Tag Archive for police shootings

DA calls for review police shootings, LA hiker run over by e-mtn biker, and NBA star was sideswiped by passing driver

March 23, 2021 / / No comments

Way to get the story wrong.

The usually reliable My News LA reports the County Board of Supervisors will vote today on DA George Gascon’s request to appoint a special prosecutor for cases involving police misconduct.

Possibly among those is the heartbreaking case of Ricardo Zeferino, who was fatally shot by a trio of Gardena cops responding to a bike theft report.

While campaigning against Lacey, Gascon promised to review several high-profile fatal shootings involving multiple police agencies, including:

— Gardena police officers’ shooting of Ricardo Zeferino, 34, who was suspected of stealing a bicycle in June 2013;

Just one problem.

Zeferino was never suspected of stealing a bicycle, or anything else.

Zeferino was helping his brother search for his stolen bike, when police stopped two of their friends who were also assisting in the search. So Zeferino ran up, excitedly gesturing and insisting in Spanish that they had the wrong men.

Except none of the officers apparently understood Spanish. And when Zeferino  allegedly made a sudden gesture to his waist that no one else could seem to see, they blew him away.

Which means the only crime he committed was trying to tell a group of trigger happy, possibly racist, cops they were screwing up.

I don’t know if they belong in jail for an overreaction that cost an innocent man his life.

But they sure as hell don’t belong on the force, in Gardena or anywhere else.

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Ms. Honey Bunnyman forwards a Nextdoor post describing a mountain biker behaving very badly, which we’re reposting with the victim’s permission.

Seriously, don’t be that guy.

Always ride safely around anyone on foot. Which includes keeping ebikes off trails where they’re not allowed, and riding with respect for others anywhere they are.

And if you know who this guy is, tell him hit-and-run applies on off-road trails, too.

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We finally have an explanation for how former NBA star Shawn Bradley received the injuries that left him paralyzed as he rode his bike near his Utah home.

According to USA Today, Bradley was apparently injured when he was sideswiped by a passing driver, causing him to crash into a parked car.

Naturally, the driver who allegedly hit him denied everything, claiming she was only driving 10 mph, and crossed onto the double yellow line to give Bradley “plenty of room.”

Sure, let’s go with that.

Even though police found a fresh scratch on the passenger side of the driver’s van, apparently from Bradley’s bike.

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America Walks is calling for you to demand stronger protections for bike riders and pedestrians in the MUTCD, aka the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices for Streets and Highways, which serves as the bible for traffic engineers.

And tell the former Mayor Pete, who now heads the US Department of Transportation, to make it better.

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A San Jose area bike rider paints a dramatic image of a bad road.

And Angeleno riders should take notes, because our streets aren’t much better.

Q: El Camino Real is so bad that I broke a bicycle spoke crossing at El Monte. It’s worse now than when it was first created back in the 1760s as a dirt road. I fear the Ghost of Father Serra will return to haunt the California highway department. It will be a well-earned haunting.

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It’s been awhile since we’ve found a decent bike-themed music video, after a rash of such songs a few years ago.

Which this may or may not be depending on your taste.

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

No bias here. Ralph Durham forwards a map showing that the proposed Nevada law prohibiting bikes from any highway with a speed limit of 65 mph or higher would ban bikes from virtually every major roadway in the state.

Click to enlarge

A 15-year old Oklahoma boy faces a first degree murder charge for shooting a 51-year old bike rider following some sort of altercation; he was arrested after police responded to reports of an accidental shooting that followed.

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

Police in Redwood City CA are looking for a bike-riding arsonist who set a car on fire in broad daylight.

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Local

Pasadena-based e-scooter maker Urb-E has raised $5 million to develop same-day ebike delivery networks.

A 46-year old Canyon Country man faces an assault charge for throwing a bicycle through a glass door during an argument, injuring his son. Of the many approved uses for a bicycle, hurling one through a glass door is not one of them.

Robin Wright is one of us, as she goes for ride through Brentwood with her husband on what appears to be e-mountain bikes.

Bebe Rexha is one of us, too, riding along the beachfront bike path in Santa Monica with her boyfriend.

 

State

AB 122, which would allow California bike riders to join the nationwide trend of treating stop signs as yields, has passed its first hurdle in the Assembly Transportation Committee, as a retired Davis police chief said the bill is embraced by the vast majority of police officers. Which is a big change from previous attempts at a similar bill, which were derailed by opposition from the CHP and AAA.

Volunteers hauled around 280 pounds of trash off Doheny State Beach in Dana Point, including a slimy bicycle someone had tossed into San Juan Creek.

Over a thousand people turned out to learn about efforts to keep San Francisco’s JFK Drive in Golden Gate Park carfree. Just like every park should be.

 

National

Yes Magazine looks at the power of bicycle education to transform lives and communities.

This is who we share the road with. A Portland man faces several charges, including 2nd degree murder, for intentionally crashing into a pedestrian while driving a stolen car.

Fifty years after Oregon made a groundbreaking commitment to spend at least 1% of the state highway fund on biking and walking projects, the state legislature is considering raising that to 5%. Which compares favorably to California’s longstanding commitment to not making a commitment to fund them. Thanks to Mike Wilkinson for the link. 

A Washington 7th grader makes a better case for skate helmets than most adults, without calling for making them mandatory.

The head track and cross country coach at North Dakota’s Minot State University suffered multiple injuries when he was run down by a 15-year old driver while riding his bike, even though the boy is too young to legally drive in the state.

Now that’s more like it. New Massachusetts road guidelines mandate sidewalks, crosswalks, bus stops and high-quality bike facilities whenever traffic engineers design upgrades to major roadways.

An op-ed from a Connecticut English teacher says protecting bicyclists and pedestrians is an idea that’s long overdue.

It takes a major jerk to leave the scene after running down an eight-year old girl riding her bike; a 47-year old woman faces charges for the Tennessee hit-and-run after a witness circled the area to find her damaged car.

A Louisiana mechanical engineering student used his pandemic downtime to design and build his own e-mountain bike.

 

International

Cyclist attempts to take the confusion out of measuring a bike frame and finding the right size bike.

Bike Radar offers a guide to selecting the right fixies and singlespeed bikes.

Vancouver residents are entertaining themselves with a lively game of bike tag.

Canadian bike shops say they’re facing the worst shortages in the 100-plus years since the bicycle was invented, while a UK expert says the country’s bike market has gone berserk.

Now that’s more like it. A trio of people who happened to be passing by stepped in to stop a group of thieves trying to steal bicycles from a London park after cutting through the locks with an axle grinder.

We recently learned that the newly svelte Rebel Wilson is one of us; today she let loose on people who let their dogs run loose, as she nursed an injured ankle from falling off her bike after riding past London’s Buckingham Palace.

After a British man shattered his thigh bone when his bike skidded on an oil-slicked road, a pair of passing riders were able to get emergency help to him in just ten minutes using the what3words app to pinpoint his location. I’ve never heard of it before, but the app might be worth looking into.

A 62-year old man hopes to represent the UK in next year’s age group world cycling championships after dropping half his bodyweight over the last two years.

A UK resident got screwed by Brexit after ordering a bike from a Polish bike shop and being told there would be no import duties on it. Except it was returned to the shop during the chaos as the county left the European Union, and when the shop reshipped it, it arrived with the equivalent of over $2,700 in taxes due upon delivery.

India’s homegrown Hero Cycles is looking to expand its ebike sales worldwide, as it opens a new international headquarters in London and expands its factory to make up to ten million bikes a year. Which only sounds like a lot because it is.

 

Competitive Cycling

The Redlands Bicycle Classic has been has been cancelled for the second consecutive year due to the pandemic; the race, the country’s oldest ongoing stage race, will be postponed until April of next year.

Cycling Weekly looks at the five legendary single-day races known as the Monuments, the first of which ran this past weekend.

 

Finally…

That feeling when your new e-mountain bike costs as much as a decent used car. Or for the same price, you can get one that looks like a fancy dirt bike.

And when you’re carrying meth and a gun on your bike while wanted on an outstanding warrant, put a damn light on it, already.

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

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

$35 million lawsuit in LASD shooting of Black bike rider, driver turns brick wall into drive-thru, and Ted Lieu is one of us

February 12, 2021 / / Comments Off on $35 million lawsuit in LASD shooting of Black bike rider, driver turns brick wall into drive-thru, and Ted Lieu is one of us

No surprise here.

The family of fallen Black bike rider Dijon Kizzee has filed a $35 million lawsuit against the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

Kizzee was fatally shot by sheriff’s deputies in South LA last August in what initially began as a simple traffic stop for riding on the wrong side of the roadway.

He attempted to flee on foot, allegedly dropping a gun he was carrying inside some clothes, then picking it up and continuing to flee.

Deputies alleged Kizzee pointed the gun at them, shooting him 19 times in response.

However, witness testimony and security cam video don’t support the deputies’ version of events, suggesting Kizzee was turning away from them with his hands raised when they opened fire.

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This is who we share the restaurants with.

But where’s the bike lane that caused it?

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Look who’s looking for LA’s worst intersection.

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West Hollywood Congressperson and impeachment prosecutor Ted Lieu is one of us.

