Tag Archive for NTSB

Elderly driver plows into 7 mountain bikers, and NTSB says AZ driver’s steering worked in crash that killed 2 and injured 17

February 29, 2024 / / Comments Off on Elderly driver plows into 7 mountain bikers, and NTSB says AZ driver’s steering worked in crash that killed 2 and injured 17
Just 306 days until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.
So stop what you’re doing and sign this petition to demand Mayor Bass hold a public meeting to listen to the dangers we face walking and biking on the mean streets of LA.

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

As of this writing, we’re still at 1,005 signatures, so let’s keep it going, and urge your friends, family and coworkers to keep signing the petition until the mayor agrees to meet with us!

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Yet another bicycling mass casualty event, after a driver plowed into a group of seven mountain bikers in Felton, California, north of Santa Cruz.

The victims were allegedly riding on the wrong side of the road when an 85-year-old woman coming from the opposite direction crashed into them. Although other reports indicate the driver veered across the roadway to hit them head on.

Four of the group were injured, two critically, with another in moderate condition.

At this time, there’s no word on why they might have been riding against traffic, or if they were in the traffic lane or on the shoulder of the roadway.

The crash once again raises the question of how old is too old to drive, and how to take away the keys from drivers who shouldn’t have them.

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While we’re on the subject, the National Transportation Safety Board has released a report on last year’s mass casualty crash in Goodyear, Arizona, that killed two road bicyclists and injured 17 others taking part in a group ride.

The driver — identified as Pedro Quintana-Lujan — had claimed that the steering on his pickup had locked, causing him to plow through the mass of bicyclists riding in a bike lane alongside the highway, sparing just one of the 20 riders.

Yet tests by both the NTSB and the Arizona Department of Public Safety found nothing wrong with the steering after the crash.

Quintana-Lujan was originally booked on suspicion of two counts of manslaughter, three counts of aggravated assault, 18 counts of endangerment and two counts of causing serious injury or death by a moving violation.

But the bicycling community was outraged when the Maricopa County DA released Quintana-Lujan without charges, kicking the case down to the city prosecutor for possible misdemeanor charges.

Just another, you know, “oopsie.”

There’s no word on whether the DA will reconsider filing felony charges now that Quintana-Lujan’s excuse been disproven.

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No surprise here, as a new study shows that drivers tend to be blamed for crashes with pedestrians in pedestrianized areas, like urban downtowns. And pedestrians tend to get the blame when they’re struck by drivers in areas built to facilitate drivers zooming down the road.

And there are a lot more of those.

Here’s how the State Smart Transportation Initiative, aka SSTI, described it — and feel free to substitute “bicyclist” for “pedestrian.”

One of the authors noted:  

“What we’re seeing in this research is that the built environment is a key factor. People make errors in judgment, but no one deserves to die or get injured for such errors. And they would be less likely to make these choices if there were more pedestrian infrastructure.” 

Roads that are designed for driving put pedestrians at an added risk. Not only are they more likely to be hit but they are more likely to take the blame for it. This puts an added burden on those without vehicles or the ability to drive. 

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No surprise here, either, as Streetsblog reports that business improved after a controversial Queens bike lane was installed, despite warnings of near-apocalyptic business failures if it was built.

When New York City proposed installing a protected bike lane on Skillman Avenue in Queens in 2017, the impact it would have on local businesses was certain — at least according to the plan’s critics.

A devastating loss of customers. Revenue falling by 20 percent. Beloved shops forced to close their doors for good.

Those predictions were wrong.

Data obtained by Streetsblog through a Freedom of Information request shows the economy of Skillman Avenue grew after the city built the new lane in the fall of 2018, with revenue increasing and new businesses setting up shop.

Sales in the stores, bars and restaurants on Skillman’s main seven-block commercial stretch collectively rose by 12 percent after the lane went in, according to the data, which was provided by the city Department of Finance. There was also a net increase of three new businesses on the strip, a jump of 10 percent.

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More on LA’s Measure HLA on next week’s primary ballot, which would require the city to build out the already-approved Mobility Plan 2035 whenever a street in the plan is resurfaced.

The Los Angeles Times considers the dispute between traffic safety advocates and the LA firefighters union over the measure, with the firefighters taking a bizarre stand against safer streets, which they argue wouldn’t be. On the other hand, there’s no question where the Begley family stands.

Letter writers to the Times call for passing HLA, arguing that CicLAvia is proof Angelenos are hungry for alternatives to driving, and that we need safer streets, and not just added law enforcement.

KNBC-4 examines what HLA would do and whether it will improve safety. Short answer, yes. Longer answer, hell yes, despite the misguided opposition from some first responders.

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Bike Culver City is hosting a Leap Year, craft beer, Handlebar Happy Hour tonight.

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CicLAvia is gearing up for a full blown April open streets event on Venice Blvd, and the year’s first CicLAmini in Wilmington in May.

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GCN wants to teach you what may be the most important bike handling skill, how to pop a wheelie on a road bike.

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It’s now 71 days since the California ebike incentive program’s latest failure to launch, which was promised no later than fall 2023. And 31 months since it was approved by the legislature and signed into law — and counting.

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

After an Oregon teenager was killed in a right hook by a van driver while riding his ebike on the sidewalk, state legislators naturally responded by unanimously passing a bill restricting ebikes, and named it for him.

A pair of British mayors are claiming credit — if that’s the right word — for getting a controversial bike lane removed.

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

When you’re carrying a loaded gun and $60,000 worth of fentanyl, meth and crack cocaine on a stolen ebike, don’t run any red lights or ride on the sidewalk without a damn helmet if it’s legally required.

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Local 

A Santa Monica letter writer complains about a new affordable housing development on Santa Monica Blvd, because it has 146 bicycle parking spots, and none for cars. Never mind that at an average cost of $10,000 per vehicle parking spot, the builder reduced costs by $1.46 million.

 

State

The Carlsbad city council has walked away from plans to improve safety on Tamarack Ave, saying the improvements they’ve already made are good enough.

The Santa Barbara council similarly nixed a proposal to improve a one-block section of State Street after complaining it was too complicated.

A Goleta bike path is finally reopened after it was flooded in last week’s storm.

Fresno police busted a 59-year old unlicensed driver for the hit-and-run death of a 33-year old man riding a bicycle earlier this month.

Back up the Brinks truck to San Francisco, which just approved a whopping $9 million settlement for a bike rider injured by a bad patch job on a city Slow Street, with at least four other suits from riders injured by the same bump waiting in the wings.

 

National

Popular Science makes some shocking picks for the best electric commuter bikes. No, not their picks; what’s shocking is that Popular Science is somehow still a thing.

That’s more like it. A Eugene, Oregon man was sentenced to six years behind bars and had his driver’s license permanently revoked for the hit-and-run death of a 19-year old man riding a bicycle. Permanent revocation of the driver’s license should be automatic for any hit-and-run.

A newly released documentary examining mountain biking on the Navajo Nation recently screened for 100 people in Cortez, Colorado. Which, as I recall, is nearly the entire population of the town. Okay, it’s actually a little more that one percent. But still. 

In a demonstration of just how wrong they can be, the Queens city council is considering a proposal to ban ebikes and e-scooters from city parks. But apparently, drivers and their cars are still welcome.

New York commissioners unanimously passed a pair of bills aimed at reigning in the city’s rising death tolls from lithium-ion battery fires, including one restricting sales of non-UL certified batteries.

 

International

Road.cc offers advice on how to avoid commuting mistakes for a hassle-free ride to and from work. Meanwhile, Momentum recommends the lightest ebikes for easy urban riding.

A Canadian site says Toronto and Hamilton, Ontario, are investing heavily in bicycling, thanks to a couple of pro-bike mayors.

A married couple is stepping away from their longtime careers as broadcast journalists, and opening a company offering bicycle tours of Wales.

A thousand women will take to their bikes in London this weekend for the city’s second Women’s Freedom Ride, including presenting a petition to the Mayor’s Walking and Cycling Commissioner demanding an end to sexual harassment of bike riding women.

The UN is celebrating International Women’s Day with a screening of Women Don’t Cycle. As long as you’re up for a quick trip to Brussels, Belgium.

This is the cost of traffic violence. The man who led the development of Intel’s groundbreaking Pentium processor was killed when a speeding taxi driver plowed into his as he rode his bike in Mumbai yesterday; Avtar Singh Saini was 68.

An Aussie site for seniors says bicycling is good for older people, but it’s also dangerous, with much of the recent increase in bicycling deaths for people over 60 involving solo falls, not collisions with drivers.

 

Competitive Cycling

Canadian Cycling Magazine makes the case for why this weekend’s Strade Bianche will never be a Monument, one of the five historic one-day cycling classics.

Bicycling explains how to watch Strade Bianche this Saturday, as long as you subscribe to GCN+. As usual, read it on Yahoo if the magazine blocks you.

American cyclist and double world champ Chloe Dygert has thrown down the gantlet, stating she doesn’t train as hard as she does to settle for second place.

British bike races are being cancelled, as rising fees cut the number of cyclists willing to pay them.

And seriously, I hate when this happens.

 

 

Finally…

That feeling when more parking is a good thing. Nothing like drawing a giant GPS shoe across Oklahoma. Now you, too, can go mountain biking on your phone.

And you may have skills, but can you make Turkish coffee while you ride?

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C25FvOjifH6/?utm_source=ig_embed&ig_rid=1c2ecec8-a66a-49ab-acc8-4e403b1999c7

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

NTSB calls for speed limiting tech, World Day of Remembrance, and LA Times calls for fast-tracking non-freeway projects

November 20, 2023 / / One comment

Time to start scrounging under your cushion for lost nickels and dimes, because we’re just five days away from the official kickoff of the Ninth Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

That means we’re also just five days away from my annual Eff Black Friday campaign, in which I urge you to skip the stores, save your money and get out on a bike ride, instead. 

