Just because she killed two innocent little kids while speeding along on surface streets at what police investigators have estimated as up to 80 mph in a 45 mph zone.
No, she says, she wasn’t drunk or street racing with her friend, former Dodger Scott Erickson, even though they were reportedly zig zagging and leap frogging one another’s cars.
And no, I don’t remember him, either.
I do, however, recall her victims, 11-year old Mark Iskander and his 8-year old brother Jacob, who were violently run down as they were crossing the street with their family.
The recording has also lead to repeated calls for councilmembers Kevin de León and “Roadkill” Gil Cedillo to resign, although the latter will be leaving next month anyway, after losing his bid for re-election, while the former refuses to do the right thing.
The conversation also bizarrely featured disgraced ex-Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong.
Kevin de León
Over the weekend, I called a buddy of mine who is a former U.S. attorney.
Nury Martinez
I have one of those, too. It’s good to have one of those.
Kevin de León
Cool. We’re very close. And he, he had the Lance Armstrong case too, when they were going to indict Lance Armstrong.
Nury Martinez
The cyclist?
Kevin de León
The cyclist. Yeah.
Nury Martinez
What did he do? Doping. Is it doping
Kevin de León
Yeah. And the case was coming out of the L.A. office of the U.S. attorney’s office here…
………
Enter this number in your phone. And take it with you when you ride.
You can lodge a complaint about Parking Enforcement Officer misconduct by calling the Central Parking Enforcement Office at 323-224-6565.
That was followed by this comment, from someone who apparently fails to grasp the concept of a protected bike lane.
Car drivers have to move over in the lane for obstructions all the time (mail trucks, trash trucks, etc.). How hard is it for a biker to move over? What happening to sharing the road?
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
A 20-year old man in the UK was sentenced to six-months time served for rebelling against his parents attempt to have him committed by brandishing a machete while riding with a group of other bike riders, even though the only injury anyone suffered was a dog bite after the group was chased by a small pack.
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Local
Babe star James Cromwell added his voice to a campaign to halt plans to restore the ecologically degraded Los Angeles Ballona Wetland Ecological Reserve, which includes plans for a ten-mile bike and pedestrian path; no word on what the pig had to say.
No irony here. A Portland bike rider was lucky to escape serious injury when he was run down by a red light-running hit-and-run driver in a crash caught on video, while he was riding to an event to mark the World Day of Remembrance for victims of traffic violence.
A decades old Fayetteville, Arkansas bicycle charity is shutting down after giving away tens of thousands of bikes to kids in need; the 76-year old wife of the man known locally as the Bicycle Man continued the program for nine years after his death, and hopes to give away another 1,000 bicycles before shutting down after the holidays.
Hanoi, Vietnam is considering establishing a public bikeshare service to to reduce traffic congestion and environmental pollution, with 1,000 bikes at 94 stations.
It wasn’t long before the city realized just how hard that would be, and how much change it would require, before quickly shoving it far back on the shelf where they hoped no one would notice.
Funny thing is, though, we told them that. The city held a series of public meetings and solicited comments from the public — without bothering to enlist the advocates who had fought for it.
But we showed up anyway.
One of the biggest things people stressed in these meetings was that it would require wholesale changes in how we get around. Something that somehow didn’t make it into the final Vision Zero Action Plan, which instead proposed a policy of nibbling at the edges of the city’s most dangerous corridors, in hopes the combined incremental changes might somehow make a difference.
Another thing we stressed was the need for a change in attitude among LA drivers, assuring the city the program would fail unless there was a large scale reeducation campaign informing motorists that they don’t, in fact, own the road, and that even the best drivers are capable of killing and maiming innocent people unless they learned to drive carefully around vulnerable road users.
And to use the long-abused and misused term, to share the road with people on bikes and on foot, making room and giving them a wide berth, rather than running them off the road.
That, too, was ignored.
I mention this because of this video posted by father and Streets For All founder Michael Schneider, as a driver on what should have been a quiet side street threatened to call the police because Schneider had the audacity to ride a cargo bike in the street with his four-year old kid.
Exhibit A of why we don’t just need bike infrastructure but a wholesale culture change in Los Angeles.
For the record we were on a 25mph residential street and this guy started honking. pic.twitter.com/1OMDgeECXE
I share it, not because it’s uncommon, but because this sort of crap is all too common.
There are few of us brave enough to mix it up with motor vehicles that haven’t run into drivers like this at one time or another. Sometime literally.
The attitude persists among too many drivers that streets are for cars, and too dangerous for people walking or on bicycles, without grasping the irony that they are the very people who keep that way.
Until that changes — or rather, until our elected leaders care enough about saving human lives to actually do something to make it change — Vision Zero will continue to fail.