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Gravel Bike California directs your attention to May Canyon.

Thanks to Zachary Rynew for the link.

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Luke Cryer takes a fast run on a secondhand bike.

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

A South Carolina man will spend the next 40 months behind bars after copping a plea to intentionally running a bike rider off the road and robbing him at knifepoint.

A UK driver got a well-deserved 42 months behind bars for repeatedly running over an ebike rider before threatening to stab him, for no apparent reason, just minutes after agreeing to meet him at a pub.

No bias here. A British government office warns bike riders to consider not riding because of ice, but just tells drivers to use care. Even though the people in cars have a lot more potential to do serious damage.

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

New York police are looking for a man who rode his bike up to a cab driver’s open window, punched him in the face and stole a handful of cash from a cup holder, making off with around $155.

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Local

Active SGV wants to know how you get around El Monte and South El Monte.

Redondo Beach has a city council election coming up, but only one candidate even mentions bikes or lower speed limits.

A website looks at the $5,500 fat tire ebike the former Gubernator rides around the LA area.

Rookie director Robin Wright is one of us, taking to the streets of LA with her husband on their own fat tire bikes.

 

State

No bias here. A Fresno man was detained by a cop in nearby Easton for the apparent crime of riding a bicycle while playing Arabic music.

Bad news from the Bay Area, where Alameda police are investigating a crash that left a bike rider with severe, life-threatening injuries.

 

National

Another bill by Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer would restore and improve the bike commuting tax benefit.

A Chicago writer looks back at an old Schwinn factory, now the site of a hard cider maker, crediting the company with the origins of the modern bicycle.

A Michigan man who viciously attacked a couple of Black teenagers with a bike lock while drunkenly shouting racial slurs at a state park last year, fracturing one kid’s skull, has been indicted on a pair of federal hate crime charges. And deservedly so.

Confronting the environmental disaster that is Mardi Gras means fewer beads and more bike bells.

A Palm Beach paper looks at Jack the Bike Man, who donates refurbished bicycles to help struggling adults and children get their lives rolling again.

 

International

How to maintain your bike through the winter.

Road.cc considers whether you should get a new bike or stick with your old one if you’re getting back into bicycling.

A writer for Cycling Tips questions whether the bike industry should operate a lot more like car sellers. And says your bike may not be as green as you think.

Brazil’s fourth largest city has cut traffic deaths in half by reimagining its streets to safely serve all users.

A stuntman takes a heart stopping run down an abandoned French Olympic luge track.

Two-time F1 champ Fernando Alonzo has been hospitalized with suspected fractures after he was struck by a driver while riding in France.

Just two years after record-setting Scottish bicyclist Josh Quigley barely survived a horrible collision in Texas while attempting to ride across the US, he suffered a number of fractures throughout his body when a gust of wind knocked him off his bike while training in Dubai.

 

Competitive Cycling

Peloton looks back at 1960’s cycling star Franco “Crazy Heart” Bitoss. And no, I never heard of him either.

 

Finally…

When you want a stealth ebike that doesn’t look like one, and have an extra fourteen grand to spend. Call it an instant bike corral.

And a NASCAR rookie has Huffy in his corner.

As well as in the pits.

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

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

Driver busted for Hawthorne hit-and-run, 16 LA-area bike riders shot by police, and bike-riding woman murders Metro worker

October 19, 2020 / / Comments Off on Driver busted for Hawthorne hit-and-run, 16 LA-area bike riders shot by police, and bike-riding woman murders Metro worker

A couple quick notes before we start. 

Today is the last day to register to vote before next month’s presidential and city council elections, along with a number of other important federal, state and local offices. Not to mention a massive number of California state propositions. 

So take a few minutes to make sure your voice is heard.

Also, my apologies to everyone who tipped me to news stories over the weekend; with a few exceptions, I’ve somehow managed to lose track of who sent what. 

But please accept my thanks anyway. I always appreciate the help, even if my feeble brain fails me from time to time. 

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Hawthorne police have busted the driver who fled the scene after running a red light and slamming into a 14-year old boy as he rode his bike in a crosswalk on Rosecrans Avenue earlier this month.

Twenty-eight-year old Darlene Delgadillo confessed to driving the car after police traced it to a home in Gardena.

Meanwhile, the now-15 year old victim remains in a coma with major head trauma, as well as a broken leg, arm and feet, more than two weeks after the crash.

Yet despite the horrific harm she allegedly caused, Delgadillo will face a maximum of just four years behind bars for felony hit-and-run under California law.

Maybe someday we’ll get our elected leaders to take this crime seriously.

Because they sure as hell aren’t doing it now.

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Apparently, Dijon Kizzee was just the tip of the iceberg.

An investigative report from the LA Times reveals that 16 bike riders have been shot by police or sheriff’s deputies in LA County over the past 15 years for what started out as simple traffic violations.

Eleven of those were killed.

The Times identified 16 cases since 2005 where a stop for bike violations in Los Angeles County resulted in a police shooting, according to interviews and a review of public records from the district attorney, coroner and various court cases. Most of the stops occurred in communities made up largely of Black and Latino residents. In 11 incidents, including Kizzee’s, the bicyclists — all male and Black or Latino — were killed.

Among those 16 cases, violations ranged from riding on the sidewalk to biking without a light or on the wrong side of the road. In 11 cases, authorities said they found a firearm. In one shooting, deputies found an airsoft gun they said looked like a semiautomatic handgun.

It’s an important read, because constantly having to worry about getting stopped by the cops for biking while Black or brown is bad enough.

But something is seriously wrong when people of color also have to worry about getting the death penalty for a simple traffic violation.

Thanks to everyone who sent this one to my attention.

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Police are on the lookout for a bike-riding woman who fatally stabbed an 18-year Metro employee Friday night following a dispute at the 7th and Metro station in DTLA.

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The city council’s Transportation Committee will consider the fate of the city’s current Slow Streets at 1 pm today, with options ranging from making them more permanent, to removing them entirely.

Here’s how to join in.

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Public radio station KPFK is in deep financial danger, and could take the popular Bike Talk program down with it without your help.

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Bicycling and SRAM will examine the issues facing people who have been swept under the rug for far too long.

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This is who we share the road with.

There’s a special place in hell for a Montana man who was charged with a sex crime involving an 11-year old girl, after he was previously charged with intentionally running down a man on a bicycle, claiming it was his bike. Although you’d think if it was really his bike, he wouldn’t want to run it over with his car.

You don’t need to speak Spanish to get that maybe this driver should pay attention to the road instead of complaining about people on two wheels.

Thanks to Erik Griswold for the tip.

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This will restore your faith in humanity.

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Now this is art.

The newest Banksy that popped up on a Nottingham, England street incorporates an actual beat-up bicycle chained to a pole in front of wall art of a girl using the missing bike tire as a hula hoop.

Seriously, he can paint that on my wall anytime.

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Speaking of art, the annual Bicycle Film Festival is back on this weekend, after going virtual due to the coronavirus crisis.

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

Police in Chico, California are looking for a woman who fled the scene after flooring her car and slamming into a woman on a bicycle in an apparently intentional attack, before continuing on to run over an employee at a gas station; police have recovered her car, but the driver is still on the run.

Someone ripped out the plastic bollards marking a popup bike lane in Glasgow, Scotland, and tossed them into a canal.

A New Zealand bike rider was the victim of a road raging driver who repeatedly honked and rammed the back of his bike, before finally knocking him off; the 65-year old driver faces a charge of dangerous driving causing injury.

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

A 19-year old New York man could face a murder charge after a group of bike-riding teens argued with a 79-year man before pushing him to the ground; the victim died later after being rushed to a hospital. There’s not a pit in hell deep enough.

Police in Edinburgh are looking for the masked bike-riding man who stole a woman’s watch and diamond rings as she was walking on a bike path.

A Belfast, Northern Ireland bike rider says he’s really, really sorry for stabbing two women and punching two others in a one-day assault spree, for no apparent reason; fortunately, none of the women suffered life-threatening injuries.

A 67-year old Australian man recovering from open heart surgery was left bloodied and banged up after he was hit from behind by a bike rider while walking on a pedestrian bridge. Yet another reminder to alway ride with extra caution around pedestrians. Not only are people unpredictable, but they’re the only ones out there more vulnerable than we are.

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Local

A local paper profiles 26-year old Alexandria Contreras as she runs for a seat on the Downey city council; the bike-riding candidate is a big supporter of community involvement, housing, urban safety and the environment.

Kindhearted members of the Rotary Club of Santa Clarita donated 17 bicycles to veterans in need. Although those little kids don’t look like veterans to me. But what do I know?

 

State

A 49-year old San Diego man suffered a broken leg and broken ribs when a motorcyclist slammed into a group of bike riders in the city’s Pacific Beach neighborhood; the motorcyclist walked away with road rash.

The Los Angeles Times offers more information about the 14-year old boy facing a possible hate crime charge for punching a San Diego rabbi.

More bad new from Northern California, where a 14-year old boy was killed in a crash while riding his bike in Elk Grove.

 

National

Here’s your chance to buy that really cool, but really strange hubless ebike for under two grand; the bikemaker promises it’s virtually theft proof.