And if you want to donate some of the money you save by not shopping, be my guest.

Then visit your favorite local bike shop the next day for Small Business Saturday, to help ensure they’ll still be there the next time you need something. 

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About damn time.

Fast Company is reporting that the National Transportation Safety Board, aka NTSB, is calling for speed limiting technology to be installed on all new cars in an effort to reduce the needless carnage on our streets.

The idea is to use geolocation to give drivers an audible warning when they’re going too fast, or make it harder, but not impossible, to press down on the gas pedal when they exceed the posted speed limit.

I vote for the latter.

Because that might have saved the lives of four young women on PCH last month, allegedly murdered by a driver doing 104 mph in a 45 mph zone. Along with countless others killed on American streets, whether on two feet, two wheels or four.

Speeding is now a factor in almost a third of the crash deaths in the U.S. The traditional approaches to reducing that toll all have significant limitations. Police can issue tickets to individual drivers, but law enforcement can hardly be in all places at all times. Automatic speed cameras, which allow police to mail citations directly to vehicle owners, are more effective; but many states, such as New Jersey and Texas, have banned their use (and they’re far from ubiquitous even where they’re allowed). Another partial solution would be to reconfigure dangerously fast roads with narrower lanes and additional intersections that naturally lead drivers to slow down, but doing so nationwide would be prohibitively expensive—and it would do little to combat reckless speeding on highways and interstates that facilitate car traffic at speeds of 45 to 85 mph…

NTSB’s proposed solution: Adopting Intelligent Speed Assist (ISA), a modern and techier version of the speed governors that Cincinnati considered a century ago. Rather than preventing a vehicle from ever exceeding a given threshold, ISA uses geolocation to automatically reflect the legal limit on a given street or highway. “Passive” ISAs issue audible or haptic alerts to drivers who exceed the top programmed speed, hopefully compelling them to slow down. “Active” ISAs intervene in the car’s mechanics, often by requiring the driver to apply extra force on the accelerator. ISAs can be set to kick in a few miles above the posted speed limit, giving drivers the ability to go faster when, for instance, passing a vehicle in the slow lane.

In the EU—where residents are several times less likely to die in a crash than in the U.S.—regulators are requiring that ISA be installed on new cars as of next year. But no similar effort is afoot in the United States (the federal government did propose requiring them on heavy trucks, a move that has faced stiff opposition from some truckers).

Let’s hope federal regulators take their recommendation seriously.

Because it can’t happen soon enough.

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Speaking of federal regulators, it starts at the top.

Fortunately, the Biden administration’s Transportation Secretary seems to get it, as Pete Buttigieg marked the World Day of Remembrance for the victims of traffic violence by calling for safer streets to get cities down to zero traffic deaths.

Including more protected bus and bike lanes.

For a change, the World Day of Remembrance got a lot of attention in the media.

Starting with a moving and dramatic display in Malibu, where volunteers installed 58 white car tires to commemorate the 58 people killed on PCH in the beachfront city since 2010.

Just in case you ever wondered why I call it LA County’s killer highway. Although it’s not much better in Orange County, either.

The World Day of Remembrance was also marked in San Diego, Fresno, Knoxville, Philadelphia, Portland, Charlotte and Houston, among many others.

Maybe one day we can remember those we’ve lost to traffic violence, without worrying about adding more names to the list.

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Good question.

After the mad-dash rush to repair the fire damage to the 10 Freeway that disrupted traffic for just over a week, the Los Angeles Times asks why more transportation projects can’t be fast tracked the same way.

So, why can’t more transportation projects get the speedy treatment? Although the work being done on the 10 Freeway is a model of expediency, other important transportation repair jobs have taken far longer to complete.

Take for example the rail line used by Amtrak’s Pacific Surfliner and Metrolink between Orange and San Diego counties. It’s the second busiest passenger route in the country, but was out of service for six months from late 2022 to early 2023 after a landslide and coastal erosion undermined the tracks.

It’s taken a year in some cases to repair storm-damaged bike paths in Los Angeles, leaving those routes closed to riders and forcing them onto busy streets, notedMichael Schneider, founder of the road safety advocacy group Streets for All.

Meanwhile, a letter writer says the freeway closure is an opportunity for more people to try public transit, and to invest in bus lanes and a quick-build bike network.

Unfortunately, Los Angeles only seems to know how to quick builds when it comes to freeways.

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Evidently, they take murder seriously down in Texas.

A Texas jury sentenced former international fugitive Kaitlin Armstrong to a whopping 90 years behind bars for fatally shooting gravel champ Moriah “Mo” Wilson in Austin, Texas last year.

However, she will be eligible for parole in just a third of that time.

Armstrong was convicted of killing Wilson in a jealous rage, because she considered her a rival for the affections of her former boyfriend, pro cyclist Colin Strickland.

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While we endure the seemingly endless wait for California’s ebike incentive program, the nonprofit program chosen to administer it offers safety advice for ebike riders, though with a glaring omission.

Sign up for email announcements here for when and if they finally get it going.

Speaking of which, Electrek says all the sales currently underway make this the best time ever to buy an ebike, while CBS News lists all the best early Black Friday sales on ebikes.

None of which you can take advantage of if you’re waiting for California’s program to launch.

And waiting. And waiting.

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It’s almost always faster to ride a bike in city traffic for relatively short distances.

When I used to ride my bike from Westwood to DTLA for Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition — now BikeLA — board meetings, I found I could bike the roughly ten mile distance as fast or faster than I could drive it.

And have a hell of of lot more fun doing it.

Thanks to Zachary Rynew for the heads-up.

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I’ve never been a Dierks Bentley fan.

But anyone who carries his kid on a cargo bike is okay in my book.

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

The Port of San Diego says you’re not welcome on the city’s Embarcadero if you ride an ebike, e-scooter or a pedicab. Although something tells me they’re setting themselves up for a lawsuit under the Americans with Disabilities Act.

No bias here. A Wisconsin website says they drove Milwaukee’s new advisory bike lane and barely survived, calling it a game of automotive Frogger. Because evidently, drivers haven’t learned anything from the previous hundred-plus years of sharing narrow streets.

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Local 

Speaking of BikeLA, the nonprofit bike advocacy group is downsizing due to limited funds, announcing “a temporary reduction in staff and operating expenses.”

Hip-hop legend MC Lyte says her best Sundays in LA include renting a bike and going for tacos at the beach. Both of which I can wholeheartedly endorse.

 

State

A San Francisco city supervisor led an informal delegation of VIPs on a damp bike rider marking the last day of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

At least two of the nearly two hundred triathletes whose bikes are impounded due to a shipping dispute live in the Bay Area; their hi-end trim bikes could be auctioned off for pennies on the dollar, and they won’t receive a dime. Thanks to Megan Lynch for the link.

 

National

Romper names the year’s best balance bike to unlock the joy of bicycling for your toddler.

The Seattle Times considers how the Pacific Northwest became the nation’s ‘cross capital.

A Las Vegas public bus driver faces charges for running a red light and killing a man riding a bicycle while apparently driving drunk on the job.

There’s a special place in hell for the Flagstaff, Arizona tow truck driver who ran a red light and killed a woman participating in a bike party ride, and injured several others; he reached a plea agreement after the investigation into the crash also turned up evidence he sexually exploited a minor.

New York’s fire commissioner says lithium-ion ebike batteries are a ticking time bomb.

Police in New York suspect a headless body that washed up onshore at Rockaway Beach could be an Irish filmmaker who disappeared on a bike ride two weeks earlier; despite the condition of the body, they don’t suspect foul play, suggesting he drowned and his body was dismembered by sharp rocks and fish. FYI, stop the page from loading before the popup to get around the paywall.

The Daily Mail seems to be suitably appalled by New York’s Bike Kill Brooklyn block party, featuring “‘freaks’ with mutant bicycles, scantily clad women and bizarre costumes,” along with Victorian unicycle jousting.

They get it, sort of. A Chattanooga, Tennessee newspaper applauds a road diet currently underway, saying safer streets and more bike lanes will benefit everyone — although the same site complains that bike lane construction is adding to the chaos on city streets.

A bystander was the innocent victim of an Atlanta shooting that began with a dispute over a bicycle. Yet another reminder that no bike is worth a human life. 

 

International

A columnist for Cycling Weekly argues that pre-internet local bike shops weren’t as good as you remember.

A kindhearted Saskatoon, Saskatchewan doctor is trying to donate more than 800 bicycles to African communities in need.

Who says you can’t carry big things on a bike? Road.cc says tradespeople like electricians, plumbers and gardeners are increasingly turning to cargo bikes to transport their goods and tools, while a London man borrowed a cargo bike to transport a big chest of drawers across the city, and had a blast in the process.

The BBC reports a spike in violent bikejackings has left some Londoners afraid to ride their bikes.

Belgian ebike maker Cowboy says they expect to become profitable next year, even as some competitors are swirling the drain.

A German bikemaker introduced what Road.cc calls the most unusual road bike of the year, which ignores UCI regs to ditche the seat post, incorporating it into the extremely compact frame.

Once he’s caught, an Indian truck driver will face a murder charge for the high-speed hit-and-run that killed one man riding a bicycle, and injured a woman and her son on another bike.

Times of Israel profiles a presumed hostage who disappeared after driving to meet friends for a bike ride near the border with Gaza; his car was later found shot up and abandoned.

Italian extreme cyclist Omar Di Felice is attempting a solo bike ride across the entire continent of Antarctica.

 

Competitive Cycling

Velo says Columbian cyclist Rigoberto Urán’s recent performance at the Gran Fondo of Colombia is a reminder that the pros are way, way faster than you and me.

Twenty-six-year old New Zealand mountain bike champ Kate Weatherly is being forced out of the sport by new UCI regulations banning trans cyclists who transitioned after reaching puberty from competing in women’s cycling.