And people will keep dying needlessly on our streets.
The four friends inexplicably disappeared after setting out for a bike ride Sunday evening. A massive search turned up nothing, until their bodies were found Friday — shot, dismembered and dumped in a local river.
Cellphone records show they traveled to a pair of salvage yards, five and eleven miles from where their bodies were found. One of which showed “evidence of a violent event” nearby.
This effectively makes the case for why slower speeds save lives, showing the difference between roughly 50 mph and 20 mph.
A visual representation of why 30 km/hr (or lesser) speeds are advocated for, especially in areas near hospitals, parks, neighbourhoods etc.
The impact of getting hit at 30 km/hr vs. 80 km/hr is similar to the difference between falling from the 1st and 8th floor of a building. pic.twitter.com/zoCJyKuvsb
The Los Angeles Times makes a surprising endorsement, picking challenger Hugo Soto-Martínez over incumbent CD13 Councilmember and acting council president Mitch O’Farrell.
WeHoVille gets the candidates for West Hollywood City Council — or most of them, anyway — on the record for their support, or the lack thereof, for proposed protected bike lanes on deadly Fountain Ave. Too many of whom insist on seeing it from a windshield perspective, preferring to protect parking and high-speed traffic over human lives.
He makes the case for the city council to get a head start on their promises to implement the Los Angeles mobility plan, rather than waiting for the inevitable drawn-out process to draft and approve an alternative to the Healthy Streets LA ballot proposal.
Schneider recommends ten streets currently scheduled for resurfacing work that they can start work on restriping right now.
Unless the councilmembers were just saying what they think we wanted to hear, with no intention of actually following through.
Today, four white men wearing black clothing and masks displayed a banner over the Highway 113 bicycle overpass that contained racist anti-Semitic statements.
We are sickened. White supremacy, hate and intimidation have no place here.
Caltrans forwards a notice that Camp Pendleton will close the bike path through the base for five days next month, so mark your calendar. And make plans to use the shoulder of the 5 Freeway through the base if you need to ride then.
Another notification to pass: Bike path from Pulgas Gate to south entrance to the San Onofre State Park will be closed for military operations from 15 to 19 September from 6:00 AM to 6 PM daily.
Thanks to Robert Leone for the heads-up.
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
No bias here, either. The New York Postcalls Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine an anti-car extremist for pushing a “pie-in-the-sky bike lane plan for the West Side Highway,” despite his record of 41 traffic violations in the past decade. Although bad driving ability is a pretty damn good reason to switch to bikes.
Sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Congratulations, Los Angeles. We now beat the Bay Area in transit use, especially buses. The story wasn’t paywalled for me, for some reason; your results may vary.
LA Times readers sound off about what streets they’d like to see closed, after the city banned cars from Griffith Park Drive in the park. My first choice would be to close Hollywood Blvd to install a pedestrian plaza at Hollywood & Highland, followed by closing Broadway in DTLA, and Wilshire Blvd from Downtown to the coast.
About damn time. Los Angeles blacktop may not be black for long, as the city works to cover one million square feet of Pacoima streets and other paved surfaces with cooling reflective paint, which can lower surface temperatures up to 12° Fahrenheit. Of course, that’s just a small fraction of LA’s heat-sink paved surfaces. And something tells me they’re not building out the mobility plan when they do it. Thanks again to Robert Leone for the link.
The rich get richer. Santa Barbara County is beginning work on the new Santa Claus Lane bikeway, which will create a new Class I bikeway and multipurpose path connecting the California Coastal Trail to bike lanes on Carpinteria Ave.
Cities around the US are debating whether to keep pandemic-era road changes, as drivers, pedestrians, bike riders and diners debate who the streets are for. Although you know it’s not a serious report when they quote a spokesperson for the tiny drivers rights extremist group the National Motorists Association.
A 19-year old Durango, Colorado man faces DUI and vehicular homicide charges for the hit-and-run death of a bike-riding local fire captain; he abandoned his car, with the victim’s bike sill under the front fender, and the victim embedded in his windshield. At his age, the legal alcohol level is zero.
This, too, is the cost of traffic violence. A 42-year old State Department employee was killed when she was run down by a flatbed truck driver while riding her bike in Bethesda, Maryland; the diplomat had most recently served as head of the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Section at the US Embassy in Kyiv.
Belgian pro Remco Evenepoel continued to hold onto to the red leader’s jersey in the Vuelta with a gap of 1:12 over Spain’s Enric Was; three-time defending champ Primož Roglič remains in striking distance at 1:53 back. All the American cyclists have dropped out of contention, with Lawson Craddock now the top US rider in 59th place, over 45 minutes back.