Despite last spring’s lighter traffic, the rate of traffic deaths jumped nearly twenty percent, mostly because of who was driving, and how. Or rather, how fast.

A new AARP survey examines bicycling among the over 50 set, concluding that many older American’s can’t imagine not being able to ride a bike.

Cycling Savvy offers a discussion of what to look for in rear view bike mirrors. Besides cars, that is.

Apparently, soap star Susan Lucci is one of us; Katie Holmes is one of us, too.

The kindhearted members of a Utah Masonic lodge gave new bicycles to 68 elementary school students as a reward for reading.

Tragic news from Texas, where a longtime scout for the NBA’s Houston Rockets was killed after he hit an open culvert in a construction zone with his bike.

A New York bus driver who killed a bikeshare user in 2017 isn’t content with the slap on the wrist he received, going to court in an attempt to have the city’s failure to yield law invalidated — even though he only got a paltry 30 days behind bars.

The partner of a New York man has filed a lawsuit alleging that he was critically injured by falling off a defective VanMoof ebike during a test ride, because missing screws allegedly allowed the fender to come in contact with the rear wheel; the victim remains in a coma over two weeks after the crash.

Speaking of New York, the bike boom means increasing numbers of bike riders are using the city’s bridges — but avoiding the iconic, if cramped and crowded, Brooklyn Bridge.

 

International

If you’re looking for speed, roll on latex in your tires.

I want to be like her when I grow up. An 80-year old English woman celebrated her birthday with an 80-mile bike ride.

A British man set a new record for riding a bike without getting anywhere, riding a stationary bike for more than 11 days.

Seriously? Police in Dubai seized 370 bicycles in a single week because their owners violated traffic laws, in a bizarre campaign to improve traffic safety. If they were serious about improving safety, they’d seize cars from scofflaw drivers, instead.

A South African writer talks with Black and white bike riders, and concludes it’s the feeling of freedom that keeps us riding year after year.

Aussies are warned that the worldwide bike shortage means you need to do something now if you want to get a new bicycle by Christmas.

 

Competitive Cycling

An American cyclist is an unexpected hair’s breadth from the Giro podium. Twenty-two-year old Phoenix resident and former world junior time trial champ Brandon McNulty of UAE Team Emirates rode to a third place finish in the individual time trial on Saturday, leaping from 12th to 4th, with another brief time trial in the final stage.

VeloNews offers a recap of who did well, and who cracked in Saturday’s time trial.

Thirty-nine-year old Aussie Adam Hansen is throwing in the towel after 13 years and 29 grand tours, saying he’s “kind of done with it now,” and looks forward to switching to triathlons next year.

Congratulations if you had Dutchman Mathieu van der Poel in your Tour of Flanders pool.

Great French hope Julian Alaphilippe broke his hand in two places when he became just the latest cyclist to crash into a race moto in the Tour of Flanders. Once again, there is no excuse for allowing motorcycles in the peloton. Keep them in front of the cyclists or well behind, for everyone sake.

Hats off to Swiss cyclist Camille Balanche, who became the first out and proud gay woman to win the world Downhill Mountain Biking World Championship.

 

Finally…

When is a bike path not a bike path? When there’s a big frigging utility pole in the middle of it. Your next bike helmet could be soft and squishy.

And maybe people don’t really love their cars after all.

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

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

Sheriff’s deputies shot Dijon Kizzee 16 times, blaming road diets for CA decline, and things are looking up in Santa Ana

October 5, 2020 / / Comments Off on Sheriff’s deputies shot Dijon Kizzee 16 times, blaming road diets for CA decline, and things are looking up in Santa Ana

The official autopsy is out.

And it’s not good.

A pair of LA County sheriff’s deputies shot Compton bike rider Dijon Kizzee 16 times — yes, 16 — in an incident that began with a failed traffic stop for riding salmon.

And escalated when Kizzee allegedly dropped a stolen gun as he struggled to escape the deputies; what’s in dispute is whether he attempted to pick the gun back up. Especially since the official version of events has changed several times in the days following the shooting.

At least four of those shots could have been fatal.

Meanwhile, in Las Vegas last year, a Black man told police officers 24 times that he couldn’t breathe before he died, in an incident that began when police tried to stop him for not having a bike light.

Yes, both men took actions that helped lead to their deaths.

But a simple traffic violation should never escalate to the death penalty.

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No bias here.

A writer for the libertarian magazine Reason concludes that California is a cautionary tale for America — including road diets that remove traffic lanes and install bike lanes.

Never mind that road diets have been successfully used for decades throughout the US, including in red states.

But that would have involved doing a modicum of research, which might have gotten in the way of his preordained conclusions.

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It looks like things are about to get much better in Santa Ana.

And should be everywhere.

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This kind of puts it all in perspective.

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Mr. CiclaValley reminds you to put more gravel in your life.

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A couple more reminders to register your bike for free with Bike Index.

Especially now that Bike Index is partnering with the LAPD and the City of Los Angeles to create a new citywide voluntary bike registration program.

it’s up to us to make sure the free, voluntary program stays that way to prevent abuses like we saw with the city’s previous mandatory licensing program, which became an excuse to stop people of color without probable cause as they rode their bikes.

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Deep thought of the day.

Thanks to Tim Rutt for the heads-up.

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

Horrifying attack in New York, where a speeding SUV driver appears to intentionally ram a group of bike-riding protestors before fleeing the scene; fortunately, no one was seriously injured. Once they find the driver, this should be prosecuted like the terrorist attack it is.

Talk about not getting it. Apparently confusing the treatment with the disease, a London columnist complains that bike lanes are choking the life out of the city through fume-filled traffic jams. Someone should tell him that it’s all those cars that cause the noxious fumes — and the traffic. And safe bike lanes mean fewer of those on the roads. 

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

An English teenager suffered a head injury when another man attacked him with a mountain bike.

A young Dublin man was accused of intentionally riding his bike into a taxi to file a fraudulent claim, but rode off after realizing he was being filmed by dashcam.

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Local

LADOT wants your input on building stress-free connections on neighborhood streets. As opposed to all those stressful connections we’re all used to.

You have one more week to tell Metro what you think about fareless transit system.

The Los Angeles Bicycle Advisory Committee — the city’s only official voice representing bicyclists — is meeting virtually via Zoom at 7 pm tomorrow evening. You can see the agenda here, including draft motions addressing bias from the LAPD and the fire department in killing the Uplift Melrose project.

South LA could be on its way to a safer and more beautiful Broadway, including parking protected bike lanes, on one of the city’s most dangerous corridors.

Walk Bike Burbank puts three important questions to three candidates for city council. Read it before you vote.

The nascent GoSGV bikeshare system expands to Baldwin Park with 45 ped-assist ebikes and nine docking stations.

Santa Clarita residents can win prizes during the city’s Rideshare Week celebration.

A columnist for the Southern California News Group remembers Long Beach real estate scion and bike advocate Mark Bixby, who fought to get a bike lane across the new replacement for the Gerald Desmond Bridge, and won, before dying in a 2011 plane crash along with four other people.

 

State

Sad news from Eureka, where a bike rider was killed in a collision when the victim allegedly swerved in front of an oncoming car, according to the driver and multiple witnesses.

 

National

This may just be the best biking on the moon photo you see today. Thanks to TedFaber for the link.

Travel & Leisure recommends the country’s best bike paths to explore US cities. Including one I grew up riding in my Colorado hometown.

After a bicyclist crashes into a cliff wall and falls into the roadway, a bighearted Tesla driver blocks traffic before rushing the victim to the hospital with a likely broken collarbone.

Wired explains what the ebike classifications are, and what that means to you.

Sad news, as longtime bicycle writer Garrett Lai died of natural causes last week; he was just 54.

The Daily Beast talks with Seattle’s Trumpet Man, the protestor who was run over by a bike cop while lying on the ground.

Three men who survived the tragic 1970 plane crash that killed most of the Wichita State University football team are riding their bikes from Wichita, Kansas to the Colorado crash site to remember their fallen teammates on the 50th anniversary of their deaths.

Chicago business owners blame new protected bike lanes for a drop in business, with one hardware store owner insisting the loss of parking spaces has meant a 30% drop in sales. Although a far more likely explanation is the same drop in business suffered by brick and mortar retailers across the US during the coronavirus pandemic.

A pair of men are now in custody for stealing a $3,500 handcycle from an Ohio man; they were captured after riding the bike in front of security cams in a Circle K parking lot.

Following a full year of international travel, bicycling helped a writer for the New York Times fall in love with the city again during the coronavirus lockdown. Thanks to David Drexler for the link.

This is the cost of traffic violence. A New York nurse who spent the past several months on the frontlines of the the Covid-19 pandemic was killed in a collision with a motorcyclist as she attempted to ride her bicycle home following a late-night shift.

 

International

Your bike might be responsible for your back problems.

Road.cc examines the results when carmakers take a stab at making bicycles.

A bighearted triathlete bought a new bike for a 16-year old Canadian boy whose bike was stolen just weeks after finishing a nearly 375-mile ride from Montreal to Toronto, raising over $8,000 to provide clean water for indigenous communities.

