Look, I don’t have a lot of time left to get anything done tonight, after writing about the second bicycling death in two days.
But I at least want to get two interrelated stories out that deserved our attention on a semi-expedited basis.
The Los Angeles Times is reporting that completing the Los Angeles River bike path is going to take a lot longer, and cost a lot more, than anyone had been expecting.
The project was originally on former Mayor Eric Garcetti’s vaunted Twenty-Eight by ’28 list of transportation projects to be completed in time for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, before it was removed in favor of easier projects completing segments in the San Fernando Valley.
According to the Times,
The longest unfinished stretch is the eight miles from Elysian Park through downtown to Maywood. For decades, advocates of the path have tried to complete those eight miles along the concretized river.
Yet a decade later, the unrideable gap remains. The ambitious project remains mired in planning and bureaucratic complications, with groundbreaking still two years off and the cost nearly tripling to more than $1 billion — almost $24,000 per foot — documents reviewed by The Times show.
That means, according to paper, that the project wouldn’t even break ground before the Olympics — if Metro somehow manages to come up with a cool $1 billion.
The problem, according to the Times, is that the original estimate and timeline was based on a simple pathway on just one side of the river, which became far more complicated after a series of public meetings.
Which is exactly what usually happens as a result of LA’s endless rounds of public meetings, in which every competing argument must be considered and accommodated, no matter how ridiculous, how much it costs, or how long it delays the project.
But by last year, the proposed designs were much wider and added seven pedestrian bridges. They also included sections where the path would be elevated above the ground, supported by beams. The changes responded to community input and comments from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and L.A. Department of Water and Power, among others. Estimated completion of the initial phase is not until 2031.
Navigating the web of nearby structures, like active rail lines and historic bridges, is part of what makes the construction so complex, Metro says. An original $75 million set aside for unforeseen expenses in 2016 swelled to $309 million last year, and the rising cost of construction also added to the high price tag.
Advocates, including Streets For All, well, advocate for a far less expensive and easier to build alternative, which would be built near river level. That means it would flood during heavier rains — just like virtually all of LA County’s other riverfront pathways.
It could also discourage women from using it, especially after dark, since they would be virtually invisible to anyone at street level.
But let me pause here for a quick aside.
This story, while well-written and informative, reflects the LA Times’ nasty habit of layoffs and buyouts, which has resulted in the loss of an incredible amount of institutional knowledge.
Beat writers familiar with project such as this, their history and the people involved, are long departed, replaced by younger and less experienced — and yes, cheaper — writers.
The former would have known that work to complete the Los Angeles River bike path has been driven by BikeLA, the former Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, for more than two decades.
But instead of contacting the former LACBC, they reached for the only numbers in their virtual rolodexes, and got comments from two people with Streets For All, including founder and chief exec Michael Schneider.
Which is great, since that organization is driving — if you’ll excuse the expression — much of the movement for safer streets in the LA area.
But BikeLA should have at least been contacted for story.
Then again, they did contact the mayor’s office, even though Karen Bass has done less for bicycling in this city than any mayor in recent memory.
Mayor Karen Bass chairs the Metro board. Despite the project’s stagnation, she continues to convey optimism.
“Angelenos voted in 2016 to make the L.A. River Path path a reality, and Mayor Bass is marshaling the resources necessary to eliminate further distraction that have threatened the project’s pace and cost,” her office said in statement.
And even though Bass has been a disaster for active transportation since assuming the chair.
But that brings us to the second part of our story, as bike industry advocacy coalition PeopleForBikes promises to ride to the rescue.
Pun intended.
To help give you the full story, I’m going to repost a press release the group sent me last week.
Ride LA Together Brings Southern California Together to Accelerate Bike Projects Before LA28
As Los Angeles prepares to host the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games, organizations from across Southern California are coming together through Ride LA Together, a regional initiative led by PeopleForBikes that brings local advocates, community organizations, businesses, and the bicycle industry together around one shared goal: creating a safer, more connected region where more people can ride bikes more often during and long after 2028.