The LUX/CTS U19 cycling team, one of the most successful junior development teams, is shutting down at the end of this season, a victim of cycling’s failed sponsorship model.
Let’s start with a new op-ed taking Metro to task for continuing to flush tens of billions of dollars down the highway toilet.
Writing in the LA Times, Streets For All founder Michael Schneider argues that the county transportation agency’s highway construction plans more than negate any climate change improvements from new transit lines, while only serving to make traffic worse.
Hello, induced demand.
Climate change impact is measured in two ways: vehicle miles traveled and greenhouse gas emissions. For the billions that we will spend on new bus and rail service, as well as active transportation improvements, Metro estimates in a study it just published that by 2047 we will reduce vehicle miles traveled by 9.7 billion, resulting in a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2.7 million metric tons of CO2. These massive reductions would result in much cleaner air for us all, and go a long way toward meeting our climate goals.
However, just as Metro is spending tens of billions building rail and bus projects, it also plans to spend billions adding 363 miles of new highways and arterials. According to Metro’s own calculations based on state standards, this will increase vehicle miles traveled by up to 36.8 billion, and emit an additional 10.1 million metric tons of CO2.
Yes, you read that right — we are spending tens of billions of dollars to make climate change and traffic worse. The expansion of highways will do far more harm than the expansion of mass transit will avert.
Never mind that the money being wasted on highway expansion could be put to better use building bus and bike networks, as well as speeding the completion of the upcoming K Line (Crenshaw Line) to connect with the B Line (aka Red Line) at Hollywood & Highland.
That would create Metro’s first viable connector line, with connections to the B Line, D Line (Purple), E Line (Expo), and the C Line (Green), as well as connecting to LAX.
As Schneider says, it’s long past time Metro stopped sabotaging their climate-friendly projects, and instead spend the money we give them on projects that will reduce vehicle miles traveled and greenhouse gas emissions.
Wasting more money on highway projects is exactly what we don’t need now.
That’s followed by Munster, Germany and Antwerp, Belgium, before we get to the usual suspects in Copenhagen and Amsterdam.
Meanwhile, Johannesburg, South Africa checks in as the worst city to ride a bike.
Not surprisingly, no American city made the top ten. You have to go all the way down to #39 to find San Francisco, followed by Portland at #41.
Los Angeles checks in at a deservedly low #57 out of 100 cities worldwide.
The only real question is why we ranked that high.
………
The plot thickens, as both CD4 Councilmember Nithya Raman and Finish the Ride, tease a big announcement on the future of Griffith Park this Friday.
⭐ Join us THIS Friday 8/19, 4-7 PM! ⭐
We’ll be celebrating with FREE food + rides at Travel Town, a community walk/bike/equestrian ride, and…an exciting update on the future of Griffith Park!
Nice. USA Cycling is looking to fast track entree to track cycling for kids from marginalized communities that have traditionally been ignored by cycling.
.@usacycling is building out a Talent Identification (TID) program focused on Hispanic, African American, and other youth communities of color in Los Angeles County with a goal to fast track the opportunity to introduce these groups to bike racing https://t.co/c58gtojEDc
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
An Oregon driver is charged with 2nd degree murder for intentionally backing his truck into a man on a bicycle following an argument between the two men, pinning the other man against a wall.
West Hollywood looks forward to Sunday’s CicLAvia—Meet the Hollywoods, which travels down Hollywood Blvd, Highland Ave and Santa Monica Blvd, and invites attendees to stick around afterwards for a free concert with M&M The Afro-Persian Experience at Plummer Park.
San Francisco has put plans for congestion pricing on hold until traffic returns to pre-pandemic levels. Meanwhile, LA’s proposed congestion pricing plan is apparently being studied to death.
A traffic safety organization in the Netherlands teamed with a bike advocacy group to call for a ban on ebike performance kits, which can double the allowed speed controls; a spokesperson says “If you install one on the electric bike, you are simply a racing monster.”
Competitive Cycling
Seven-time Grand Tour winner Chris Froome says he’s fully recovered from Covid, and ready to roll in Friday’s Vuelta a España, where he’ll co-lead the Israel-Premier Tech team with Michael Woods.
Los Angeles’ Bureau of Engineering, LADOT, and Caltrans have sent a “love letter” that is actually a breakup letter to people on bikes. Whether intentional or not, it signals that the city doesn’t really care about the safety for people on bikes (or they do, unless the space is needed for cars). Spending $600M of our taxpayer dollars on a substandard multi modal bridge in 2022 isn’t acceptable. The striping should be changed ASAP to accommodate broken down cars and emergency vehicles in the center while physically protecting people on bikes with concrete and extending the lane for the full length of the bridge.