The Sportsman offers a nice profile of Josh Quigley, the bicyclist who set a new record for the northern crossing of Scotland, just months after he barely survived getting run down at 70 mph driver by a Texas driver while on an around the world bike tour. He was inspired to do the ride by Britain’s Sir Chris Hoy after a failed suicide attempt.

A British woman wishes she gotten on the saddle sooner, after spending most of her adult life thinking riding a bike wasn’t for her.

In a truly heartwarming story, a seven-year old girl in the UK rode her bike around her school 100 times, completing nearly 16 miles over two days to raise funds for the hospice where her grandfather spent his last days. At last count, she’d raised the equivalent of nearly $1,500.

A German man turned his bike into a mobile video game.

A writer for Outside searches for meaning by island hopping through Norway on two wheels.

An Indian movie screening on Netflix centers on a brahmin’s stolen bicycle, without hiding the country’s dehumanizing caste system.

Ex-Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong took a lap around Beirut on Sunday, leading a bike tour to raise funds and call attention to the city that was devastated by a massive explosion.

Heartbreaking news from Kenya, where a pediatric dentist who had called for the government to reduce crashes was killed in a collision while riding his bike.

A bike-riding Philippines columnist says it’s time the country has a mandatory bike helmet law. Never mind that experience around the world shows that helmet laws depress bicycling rates, which is exactly the wrong thing to do with the world facing a climate crisis — let along the Covid-19 pandemic.

 

Competitive Cycling

It was a bad day for new world champ Julian Alaphilippe, who missed out on winning the rescheduled Liège-Bastogne-Liège by celebrating too soon, losing out to Primož Roglič at the finish line. Then was stripped of his podium position and relegated to fifth for an overly aggressive sprint.

Meanwhile, Britain’s Lizzie Deignan won the women’s Liège-Bastogne-Liège in a bold breakaway, racing about half the distance as the men.

The Giro kicked off on Saturday with a mini-tour of Sicily replacing the originally planned Hungary start that was derailed by the coronavirus, which did not work to three-time former world champ Peter Sagan’s advantage.

Good news as Belgium’s Remco Evenepoel is back on his bike, just six weeks after falling off a bridge in a dramatic crash at the Il Lombardia classic.

 

Finally…

If you’re going to perform bike stunts on your 12th floor balcony, at least put some damn clothes on — and try not to fall off. That feeling when a cat finishes the around the world bike tour you’re still dreaming about.

And who says you need a car to go shopping?

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

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

DA candidate Gascón pledges to reopen shooting of Gardena bike theft victim, and new bike lane on Manchester Blvd

September 30, 2020 / / 2 comments

About damn time.

DA candidate George Gascón pledges he’ll reopen four police shootings that were swept under the rug by current DA Jackie Lacey, including the killing of Ricardo Diaz Zeferino by three Gardena cops seven years ago.

Zeferino was the unarmed, Spanish-speaking brother of a bike theft victim who was fatally shot as he tried to tell the trigger-happy cops that the men they had detained weren’t thieves, but had been helping the victim look for his stolen bike.

Lacey inexplicably ruled that the shooting was justified, because Zeferino gestured as he as speaking, and failed to understand the orders shouted to him at gunpoint in English.

At last report, all three officers were still working as Gardena cops, without so much as a slap on the wrist.

Which is more than enough reason to give my vote to Gascón.

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Ted Faber reports there are new bike lanes on Manchester Blvd.

View this post on Instagram

New bike lane markings on #manchester

A post shared by Ted Faber (@snorerot13) on

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A writer for Bike Magazine pens a challenging piece on the question of race, saying when you’re black, “just ride” isn’t an option.

When conversations about race within the cycling industry come up, white cyclists often say things like, “The trail/bike/biking doesn’t care what color you are … just ride.”

When I’m feeling generous, I can write this off as naiveté. When I’m being brutally honest, I understand this as a dangerous distraction from the real issue.

For many white cyclists, the bike is often separate from their sociopolitical lives; it’s a means of escape, a recreational machine reserved for fitness or fun.

For many BIPOC cyclists, the bike is a tool that is intimately connected to the way we experience the world.

For those of us who are white, it’s impossible to know what it’s like to experience our streets as a person of color, unless we take the time to actually listen.

Pieces like this may not celebrate the world of bicycling that we know and love.

But they are vitally important to make riding a bike, and our world, more inclusive for everyone.

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Here’s your chance to enter Dutch academia, while working on the science of bicycling.

Thanks to Megan Lynch for the forward.

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Pink Bike offers tips and tricks on how to set up your new bike.

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

Portland bike riders were subjected to an illegal checkpoint by armed men representing the Proud Boys hate group. Yet another example of the dangerous times we’re living in. Thanks again to Megan Lynch.

No bias here. After a Texas driver was confronted by a bike rider enraged by his close pass, he responded by suggesting that a) bike riders should be licensed, b) bikes are too slow to be allowed on roads, and c) bike cops should get tickets for not signaling their turns. Apparently d) maybe he should try driving a little more safely next time never crossed his mind. (Scroll down)

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

Police in Idaho are looking for a major scumbag who used his bike to make a teenage girl fall off hers on a bike path, then groped and threatened her until an approaching rider frightened him off.

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Local

Culver City continues to leap past Los Angeles in repurposing the streets, including a new protected bike lane on Washington Blvd. Although it seems to be best protected from pedestrians and diners, with only thin plastic bollards to keep the cars away.

 

State

You’ve got to be kidding. After a Paso Robles bike rider suffered back and leg injuries when he was hit by a car, the local police were quick to blame the victim and stress that he wasn’t wearing a helmet. Which wouldn’t have done a damn thing to prevent his injuries even if he had been.

Bay Area residents are celebrating the governor’s signing of SB 288, which streamlines bike and transit projects by exempting many projects from the environmental reviews that were too often used as a cynical tool to stop them. We should be celebrating that one down here, too.

 

National

Streetsblog says a surprising number of cities don’t even bother to map out the streets on their High Injury Network. At least Los Angeles does that much, although after four years, it could probably stand to be updated.

A writer for Green Biz says now is the time to reimagine public transportation, including recognizing that streets aren’t just for cars.

Bicycling offers a mathematically challenged list of five things you should do after falling off your bike. I count seven myself, but I was an English major. Here’s the Yahoo link if you’re blocked from the Bicycling site.

The body of an Aspen CO man was found near a local bike trail after he’d gone missing over the weekend, when someone spotted his John Deere bike on the path.

When a Forth Worth, Texas high school student’s bicycle was stolen, the school’s football team pitched in to buy him a new one.

After an Illinois man returned from shopping to find his bike had been stolen, support poured in from kindhearted people, raising $400 in the first ten minutes; the crowdfunding campaign is now up to over $1,500.

A Massachusetts Streetsblog op-ed wonders whether the Covid-inspired bike boom will continue, saying we have a real opportunity to create a “safer, more resilient, and more equitable transportation future.”

The Wall Street Journal appears to tell the story of a digital advertising salesman who rode the crest of the bike boom with a used bike business after losing his job. But we may never know, since it’s blocked by the paper’s draconian paywall. And there’s no Yahoo mirror site for the Journal. 

After a Florida fundraising ride to fight childhood cancer was canceled due to the coronavirus, a bighearted Florida cop set out on a 1,000-mile solo journey to call attention to the disease.

 

International

Add a Jamaican bicycle tour to your bike bucket list.

Oh, well if that’s all. A Welsh driver got 42 months behind bars for fleeing the scene after killing a bike rider, claiming he was tired from partying on coke with a pair of prostitutes.

A new Korean dual beam bike light promises bright illumination without blinding people coming from the opposite direction.

A Japanese man beat a bike theft charge after convincing the judge that he was only borrowing the bike without permission. Repeatedly.

 

Competitive Cycling

Cycling greats and former dopers Ivan Basso and Alberto Contador have teamed up to introduce a new bike line, starting with a UCI-legal road-racing bike. No word on whether you need to consume clenbuterol-tainted meat or attempt blood doping to ride it. But hey, the era of doping is over, right? Here’s the Yahoo link for the Bicycling banned. 

VeloNews examines the disastrous front end wobble that sent American Chloé Dygert over a guardrail and down an embankment at the road worlds.

Two of the three remaining stages of the BinkBank Tour in the Netherlands have been cancelled due to a surge in Covid-19 cases.

 

Finally…

Take your coffee with you when you ride — and sell it along the way. Probably not the best idea to crash into the mayor with your e-scooter.

And the perfect bike for people with more dollars than sense.

Even if it is for a good cause.

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A special thanks to Margaret W and Dennis E for their generous contributions to help support this site. And thanks to Terry E for his kind words yesterday. That’s what keeps me going these days. 

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

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

LASD exonerates itself in Kizzee shooting amid calls for sheriff to resign, and e-scooters just ain’t the problem

September 18, 2020 / / Comments Off on LASD exonerates itself in Kizzee shooting amid calls for sheriff to resign, and e-scooters just ain’t the problem

No surprise here.

Nearly three weeks after LA County Sheriff’s Deputies shot and killed Compton bike rider Dijon Kizzee, the department held it’s first press conference.

Not surprisingly, it exonerated itself completely, even while multiple investigations are still ongoing.

And even as community activist Najee Ali accused the Sheriff’s Department of trying to “blame a Black man unjustly shot … for his own murder by his deputies” while speaking on behalf of family members.

