiss, who says our surrender to the automobile is absurd and deadly, yet people still prefer a handful of cars to hordes on bikes coming to spend money at local businesses. Thanks to Victor Bale for the heads-up.
Strong Townslooks at how bike lanes benefit businesses, saying that in city after city, business owners see more foot traffic and higher sales when streets are redesigned to be more bike and walk friendly.
Colorado tells bicyclists and pedestrians that safety starts with all of us. On the other hand, it usually ends on the bumper of a car.
Come to the US for a summer work program, go home in a box thanks to a Texas drunk driver who plowed into a group of five bike riders, injuring one rider and killing a 23-year old man from Columbia who had only been in this country for three weeks. Somehow, I suspect the tears on the cheek of the driver in her booking photo are nothing compared to those of the victim’s family. But maybe that’s just me.
A St. Paul MN man has pled guilty to vehicular homicide for fleeing the scene after killing a bicyclist; he claimed he ran a red light to get away from a road rage altercation and hit something, but didn’t stop to see who or what he hit. His mother is also charged with aiding him in the coverup.
An Ohio family is understandably outraged that no charges will be filed in the death of a 12-year old boy, even though the driver admitted he was reaching for a phone just before the crash; police incorrectly blamed the victim for riding his bike in the traffic lane, rather than as close to the edge as possible.
New York bicyclists will form a human-protected bike lane tomorrow to demand safer streets where a man was killed while riding home from work last year. Maybe that’s what we need to do here to finally get a little attention.
A Canadian news site talks with the Toronto mountain biker who cut up his arms crashing into barbed wire that had been strung at chest height across a popular trail. Stunts like this aren’t pranks, they’re acts of terror — deliberate attempts to injure or kill people on bicycles. And the jerks responsible should be charged accordingly.
Cycling Weekly offers tips on how to nail your first bike race, saying “racing is a landmark moment in the life of any competitive-minded rider.” Funny, I took up bicycling because I was too competitive, and it offered me a chance to ride just for the sheer joy of it.
Hernandez was seen on security video running the red light while riding without lights, so Henderson wouldn’t have been at fault if he had simply stopped as the law and basic human decency requires.
Hernandez was riding to a friend’s house when he was killed; he was reportedly troubled after joining his family to mark his sister’s birthday, who had died of leukemia a few months earlier.
He was struck by second driver as he lay in the road after getting hit by Henderson’s tow truck; that driver was never found.
The race starts a week from today in Oceanside, California and will finish in Annapolis, Maryland roughly eight days later.
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Local
Councilmember Mitch Englander is calling for an emergency moratorium on dockless bikeshares and greater regulation, after complaining about bikes being haphazardly strewn about. Because it’s just so darn hard to pick up a bike and move it if it’s in the way. And he couldn’t be more wrong about the “failure” of dockless bikeshare in China, where its overwhelming success has led to problems of oversupply as competing providers try to capture the market.
An Op-Ed in The Daily Pilot says more people in Costa Mesa would bike or walk if they felt safer on the streets. In other words, pretty much like everywhere else.
This is the cost of traffic violence, as a Texas family cries out for justice, and wonders how anyone could be so cruel that they could leave a bike rider dying in the street. Thanks to Stephen Katz for the link.
Two years after she was paralysed from the waist down by a distracted driver on a Bike & Build ride, and her riding companion killed, a Michigan woman is planning to use a handcycle finish the ride she never completed. The driver who hit them got just two months behind bars.
A Manhattan congressman is the definition of windshield bias as he blames bike lanes for traffic problems, and not the illegally parked SUVs. Seriously, some people just can’t see the traffic for the cars.
Tragic news from Singapore, where a 60-year old woman is on life support after a 17-year old bike rider allegedly crashed into her from behind on a shared-use path.
A Wisconsin paper profiles 33-year old ultra-cyclist Brett Stepanik, the first rider to finish the 750-mile Arizona Trail Race, the 2,732-mile Tour Divide Mountain Bike Race and the 580-mile Colorado Trail Race on a single-speed bike in a single year.