Because as much as we want to love the new bridge, city and state officials have made it clear that your life and safety is worth less to them than a broken-down car.
Under Snyder’s leadership, CalBike’s tenacious, hardworking team has passed model e-bike legislation, pushed through Complete Streets reform at Caltrans, defeated a helmet mandate, legalized protected bike lanes, and gotten several bills passed to protect bicyclists, including the Three Feet for Safety Law requiring motorists to give bicyclists 3 feet of space when passing. They have gotten more funding for bicycling as well, securing an increase in state-level funding for biking and walking from around $100M to over $1 billion, and winning $10M for e-bike purchase incentives.
CalBike has helped to coordinate more than twenty local advocacy organizations with a combined membership of over 100,000, influencing elections for the California State Assembly and Senate and building support for ballot measures such as the successful defeat in 2018 of a proposed repeal of the gas tax.
He’s leaving to take a position as Senior Director of Local Innovation with Colorado-based People For Bikes.
He’ll be missed.
Current CalBike Operations Manager Kevin Claxton will step in as Interim Director while the group conducts a search for new leadership.
Despite the overwhelming success of Denver’s ebike rebate program, California’s minimally funded $10 million program, which was supposed to launch this month, has been dead on arrival, apparently due to the state’s inability to select anyone to administer it.
It almost feels as if CARB is more than reluctant to offer these incentives, even though it is increasingly clear that e-bikes can be excellent replacements for private cars. Their carbon footprints, costs, parking requirements, and the space they take up on roads is also considerably less than that of electric cars, and CARB doesn’t seem to have much trouble pushing EVs as a climate solution.
Never mind that California provides $425 million to purchasers of electric vehicles, which offer far fewer public benefits than electric bicycles.
You’d think that a cost of just 2.3% of the EV program while getting more cars off the road would be enough of an incentive for the state to get its shit together.
But apparently, you’d be wrong.
………
Just 136,000 of the reasons I’m a fan of the East Side Riders.
— SoCalCycling.com – Your Cycling Source (@SoCalCycling) July 19, 2022
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This is what can happen when a country’s leaders actually give a damn about ending traffic deaths.
Unlike a certain North American country we could name.
"After fifty years of working towards a safe, sustainable, and inclusive road system, the Netherlands has made fatality rates for pedestrians, cyclists, and vehicle occupants all converge at a very low level… and it is an incredible achievement."
You see a lot of things riding a bike. Like a cackling arsonist starting a brush fire, and a bike rider with a bleeding head injury who insists on riding off rather than waiting for paramedics. Seriously, if someone insists you need medical help, listen to them.
The writer of a Santa Barbara op-ed, who apparently doesn’t know the difference between a Class 1 bike path and Class 2 bike lanes, opposes the former because it could mean the loss of trees on a street that already has the latter.
Canada’s Hugo Houle captured the biggest win of his career yesterday, topping the podium as the Tour de France entered the Pyrenees for the final week of racing; Houle dedicated the win to his little brother, who was murdered by a hit-and-run driver ten years ago.
December 15, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on San Diego bike rider gravely injured, waking the two-wheeled giant of LA politics, and biking to school in the rain
Thanks to Michael W and Dan W — no relation — for their generous donations to help keep SoCal’s best bike news and advocacy coming your way every day.
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Including bike lanes already been approved by Metro, Los Angeles and/or Caltrans, but never installed.
Even when the cost is nothing more than a few cans of paint.
Recently, there has been a frustratingly continuous drumbeat of planned bikeways being left off of large-scale southern California construction projects.
There are a host of reasons for the omissions. Numerous agencies are involved, though it’s mostly Metro, Caltrans, and L.A. City Public Works Department bureaus. The effect is the same: missed opportunities for interconnected facilities that would move the southland closer to becoming a safe and convenient place to get around by bike.
He goes on to cite a long list of recent projects where previously approved bike lanes were either downgraded or omitted entirely.
From the infamous Northvale Gap in the E Line — nee Expo — bike path, to the upcoming Van Nuys Blvd light rail project, which was supposed to include nine-miles of bike lanes along the rail route, but will now preserve that road space for cars.
And that doesn’t include countless other bike lanes that government officials have already committed to, but which have been unceremoniously shelved, often with little or no fanfare.
Bike riders press to get bikeway facilities included during project planning processes, often to be told that there just isn’t space or funding or staffing or something-or-other for bikeways. Then, even when agencies (often reluctantly) approve bikeways as part of larger plans, they are dropped in full or in part during construction – as if bicycling is just not a valid way to get around, and as if the safety of bicyclists just isn’t quite worth following through on.
The bottom line, though, is that crap like this only happens because we let them get away with it.