According to a department spokesperson, deputies originally attempted to stop Kizzee for riding salmon, a crime that does not normally carry the death penalty.

Kizzee reportedly was carrying a gun that had been stolen in Las Vegas, which he was not legally allowed to have due to a prior felony conviction and a restraining order.

Deputies fired at least 15 shots after spotting the weapon when he dropped it, along with some clothes he’d been carrying.

However, after giving the deputies over two weeks to get their stories straight talk to investigators, the gun somehow went from the ground, as the sheriff’s department originally stated, into Kizzee’s hand as claimed in the new report.

Never mind that security video appears to show the deputies shooting at Kizzee as he ran away.

Unfortunately, we may never know for sure what happened, since LA County Sheriff’s Deputies aren’t currently required to wear body cams.

But the shooting does raise questions, especially in a department where gang-like groups wear matching tattoos and call themselves names like the Executioners.

It doesn’t matter who Kizzee was, or whether he had a record. It also doesn’t matter that he ran from the deputies, or briefly tussled with one when they tried to tackle him.

For the crime of riding on the wrong side of the street.

What matters is whether the deputies had a legitimate reason to fear for their own lives, or that of the public, before opening fire.

Let alone whether the department can, or will, conduct an honest investigation of its own deputies. Especially under the current administration.

Because this one doesn’t begin to pass the smell test.

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On a closely related subject, the LA Times says LA County Sheriff Alex Villanueva, who has repeatedly ignored subpoenas and attempted to dodge civilian oversight, is the best advisement for the need for “muscular” oversight.

In addition, several city and county officials are calling on Villanueva to resign, including LA Councilmember David Ryu and county supervisors Mark Ridley-Thomas and Sheila Kuehl.

Yeah, that’ll happen.

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CBS News says micromobility is proving increasingly deadly, citing 41 deaths linked to e-scooters, ebikes and hoverboards over a three-year period.

Which compares to roughly 112,500 people killed in motor vehicle collisions over the same period.

Admittedly, I’ve never been very good at math, but I’m pretty sure 41 is less that 112,500.

A lot less.

So which one is really the problem on our streets?

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Something is seriously wrong when you’re not even safe from cars and their drivers in your own home.

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Here’s one for weight weenies, as GCN investigates whether bike weight really matters in the Tour de France.

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

Police in San Diego busted a bike-riding arsonist who used “molotov cocktail-like devices” to repeatedly set shrubs on fire outside a police station.

Chicago authorities are on the lookout for a masked bike-riding groper who has assaulted several women.

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Local

The LA Times catches up with the founder of the magical Venice Electric Light Parade weekly bike ride.

A former LA city planner accuses Los Angeles officials of being closet climate change deniers in environmentalist clothing.

The Covid-19 pandemic has brought a temporary halt to the Long Beach State Cycling Club, which is unable to keep riding under current university restrictions

 

State

Seriously? San Diego washed away a series of children’s chalk drawings supporting Black Lives Matter on a La Jolla bike path just days after they were finished, citing complaints that they were “hate speech.”

Santa Barbara is looking for a way for bike riders to coexist with pedestrians after the city closed a popular street to make room for shopping and dining while social distancing, which was also the spine of the city’s bike network.

 

National

The Idaho Stop Law is slowly spreading across the US, allowing bike riders to treat stop signs as yields.

A writer for Bicycling says never mind the cliche about never forgetting to ride a bike, because the truth is, you never forget how good it feels to ride one. As usual, you can read it on Yahoo if Bicycling blocks you out. 

Good question. Wired wonders why Uber wasn’t charged in the death of an Arizona bike rider who was killed by one of their driverless cars, instead of the admittedly distracted human behind the wheel.

A new study from Portland’s Alta Planning and Design says don’t cut corners on corner design to prevent unsafe turns by drivers.

A kindhearted Texas cop replaced a nine-year old boy’s bike after it was stolen.

An Arlington Texas police detective was released from the hospital following a crash that killed a fellow bicyclist when a driver plowed into the group they were riding with. But since the driver remained at the scene, it’s evidently okay.

A Houston reverend will bike 500 mies through Michigan to raise funds to fight hunger in Guatemala.

Martha Stewart is one of us, enjoying the coronavirus quarantine while popping her new line of CBD-infused fruit pate and riding her ebike around her 153-acre New York state farm.

He gets it. A New York assembly member says the state should subsidize ebike purchases to wean people off of cars. We need to start hearing that from California officials, too.

 

International

A Scottish bicyclist who was nearly killed in a Texas collision while riding across the US will attempt to set a new record for riding nonstop over 500 miles through the Scottish Highlands, taking aim at the existing record of 31 hours and 23 minutes.

Paris is the latest major city to announce that 31 miles of popup bike lanes that were installed at the beginning of the coronavirus lockdown will be made permanent. That compares favorably to Los Angeles, which will make zero lanes permanent, out of the zero popup bike lanes that were installed. 

Here’s something you won’t see in the US. The king and queen of the Netherlands took a casual bike ride while meeting with local officials, wearing a suit, gown and practical pumps.

A Singapore letter writer says licensing drivers doesn’t seem to make them any safer, so maybe it’s not the answer for bike riders, either.

 

Competitive Cycling

The 600 pound gorilla that is Team Ineos finally performs as expected in the Tour de France, at least for one stage.

The president of Slovenia is pretty pumped that two of his countrymen could be standing on the final podium when the Tour gets to Paris.

The director for leading team Jumbo-Visma got the boot from the Tour after losing his cool when inspectors allegedly damaged leader Primož Roglič’s bike checking for signs of motor doping.

Defending champ Annemiek van Vleuten of the Netherlands is out of next week’s worlds after crashing while leading the Giro Rosa. 

 

Finally…

Your next bike could be made of wood. Seriously, don’t bite the guy whose bike you just stole.

And don’t put dog poop in Trump supporters mailboxes.

On a bike or otherwise.

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

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

More details in cop shooting of Black bike rider Dijon Kizzee, Van Nuys bike lanes in peril, and Seattle guerrilla bike brigade

September 3, 2020 / / One comment

More details are emerging in the shooting death of Dijon Kizzee as he was riding his bike in South LA on Monday.

The Lancaster resident was shot at least 18 times by LA County Sheriff’s deputies as he attempted to flee a traffic stop for an undisclosed vehicle code violation.

Relatives note that he never pointed a weapon at the deputies, and no effort was made to de-escalate the situation.

US Congresswoman Maxine Waters, who represents the area where the shooting occurred, called out the sheriff’s department for a pattern of abuse.

Whatever details the sheriffs leak or reveal over the coming days about why Dijon Kizzee was shot dead in Westmont, we know for a fact that a Black man stopped while riding his bicycle should not be dead today,” Waters, D-Los Angeles, said in a statement. “I stand with the community in condemning unaccountable rogue sheriffs and police officers who continue to hunt and murder unarmed people of color in our communities.

“It’s past time for the attorney general of CA, Xavier Becerra, to intervene and investigate the pattern of abuses at the L.A. (County) Sheriff’s Department,” she said. “The department is out of control and has lost the confidence of the community it is supposed to protect. There will be no peace in our streets until the LASD cleans house.

Kizzee’s family retained famed civil rights attorney Ben Crump — the lawyer representing Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and Jacob Blake, among other victims of police shootings — who asserts Kizzee was shot 20 times in the back as he tried to run away.

Security video from the scene appears to back up that claim; while difficult to make out, it looks like Kizzee is running away and some distance from the deputies when the fatal shots were fired.

Residents of the area, and others from throughout Los Angeles, expressed understandable sadness and outrage over the killing.

LA Times readers weren’t happy about the shooting, either, though one seemed to be just as unhappy with scofflaw bicyclists.

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Apparently, the proposed rapid bus line on Colorado Blvd in Eagle Rock is not the only Metro project that could result in removing much needed bike lanes.

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Stop whatever you’re doing — okay, reading this — and take a few minutes to read this great illustrated memoir of a woman’s time in a guerrilla bike brigade supporting Seattle BLM protests.

Thanks to Pops and Megan Lynch for the heads-up.

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

An Illinois woman faces a hate charge after telling three Black bike riders they needed a permit to be on a public pier, then smacking one rider to stop him from filming her, and claiming she’d been attacked by them even though she was the aggressor throughout.

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

A man on a bicycle attacked an Asian couple in New York, yelling “You are Chinese, God hates China, China has virus” before spitting at them and throwing his bike at the man.

A mountain bike-riding man attacked a Vancouver traffic control flagger with some sort of undisclosed weapon, before fleeing the scene.

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Local

According to Streetsblog’s Joe Linton, Los Angeles installed 37.5 miles of new and improved bike lanes during the last fiscal year, though there’s still nothing even remotely resembling a bicycle network in the city. However, those are lane miles, rather than centerline miles, so it actually works out to less than 19 miles of roadway.

 

State

An Irvine site profiles our old friend and Orange County bike advocate Bill Sellin, founder of the Bicycle Club of Irvine.