Finally…
This story seems to be saying if you’re going to ride drunk, wear a helmet. If you ride naked with a group, it’s the World Naked Bike Ride; if you ride naked by yourself, you’re just a perv.
Yesterday morning, a reporter from outside of LA emailed me with a single, very simple question.
But the answer was just the opposite.
She wanted to why Los Angeles continues to be one of the nation’s deadliest cities for bicyclists.
This is how I responded.
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That’s a complicated question.
There are a number of factors involved, but let’s start with the most obvious. Los Angeles is the second largest city in the US, so ignoring any other factors, we could be expected to have one of the highest traffic fatality rates.
We also have roughly 6,500 miles of surface streets, the most in the US. And due to the city’s mistaken obsession with LOS (Level of Service) until recent years, virtually all of those streets have been over-engineered to move as many vehicles as fast as possible, with little or no regard for safety.
That’s complicated by California’s deadly 85th Percentile Law, which allows drivers to set speed limits with their right foot. So you have streets that have been designed like highways, despite their original speed limits.
As a result, drivers naturally speed, which results in a continual raising of the speed limit until some LA streets have speed limits of 50 mph or more. And on those that don’t, drivers routinely exceed the limit by 10 to 15 mph — and complain in the rare instances that they get pulled over, because everyone else is doing it.
Add to that the smallest police force of any major city, resulting in just a few hundred officers patrolling the streets at any given time, most of whom are too busy dealing with major crimes to bother pulling anyone over for an illegal U-turn or weaving in and out of traffic. And until recently, police couldn’t enforce speed limits on most of the city’s streets, because LA failed to conduct the speed surveys required by the 85th Percentile law.
So is it any wonder that LA has what may be world’s most entitled drivers, who seem to feel they have a God-given right to do anything they want, with little or no fear of consequences?
Then there’s the lack of safe bicycling infrastructure in the city. While the city made great gains under the previous mayor, who committed to building 40 miles of bike lanes a year, that has trickled to a crawl under the current administration, resulting in less than 10 lanes miles a year. We have just a handful of parking protected bike lanes, no curb-protected lanes — the first is expected to open this summer on South Figueroa — and a few of what are questionably called protected lanes, guarded only by thin plastic flex posts, which are easy to drive over with no damage to your car.
To complicate matters, there is nothing even resembling a bikeway network in Los Angeles. With the exception of Downtown LA, it is virtually impossible to plan a safe route from one part of the city to another. Bike lanes start and stop at random, and usually don’t connect to anything, forcing riders to contend with high speed traffic and aggressive drivers.
As a result, a disproportionate number of LA riders use sidewalks instead of riding in the street, putting them at significant risk when they have to cross a side street or driveway. In addition, LA has a large immigrant population, many of whom ride bikes as their only form of transportation. And many of whom learned to ride against traffic in their home countries, and continue the practice here; in some neighborhoods, salmon cyclists make up most, if not all, of the bicycling victims according to the LAPD.
Do I even need to mention that there is no bicycle eduction in most California cities? Some of the local advocacy groups offer adult bike education, but that reaches only a handful of people each year. And usually not the ones who need it most.
Finally, Los Angeles has a weak mayor political system which gives the mayor limited authority, while placing most of the power in the hands of individual councilmembers. As a result, while the mayor has set some bike friendly policies, such as Vision Zero, actual implementation falls on each councilmember to approve or deny safety improvements in their own districts.
A fear of angry drivers — and voters — has resulted in the cancellation of shovel-ready road diets and bike lanes throughout the city, virtually halting any real progress on Vision Zero, let alone providing any alternative to driving for most people. And famously led to the reversal of several road diets installed in Playa del Rey last year when pass-through drivers, mostly from outside the city, rose up in revolt.
Los Angeles has great potential for bicycling. If the city actually builds out its Mobility Plan 2035, and the bike plan within it — which seems highly unlikely at this point — it will transform itself from the nation’s most traffic and smog-choked city into one of the safest and most livable communities anywhere.
But that’s a big if.