Never mind the estimated 786,918 people who ride every summer, or the 1,356,754 who ride sometimes. Let alone the overwhelming majority of people in Los Angeles who say they’d like to ride a bike more, if they only felt safer on the streets.
So let’s wake that sleeping Giant.
We have the perfect opportunity to be heard, and to make a real difference in this city with the upcoming 2022 elections — the first time since 2013 we will be electing someone other than the disappointing, and soon to be disappearing, Garcetti. Not to mention half of the city council, including a number of open and contested seats.
It’s up to us to make enough noise that we can’t be ignored.
And then hold their feet to the fire once they get elected.
………
As George Bernard Shaw once wrote, “People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.”
Which applies perfectly to all those drivers who insist you can’t ride a bike in the rain. Let alone drop off your kids at school.
And to which Streets For All founder Michael Schneider responds with actions, not words.
“But what about when it rains!?” “But I can’t bike I have kids!”
Here’s your chance to ask for bike lanes in Larchmont.
Do you live near Larchmont or go there to shop/play/eat? Take this survey and ask for more outdoor dining, bike lanes, and people space!https://t.co/ZhCacrXlEr
Good to hear from our old friend Opus the Poet, even if the news he shared wasn’t.
There was a YouTube creator hit on an e-bike in a hit and run.
Suspect vehicle was a black SUV of unknown make, model, and year. Victim’s insulin pump was destroyed in the wreck, to give an idea of how violent the wreck was.
It starts around the one minute mark. Unfortunately, while Hartford lives in California, she doesn’t say where the crash happened.
………
The war on cars may be myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
San Francisco Streetsblog’s Roger Rudick discovers that some Sprouts security guards didn’t get the memo when it comes to letting shoppers into the store with a bicycle. Adding insult to injury, one even told him to get a car.
The founder of Bike Index says OfferUp refuses to do anything to curb scammers, after a man ran off with a San Marcos man’s bike in response to an OfferUp ad, after handing him a bag supposedly full of cash to buy it.
National
A new report from the Coalition for a Prosperous America says the US must build back bike manufacturing in this country if we want the pandemic-induced bike boom to continue; over 97% of bikes sold in the US come from outside the country, with over 86% coming from China alone. Just like virtually every other American industry these days. Thanks again to Keith Johnson.
No bias here. Politico says Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo has lost the love of Parisians in her efforts to transform the city into a “green cyclist’s utopia.” Even though she was just re-elected last year after already setting much of the changes in motion.
December 14, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Times op-ed says LA can’t keep pushing bikes and buses aside, and 330-mile NorCal rail trail threatened by coal plans
Or worse, actively block implementation of safe bus and bike lanes.
Paul Koretz kills a bike lane on Melrose and fights a bus lane on Wilshire. Gil Cedillo and Mitch O’Farrell work together to kill a bike lane on Temple. Paul Krekorian kills a bike lane on Lankershim. David Ryu kills a bike lane on 6th Street. John Lee fought a bus lane on Nordhoff. All of these real events over the last few years have something in common: members of the Los Angeles City Council actively ignoring the city’s Mobility Plan 2035, part of the general plan passed by the council in 2016.
He goes on to explain that there’s no way to get drivers out of their cars without more efficient transit and bikeways.
And that there is no way to prioritize alternative modes of transport without sacrificing some driver convenience and space on the street.
Then there’s this.
Another issue in Los Angeles is that we tend to build bike lanes in small segments based on the city’s repaving schedule. The problem here is that just like car lanes, bike (and bus) lanes really work well only as a network. Imagine if the 101 almost connected to the 405, and the 405 almost connected to the 10, and in the gaps, drivers faced a dirt road with potholes. How many cars would drive on those roads? Yet we ask the same of people on bikes today. Unless someone can get to where they need to go and feel safe for the entire journey, many won’t bother. That requires a network of protected bike lanes that connect to other protected bike lanes, criss-crossing the city.
Not surprisingly, he hits the nail on the head when it comes to the solutions.
We need all candidates running for mayor and City Council in 2022 to be leaders on this issue. The mayor especially must lead by action, not just talk, as it is today. Individual council members should not be allowed to block road changes prescribed in the Mobility Plan. We need citywide implementation, across district lines; the average Angeleno has no idea where one district ends and one begins, and those boundaries should not determine where a bike or bus lane mysteriously stops or starts.
We have elected far too many hypocrites and spineless “leaders” with their finger to the wind, bending whichever way people scream the loudest.
That needs to change.
Now.
We have to elect genuine leaders committed to their principles, who know what needs to be done and have the political courage to do it.