Authorities have arrested the heartless cowards who fled the scene after critically injuring a 66-year old San Diego bike rider last month; 29-year old Mauricio Flores and 50-year-old Jessica Bailey were taken into custody outside a Lake Isabella Vons store. Their van’s Georgia plates had been changed at least twice, first to California government plates, then to Vermont license plates, in an apparent attempt to coverup the crime.

Riverside will shut down its ebike bikeshare system next month, after vandalism and Covid-19 undercut ridership and revenue for the two-year old program.

Seriously? A 77-year old Napa man was seriously injured when he was struck by a driver while walking his bike in a crosswalk — yet police don’t seem to think the driver did anything wrong. Except maybe crashing into a man and his bike walking in a crosswalk directly in front of him.

 

National

More evidence bicycling is a miracle cure, as a new study shows older people who ride bikes walk more efficiently than those who walk for exercise.

Trek’s chief financial officer says be patient, there are a lot more bicycles on the way to restock empty stores.

Streetsblog says it will take a different form of advocacy to get Americans on ebikes. Although the current bike shortage might argue otherwise.

If you can get past their paywall, the Wall Street Journal offers easy biking escapes in New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Los Angeles.

Vehicle miles are down significantly in Colorado, but traffic deaths are up slightly. It’s a sad commentary when a slight increase in bicycling and pedestrian deaths is considered good news.

There’s a special place in hell for whoever stole the Schwinn American bicycle an Oklahoma City woman received 63 years ago for her 11th birthday, and has never been without since.

A second grader has created a historical bike tour of the Massachusetts town where she spends summers with her grandparents.

Heartbreaking story from South Carolina, where a man was killed and his dog critically injured when they were struck by a driver while on a bike tour from New York to the Florida Keys; a crowdfunding campaign to send them both home has raised $4,200 of the $5,000 goal.

No surprise here, as a witness contradicts the account of a veteran New Orleans police officer who killed a bike rider; officials claimed the victim ran the red light, while the witness said the cop was speeding and hit the victim while he was still standing on the curb with his bike.

 

International

The bike boom is surging in Mexico City.

Ontario, Canada officials still haven’t identified the victim in the bike-on-bike crash we mentioned yesterday, posting photos of his bike and other personal items in hopes someone will recognize them. Yet another reminder to always carry some form of ID that won’t get lost or stolen following a crash; I wear a Road ID every time I leave my home, let alone ride my bike. Speaking of which, if you know anybody who works there, tell ’em they should sponsor this site, as often as I plug them on here. 

Donations of bicycles and laptops are helping migrant workers in Ontario keep in touch with their families and the community, despite the coronavirus lockdown.

Montreal officials are caving to angry residents and ripping out a bike lane in favor of parking spaces that had been removed to make room for it.

A pair of Welsh drivers played the universal Get Out of Jail Free card, claiming they couldn’t see the bike rider they killed because the sun was in their eyes. Never mind that if you can’t see, the correct solution is to pull over to the side of the road until you can, not keep driving until you hit something. Or someone.

It takes a major schmuck to steal a British doctor’s bicycle while he was working a 13-hour shift. Then again, the same could be said for whoever stole firefighter’s bicycle while he was working.

 

Competitive Cycling

The world road championships have been moved to Italy later this month after Switzerland backed out due to Covid-19 restrictions; only the elite men’s and women’s races will be held.

The Tour de France has a new leader, after Julian Alaphilippe was penalized 20 seconds for taking a water bottle in the final 20 kilometers of Thursday’s stage.

The Guardian calls Wednesday’s stage uneventful.

Pez Cycling News considers why pro cyclists crash so much.

A new jersey material being used by Team Sunweb in this year’s Tour promises to protect cyclists from road rash in crashes up to 60 mph, and reduce severity at even higher speeds.

And this is how it should be done, if NBC was willing to spend a few more bucks to broadcast cycling.

 

Finally…

If you’re going to steal a bike, make sure no one sees you — when you take it, or when you ride it later. If you’re going for a drunken early morning bike ride while carrying meth and weed, put a damn taillight on it.

The bike, that is, not the weed.

And evidently, lions aren’t just king of the jungle.

https://twitter.com/QTAnon1/status/1300721316719452160?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1300721316719452160%7Ctwgr%5Eshare_3&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Froad.cc%2Fcontent%2Fnews%2Fcycling-live-blog-2-september-2020-276945

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

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

Sheriff’s deputies kill Black bike rider in South LA, driver rams LA bike protest, and Metro nixes Eagle Rock bike lanes

September 2, 2020 / / Comments Off on Sheriff’s deputies kill Black bike rider in South LA, driver rams LA bike protest, and Metro nixes Eagle Rock bike lanes

Biking While Black has long been treated like a crime.

But it’s not supposed to carry the death penalty.

Yet that’s what appears to be what happened Monday afternoon when a pair of LA County Sheriff’s deputies spotted a Black man riding a bicycle on Budlong Avenue in the Westmont neighborhood of South LA.

They attempted to stop him for some unspecified traffic code violation, which could have been anything from riding the wrong way to riding a cruiser bike with raised handlebars.

Or it could have just been a pretext to stop and search, despite a lack of probable cause.

Twenty-nine-year old Dijon Kizzee attempted to flee on foot, and allegedly punched one of the deputies when they caught up to him a block later.

He dropped a bundle of clothing he was carrying; the deputies opened fire when they reportedly spotted a semi-automatic handgun in the bundle — making Kizzee just the latest in a long line of Black and brown men and women killed by police under questionable circumstances.

But LA Congresswoman Karen Bass asks the same questions I have. Especially why did the deputes shoot after Kizzee dropped his weapon?

A day later, the Sheriff’s Department attempted to clarify, saying Kizzee had made a motion towards the weapon.

Which, again, can mean absolutely anything, from lunging towards it to merely pointing in that direction.

But what’s painfully clear is that he was not holding it or threatening them with it when both deputies shot him multiple times.

And continued firing after he was on the ground.

One witness insists he never had a gun, and what the deputies saw was his cellphone; however, authorities say a gun was recovered from the scene.

Another indicated that Kizzee had his hands in the air at the time of the shooting.

Sadly, I have no confidence in the Sheriff’s Department to conduct a full, fair and honest investigation of the shooting. Especially under the leadership of a sheriff who seems more interested in getting fired deputies back on the force than in protecting the people of LA County.

And one who continually denies the existence of tattooed gangs within the department, including a clique called The Executioners operating out of South LA.

The mere name of which raises questions anytime they fire a gun.

We need to wait for more information before drawing any conclusions about what actually happened, because initial reports are often wrong.

And we may never know what really happened, since the LASD doesn’t require body cameras on its deputies, although thankfully, that may soon change.

Yes, there’s an argument to be made Kizzee shouldn’t have run, and shouldn’t have fought with the deputies. Let alone carried a concealed weapon.

Although some of that could have been caused, or exacerbated, by Kizzee’s ADHD.

But nothing he did appears to have called for a summary execution without trial on the streets of LA County.

One thing is clear, though. 

It’s long past time to stop needlessly killing Black and brown people.

And no one should ever be executed merely for riding a bike with the wrong skin tone.

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Somehow, this didn’t make the news here in Los Angeles.

A driver rammed through a crowd of bike riders, apparently part of a rolling Black Lives Matter protest, at Melrose and La Brea on Sunday afternoon.

And may have deliberately tried to run down a 14-year old boy.

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Metro proposes taking a big step backward by removing bike lanes on Colorado Blvd in Eagle Rock, and replacing them with bus lanes that bike riders can use.

As long as they don’t mind having a speeding bus run up their ass.

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The candidates for LA City Council in CD4 will hold a virtual debate tonight.

https://twitter.com/bikethevote/status/1300636096330563584

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In what’s definitely the best story of the day, after discovering a boy riding his bike in his driveway, a man responded by taking some chalk and drawing a racetrack for the kid.

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Today’s common theme is an incredible string of violent assaults involving a question of bicycles, and who owns them.

A 19-year old New Mexico man faces a murder charge for fatally shooting another man in a dispute over the victim’s bicycle.

A Wisconsin man was arrested for using a knife to fight with another man, armed only with a belt, in the middle of a street over who owned a bicycle.

Police in New Jersey arrested two men for attempting to steal a bicycle, and swinging a bottle at the victim’s head.

An English man was knocked off his bike and punched in the face by a group of teenage boys, who then made off with his bicycle.

A 17-year old Irish boy faces a murder charge for allegedly stabbing an 18-year old man five times in a dispute over a possible stolen bicycle.

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

No bias here. A London paper blames a jump in rural bicycling injuries and deaths on weekend warriors chasing KOMs, without a single mention of the people in the big, dangerous machines.

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

A pair of Fresno men were injured when they were shot by someone on a bicycle, several minutes after first coming in contact with him.

An Arcata CA bike rider is under arrest for throwing several large rocks in a road rage incident, shattering a store window at a local shopping center.

Someone on a bicycle attacked a New York City judge, punching her in the jaw as she was walking to the courthouse Monday morning; it’s not clear whether she was the victim of a random attack, or if someone deliberately targeted her. Thanks to John Damman for the heads-up.

A New Jersey bike rider faces a sex charge for allegedly fondling a woman after circling back to assault her.

Apparently, it’s possible to have a drive-by shooting without a car, after a bike rider fired several shots at an Alabama home.