The campaign builds on the work already being led by organizations across the region, including BikeLA, Move LA, Active San Gabriel Valley, the Los Angeles Bicycle Academy (LABA), and many others. Rather than replacing those efforts, Ride LA Together aligns partners around shared priorities, helping accelerate projects, amplify successes, and build the public support needed to move projects from planning to reality.
A recent example of what’s possible through coordinated action is the advancement of the $430 million LA River Bikeway, a voter-backed project that closes a roughly nine-mile gap between Long Beach and Griffith Park. Once complete, the bikeway will create a continuous, low-stress corridor that serves residents during the 2028 Games and for decades afterward.
“Los Angeles has a once-in-a-generation chance to change how people move, and, with the 2028 Games on the horizon, this is an opportunity we can focus on immediately,” said Jenn Dice, president and CEO of PeopleForBikes.
“LA’s bike network is fragmented and progress is happening slowly, but with real coordination and investment, we can accelerate these projects, grow ridership, and leave a legacy that serves the people who live here long after the Games are over.”
Ride LA Together was created to connect organizations already leading this work, advance priority projects, support community rides and events, and amplify local successes.
The work has already begun and will initially focus on accelerating projects moving through public planning and funding processes, including the San Gabriel Valley Regional Greenway Network, the LA River Bikeway Project, Rail to River, and Sunset Boulevard safety improvements. Together, these investments will create safer connections between venues, neighborhoods, transit, jobs, schools, parks, and destinations across the region.
“You can feel the momentum building across Los Angeles,” said Eli Akira Kaufman, Executive Director of BikeLA, “Projects that have been discussed for years are moving forward, organizations are working more closely together, and there’s a growing sense that this is the moment to build the bike network our communities deserve. Ride LA Together is a key force multiplier that is deepening the connections within the movement, hard at work to transform Los Angeles into a more bikeable and livable city for everyone.
”By 2028, Ride LA Together aims to help accelerate priority bike projects, grow ridership through community programs, strengthen regional partnerships, and demonstrate how coordinated action can create safer, more connected transportation and recreation networks.
To learn more about Ride LA Together or get involved, visit ridela.peopleforbikes.org.
See how easy it was to get a quote from BikeLA ED Eli Akira Kaufman? They probably have him on speed dial, unlike a certain newspaper I could name.
(For younger readers, back in the olden days, we would pre-program frequently called numbers into our phones, so we could call someone without having to dial the whole number. And yes, I know texting is easier and less intrusive, but that’s how we did it back then.)
This is from the email accompanying the press release.
LA’s transportation system showed its limits during the 2026 FIFA World Cup. The 2028 Olympics will bring twice the pressure. However, a coordinated effort is already underway to ensure LA is ready and it starts with bikes.
Paris solved a similar challenge in three years by making every Olympic venue accessible by bike. LA has less than two years, but six priority infrastructure projects are already in motion:
- LA River Bikeway (Closing a nine-mile gap between Long Beach and Griffith Park
- Rail to River (Connecting South LA communities to the river corridor)
- Festival Trail
- Western Our Way
- San Gabriel Valley Greenway
- Sunset4All
Some of those even I wasn’t familiar with, like the Festival Trail and Western Our Way. Others have been in progress, or at least under discussion, for years, if not decades.
But few, if any, promised to be complete in time for the Olympic Games, as the Metro and Los Angeles leadership — which is currently one and the same — has continued to drag their feet on projects that should have been completed by now, let alone in another two years.
So any help PeopleForBikes and the Ride LA Together coalition can provide would be a blessing for a city that has long talked about making progress, without actually doing it.
If they can manage to cut through the city’s Gordian Knot of red tape and endless series of pointless public meetings, and overcome the chronic understaffing at the chronically understaffed LADOT, which seems to have fewer engineers that most modern trains, I’m all for it.
I confess, I’m feeling something I don’t really recognize, and haven’t experienced since those heady days of the Garcetti years, when groundbreaking programs were announced with great fanfare, before being allowed to whither and die on the vine.
I think it’s called…
Hope.
Image of LA River bike path gap closure from LA Metro website.