 

Finally…

Your next bike could be made for bikepacking, but look like a Penny Farthing drawn by a drunk who’s never seen one. We might have to dodge dodgy LA drivers, but at least we don’t usually have to worry about hit-and-run golf cart drivers.

And Rosalyn was one of us.

May she rest in peace, after a lifetime of service.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin

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

Bolo Alert for Mid-Wilshire hit-and-run, NTSB ebike and e-scooter report a bust, and LAPD impaired driving holiday PSA

December 21, 2022 / / Comments Off on Bolo Alert for Mid-Wilshire hit-and-run, NTSB ebike and e-scooter report a bust, and LAPD impaired driving holiday PSA

It’s the last four days of the 8th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

Just 96 short hours to show your love for this site, and help keep SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy coming your way every day. 

Or even less, depending on when you read this. Never mind when I finally get it posted online. 

So let’s all thank James S, Brian N and Robert L for doing their part to ensure this site is here for you today, and every day!

Don’t waste another minute. Let alone another hour. 

Take a moment to donate right now via PayPal or Zelle. Then pat yourself on the back for doing a good thing. 

Because every contribution, no matter how large or small, is truly and deeply appreciated. And needed. 

And seriously, I mean it. Our spokesdog and chief fundraiser is going to keep staring until you give in and give something.

Trust me, you don’t want that.

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The LAPD is looking for a hit-and-run driver who seriously injured a bike rider in the Mid-Wilshire neighborhood earlier this month.

The victim was struck by the driver of a 2012 to 2017 Toyota Camry at the intersection of Venice and Hauser around 9 am December 7th.

No information has been given about the victim, who suffered serious, but thankfully, non-life threatening injuries.

As always, there is a standing $25,000 reward for any hit-and-run resulting in serious injuries in the City of Los Angeles. Anyone with information is urged to call LAPD detectives at 213/473-0234, or 877/527-3247 after hours.

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The first NTSB report on ebike and e-scooter crashes is a bust, as the agency concludes they just don’t have the data they need to reach any conclusions, after finding just 117 deaths on electric micromobility devices over a four-year period.

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A new holiday PSA from the LAPD’s Central Traffic Division sends a pretty clear message about the dangers of impaired driving.

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

Japan will become the fifth country to mandate bike helmets for adults, after Argentina, Cyprus, Australia, and New Zealand, in an apparent attempt to reduce ridership right when we need it most; however, there’s no penalty for failing to comply.

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

There’s a special place in hell for the Florida man who tried to use his bicycle to abduct a 14-year old girl who was walking with her friends. And hopefully, behind bars, soon. 

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Local 

California Senator Alex Padilla announced $80 million in funding for projects in the Los Angeles area; the list includes $5 million for Glendora’s ten-mile active transportation People Movement project, $4 million for Metro’s Rail to River Active Transportation Corridor, and $3 million for El Monte’s Merced Avenue Greenway. His office also announced $69 million in funding for the Bay Area, and $48 million for the Sacramento area.

 

State

Orange County cities are struggling to regulate e-bikes, with restrictions — such as a 10 mph speed limit on public streets in Lake Forest — that may be illegal under state law.

Fifty San Jose kids could win free bicycles and helmets if they pledge to reduce waste and be more environmentally aware.

A Michelin-starred San Francisco chef examines the parallels between riding a bike and running a restaurant. Although no one ever got a Michelin star for riding a bike, though some of us do use Michelin tires.

 

National

VeloNews talks pinch flats and how to fight them, while Road Bike Action wants to know why bike events are so damn long.

PinkBike considers whether elite bicyclists are at higher risk of heart problems and premature death, concluding there’s a slightly elevated risk, but it’s still significantly less than not riding at all.

The NYT’s Wirecutter recommends the best gifts for bike riders, ranging from olive soap to an otter-shaped water bottle and cage, as well as summer weight women’s jerseys from LA-based Machines for Freedom.

Bike Portland’s Jonathan Maus asks if officials really care about record traffic deaths when they don’t do anything to solve the problem.

Kindhearted Seattle residents have raised over $1,600 to buy a new e-cargo bike for a young girl after someone stole the bike she used to ride with her father on Sundays.

Utah is suffering through a record number of bike and pedestrian deaths; bicycling fatalities are at least 50% higher than any year since record keeping began in 1994.

A bike path along a Nantucket roadway is wanted by virtually everyone except the homeowners who live alongside it, who call it a bike path to nowhere and fear bike riders “wandering around private property.” They also suspect people won’t be able to control their bladders after a modest ten-mile bike ride.

Some Cambridge, Massachusetts city councillors want to rip out a new lane reduction and separated bike lanes, rather than give it time for traffic patterns to settle in.

A New York man says riding outside is still better than riding in his basement, even after getting hit by an elderly driver, and that surviving the crash made him feel invincible. Oddly, getting hit by a road raging driver had the opposite effect on me. 

The Washington Post offers advice on how to stay safe while biking through the dark winter months. Unfortunately, the story doesn’t have their usual option to share it, so your ability to read it may vary.

A 91-year old Florida woman will spend what could be the last years of her life behind bars after running down a couple riding their bikes, then getting out to look at them, and just getting back in her car despite their serious injuries, and driving away to have it repaired at the local dealership; one of the victims called her “a heartless monster who only thinks of herself.”

 

International

Great idea. An English market district is using ebike-riding volunteers to make Christmas deliveries.

Cyclist talks with the British couple who just set a new world’s record for riding around the world on a tandem.

Ikea is experimenting with three-wheeled, solar powered e-cargo bikes to make deliveries in the Netherlands.

You could go for a Christmas bike ride through the streets of Cyprus tonight. Except it will probably be over by the time you read this, thanks to a ten-hour time differential between Cyprus and Los Angeles.  

Autoevolution considers a vaporware slap bike lock developed by a Korean inventor, designed to be easy to use and carry, but which currently exists only as trademark renderings.

 

Competitive Cycling

Cycling’s governing body will expand the Mountain Bike World Cup even further next year, with the introduction of enduro and E-enduro racing, which comes on the heels of adding cross-country marathon racing to the Cup.

No surprise here, as VeloNews names Annemiek van Vleuten their female cyclist of the year.

 

Finally…

Nothing like turning your e-cargo bike into a heavy duty snowplow. That feeling when your kid’s new Christmas bike was built by prison labor.

And don’t lie to your mom about wearing a helmet.

Seriously.

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Happy Chanukah to everyone celebrating today.

Chag Urim Sameach!

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

Oh, and fuck Putin, too.

 

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

Former NTSB official says no deaths should be the only goal, legalize crossing the street, and building the 15 minute city

April 29, 2021 / / Comments Off on Former NTSB official says no deaths should be the only goal, legalize crossing the street, and building the 15 minute city

She gets it.

A former acting chair and board member of the NTSB says we know how to prevent traffic deaths.

And the only rational goal should be zero.

Sometimes I arrived at the scene of a business jet or helicopter crash, other times it was a train derailment, once it was a cargo ship lost in a hurricane — always, it involved a tragic loss of life. But despite the terrible toll of motor vehicle deaths on our nation, I never launched to the scene of a traffic crash. Why? Perhaps because the NTSB only has the capacity to investigate a handful of vehicle crashes each year. Perhaps because there weren’t any crashes classified as major disasters when I was on duty. But in 2019, more than 36,000 deaths were recorded on U.S. roads, so an average of nearly 700 traffic deaths occurred every week I was on duty.

Yet our nation doesn’t think of a traffic crash as a disaster, since deaths typically occur one or two at a time. Many of us don’t believe that every road death is preventable. As a nation, we haven’t yet decided that we can protect everyone, including the most vulnerable among us who use our streets and highways — people who are younger or older, people who are walking or biking, people with disabilities. We accept tens of thousands of deaths on our roads every year as simply unavoidable “accidents,” even though we have proven solutions to prevent them.

It’s worth a few minutes to read.

Because she’s right. There’s no acceptable number of traffic deaths.

And it’s long past time we did something about it.

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Los Angeles Walks is joining with partners across the state on Monday for a national discussion about jaywalking and efforts to decriminalize it.

Like their sponsorship of AB 1238, aka the Freedom to Walk Act, which would get rid of California’s jaywalking law, which is too often used to target people of color.

You can register for the webinar here.

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Streets For All hosts what promises to be a fascinating discussion with the creator of the Paris 15 Minute City Plan on May 11th.

The plan, which is currently being implemented in Paris, promises to put everything you need within a 15-minute walk, bike or transit ride, anywhere in the city.

The LA transportation PAC is also asking for you to take a stand in support for a proposal to make Calfornia’s Slow Streets permanent by emailing the Assembly Committee on Local Government by this coming Wednesday.

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Give credit where credit is due.

Unless you’re LADOT, evidently.

………

Bike Talk discusses the bible of traffic engineers this Friday, which is undergoing its first revision in a decade.

https://twitter.com/biketalkpfk/status/1387648749007118344

………

A periodic reminder that bicycle are mobility devices.

And bike lanes help older and disabled people get around, without having to rely on a car.

https://twitter.com/AmericanFietser/status/1387647840109879297

………

Hats off to a kindhearted Cambridge MA cop, who took a few moments out of his day for an impromptu bike ride with a little boy.

https://twitter.com/CambridgePolice/status/1387107364986363906?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1387107364986363906%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwhdh.com%2Fnews%2Fleft-a-lifetime-impression-cambridge-police-officer-goes-on-bike-ride-with-4-year-old%2F

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes is all too real.

A British bicyclist had to call off a fundraising ride across the country after a group of jerks men pushed him off his bike around the hallway point. Which makes the real victims the cancer charity he was raising funds for, and the people they could have helped.

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

Police in Ontario, Canada are looking for a bike rider who fled the scene after crashing his bike into a trash bin, while towing a trailer filled with 31 pounds of cannabis. And a guitar.

A bike-riding British thief uses his head to balance the spa he just stole.