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Caltrans celebrates the last day of Bike Month by discussing the role bikes can play as a legitimate form of transportation in reducing greenhouse gasses.
And enjoy free hot dogs, hamburgers and tacos while you watch some of LA’s best track cyclists, hosted by BikinginLA sponsor Thomas Forsyth.
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The Guardian offers a video explaining why forcing bicyclists to wear helmets won’t save lives.
Just to be clear, I’m a firm believer in using helmets on American roads, and always wear a one when I ride. But they should always be seen as the last line of defense when all else fails.
We’ll save a lot more lives by taming traffic and building better bikeways than by making everyone wear a helmet for every ride.
A self-described “keen cyclist” in the London’s Waltham Forest borough says bicyclists have turned a local pedestrian plaza into a death trap. Yet he somehow fails to note that no one has actually been killed by bike riders there. Which is not to say riders shouldn’t show extra care and consideration around people on foot.
Yesterday’s press conference revealed more details about the nearly $12 million settlement from the County of Los Angeles for the death of bike-riding music executive Milt Olin, who was killed by a distracted sheriff’s deputy in December, 2013.
The DA had said there was no evidence the deputy was actually moving while he texted and used the onboard computer in his patrol car just prior to the crash.
However, new evidence shows Deputy Andrew Wood was traveling at over 40 mph on Mulholland Highway as he typed into his laptop to respond to a message from another deputy at the time of the crash. And had used his personal cell phone to text his wife just 15 seconds earlier.
Olin should have been visible to Wood for 21 seconds as the deputy drove down Mulholland — or would have been if he hadn’t been distracted. Wood initially said that Olin swerved in front of him before investigators placed the point of impact squarely in the bike lane.
A Venice-based writer for The Atlantic dons his best Raymond Chandler-esque prose to say e-scooters could ease traffic. But only if cities can avoid over-regulating them.
If Bird comes to your city, its detractors will cry foul.
They’ll lash out as if every Silicon Beach scheme to make some scratch is zero sum, call the code-enforcement coppers on anything without a business license, insist on “a comprehensive regulatory scheme” as if mere scooters require one, and remain so beholden to status-quo bias that they’ll hold Birds to standards they’ve never applied to Firebirds, Skylarks, Falcons, Cygnets, or Roadrunners.
Before throwing in with the skeptics, at least take a ride.
It’s a good read, and worth a few minutes of your day.
A Pittsburgh public radio station considers what happens when construction work closes a bike lane or bike path; city policy requires developers to provide an alternate route. Unlike Los Angeles, where bike lanes are closed for construction work or movie shoots with no detour on a regular basis.
A New York man says he hasn’t bought a bicycle since the 1990s, even though he’s ridden all over the world. Then proves it by suggesting racing bikes cost just $600 these days.
The war on bikes goes on, as a New York man was attacked for the crime of riding his bike in a bike lane that was overflowing with pedestrians forced off a narrow, overcrowded sidewalk.
Chris Froome is confident about repeating as Tour de France champ this summer, after bouncing back from his “brutal” Giro win. If he doesn’t get a belated ban for a failed drug test at last year’s Vuelta, that is.
Five and a half years after music executive Milt Olin was killed by a distracted LA County sheriff’s deputy, his family has finally received some justice.
Which is just slightly more than the $80,000 requested in their original lawsuit.
But possibly less than a jury would have given them if the case had gone to trial.
Olin was riding in a bike lane on Mulholland Highway in Calabasas when the deputy ran him down from behind while responding to a message from another officer on his onboard computer.
That came just moments after the deputy had been texting with his wife while driving. Which, remarkably, is legal for emergency personnel in California, even if the text has nothing to do with official business.
The LA County District Attorney refused to file charges in the case, or to hold the sheriff’s department accountable in any way for a policy that allowed deputies to use the onboard computer while driving, with predictable results.
That policy was changed as a result of Olin’s death.
Which, in the long run, may be worth much more than his family will receive in this case.
Every few years, Malibu sheriff’s deputies insist on harassing and ticketing bicyclists who are doing absolutely nothing wrong, based on a flawed interpretation of California law.