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Local

Apparently, LA bicycle advocates have gone “way beyond the pale of being pro-mobility” and are somehow tied to crooked developers. In that case, I want to know who’s getting my take, cause I’m sure as hell not getting it.

The Harvard Park intersection of Slauson and Western Aves ranks as the most dangerous in Los Angeles, in terms of the number of collisions.

LADOT wants your input on creating safe, stress-free connections on neighborhood streets. Thanks to Keith Johnson for the tip.

Metro is celebrating a long-delayed Bike Month in September.  Uh, yay?

Pasadena police wrote 82 tickets during a seven-hour crackdown on traffic violations that endanger bike riders and pedestrians; 67 tickets went to drivers, while 11 pedestrians were ticketed, along with just four bike riders.

Pasadena is extending their free Project Wheelie low-income bike repair program.

Santa Clarita sheriff’s deputies are holding their own bike and pedestrian safety crackdown today. As always, ride to the letter of the law until you get outside their jurisdiction.

 

State

The California legislature passed SB 288, which streamlines CEQA approval for environmentally friendly transportation projects such as bike lanes, light rail and bus lanes; now it goes to the governors desk for approval.

The rich get richer. Oakland has extended the parking protected bike lanes on iconic Telegraph Avenue.

Newly rebranded Jump dockless ebikes will return to the streets of Sacramento, after Lime bought the brand from Uber.

 

National

Yahoo names America’s most bike friendly cities, led by Portland and Minneapolis; California is represented by San Francisco and Oakland, ranking fifth and twelfth, respectively, as well as a surprising Irvine at 24th. Needless to say, Los Angeles is nowhere to be seen.

SGV Media talks with new PeopleforBikes CEO Jenn Dice.

An Oregon man will spend this month riding down the Left Coast from Canada to Mexico to call attention to suicide awareness.

Unbelievable. After a Reno bike rider gets left crossed by a driver, a local  TV station blames the victim for hitting the car.

A Wisconsin family drove across the US to deliver 50 refurbished bicycles to a Lutheran mission in Texas, to donate to underprivileged children in El Paso and across the border in Juarez, Mexico.

New York responds to a jump in traffic deaths by lowering the speed limit on nine major streets. Which compares to Los Angeles, where speed limits only seem to go in one direction. And it ain’t down.

New York won’t be upgrading the bike network in the Bronx, despite four bicycling deaths in just three months; instead, the city will respond with heavier police enforcement, even though that didn’t help when they tried it earlier this summer.

New York Magazine offers advice on everything you need to start mountain biking, from the bike up.

A Christian radio host claims a bike rider harassed him as he was leaving the White House last week, while denying he tried to punch the other man, despite video appearing to show exactly that.

A North Carolina company is literally reinventing the wheel, creating a new bike wheel with carbon spokes half the weight of metal spokes.

A kindhearted Georgia cop bought a new bike for a Walmart employee, after a bike theif forced him to walk to work.

Kindhearted Florida sheriff’s deputies got a new bike for a 13-year old boy after his was destroyed by a hit-and-run driver.

 

International

Road.cc offers advice on crosstown bike commutes.

Another reminder to slow down and ride carefully on bike paths — and always carry ID — after an unidentified Windsor, Ontario man suffered life threatening injuries in a collision with another bike rider.

Scotland will invest $100 million a year for the next five years to improve conditions for bicycling and walking, along with reallocating more road space from cars to bikes.

A new study shows that closing central Madrid boosted retail spending nearly 10%. Thanks to W. Corylus for the link.

Sad news from Australia, where 26-year old BMX legend Charlie Gumley apparently drowned while on a kayaking trip.

 

Competitive Cycling

In today’s spoiler-free Tour de France update, that guy with the unpronounceable name won the race’s first mountaintop finish

Sunweb cyclist Tiesj Benoot escaped without any major injuries after crashing over a guard rail in Tuesday’s fourth stage of the Tour. But his bike wasn’t so lucky.

Bicycling looks ahead to today’s stage five.

The BBC talks with South LA’s Williams brothers about their efforts to diversify cycling and create bike racing superstars.

This is what is looks like when photographers don’t get the hell out of the way.

 

Finally…

This is what you get when bikemakers consider getting into the e-car business. Seriously, don’t touch the horses when you zoom by on your ebike.

And that feeling when you’ve got a big truck tire to move, and your cargo bike must be in the shop.

……

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

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

Morning Links: Huizar, Price under corruption cloud, bike rider kills Davis cop, and driver attacks Fresno bicyclist

January 14, 2019 / / Comments Off on Morning Links: Huizar, Price under corruption cloud, bike rider kills Davis cop, and driver attacks Fresno bicyclist

A couple quick notes — If anyone is still using the old bikinginla@mindspring.com email address to contact me, that account has now been closed; please use the address you’ll find on the About page.

And use extra caution if you’re riding in the rain today, or any day this week. Most drivers can’t imagine anyone would ride in wet weather, and aren’t likely to be looking for you. At all.

………

The FBI could be preparing to take down one of bicycling’s biggest supporters on the city council.

And one who’s not.

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that DTLA Councilmember Jose Huizar is a subject of a wide-ranging investigation into possible “bribery, kickbacks, extortion, and money laundering involving 13 people” in the Los Angeles city government.

Also among those 13 is South LA Councilmember Curren Price, and a senior aide to Council President Herb Wesson.

Huizar has overseen the rapid expansion of bicycling networks in DTLA, while Price was responsible for killing plans for a desperately needed bike lane on historic Central Ave and removing it from the city’s mobility plan.

But supporter or not, there’s no excuse, ever, for corruption.

Period.

If any or all of those under investigation are indicted, let alone convicted, they should leave the council immediately — and have a nice, long sentence to reconsider their crimes.

It just hurts a little more when it’s a trusted ally like Huizar who’s done so much good for the community.

………

Very sad news from bike-friendly Davis, where an apparently disturbed gunman rode his bicycle up behind a young cop as she was investigating a traffic collision, and shot her multiple times, before reloading and shooting wildly around him.

She died at the scene.

He then rode his bike back home, locked himself in his apartment, and fatally shot himself as police tried to get in.

He left behind a letter claiming the police had been assaulting him for years with “ultrasonic waves” meant to keep dogs from barking.

Thanks to Megan Lynch for the heads-up.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes goes on.

After a Fresno woman was sideswiped as she was taking the lane in Clovis, the road raging driver lunged his car at her when she complained, then got out and physically attacked her.

Although here’s a hint: If you don’t want the occupants of a car to assault you, don’t use pepper spray on them — regardless of how much they may deserve it.

………

The next generation of e-scooters is about the hit the streets of Austin TX, courtesy of an Oxnard company. The scooters are designed for street use, with seats and wider platforms and tires for greater stability.

Maybe that will help reduce the e-scooter conflicts on the sidewalks.

Meanwhile, Los Angeles County is attempting to shove the genie back into the bottle, as it considers a policy that would ask companies to pretty please not to deploy their scooters in unincorporated areas.

………

The Wall Street Journal has prepared a 20 minute video about Denise Mueller-Korenek’s successful attempt to set a new bicycle speed record of 184 mph.

Thanks to George Wolfberg for the tip.

………

Not only is this guy better on a bike than you — or me, for that matter —  he’s only eight years old.

Okay, especially me.

Seriously, when I was eight years old, I was still trying to master a controlled skid on the gravel playground across the street.

………

Local

Los Angeles is proposing a nearly one-mile bike lane on deadly Winnetka Ave, connecting the Orange Line to the LA River bike path.

Streetsblog offers a short interview with new LACBC Executive Director Eli Kaufman.

KABC-7 profiles Manny Silva, the Mexican-born owner of Compton’s Manny’s Bike Shop, builder of some of the world’s best chromed-out, custom low-rider bicycles.

If you prefer to do your riding inside, especially in this weather, Peloton has opened a new Pasadena showroom.

A new 185-acre, 450-home residential development in Santa Clarita will include an 11-acre park with 10 miles of shared-use pathways.

Santa Monica is finally taking steps to improve safety on deadly Wilshire Blvd as part of the city’s Vision Zero program; unfortunately, no lane reductions or bike lanes are planned.

State

A UC Irvine student was seriously injured when his bike was struck by a rideshare driver leaving a parking structure Friday morning.

A group of bighearted Laguna Beach middle school students built bicycles for children at the Orange County Rescue Mission as part of their annual Christmas toy drive.

Spectrum News 1 considers Riverside’s Bikes for Vets program, where veterans refurbish confiscated bicycles for people in need.

The Coachella Valley bicycling community turned out on Sunday to remember fallen bike rider Will Campbell, who was killed by a speeding driver exactly one month earlier. Thanks to Victor Bale for the link.

A couple takes an ebike ride along the Monterey Peninsula’s famed 17 Mile Drive. And discovers bike riders don’t have to pay the $10.25 toll.

A bike riding Bay Area architect switched to rowing after surgery for a brain tumor left him blind; he says he’s now even better at his job.

There’s a special place in hell for whoever broke into a Stockton ministry that built and refurbished bicycles to donate to people in need, forcing it to close after it was broken into for the fourth time.

National

Americans are now more likely to die of an opioid overdose than in a traffic collision. Which is not actually good news.