………

Local

No news is good news, right?

 

State

San Diego opens a new South Bay campground and bike park. But not together, unfortunately.

A Bakersfield bike path could be underwater through today, thanks to a water line break.

Speaking of Bakersfield, the city will kick off Bike Month with a solidarity ride this Saturday.

Trek CEO John Burke penned a heartfelt ode to his penpal Joe Shami, the 86-year old Legend of Mount Diablo, who was killed in a collision with a driver on yet another ride up the mountain earlier this month.

Bay Area transportation officials marked the beginning of Bike Month by announcing nine Bike Champion of the Year winners, honoring one person from each county in the Bay region for their commitment to bicycling.

The rich get richer. The Sacramento region is planning a bike freeway network connecting area cities, which could require an another 300 miles of trails in addition to the 450 miles already on the ground.

 

National

The Associated Press says give mom an ebike this year.

Outside says it’s time for a federal ebike tax credit.

AARP takes a look a look at bicycling over 55, including what to look for in a new bike, bikes for people with mobility issues, how to be safer on your bike, and eight of the nation’s top rail trails, including the Monterey Bay Coastal Recreation Trail.

Pop Sugar recommends ten padded bike shorts to make your ride — and presumably, your wallet — more comfortable.

Bicycling considers how to advocate for and protect the trails you ride this summer. As usual, you can read it on Yahoo if Bicycling blocks you. And they probably will.

Even Honolulu is building a protected bike lane network.

The newest edition of Oregon’s state bicycling manual gets rid of labels in favor of more inclusive people-first language.

In a common lament across the country, Omaha, Nebraska has more bikeshare bikes than ever. Just not enough safe places to ride them.

They get it. A new survey shows Pittsburgh residents overwhelmingly support bike lanes, walking routes and reduced speed limits. And think traffic injuries are a major problem. Maybe someday someone will finally get around to asking Angelenos those same questions, so our elected leaders might finally see that the car-first crowd is just a very loud minority.

New York has sent a cease and desist order to a new rival to the city’s Citi Bike bikeshare system, saying the privately run dockless bikeshare isn’t authorized to do business in the city.

A New Jersey DJ pleads with lightless and scofflaw bicyclists to stay safe.

In an overly familiar story, DC traffic deaths continue to climb while Vision Zero funding is stuck in limbo.

Camila Cabello is one of us, as she goes for a bike ride through the streets of Miami.

 

International

Road.cc offers 14 tips on how to make your bike more comfortable. I’m a big fan of padded gloves, new bar tape and better insoles myself.

He gets it. A writer for Innovation Origins says we need more and better bike paths, not more helmet laws.

This is who we share the road with. A newlywed English teenager gets a well-deserved year behind bars for stealing a crate of eggs, then driving his car while friends threw the eggs out the window at passing people and cars, permanently blinding a motorcycle rider in his right eye with a direct hit. He took the fall for his friends, refusing to name who actually tossed the eggs.

Princess Di’s “shame” mixte bike sold for the equivalent of over $61,000, which the palace forced her to sell before her ill-fated marriage to Prince Chuck; the bike went for more than twice the presale estimate.

Add this to your bike bucket list, with eleven “of the best and most beautiful places” to ride your bike in Scotland.

Rouleur looks at the 18k gold framed bike famed Italian bikemaker Ernesto Colnago made for Pope — now Saint — John Paul II.

Heartbreaking story from India, where an elderly man was forced to carry his dead wife’s body on his bicycle for hours after villagers blocked him from the local crematorium for fear of Covid-19, even though there was no confirmation she ever had the disease.

 

Finally…

That feeling when God tells you to start a weekly bike night at the local skatepark.

And let’s consign “savages” to the racist dustbin of history. Even in reference to some truly despicable bike thieves.

Oh, and it’s “thief,” not “thieve.”

………

Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask. 

And get vaccinated, already.

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

Morning Links: More mandatory helmet fallout, dog hitches ride at Phil’s Fondo, and SaMo bikeshare may go dockless

November 19, 2019 / / 2 comments

In yet more fallout from the NTSB’s ill-considered call for mandatory bike helmets, a Fresno paper questions whether they’re really needed for adults.

That’s despite living in what they say is one of the nation’s most deadly cities for bike riders.

Meanwhile, executive director of the Sonoma County Bicycle Coalition says “The problem isn’t that we don’t wear helmets, it’s that we’re forced to share space with much faster vehicles.”

Photo by Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke from Pixabay.

………

Local

Phil Gaimon’s Phil’s Fondo brought out hundreds of bicyclists to ride the Santa Monica Mountains, along with one miniature bulldog who hitched a ride in his owner’s backpack.

Santa Monica is considering getting rid the docks for its Breeze bikeshare, replacing the current system with dockless ebikes.

 

State

Bike Mag says San Diego’s mountain bike scene is finally on the rise. Or maybe they’re just discovering it.

No bias here. A writer for a San Diego paper calls e-scooters today’s Pet Rock — and simultaneously a plaything for 30-somethings, a toy best suited for children, and what’s keeping Millennials from walking.

That’s more like it. San Francisco plans to address the need for more bike and scooter parking by installing 100 new bike racks every month for the foreseeable future.

A Bay Area bike advocate says the new protected bike and pedestrian lane on the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge may not draw a lot of regular use, but it’s a better transportation policy than adding another motor vehicle lane.

Sacramento is done handing out warnings, and ready to crackdown on scofflaw bikeshare and scooter riders.

 

National

Presidential candidate and former VP Joe Biden offers a $1 trillion transportation plan that keeps America addicted to motor vehicles.

Good question. A science writer says she cares about climate change, so why does she still drive an SUV?

A Kansas paper totally misses the point, after woman followed a man in her car before trying to run him down as he jumped off just in time, then chased him across the parking lot with it. But the local paper only says she hit a bike ridden by a man. Note to Salina Journal — the past tense of ride is rode, not road.

This is why people keep dying on our streets. A Chicago woman only faces a trio of misdemeanor charges for killing a man riding a bike, despite driving with a suspended license.

A former Minnesota Ford plant will be redeveloped as a low-income housing community, with an emphasis on getting around by bicycling, walking and transit.

Bighearted Kentucky residents pitched in to buy a new bicycle for a 62-year old local celebrity after his was mangled when he was hit by a motorist; the man is known for riding his bike around town and waving as he goes by.

New York police are looking for a group of men who surrounded a delivery rider, striking him in the head before making off with his ebike.

The Virginia Tech student newspaper says trading a car for a bicycle could be one of the best decisions students could make during their time on campus.

Kindhearted Virginia race organizers buy a new handcycle for a man who lost both legs due to complications from diabetes.

Police say the Florida bike rider who was run down by a hit-and-run driver in a crosswalk after rolling a stop wasn’t at fault, because regardless of any other factors, drivers are required to stop for anyone in a crosswalk — including people on bikes.

 

International

A new European study shows that bicycling just 20 minutes is enough to ward off heart disease in people over 60.

The Sun says a “shocking” study shows 20% of British men can’t ride a bike. Which really just means a full 80% can, which is pretty damn good.

The founder of London’s Black Cycling Network says he was stopped and frisked by a cop who swore he could smell weed on him.

Four women take a video boat and mountain tour of Norway and Sweden.

Modern Family star Ariel Winter is one of us, posing with a bicycle in front of an Amsterdam canal. There’s just something about a bicycle that makes anyone look good. Although it helps if you already look good without one, too. 

Uber is preparing to make the big jump to Rome with their dockless Jump ebikes, hoping that Romans won’t trash them like they have every other bikeshare system that dared besmirch the city’s streets.

A Romanian bicycle factory promises to be the biggest in Europe, producing 1.5 million bikes a year.

A pair of Indian parliament members arrive by bike for the current session.

 

Competitive Cycling

UCI is making plans for an annual, cross-discipline world championships that would award titles in virtually every form of cycling over a two-week period.

 

Finally…

If you’re trying to escape the cops on a stolen bike, try to keep it upright. Seriously, it’s not that hard — even a dog can do it.

And how many times do we have to say it? If you’re already on probation and riding your bike carrying a concealed weapon after dark, put a damn light on it.

The bike, not the gun.

………

On a personal note, we’re once more hearing the pitter patter of corgi feet around our apartment. We’re fostering a ten-year old corgi for the next few months while his owner is in rehab. 

This is Bowser — that’s really his name — sleeping off the trauma of what his owner claims was his first ever bath. 

And yes, he smelled like it.

 

 

Category: Morning Links / Tags: , , , ,

Morning Links: The real reasons bike riders keep dying, $100k OCTA bike safety grant, and Oaxaca Day of the Dead race

November 15, 2019 / / Comments Off on Morning Links: The real reasons bike riders keep dying, $100k OCTA bike safety grant, and Oaxaca Day of the Dead race

Last week, Peter Flax explained why the NTSB — the National Transportation Safety Board — was wrong about their call for mandatory bike helmets to cut the rising rate of bicycling fatalities.

This week he’s back to spell out the real reasons people are dying on our streets.

And it ain’t a lack of helmets.

He starts by recounting the last decade’s decline in bicycling deaths.

Then this.

The situation seemed great—until it wasn’t great. Right around 2011, things started arcing in the wrong direction. In 2010, a total of 618 cyclists were killed—hardly miraculous, but the lowest toll in at least 40 years. Then every year after that, the number of casualties has gotten progressively worse. The newly released 2018 statistics mean that the fatality rate for riders has risen 37 percent in just nine years—and NHTSA data indicate that the death rate for urban and female cyclists has soared even more.

So while the NTSB analysis focused primarily on encouraging or mandating greater helmet use, as well as things cyclists, road designers, and carmakers should do so riders are more conspicuous to motorists, those factors don’t really explain why a serious, sustained uptick of deaths began in 2011. It’s not like helmet use had a major decline, or cities ripped out quality protected bike lanes, or high-viz apparel or auto headlights got worse. These factors, especially related to road design, might have an impact on fatalities going forward, but they don’t explain why more cyclists have been dying in the past decade.