Not only would the plan be like setting a torch to the growing climate emergency, it would expose everyone living along the rail line to the dangers of highly carcinogenic coal dust.
And it would mean the death of plans to convert the defunct North Coast rail line into the Great Redwood Trail, taking riders through ancient redwood forests and along roaring rivers.
Because there’s no benefit to anyone to shipping coal through the redwoods.
Except for the people whose pockets it would line.
………
Throw in some donuts, and we’ll all show up.
Join us and @lacbc this Saturday for FREE coffee and local business outreach! Learn more about project updates and mingle with fellow supporters! pic.twitter.com/cfT5d03v8e
This is who we share the road with, part two. Once again, an elderly driver has been kept on the road until it’s too late, as an 87-year old Desert Hot Springs man faces vehicular manslaughter and hit-and-run charges for crashing his Caddy into the back of a school bus, then plowing into a group of kids as he tried to flee, killing a nine-year old girl and injuring three other children. Whoever kept renewing his license should face charges, too.
Bike lawyer Bob Mionske writes about the need for bright lights on your bike, both to stay safe and and limit liability in a collision. I suggest going even further by riding with multiple bright lights day or night to increase your visibility. And note to Mionske: Isn’t time to stop using that outdated and inaccurate term “accident?” A crash isn’t an oopsie.
Baton Rouge, Louisiana is finally recognized as a Bicycle Friendly Community. And only 40 years too late for me, after risking my life to ride there. And don’t get me started on beer-chucking LSU frat boys.
It only took four hours to fully crowdfund new bike lights from Northern Ireland’s See.Sense, promising 575 lumens from the front light, and 350 in the rear, which brightens as you slow down. And if you hurry, a set will set you back as little as $118.
Thanks to everyone for all the kind words following my surgery earlier this month.
My fumble fingers are finally functional again, even though the swollen new Frankenhand they’re attached to is still almost, sort of, not really, kind of back to normal.
But it’ll get there. And nearly two weeks after surgery, the pain is already better than it was before, so there’s that.
Meanwhile, we have a lot to catch up on.
It will take a few days to catch up on all the bike news we missed, but I’ll make sure we don’t miss out on anything important.
So let’s get started on the first installment.
And my apologies for the near-total lack of credits today; with one exception forwarded by multiple people yesterday, I lost track of who sent what to my attention during my extended downtime, which is going to be a problem until we get caught up.
Heartbreaking news from DC, where a longtime bike advocate was killed in a collision, just hours after tweeting about the dangers on the city’s streets.
Had to bike through a roundabout over a highway to get my Covid jab. Lifespan maximization function is clearly perfectly well-calibrated. pic.twitter.com/Zw62SRq70w
(Jim) Pagels was struck in a horrific chain-reaction crash along Massachusetts Avenue NW, about a mile from his home on Capitol Hill, his family said. The avid rider and self-described urbanist who was in his second year of a doctorate program in economics, died at a hospital.
Pagels’s sister, Laura Menendez, described her brother as funny, smart and passionate about many things — pursuing his postgraduate studies, playing tennis and board games, and traveling by bike.
“He had a good heart,” Menendez said. “And he was such a huge advocate for bike safety.”
The paper also quotes a friend of Pagels.
“He was so excited about working in that urban space,” said Finn Vigeland, a close friend who met Pagels while the two worked on the Columbia Daily Spectator. “He was well aware of the dangers of cycling . . . but he loved biking, and he wanted everyone to bike. He wanted everyone to feel like this was the best way to get around D.C…
I hope our city leaders hear about Jim and understand the life that was so senselessly taken away on Friday. He cared so deeply about the injustices that led to his death, and he would want us to be furious about it,” Vigeland said. “I hope that knowing that this was something Jim was working so hard to change might prompt people to take bolder action.”
Let’s hope city leaders get the message here, too.
And used the tragedy as a springboard to call for safer streets, and talk with Michael Schneider, founder of LA street safety PAC Streets For All.
It doesn’t take long for their conversation to get to the heart of the problems on our streets.
ME: Six years ago, L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti set a goal of zero traffic-related deaths by 2025, part of the global Vision Zero initiative. So far, we’re not on track to meet that goal. My colleague Steve Lopez recently reported that 238 people died in car crashes in Los Angeles last year — only a tiny decrease from 2019 despite significantly reduced traffic due to COVID-19, and just 8% less than the first full year Garcetti’s policy was in effect. What is going on?
SCHNEIDER: Our city is very good at plans and goals and not very good at implementation. Can you imagine if you were a heart surgeon and people were coming in for heart surgery, and no one would let you operate? Vision Zero is a laudable goal, but until we have a City Council and a mayor who will spend the political capital to make the tough decisions and deal with NIMBY blowback to make changes to our streets, it’s never going to happen…
ME: Where has Mayor Garcetti been on safe streets?