The Bike League offers five tips on how to build a more bike friendly business.

Your next helmet could take you from bicycling to snowboarding, complete with built-in speakers and microphone, impact sensor and turn signals. Which would no doubt come real handy on the slopes. Especially the turn signals.

Writer and artist Anna Brones is one of us.

A former addict is riding his recumbent through 48 states to raise awareness of addiction.

Bicycling says the death of bike commuting has been greatly exaggerated, noting that commuting rates are still way up from just ten years ago. Meanwhile, the magazine looks at the best bike tech from the CES trade show in Las Vegas.

New Mexico state legislator Angelica Rubio finished her six day, 350-mile bike ride from Las Cruces to Santa Fe for the new legislative session.

Nice story from a small — okay, minuscule — Kentucky town, where a tree-cutting crew pitched in to buy a new bike for a man who came to watch them work every day, after his was stolen.

Liev Schreiber is one of us, as he goes for a cold weather ride in NYC.

My new hero. Bike-riding New York Rangers hockey player Sean Avery is picking fights with people who park in bike lanes.

He gets it. A New Jersey letter writer says streets aren’t just for car owners.

International

Road.cc ranks their top ten commuter bikes for under $1,300. Note to Road.cc — if you’re doing a piece on commuter bikes, try not to picture most of the people riding in spandex.

Vancouver bicyclists aren’t thrilled bikes have to share a lane with buses. And neither are the bus drivers.

He gets it. A Toronto columnist says the city’s bike lanes prove transportation solutions can be cheap and effective.

No surprise here, as London’s attempts to reclaim the streets to fight pollution have been met with hate and anger from some drivers.

Brit bike hero Chris Boardman says he knows how to turn auto-centric Manchester, England into a bicycling city, setting an example for other cities to follow.

The Guardian says British bike shops are closing because Millennials think bicycling is too scary. Seriously, is there anything Millennials don’t get blamed for these days?

Interesting idea. A German company has developed a city bike that converts to a cargo bike and back in just seconds. It’s set to sell for around $2,000 when it hits the ground this summer.

Luxembourg is now the first country to make all transit free.

The Guardian asks why is Australia failing its bicyclists. Which is a question we should be asking here, too.

Japan is moving forward with plans for mandatory liability insurance for bicyclists.

Caught on video: A Singapore bicyclist is lucky to escape with a few scrapes after falling trying to move away from a bus during a far too close pass.

The South China Morning Post asks who gets the blame credit for fashion’s current bike shorts craze.

Competitive Cycling

Australia’s Caleb Ewan held off Peter Sagan to win his home country’s Tour Down Under, beating last year’s champ by a bike length.

Wired examines the insane numbers behind the hour record, calling it bicycling’s most masochistic race.

Bicycling profiles 2016 Trans Am champ Lael Wilcox, calling her the fastest untraendurance racer in the world. And questioning why anyone else even bothers.

Forget racing in the SoCal sun. If you really want to impress everyone, try racing on snow and ice in the dead of the Alaskan winter, with a wind chill of -11° Fahrenheit. And leave those skinny tires at home while you’re at it.

Finally…

No, ebikes don’t pedal themselves. If Strava crashes, did your ride really happen?

And if motorcycles don’t need riders anymore, how long before your bicycle can do a century while you sleep on the couch?

………

Thanks to John H for his generous donation to support this site. Donations of any size are always welcome.

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

Morning Links: Backlash to Palisades road diet, shooting of unarmed Castaic man protested, and bike events

August 5, 2016 / / 3 comments

No surprise.

The proposal to install a road diet on Temescal Canyon Road, with a parking protected bike lane on the uphill side and a buffered lane downhill, ran into opposition at the Pacific Palisades Community Council last week. (“Proposal to Take Away Downhill Temescal Lane;” right column, bottom of first page)

People tend to be very defensive of their traffic lanes — almost as much as they are parking. And anything that promises to improve safety usually takes a back seat to fears of traffic congestion, warranted or not.

Hopefully, local residents will come around once the benefits of the project are actually explained.

………

A group of mostly African-American civil rights leaders is stepping up to protest the shooting of an unarmed bike rider by sheriff’s deputies in Castaic Tuesday night.

………

The Ovarian Psychos’ 5th annual Clitoral Mass ride rolls tomorrow for riders who identify as female.

The LACBC is teaming with Just Ride LA for this month’s Sunday Funday Ride in DTLA on Sunday, regardless of how you identify.

Also on Sunday, Finish the Ride and Velo Studio are hosting the free community ride Tour de Griffith Park: An Introduction to Safe and Fun Riding.

West Hollywood will have a soft-launch of their new smart-bike bikeshare system on Tuesday.

Long Beach will celebrate the opening of a new parking protected bike lane on Artesia Blvd this Thursday.

And don’t forget the return of CicLAvia to iconic Wilshire Blvd next Sunday, albeit in a shorter version due to construction of the Purple Line.

………

Megan Guarnier has gone from doing risk assessment in nuclear plants to America’s best hope for cycling gold in Rio; she describes the road race as the hardest single-day course she’s seen, stray dogs and slick surfaces included.

Cycling Weekly looks at the favorites in the Olympic men’s road race, none of whom are American.

Australia’s Rohan Dennis was nearly out of the games before they started after crashing on a bad surface on the road course.

The good news is, there’s less doping in the women’s peloton than in the men’s; the bad news is, there’s doping in the women’s peloton.

………

Local

The LA Times looks at the popularity of fixies, saying they’ve gone from hipster status symbols to being found everywhere. Although I question whether the too-frequent stories of cyclists injured after recklessly blowing through stop signs in front of oncoming traffic results from the inability of beginning fixed-gear riders to safely stop their bikes.

Atwater Village residents demand the removal of flood control barriers along their stretch of the LA River bike path, after the barriers have been removed everywhere else.

CiclaValley concludes his list of the ten most essential climbs in the LA area.

 

State

A Santa Ana man told police he was shot in the chest when he struggled with an armed gang member trying to steal his bike. Once again, if there’s a weapon involved, just let your bike go. Your life is worth more.

A new UC Riverside study concludes that low income bicyclists who ride out of necessity are largely ignored by SoCal communities, where bike paths and policies favor recreational and upper-income riders.

Salinas ranks among the worst in the state for pedestrian and bike safety.

San Francisco’s mayor announces increased efforts to improve safety on the city’s streets in the wake of recent deaths and criticism by bike advocates.

 

National

A new premium Strava feature will tell your friends exactly where you are so they can meet up, or find you if you don’t get home on time.

An off-duty Oklahoma officer is credited with saving a bike rider from being shot by an admitted killer.

The family of a bike messenger who was killed by a Chicago tour bus have filed suit, alleging the driver blew through the red light.

A Staten Island mom uses Facebook to get her son’s stolen bike back.

The New York Times talks to the hero bicyclist who saved a young man from jumping off the George Washington Bridge.

A New Jersey mountain bike trail is the latest to be sabotaged by anti-bike terrorists who planted barbed wire, broken bottles and boards embedded with screws and nails along the path. The scumbags who did this deserve to have the book thrown at them. But probably won’t, since they’re only targeting people on bicycles.

A full 40% of people in Baton Rouge LA say they would consider riding to work if the city had dedicated bike paths.

 

International

A transportation consulting firm says the cyclists cities should target are the ones who don’t ride yet.

Vancouver’s new bikeshare system has proven more popular than expected just two weeks after its launch.

Bighearted Victoria, Canada police pitch in to ship a boy’s stolen bike back to Alberta after it was stolen while his family was visiting the city.

The mayor of Edmonton, Canada says the racist rants telling a black bike rider to get off the street demonstrates the need for better infrastructure. It also demonstrates the need for fewer racist drivers.

There’s a special place in hell for the Ontario, Canada jackass who dragged a dog behind an ebike; fortunately, the dog is okay, while the driver faces charges including DUI.

Toronto drivers didn’t even wait for a new bike lane to be finished to before they started parking in it.

An Ottawa, Canada woman filed an assault complaint with the police after a male rider slapped her ass for riding too slow. Seriously, let other people ride their own way. And keep your damn hands to yourself.

Speaking of a special place in hell, that goes double for whoever stole the bike used by a British father to take his seriously ill five-year old daughter out for rides, and raise money to fight the disease that will eventually take her life.

The Guardian recounts the tale of bikeshare inventor Luud Schimmelpennink, and the failure of his hometown of Amsterdam to embrace the idea.

Romania wants to install new cycling routes to encourage bike tourism, including bike paths, public roads where cars are banned, and streets where traffic is limited to 18 mph.

Hyerabad, India will install a 300 station, 10,000 bike bikeshare system along the city’s railways.

The Israeli border guards caught on video confiscating a Palestinian girl’s bicycle and tossing it into the bushes say they did it to protect her. Sure, let’s go with that.

 

Finally…

Forget cornering or descending; the most important cycling skill you need is riding the right speed to catch Pokémon. Your next bikeshare helmet could be made of paper.

And a clunky looking bike bell promises to turn any bike into a smart bike; a smart rider is another matter.

 

Category: Bike Events, Morning Links, Streets and Infrastructure / Tags: , , , , , ,
 
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