It’s a must read for anyone who wants to understand what the real problems are, and why we keep dying.

And do something about it.

………

Orange County’s OCTA announces a grant to improve bicycle safety and education.

The Orange County Transportation Authority has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety for a year-long community program dedicated to pedestrian and bicycle safety classes and distribution of safety equipment for people walking and biking.

The aim of the program is to increase safety and reduce traffic-related injuries and fatalities. OCTA will use the funding as part of the agency’s ongoing commitment to deliver transportation solutions, including for active transportation – biking, walking and skating.

“OCTA appreciates the strong partnership we have formed with the state’s Office of Traffic Safety to work toward enhancing safety on our streets,” said OCTA Chairman Tim Shaw, also a City Council member in La Habra. “OTS has provided grant funding for the past three years to develop programs improving conditions for walking and biking, and ongoing grant funding will help us with one of our primary goals of reinforcing safety throughout Orange County.

Activities to be funded by this year’s grant include:

  • Pedestrian and bicycle safety classes
  • Distribution of bicycle lights and helmets
  • Distribution of reflectors for pedestrians

The need for increased safety training is clear. Bicycle and pedestrian-related collisions have been on the rise for the past decade.

“No matter which way you get around, you play a part in roadway safety,” OTS Director Barbara Rooney said. “These grant programs are intended to educate residents on ways they can make themselves and those around them safe when they walk or bike.”

The pedestrian and bicycle safety program and distribution of safety materials will occur throughout 2020. Funding for this program was provided by a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety, through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

For more information on bicycle programs and safety in Orange County, and to stay updated on where classes are being scheduled, visit octa.net/bike.

………

The LACBC is looking for volunteers to help give out free bike lights to riders who don’t have them in Koreatown next week.

………

Tune into Bike Talk at 6 pm tonight to hear, and maybe chat with, Juli Briskman, the Virginia woman who lost her job after flipping off Trump’s motorcade.

And responded by running for office — and winning.

………

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

A 13-year old New York boy credits an Emergency 911 app on his phone with scaring off a group of older boys on bikes who tried to rob him.

………

Local

A 35-year old Fontana man was arrested for a Pasadena hit-and-run that left a juvenile bike rider hospitalized with critical injuries; he was booked on suspicion of hit-and-run and DUI resulting in serious injury or death. Let’s all say a pray or offer best wishes that the kid makes a full and fast recovery.

People for Bikes invites you to join the weekly Ride and Pint mountain bike ride rolling out of Pedlar’s Fork in Calabasas every Thursday. You can find it, and other great rides, through their Ride Spot app.

The future of Santa Monica’s Breeze bikeshare is in doubt as it faces stiff competition from dockless bikeshares; the city will have to fork over $225,000 in subsidies just to keep it operating for the next year. West Hollywood has already pulled the plug on its money-losing sister operation.

 

State

Seven Orange County communities will host the first Meet on the Beach festival, offering a carfree open streets experience along 1.5 miles of Beach Blvd to reimagine what the street could be. Thanks to the Orange County Bicycle Coalition for the heads up.

Temecula is opening a new pump track bike park this Tuesday.

A new 32-page manual put together by a pair of San Francisco advocacy groups explains how to build protected bike lanes that work for everyone, including pedestrians and disabled people.

The long-promised bike and pedestrian lane on the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge connecting Contra Costa and Marin counties will open tomorrow, despite continued efforts in some quarters to convert it to a yet another lane for motor vehicles. Because everyone knows just one more traffic lane will solve all our traffic problems forever.

 

National

EcoWatch makes the case for why your next car will be a bike.

Joe Biden attempts to boost his run for president with a new infrastructure plan that’s heavy on high-speed rail, transit and bicycling.

An Oregon Republican proves conservatives can support bicycling, too, as he announces his run for Congress.

Be careful carrying that bike. A 74-year old Detroit man was found dead after he fell down the stair while trying to carry his mountain bike up them.

He gets it. An op-ed in the New York Daily News calls for eliminating free parking to pay for free transit.

Britain’s Beryl bikeshare brand makes a beachhead in New York’s Staten Island, booting Lime and Jump; meanwhile, Lyft is pulling the plug on their e-scooter operations in six smaller market cities.

After a Virginia boy’s new bike was stolen, his bighearted neighbors pitched in to buy him a new one. Stories like this remind us that there’s still a lot of good in this world, despite how it may seem these days.

Florida’s Jack the Bike Man says he needs a miracle to keep giving thousands of refurbished bikes to kids in need, after the building housing the nonprofit was sold and the new owner jacked his rent up over $100 grand a year.

 

International

Cars could be killing us even without touching us. A new study has linked pollution from motor vehicles to brain cancer for the first time.

Bicycle Retailer reminds us that Trump’s trade war with China is still going strong, and the bikes are losing.

Your next bike helmet could be a custom-made, 3D printed number with individual hexagon-shaped crumple zones that the company says is safer than MIPS or WaveCel — if you have an extra $390 on hand.

A writer for Gear Patrol offers lessons learned from Trek’s mountain bike camp at the Whistler resort in British Columbia.

A pair of British doctors set a new Guinness record for circumnavigating the globe on a tandem bike, covering 18,000 miles in 218 days and 22 hours, breaking the previous men’s record by nine days.

He gets it. An Irish letter writer reminds the anti-bike crowd that roads are a public service that we all pay for.

A European bikemaker came up with a smart, if somewhat creepy and invasive, sales promotion, scanning Paris license plates to determine how much CO2 each car puts out, and using that figure to offer the owner a discount on a new bicycle.

Tom Vanderbilt explains how he went from riding solo to taking his family along, thanks to a trip to Italy.

Now that’s more like it. A stoned, speeding Australian driver will spend the next 11 years behind bars and be prohibited from driving for two decades after walking away from the crash that killed a Dutch woman riding a bike.

 

Competitive Cycling

Britain’s Cyclist magazine recalls the Motorola team that rose from the ashes of America’s late, great 7-11 team after the convenience chain declared bankruptcy — including the tragic death of Italy’s Fabio Casartelli in the 1995 Tour de France.

The UAE Team Emirates cycling team is considering legal action against Croatian pro Kristijan Đurasek following his four-year ban for doping. But cycling officials keep telling us the era of doping is over, right?

 

Finally…

Now you, too, can get your very own ebike branded by your favorite soccer team — as long as your favorite team is Paris Saint-Germain. When your round-the-world bike trip gets interrupted by a water-logged passport, just fly home and get a new one.

And nothing like a little Dia de los Muertos mountain bike racing in the middle of Oaxaca.

 

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

Morning Links: More NTSB bike helmet fallout, OC bike rider dies after hit-and-run, and the wise really do ride bikes

November 11, 2019 / / 3 comments

Let’s start by wishing a happy Veterans Day to everyone who has served their country to help keep the rest of us safe.

Cycling Weekly considers how military training can make you a better bicyclist.

And hundreds of bike-riding military vets, many disabled, were expected to roll through Las Vegas this Veterans Day weekend as part of Project Hero to call attention to the problem of suicide among veterans.

Let’s hope that one day veterans will finally get the care they need to come all the way home.

Artwork by VintageBlue from Pixabay.

………

The fallout over the National Transportation Safety Board’s call for mandatory helmet laws continued over the weekend.

NACTO told the NTSB not so fast on calling for mandatory helmet laws, saying building safe places to ride a bike will keep people safer than making everyone wear a helmet; you can read their full statement here.

Sonoma’s Press Democrat begged to differ, however, saying requiring helmets for all bike riders of any age would save lives. Although more than a few studies have suggested the opposite is true.

An automotive website notes that not one state currently mandates all bicyclists have to wear helmets.

And bike riders aren’t sold on the idea, either.

………

Just learned that OC bike rider Virgil Lemus Garcia died last month, two days after being critically injured by a hit-and-run driver.

Unfortunately, there was no follow-up story in the news, and no coroner’s report since he died in the hospital.

We’ll post our story later today.

Thanks to Bill Sellin for the heads-up.

………

Don’t give drivers the bird.

Especially it’s on your handlebars.

https://twitter.com/Hoshikazu123/status/1192350304123015168

Clearly, any owl that rides a bike really is wise.

………

Cute video from pro stunt cyclist Cam McCaul, as he goes for a bike ride with his adorable daughters, and takes a spin around a bike park with his three-year old on his bike.

But thankfully saves the back flips for when he’s riding solo.

………

When a bike gets too old to ride, you can still use it to hold your burger and beer.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes is all too real.

A Stanford student was the victim of a hate crime when a white woman pushed a woman of Asian descent off her bicycle, then stood over her on the street and called her an ethnic slur before walking away.

The owners of a Portland bikini coffee shop face charges after a road rage incident involving a group of bicyclists in front of their shop; after one of the riders didn’t take kindly to being yelled at, one the men got out of their car carrying a hammer, punched one man, then knocked a phone out of a woman’s hand before punching her out cold.

The New York Post claims that in four years, the city’s war on cars has claimed 6,100 parking spaces. On the other hand, it’s also claimed the live of 39 people riding bicycles over the same period. So which side is losing?

Yet another British man has been pushed off his bicycle by someone in a passing vehicle; this time the victim was a 72-year old grandfather.

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

A man on a bicycle could face attempted murder charges for shooting two homeless people with a bow and arrow in the East Bay city of Richmond CA; the victims are in stable condition following surgery.

………

Local

Michael over at CLR Effect questions whether officials on La Verne are just yanking our chains by failing to paint the promised bike lanes after Baseline Road was repaved, and restriped for every other purpose. Thanks to Erik Griswold for the link.