And after various bicyclists, bike advocates and organizations explain the law to them, they back off. Until the deputies are transferred out, and new ones come in to take their place.
Then the cycle starts all over again.
Like it did this past weekend, when members of the Major Motion Cycling Club were harassed by a sheriff’s deputy, who used his loud speaker to insist that they ride single file in a non-existent bike lane.
Bike riders can, at their own discretion, ride on the shoulder of a roadway. However, nothing to the right of the limit line is legally considered part of the road, and bicyclists can’t be required to ride there.
And just because there’s a stripe on the side of the road, that doesn’t make it a bike lane.
It’s true that CVC 21202 requires anyone using a bicycle to ride as far to the right as practicable — not as far as possible, as it’s frequently misinterpreted.
However, it contains a number of exceptions when the ride-to-the-right rule does not apply, including in a substandard traffic lane. That means any lane that is too narrow to safely share with a bicycle and a motor vehicle, while allowing for a three-foot passing distance.
Like the lane shown in the video, which is clearly too narrow for a bike and a car to safely travel side-by-side. And like most of the other right hand traffic lanes in the LA area.
There is also absolutely nothing in California law requiring bicyclists to ride single file.
The CHP and LASD have often attempted to misapply the ride-to-the-right rule in CVC 21202 to say that anyone riding abreast is not riding as far to the right as practicable. However, as we noted, that requirement does not apply on a substandard lane.
It is actually safer to ride abreast under those conditions, because it increases the visibility of the riders and allows them to control the full lane, forcing drivers to change lanes to go around them.
And it makes the riders easier to pass by bunching closer together in a small group, rather than stretching out in a long line.
Finally, it’s impossible to obstruct traffic on a roadway with two or more lanes in each direction, where drivers can simply change lanes to go around.
But don’t take my word for it.
Below is the video the LAPD prepared to train its own officers in bike law and the rights of bicyclists.
Which should be required viewing at the Malibu/Los Hills sheriff station.
Registration is open for this summer’s Tour de Laemmle, the annual 135-mile ride along with Laemmle Theaters president Greg Laemmle as he visits all of the theater chain’s nine LA area venues.
State
No surprise here. San Diego drivers are taking advantage of a new bike lane in Mission Valley for prime parking space, forcing riders out into high speed traffic; police are ticketing the cars even though No Parking signs haven’t been installed yet.
An Oregon letter writer says bicyclists should be held to the same standard as drivers. So feel free to roll stop signs, ride through intersections after the light has changed, never signal, and ride ten miles over the speed limit while texting, just like the people in cars do.
A retired Los Angeles man says he’s given up on bicycling in the city, driven off the streets by road raging drivers, and moving to Tucson to take advantage of the city’s 131-mile off-road bike and pedestrian loop. Someone should send that to every member of the city council so they can see what we have to deal with on a daily basis.
A marathon runner is suing New York for $2 million after he broke his arm in a collision with a bike rider on the George Washington Bridge, claiming there’s not enough room for people on bikes and on foot on the bridge.
Horrifying story from Ontario, Canada, where a man is fighting for his life, and a woman seriously injured, after a driver slammed head-on into four bicyclists on a charity ride; the driver was attempting to pass a slower vehicle, and reportedly never braked before hitting the riders.
In a bizarre comment, the head of London’s department of transportation apologized to drivers for the city’s hugely successful cycle superhighways, saying they were poorly thought out and rushed through under the previous mayor. Although he may have been talking about the construction delays, not the bikeways themselves.
When is a bike lane not a bike lane? When it can convert to other uses at different times of day, thanks to a new concept from a London design engineering firm.
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes continues. Someone reportedly sabotaged a UK mountain bike trail by stringing wire across it, as well as placing logs and other obstructions on the trail.
Five-time Tour de France winner Bernard Hinault doesn’t hold back, saying Team Sky star and Giro champ Chris Froome doesn’t belong with the legends of cycling, and shouldn’t be allowed to compete until his doping case is resolved.