SCHNEIDER: Absent. He says all the right stuff, and he hires great people, like Seleta Reynolds. He will never risk his neck at all for a bike lane or a bus lane.
But I think we’re on the cusp of some exciting changes, especially because the city of Los Angeles has now aligned their elections with federal elections, and the turnout is so much larger and so much more progressive. I think we are on the cusp of truly having different political leadership, where a guy like Paul Koretz, who’s termed out, couldn’t win in 2022 and beyond. And where someone like Nithya Raman, who had making the city more bikeable in her campaign messaging, can defeat an incumbent.
Then there was this about the recent failed attempt to make iconic Melrose Ave safer and more livable for everyone.
ME: Talking about blowback, I read the post you wrote about the proposed “Uplift Melrose” project, which would have added protected bike lanes, wider sidewalks and shaded seating areas along a 1.3-mile stretch of Melrose Avenue. There was broad support from local businesses, but City Councilmember Paul Koretz effectively killed the proposal. Why is it so difficult politically to get changes like these approved?
SCHNEIDER: Opponents typically say the following: If you remove parking or reduce car capacity in any way, how are people going to shop or get to businesses? You’re going to kill business. They also ask, “Why would we invest in this when no one uses the bike lanes anyway?” People cite anecdotes of driving by bike lanes and seeing them empty.
If we had a beautiful six-lane paved highway that only went for one mile and then became a dirt road with potholes, how many cars would take that road? That is the equivalent of what we ask people to do when they bike around Los Angeles. If we had a network of protected bike lanes, you would see a ton of people using them. One piece of evidence is CicLAvia. Those events bring out tens of thousands of people to ride their bikes on closed streets.
What happened to Uplift Melrose was egregious even by L.A. standards. Koretz basically became a puppet for mostly white, wealthy homeowners who couldn’t see themselves riding a bike or a bus.
But if anything ever happens to me when I’m riding a bicycle, I want you to politicize the hell out of it.
Take what’s left of my body to the city council and dump it on the dais, if you have to.
Metaphorically speaking, of course. Or literally, for that matter.
And if it happens on a street marked for safety improvements in city’s mobility plan, I hope those lawyers up there on the right will join together to sue the hell out of the city for failing to keep their commitment to safer streets.
Or maybe just sue over LA’s failed and forgotten Vision Zero plan to force the cowards we foolishly elected to lead us to the changes we so desperately need on our streets.
………
LADOT has finally release the results of the city’s biennial walk and bike count, which for years has been done on a volunteer basis by the LACBC and later, LA Walks.
Which is something they should have been doing all along.
And yes, they are just now releasing data collected that was collected two years ago, for reasons known only to them.
It also shows how easy it is to boost bicycling with a little decent infrastructure, with a 73% jump in ridership as a result of the protected and separated bike lanes on the MyFigueroa project.
MyFig also resulted the city’s most heavily-trafficked pedestrian corridor, even above the tourist-clogged sidewalks of Hollywood Blvd.
And it points to how Los Angeles can increase the far too low rate of women riding bikes on city streets.
While the report found that women make up 40 percent of pedestrians on weekdays and 44 percent on weekends, women made up just 14 percent of cyclists. However, the report also indicated a 120 percent increase in female riders on streets improved with dedicated bike paths.
In other words, all they have to do is what the city already committed to in the 2010 bike plan, and the mobility plan that subsumed it.
Not to mention LA’s nearly forgotten Vision Zero and the mayor’s Green New Deal.
………
What the hell.
I’m not sure where this video is from; I can’t make out the the police patches or or the name on the patrol cars.
But something looks seriously wrong about a bunch of while cops taking a young black man into custody for the crime of…wait for it…
And while some cities require bikes to be registered, I don’t know any place where police have the authority to seize private property over a handful of minor infractions.
Which would be illegal as hell if they tried to seize someone’s car for an expired license or failing to signal a turn.
Let alone not having their headlights on in broad daylight.
Unfortunately, there’s a term for crap like this — Biking While Black.
And regardless of their motivation, it makes the cops look racist AF.
Thanks to Jon, Megan Lynch and Stacey Kline for the heads-up.
And if anyone knows where this happened, let me know so I’ll never make the mistake of going there.
Update: Thanks to Al Williams for identifying this as Perth Amboy, New Jersey. Which I will make a point of never visiting.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
A Texas bike rider bike rider was hospitalized with a brain bleed and facial fractures when he was run down by a drunk driver — while riding on an ostensibly carfree bike path.