 

State

The former mayor of Encinitas wears her windshield bias on her sleeve, concluding that a road diet on the coast highway is a bad idea because only around 300 people in the city ride their bikes to work. So apparently, all those people who ride their bikes to school, for errands or shopping, or for recreation and exercise through the city don’t exist. Or maybe just don’t count in her book.

Horrible story from Mead Valley, where a woman was mauled by a pair of pit bulls as she walked her bicycle; police also found the badly decomposed body of the dogs’ owner when they checked their home.

Bad news from San Francisco, where a woman suffered life-threatening injuries when she was collateral damage after another driver hit a car and swerved into her. Note to KRON-4 — yes, the vehicles stayed at the scene. But only because the people driving them did.

A Bay Area pedestrian advocacy group has started a Slow Our Streets campaign to call for reduced speed limits, speed bumps and better traffic enforcement to protect the lives of people walking or riding a bike.

This is who we share the roads with. A Marin County woman will face a handful of charges for killing a woman on a bicycle last year, after investigators presented evidence that she was drunk and possibly impaired by cannabis and a medication to treat epilepsy and bipolar disorder, and had been texting moments before the crash.

Sad news from Sacramento, where a man was killed when he was run down from behind by an SUV. Yet somehow, the city’s CBS station manages to get through the entire story without mentioning that the SUV may have had a driver.

 

National

Good advice. Bike Snob says don’t try to fix your bike when there’s nothing wrong with it.

A new study from BYU says yes, an ebike gives you a real workout, but it doesn’t feel like one.

Skip the recovery drink after your next ride, and just grab a cold one.

A New Mexico man looks back on earning ride patches in the early days of the League of American Wheelmen, long before the group changed its name to the League of American Bicyclists and transformed in to the advocacy group better known as the Bike League.

An Arkansas man is likely to go away for a very long time; in addition to a felony bike theft charge, he faces ten years for violating probation for burning down a barn, and another ten for not updating his registration as a sex offender after getting kicked out of a halfway house.

Wouldn’t a better term for an “interactive live mannequin” pedaling in the window of a Wisconsin bike shop be a person riding a stationary bike?

After Chicago suffers its third bicycling death of the year, the Chicago Tribune calls on the city’s drivers to start seeing people on bicycles.

A Illinois man has earned the title Bike Man by saving over 3,000 broken bikes from the junk heap and repairing them to give to people in need.

A new sculpture in Auburn NY will honor former slave and Underground Railroad founder Harriet Tubman with bicycles depicting different aspects of her life.

Evidently, public shaming motivates police departments, too. Streetsblog reports the NYPD was motivated to hold a reckless driver who crashed into a bike rider accountable, but only after they asked cops about a viral video showing the crash.

The carnage continues on the streets of New York, where 25-year old professional wrestler Matt Travis became the 28th person to be killed riding a bike in the city this year when he was struck by a dump truck driver making an illegal turn.

We already knew New Orleans Saints QB Teddy Bridgewater is one of us; now he’s thanking the people who unexpectedly fixed his bike so he didn’t have to walk to Sunday’s game.

 

International

The Financial Post considers how former Microsoft star J Allard developed the 529 Garage app, and worked with police in Vancouver to cut bike theft by 40% in four years.

Toronto’s Globe and Mail wants to know what Canadian officials are doing about distracted driving, calling it as dangerous as DUI was decades ago.

This is who we share the roads with, part two. Police in Ontario fined a semi driver $615 for weaving all over the road while he was watching TV behind the wheel.

A London cartoonist offers his view of bicycling in the city. I particularly like his take on the urban peloton and the reality of city cycling.

The New York Times takes a deep dive in the bicycling world of Copenhagen, where the only traffic congestion is on two wheels, and even the dead ride bikes.

A Ugandan-born man won Sweden’s 2019 Environmental Innovator of the Year Award for offering tours of Stockholm on Greek-made wooden bicycles.

While most of Europe is moving forward with creating bike lanes and space for people, Madrid is in retreat.

An Aussie teacher and mother of two has traded her car for a bicycle and pledged not to even set foot in a car for the next year.

 

Competitive Cycling

It was a close call for 52-year old Italian great Mario Cipollini, who was lucky to survive a major heart problem thanks to a five hour surgery; now he faces charges for pointing a gun at his ex-wife.

Another trans woman has been subjected to online harassment after winning a bike race; fixed-gear racer Evelyn Sifton said no one cared when she finished in 20th or 30th place, but only when she finally won one.

 

Finally…

Using a bicycle as an anchor to weigh down a body may not be its best use. Any bike cartoons that feature Santa Claus and a corgi can’t be all bad.

And James Bond is one of us. No, not that one. Not him, either. Nope, not that guy. Or the other guy, for that matter.

………

Thanks to Felicia G for being the first person to donate to this year’s BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive, before it even started. 

The annual fund drive won’t officially launch until Thanksgiving, but the page is already active in case anyone else wants to get a head start on it. 

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

Morning Links: Cars killing progress on CA climate goals, Flax debunks call for helmet laws, and what a bike thief looks like

November 8, 2019 / / 3 comments

As things stand now, California is likely to miss its climate goals.

By a century.

That’s according to a report from MIT Technology Review, which says that despite significant reductions in the energy sector, the state is making little or no progress in other areas.

They point the finger at rising auto emissions, as car ownership climbs while transit use declines.

Transportation emissions, the state’s largest source, have steadily risen since 2013, as the improving economy put more cars on the road and planes in the sky. Emissions from waste dumped into landfills have also been ticking up since the recovery took hold. Meanwhile, highly potent greenhouse gases from the aerosols, foams, and solvents used in refrigeration and air conditioning are rising sharply…

At the same time, overall car ownership rates are rising, public-transit use is falling, and consumers are still shifting toward gas-guzzling trucks and SUVs. And the 92% of vehicles sold last year that weren’t EVs will, on average, still be on the roads more than a decade from now.

Accelerating the shift to cleaner vehicles is likely to require far stricter policies, far more generous subsidies, cheaper EVs, and a massive build-out of charging infrastructure. And even California’s efforts to boost the average fuel efficiency of cars sold in the state have been complicated by the Trump administration’s legal challenges.

And while San Francisco and San Diego have been making progress in building out bicycle networks to entice people out of their cars, it’s ground to a near halt in the state’s largest city.

Yes Los Angeles, we’re talking about you.

Maybe one day, the so-called progressives, environmentalists and other assorted climate activists at city hall will stop talking about the problem, and actually do something.

But sadly, that day is not today.

………

Bike scribe Peter Flax is up to his old tricks.

If you can call insightful writing and consistently hitting the nail on the head a trick.

Writing for Bicycling, Flax examines the extremely flawed recommendations from NTBS — the National Transportation Safety Board, which usually concerns itself with plane and train crashes — to reduce the climbing rate of bicycle deaths.

Starting, and nearly ending, with bike helmets and high viz.

And yet the top-line proposals from the NTSB largely shifted responsibility to solve this deadly crisis onto cyclists themselves. Two of the three key recommendations focused on the need for riders to wear helmets and be more conspicuous. (The third was about improving road design, which is awesome because poor cycling infrastructure is an actual cause of cycling fatalities.)

He goes on to sum up exactly what the agency failed to address that’s actually killing people on bicycles, in one brilliant paragraph.

Now let’s talk about all the important stuff that the NTSB report passed over to focus on helmets and high vis and scold renegade riders. Like the problem of distracted driving—where four in 10 motorists admit using social media (and one in 10 say they watch YouTube videos) on their phone when they’re on the road. Or the nation’s pernicious problem with speed limit violations, a widely tolerated illegal behavior that is a known killer. They could urge the auto industry and tech sectors to work together to solve these entirely fixable problems. They could ask out loud how or why many states still don’t have 3-foot safe-passing laws or regulations banning handheld phone use, and how or why these laws are rarely enforced in those that do. They could demand that American trucks and passenger cars match the far superior standards set in Europe and Japan to keep vulnerable road users safe—why don’t our garbage and box trucks have side guards to protect pedestrians and cyclists from the wheels, for instance? They could address an epidemic of fatal hit-and-run crashes and the shifting complexion of impaired driving and America’s love affair with 5,000-pound SUVs. Rather than scold naughty cyclists, agency researchers could have examined the carnage caused by negligent and reckless motorists—and offered commentary on what to do about it.

It’s today’s must read.

So go ahead and click the link. We’ll wait.

Meanwhile, here’s the full two hours and forty-eight minutes of the woefully misguided NTSB meeting.

Thanks to Mike Cane for forwarding the video.

Photo of the ghost bike for the still unidentified Hollywood hit-and-run victim by Healthy Activest via Instagram.

………

This is what it looks like when someone steals a bike from a San Marcos CA garage.

Hopefully, that video shows enough of his face to bring the jerk to justice.

Meanwhile, after a Georgia woman chased down the thief stealing her bike and demanded it back, the bighearted victim is offering to give him a bike to help him get a fresh start.

………

This is what a passenger-side dooring looks like. Toronto bike riders are justifiably outraged.

………

We’ve mentioned Malaysia’s basikal lajaks several times in the past two years, ever since eight riders of the modified bikes were killed when a driver plowed into them.

This response to my tweet shows exactly what the bikes are, and how they’re ridden.

A website calls them a menace to society, but the nation’s sports minister says the riders can be redeemed and represent the county in international competitions with the proper training.

Thanks to kirin for the heads-up.

………

The Los Angeles Handmade Bicycle Show takes place tomorrow…somewhere.

Maybe LA bikewear maker Swrve knows, since they plan to be there.

………

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

A New York man faces two counts of reckless endangerment for killing a 67-year old woman when he ran a red-light on his bicycle, and slammed into her as she walked in a crosswalk with the light; he faces charges from the same DA who routinely lets drivers off the hook. This is wrong in so many ways. So just…don’t.

………

Local

Streetsblog talks with Michael Schneider, the founder of Streets for All, LA’s first, and only, political action group, aka PAC, dedicated to changing city hall to change the city’s streets; the group is meeting in Hollywood next Saturday to discuss pedestrianizing Hollywood Blvd.

KCBS-2 reports nearly a third of the Metro Bike bikeshare bikes get stolen or stripped for parts.

A USC op-ed says students should be discouraged from driving to campus. Or looking at it another way, the school should do more to encourage students to bike or walk to class.

Beverly Hills received a $90,000 traffic enforcement grant from the state, which will allow them to do bike and pedestrian safety crackdowns, among other things. Even if their police department doesn’t exactly have a reputation for being bike and pedestrian friendly.

 

State

The California Transportation Commission is holding a workshop in Sacramento this Tuesday to kickoff discussion of the 2021 Active Transportation Program. Thanks to Robert Leone for the tip.

Call it a good time for a good cause. San Diego’s annual 20-mile Bike for Boobs bike ride and dinner takes place tomorrow to raise funds for a local charity to help women experiencing financial difficulties due to breast cancer.

The Coachella Valley Bicycle Coalition held a ghost bike memorial for Raymundo “Ray-Ray” Jaime; sadly, the 30-year old hit-and-run victim left behind his wife and four-year old daughter, who will now grow up without a father.

Thousands Oaks has opened an expansion to the city’s bike park.

Santa Cruz has identified the bike rider who died after riding off a cliff as the owner of a Salinas bike shop.

This is who we share the roads with. Just hours after a Modesto man got out of jail on a DUI conviction for driving while stoned, he got drunk and drove again, killing a bike rider while driving with a BAC nearly two and a half times the legal limit; his trial was delayed five years when he was institutionalized for mental illness.

Lyft is returning their bikeshare ebikes to the streets of San Francisco; hopefully they won’t burst into flames this time. However, you won’t see them in London anytime soon.

 

National

An Omaha bike rider says bicyclists should have to pay the same fees drivers do and have to have a license to ride just like drivers do, saying he knows other cities require that. No, they don’t. I’m not aware of any city in the US that tests and licenses people on bicycles. Never mind that bike riders already pay more than our share.

Chicago bicyclists respond to the death of a woman killed by a dump truck driver by protesting along the bike lane she was riding in.

Now that’s more like it. Instead of warning bike riders when cars get too close, researchers at the University of Minnesota designed a system to warn drivers when they get too close to someone on a bike. Seriously, take my money, already.

A Minnesota advocate refutes common objections to riding a bicycle, calling it carbon-free transportation using the original two-stroke engine. 

An Indiana cycling club shows that yes, it is possible for a riding club to get involved in advocacy and help teach people how to drive around bicyclists. Just in case any LA-area clubs want to give it a shot. Thanks to Melissa for the link. 

Bicycle Retailer dives into the history of Ross Bicycles, calling it the Schwinn of New York.

Kindhearted New Jersey residents passed the hat to buy a new bike for a teenage boy after his was stolen.

New York’s non-helmet wearing mayor and failed presidential candidate is seriously considering making everyone else wear one.

Al Pacino is one of us; he worked as a bike messenger to support his sick mother before finding success on stage, then film. And yes, he still rides.

DC approves plans for a two-way, curb-protected bike lane even though it’s opposed by a neighborhood commission. And even though it means removing parking spaces.

As we noted before, New Orleans Saints backup QB Teddy Bridgewater is one of us. Even if he has to tweet for someone to drive his broken bike to the shop, because he refuses to get to his games any other way. Thanks to BikeLosFeliz for the link.

 

International

The co-founder of Lumos Helmet discusses how they’re creating what they consider the next generation of bike helmets to help bicyclists feel safer.

Once again, the Mounties got their man, busting an 18-year old man for being a bike-riding serial butt slapper.

Twenty-five Montreal bike riders will be allowed to ride a bike path across an otherwise closed bridge to try out various snow clearing methods, as long as they wear a special vest and sign a waiver.

London’s Daily Mail suggests giving your child a bike for Christmas, saying you never forget your first bike. Good advice, even if it is an ad for a British retailer.

A British military vet who lost three limbs in Afghanistan was lucky to survive when he had a blowout on his handcycle and slammed into a truck at 25 mph, shattering what’s left of his right leg.

A Belgian city has managed to cut car motor vehicle traffic by 12% at rush hour, and 40% on key bicycling routes — resulting in a 25% jump in bicycling rates.

Here’s one for my own bike bucket list — a beer hall bike tour along Germany’s Danube River.

 

Finally…

Your next Harley Davidson could have pedals. Forget the family SUV, your new kid hauler could have three wheels with child seats up front.

And UCLA parking meister Donald Shoup gets animated.

No, literally.

 

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

Morning Links: Feds say wear a helmet or else, cross-country bike tourist killed, and bike parking on South Pas agenda tonight

November 6, 2019 / / One comment

A new report from the National Transportation Safety Board says the most common cause of bicycling fatalities is drivers passing people on bicycles.

Or rather, failing to.

That’s followed by “problems with parallel bike and vehicle lanes” — presumably meaning painted bike lanes — bicyclists failing to yield and bicyclists making a left turn.

Bearing in mind that those stats are based on police reports that can suffer from a severe case of windshield bias when it comes to assigning blame.

And the NTSB’s recommended solutions?

Protected bike lanes. Blindspot cams for SUVs. And mandatory bike helmet laws in every state.

Seriously.

Never mind that bike helmet laws have been shown to reduce bicycling rates at exactly the time we need to increase riding to fight climate change.

Or that requiring everyone to wear a helmet every time someone rides a bicycle is like addressing gun violence by requiring everyone to wear a bulletproof vest whenever they leave home.

Except bulletproof vests are a hell of a lot more effective than bike helmets, which are designed to protect against a fall off your bike — not an impact with a speeding SUV driver.

And as we’ve pointed out before, they do nothing to protect against injuries to any other part of the body.

https://twitter.com/Kenmcld/status/1191749183881043970

As we’ve said before, a bike helmet should always be considered a last line of defense when everything else fails.

Like better infrastructure, lower speed and safer motor vehicles.

Yet the board still approved the last-minute addition to their agenda, even though staff members had specifically recommended against it.

Mike Cane used screen grabs to capture much of the discussion leading up to the vote.

It should be stressed, however, that at this point, it’s just a recommendation for each of the 50 states. Although the NTSB’s recommendations have a habit of getting turned into laws.

Meanwhile, Washington lawmakers from both parties are finally talking about ways to reduce bicycling and pedestrian deaths.

Of course, talking is what they’re good at.

We’ll see if they can actually get anything passed in today’s highly divided Congress.

………

Once again, a bike-riding visitor to this country will be going home in a coffin.

A 27-year old Korean man was killed in South Carolina on Monday when he was struck by a delivery truck driver.

He was riding down the East Coast before turning west, planning to arrive in Los Angeles in early January.

Now he’ll never get here. Or anywhere else.

Seriously, there’s something very wrong when someone can’t visit this country without risking their life.

………

Active SGV reminds us that South Pasadena will consider bicycle parking at tonight’s City Council meeting.

And Megan Lynch reminds South Pasadena to consider the needs of disabled bicyclists.

https://twitter.com/ActiveSGV/status/1191916300253089792

………

He gets it.

Bay Area State Senator Scott Weiner says fighting climate change means making it easier for people to cut back on driving.

………

America’s oldest surviving veteran of the excruciating WWII Battle of Iwo Jima was one of us, still riding his three-wheeled bike two weeks before his death at  103.

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The crowdfunding page for dirt bike legend Micky Dymond has raised just under $24,000 of the $100,000 goal for his medical care, after suffered critical injuries going over the handlebars of his time trial bicycle.

There are a lot worse things you could do with your money.

Thanks to Steve S for the reminder.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes is all too real.

As one OC bike rider learned the hard way yesterday.

But sometimes its the people on bikes behaving badly.

San Diego police are looking for a man who beat another man senseless with a bicycle, or part of it, in a 7-11 parking lot.

………

Local

This is who we share the roads with. After a pedestrian was killed by a street racing, hit-and-run driver while crossing an LA street, dozens of people continued to drive past his body lying in the street without stopping to help.

Curbed’s Alissa Walker says the problem isn’t the new ride hailing management system at LAX, it’s the cars. And it won’t get better until the airport finally embraces mass transit. Thanks to Jeff Vaughn for the heads-up.

Metro approves funding for Rock the Boulevard, a $16.2 million Complete Streets makeover of Eagle Rock Blvd. Even if it will be awhile before we see any changes to the street.

Lime is launching a new hyperlocal ad campaign focusing exclusively on the LA market.

Hollywood Burbank Airport will try to cut its emissions, in part by encouraging employees to bike, carpool or use transit.

Culver City restaurant Hatchet Hall will honor noted LA chef and fallen bicyclist Joe Miller with a special dinner tomorrow night, with proceeds going to No Kid Hungry; the Michelin Star-winning chef died of a heart attack while riding in New York recently.

Santa Monica Next says a record jump in available parking spaces in Downtown Santa Monica presents a rare opportunity to reclaim the city’s streets.

Long Beach wants your input on the city’s Safe Streets Action Plan.

 

State

Instead of encouraging bicycle riders to use bike lights, or providing free lights to riders who don’t have any as other cities have done, San Luis Obispo police will be cracking down on lightless bicyclists with a pop-up checkpoint today, subjecting bike riders to a fine up to $200.

About damn time. San Francisco responds to another traffic death by declaring a state of emergency for pedestrian and bicyclist deaths. Now maybe Los Angeles can take the hint and actually do something about the deaths down here.

Heartbreaking news from Petaluma, where an bike rider who was killed two weeks ago in a crash with a semi driver was identified as an 89-year old man riding an adult tricycle. Anyone who can still ride at that age, on two wheels or three, deserves better.

More bad news comes from nearby Santa Rosa, where a bike rider was killed when he inexplicably crashed into the trailer of a flatbed truck he was riding next to yesterday, in a crash that doesn’t make any sense at all the way its described.