Singaporean actor Tay Ping Hui says he’s got nothing against bicyclists, despite complaining when a small group of riders merged onto the roadway ahead of him. Because apparently, it’s asking too much to slow down or change lanes to drive safely around them.
Sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
No bias here, either. A Singapore motorcyclist calls for banning bicycles from the roads after watching one — count ’em, one — scofflaw bicyclist weaving through traffic. Meanwhile, the website somehow feels the need to point out that 34 bike riders were ticketed for breaking the law over the weekend. Makes you wonder how many motorcyclists got tickets the same weekend. Let alone drivers. But sure, blame everyone on bicycles.
Calbike wants your support for the proposed Safety Stop Bill, which would allow bike riders to treat stop signs as yields. Which is exactly what many riders safely do right now. And far too many drivers do unsafely.
Meanwhile, AB 43 unanimously passed the Assembly Transportation Committee with no opposition; the bill would retain the deadly 85th Percentile Law, but allow cities to consider factors other than drivers’ right feet in setting speed limits, such as the location as well as pedestrian and bicycle safety.
California is joining a nationwide movement to prioritize safety over speed. The question is whether the shift is real, or if the legislature will simply pass a few feel good bills before forgetting all about it and moving on to other matters, as too often happens.
A San Francisco woman celebrates seven years of living carfree after switching to an ebike when her car was totaled by an uninsured driver; she claims she’s saved over $50,000 over that period.
My hometown university has now joined the Vision Zero club. Which isn’t too surprising, considering it’s surrounded by one of the nation’s most bike-friendly communities. Even though it didn’t get that way until long after I left, of course.
Apparently writing with all seriousness, a New Hampshire medical worker and self-described cyclist says he worked with a state legislator on a bill that would require bicyclists to ride salmon, but the bill died when he couldn’t get time off work to attend the hearing. Because evidently, riding a bike in New Hampshire just isn’t dangerous enough already.
A pair of Vancouver business owners are taking their case to the British Columbia Supreme Court to fight the re-installation of a protected bike lane through a park, arguing the decision to swap a traffic lane for a bikeway wasn’t “reasonable, rational or logical.” Seriously. It’s in a park.
Life is cheap in the UK, where a 26-year old driver got a lousy 35 months in jail for intentionally running down a 13-year old boy riding his bike after getting into an argument with the kid in a park, and following him for 20 minutes before using his car as a weapon to attack him.
Scottish cyclist Josh Quigley is on his second day of a world record attempt for the greatest distance ridden on a bicycle in a single week, attempting to ride 320 miles a day in an 80-mile loop through the Scottish countryside; he’s aiming for Aussie pro Jack Thompson’s record of 2,177 miles, despite suffering multiple broken bones in a crash three months ago.
This is who we share the road with. A Kiwi driver is filmed blissfully driving on the right side of the road — which is the wrong side Down Under adjacent — until confronted head-on by a large truck. If your first thought was that it was probably just an American tourist confused about what side to drive on, join the club.
Flores is the minivan driver who allegedly slammed into a 66-year old bike rider near the city’s airport last month, leaving the victim with a life-threatening head injury.
In actions captured on video, he allegedly got out of his van, along with a passenger identified as 50-year old Jessica Bailey, examined the victim lying in the roadway, then calmly removed his bike from under their van and drove away.
They were captured in Kern County less than two weeks later.
There’s no word on whether Bailey is in custody, or if she will face any charges.
And no word on the identity or condition of the victim.
There are several stories from other news outlets, like this one, but they’re all virtually identical. Thanks to Phillip Young for the heads-up.
And how the environmentally friendly project was killed by a single LA councilmember, acting on behalf of a notorious NIMBY group.
Just after the Mid City West meeting, the NIMBYs sprang into action. They viewed Uplift Melrose as a threat to the sacred space of vehicles in this city, and were outraged that a project would even be considered that would rellocate space from cars for a bike lane. Those bike lane thieves, trying to take away sacred car space! And while the project was so much more than a bike lane — it was wider sidewalks, new trees, raised crosswalks, new lighting… all they could see was the bike lane.
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
An American marine biologist in the Philippines with a bad case of windshield bias questions why road space is being given to bike riders when motor vehicles bring in much more “revinue” for the government. He may be many things, but an environmentalist clearly ain’t one of them, regardless of what the headline says.
Washington state is adopting the Idaho Stop Law next month, allowing bike riders to treat stops as yields — but not treat red lights like stop signs, as is legal in Idaho.
This is how it works in other places. Austin, Texas is going to make permanent a popup bike lane installed during the coronavirus crisis after it proved successful. Unfortunately, unlike countless other cities around the world, auto-centric Los Angeles never bothered to install any temporary bike lanes during the lockdown period to begin with.