 

National

Depending on how they decide, and how broadly the justices rule, a case currently before the Supreme Court could make hit-and-runs easier to prosecute by ruling that police can assume the owner of a car is the person driving it.

A driving website makes a surprising case for getting rid of your car altogether. Trust me, I’m working on it.

A 70-year old woman is on a six-year quest to ride around and across the United States in the shape of a peace sign; so far, she’s logged over 40,000 miles through the US and Canada.

Outside says mountain bikes make great “self-sufficient adventuremobiles” for bikepacking trips.

Indoor cycling company Bkool has pulled the plug on their turbo trainers and exercise bikes, and will be focusing on the software side of their business.

Evidently, bicycling must be kosher, as the Jewish Journal picks up a story from Wired concluding that the vehicle of the future is a bicycle.

Speaking of the NTSB, the board concluded that the new software for Uber’s self-driving cars would have spotted a bike-riding Tempe AZ woman in time to avoid the crash that killed her.

Congratulations to Virginia’s Juli Briskman; the woman who gained fame by flipping off Trump’s motorcade while riding her bike just got elected to the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, where she’ll oversee the president’s golf course.

A Florida state trooper is asked if drivers are allowed to use a bike lane to pass a stopped car. Short answer, no. Longer answer, hell no.

 

International

Your next Segway could be half mountain bike, half dirt bike, and all electric. Although it would be considered a motorcycle under California law, and require a motorcycle helmet and license.

Bike Radar offers advice on how to determine what kind of bike you need, based on how you plan to ride.

The Guardian’s Laura Laker rides a ped-assist ebike from one end of the UK to the other; she joined 800 other bicyclists on the ride, but was one of just two on ebikes.

More heartbreak, as a British man decides to end his life by turning off his ventilator, six years after he was paralyzed in a mountain biking crash.

One hundred Dublin bike riders held a die-in outside city hall to protest the dangers of riding in a city without adequate bicycling infrastructure, following the death of a local man riding his bike.

German students are learning about the Berlin Wall by riding their bikes alongside it, 40 years after it fell.

Ebikes are surging in popularity Down Under, even as a lack of safe bicycling infrastructure puts lives at risk. Just flip the globe over, and you could be talking about Los Angeles.

 

Competitive Cycling

Bicycling looks at the five most badass American women crushing cycling right now.

Former Olympic champ Alexandre Vinokourov and fellow cyclist Alexandr Kolobnev have officially been cleared of fixing the 2010 Liege-Bastogne-Liege race, after prosecutors said they gave them the benefit of the doubt.

New Zealand cyclist George Bennett will be riding next year with three fewer ribs.

 

Finally…

Even world champs get their bikes stolen; teenage state champs, too. When you’re a registered offender riding your BMX with several outstanding warrants, maybe you should try leaving the meth and guns at home.

And nothing like posting your own anti-bike self-own.

 

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

Morning Links: NTSB report concludes speed kills, Press-Enterprise misses the mark, and a new SoCal bike film

August 16, 2017 / / 2 comments

Traffic safety advocates already know that speed kills.

One of the basic tenets behind Vision Zero states that a pedestrian — or bike rider — hit at a speed of 20 mph has a far greater chance of survival than one hit at 40 mph or higher.

A difference of a 10% chance of death at 20 mph versus 80% at 40, according to one federal government study.

Although a study by AAA cites a much lower risk of death at similar speeds.

Now the National Transportation Safety Board — the group that brought you air bags and graduated driver’s licenses for teens — says speeding is responsible for roughly as many deaths as both drunk driving and not wearing a seat belt.

And they say it’s long past time to do something about it.

That something ranges from automated speed cameras — currently illegal in California — and cars that alert drivers when they’re exceeding the speed limit, to a national anti-speeding campaign and changes in how speed limits are set.

And yes, it also includes the sort of lane reductions that have been much maligned in Playa del Rey and Mar Vista. Even though they’ve proven hugely successful in improving safety and revitalizing Santa Monica’s Main Street and York Blvd in Northeast LA.

So, increasingly, traffic engineers are trying to design roads that reflect the needs of all users, not just motorists. “The design of a facility can help send the message of what the proper speed is and encourage people to drive at that speed rather than a faster speed,” Lindley says.

The NTSB report did not explore the issue of road design, and that’s a missed opportunity, says Atherton, the director of the National Complete Streets Coalition. “You have to pair speed limits with physical traffic-calming measures for them to be effective,” she says. “Just lowering the speed limits is insufficient.”

One of the NTSB commissioners asked the agency’s researchers during their presentation why road design wasn’t emphasized in the report. One of the authors said that other publications, like street designs by the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO) and the Federal Highway Association already explained in great detail how to improve road design to improve safety.

The people fighting to have the lane reductions ripped out insist they’re not anti-safety.

In which case, they need to step up and work with those who have already been focused on improving traffic safety, rather than just standing in the way of community-driven improvements.

Because speed kills.

And it’s already taken far too many of us.

………

The Riverside Press-Enterprise tried to clarify California bike laws after getting the rules on sidewalk riding wrong.

Yet they still get it wrong when they say that bicyclists have to use bike lanes when they’re available, but fail to point out that bike riders can legally ride on any public street, with or without a bike lane or sharrows, with the exception of some limited access freeways.

Or that bicyclists are legally allowed to ride in the center of the lane on any right-hand lane that’s too narrow to safely share with a motor vehicle. Which is the case on most of the roadways in LA County, and many in the rest of Southern California.

Although nothing says riders have to take the lane if they’re not comfortable there. Even though riding to far right increases the risk of unsafe passing by motorists.

And if bicyclists are traveling with the speed of traffic, they can legally ride anywhere on the road they damn well want to, as long as they travel in the direction of traffic.

………

A new experimental film dropping this weekend paints a portrait of Southern California’s Cryptic Cycles, award winner at the 2016 North American Handmade Bicycle Show.

The trailer below offers a first look at what the filmmaker describes as “the unique handmade build process of crafting a one-of-a-kind carbon fiber bike frameset and the amazing feeling it gives you on your first ride.”

………

Ex-Tour de France winner Floyd Landis talks with Cycling News, saying nothing has really changed since he broke cycling’s omertà.

VeloNews says the Colorado Classic represents the future of bike racing, while the Denver Post offers some great photos from last weekend’s race.

Riders in the Tour of Britain could be breaking the law when one stage starts in a town where bicycling is banned in the city center.

Food & Wine examines the decidedly non-gourmet 7,000-calorie diet of a professional cyclist.

……….

Local

LA Downtown News explains what happened to the protected bike lane and other streetscape improvements that were promised as part of the Wilshire Grand construction project; city officials insist it’s still coming as part of a longer corridor improvement project leading into the Arts district.

Plans for safety improvements on North Figueroa are on hold, as Roadkill Gil Cedillo attempts to block any road diets in his district without his prior approval. Which would simply codify the virtual fiefdoms councilmembers currently enjoy in their districts, but for just him.

A smart essay on the Los Angeles Walks website says Vista del Mar offers a sad but instructive lesson for LA, and calls for more productive conversations to ensure pedestrians are protected.

 

State

The husband of an Encinitas hit-and-run victim calls for help in finding the coward who left his bike-riding wife lying injured in the street.

Great idea. The annual Victor Valley Bicycle Tour has donated 600 traffic signs promoting California’s three-foot passing law, to be posted in Apple Valley, Hesperia, Victorville and San Bernardino County.

A local TV station talks with the Atascadero man who won this year’s Tour Divide, despite being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes last year.

Tragic news from Fresno, where a 51-year old bike rider was killed after allegedly running a red light.

Streetsblog looks at last week’s pop-up protected bike lane in San Jose.

 

National

Bicycle Times offers advice on how to pack your bike for travel. Or better yet, you could just pack your panniers and ride it there.

Post-Charlottesville, conservative media sites are deciding that maybe it’s not a good idea to encourage people to drive through protesters. Although conservative lawmakers don’t seem to be getting the message. Thanks to Megan Lynch for the heads-up.

The Today Show profiles a DC doctor who only makes house calls — often by bicycle.

A Savannah GA weekly says widening roads can make them more dangerous, rather than the other way around. Which is putting it mildly.

A Florida business is raising funds to build a new custom bicycle, compete with speakers, for the town’s “bike man” after his was destroyed in a collision that left him hospitalized.

This is why so many people hate lawyers. A Florida attorney blames the hospital for a bicyclist’s death, even though the victim wouldn’t have been there if his client hadn’t dragged the man under his car for two miles following a collision, then dumped him into a trash bin.

 

International

Caught on video: A road raging Brazilian driver rams a bicyclist from behind, then repeatedly runs up onto his bicycle before the rider jumps up onto the hood of the car to keep him from fleeing. That last part’s not smart, as we saw in this week’s Long Beach crash.

A Vancouver cyclist is doing a double Everest — 58,058 feet of vertical climbing — to fight depression.

The war on bikes continues, as someone strung fishing line at neck height across a popular English biking trail. A particularly dangerous crime, since fishing line tends to be virtually invisible, even in daylight.

Caught on video too: A bike rider suffers a too close call in the British equivalent of a right hook.

Cyclists in South Africa’s Western Cape region complain about life-threatening drivers who run them off the road. More proof that you’ll find LA drivers everywhere.

Gold medal-winning Australian track cyclist Stephen Wooldridge died at age 39 after taking his own life; like many athletes, he struggled to cope after his cycling career ended.

The vice mayor of Brisbane, Australia calls for scrapping the country’s mandatory bike helmet law.

 

Finally…

Just because a bridge doesn’t have a bikeway doesn’t mean you can’t find a scary way across. Your next smart bike could cost 1999 yuan.

And it’s easy to go incognito on a bicycle.

Even if you’re dressed in spandex shorts and a hunting shirt.

 

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