Okay, so let me start with a (relatively) brief rant. And don’t worry, I’ll get to the point eventually.
Because I now find myself at that golden age when I metaphorically yell at kids to get off my lawn.
I did that this afternoon, when I spotted — and heard — someone setting off extremely large and extremely illegal fireworks from the roof of the building next door.
And yelled loudly off the balcony regarding where they could put their explosives, assuming they were the same jerks who set off two literal bombs at 4 am Wednesday night, shaking our windows, waking my wife and terrifying the corgi, who ran off to hide in the closet for the rest of the night.
Bombs so loud, my phone lit up with people on Citizen and Ring Chat complaining about the noise half up to a mile away. Although some people assumed it was gunshots, because Los Angeles.
But that’s the problem. Because the past few years, we’ve been dealing with noise from illegal fireworks any and every time of the day and night, virtually every day of the fricking year.
While I didn’t agree with Spencer Pratt about much during his brief run as a national political celebrity, he was right about the quality of life here in Los Angeles being in the toilet.
Streetlights are out all over town. Trash piles up everywhere, and God forbid you should try to find a trashcan to throw something away. Storefronts sit empty on every block. Our streets are so rutted and potholed, many are virtually impassible.
Seriously, take North Fairfax. Please.
I could go on…and on. But you undoubtedly have your own complaints. And yet no one seems to be doing anything about it.
In fact, our elected leaders seem dedicated to doing exactly nothing.
Like quashing police reform and proposals for ranked choice voting and expanding the city council, despite overwhelming public demand. And actively blocking Measure HLA, which passed by a two-thirds majority.
See, I said I’d get to the point.
The things that could improve the safety, vitality and livability of this city are the very things no one in our elected city leadership seems to give a damn about.
We’re now down to two candidates for Mayor of Los Angeles, and 16 people running for city council.
I’m not going to tell you who to vote for. But when you mark your ballot this November, don’t just bike the vote. It should be a given by now to vote for someone who will support your right to ride a bicycle comfortably, and return home safely.
But more than that, vote for someone with a commitment to make this city more livable — and tells you exactly how they plan to do it.
Because I’m done with promises. We’ve had over 20 years of promises, and things haven’t gotten any better. It’s long past time when our leaders acted in our interest, and not theirs. And I’d really like to see Los Angeles make this damn list while I’m still around to enjoy it.
And I don’t want to be that guy shaking my fist and yelling at the kids to get off my lawn.
Okay, rant over.
Today’s photo of the rockets red glare doesn’t begin to capture the sound of bombs bursting midair at 4 am.
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Speaking of livability, the ready availability of electric motorbikes sold under the guise of ebikes, and the underaged hooligans on them, seem to be at or near the top of everyone’s list these days.
Encinitas State Senator Catherine Blakespear’s SB 1167 is designed to address that problem without throwing the ped-assist ebike baby out with the bathwater.
Here’s is what Calbike had to say about it in an email I received yesterday
This year, California lawmakers considered a wave of proposals responding to concerns about electric devices. The most burdensome approaches, including new license plates and registration systems for legal e-bikes, have fallen away.
There is a reason why SB 1167, the Truth in Biking Bill is still moving, and passing every benchmark in decisive fashion. Because it takes the simpler approach: make companies tell people the truth about what they are buying, because an honest, fair marketplace is better for all involved.
SB 1167 does not ask the DMV to build a new registration system. It does not impose new licenses, plates, or fees on people who ride legal e-bikes. Instead, it relies on definitions California already has. Devices that are too powerful or fast to qualify as legal e-bikes must be accurately marketed, labeled, and disclosed to buyers. That is easier for the state to maintain, easier for responsible businesses to follow, and easier for families to understand.
This practical approach has earned unanimous support at every major vote, including a 15–0 vote in the Assembly Transportation Committee. SB 1167 is now before the Assembly Appropriations Committee.
Please ask Speaker of the Assembly Robert Rivas, and Chair Buffy Wicks to advance SB 1167 to the Assembly floor.
California does not need to build an expensive new system around legal e-bikes. It needs clear rules and honest information at the point of sale.
Thank you for your support,
Kendra Ramsey
Executive Director
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Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of the hit-and-run that took the life of Blake Ackerman as he rode his bike home from work on Fountain Avenue in West Hollywood.
Maybe it hit me harder than most because it was so close to my apartment. Someplace I’ve walked, biked and driven by countless times since moving to Hollywood a decade ago.
Or maybe it’s because we’ve fought so long to improve safety on Fountain, and finally seemed to be getting somewhere.
Or maybe just because it was all such a fucking needless waste of a young man’s life.
Or maybe just all of the above.
I’ve placed flowers on his ghost bike several times over the past year to let his loved ones know we still remember, and care.
I plan to walk over tomorrow and place artificial tropical flowers on his ghost bike — tropical because he loved Hawaii, and artificial because they last longer. And say a prayer to tell him how just how very, very sorry I am.
Nothing would make me happier than to walk over and find his bike already covered with flowers, real, fake or otherwise.
But I’ll still do it, even if I’m the only one.
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A European ski instructor and bicycling fan ranks the top five mountain passes in the Alps, for your next two-wheeled journey for fame and glory.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
No bias here. An op-ed in the Tennessee Conservative — already a bad sign — argues that the best way to piss off bike riders is to criticize them, then goes on to do exactly that, taking riders to task for legally exercising their right to ride on the roadway. Which means he’s undoubtedly right by pissing off bicyclists for criticizing them when he’s undoubtedly wrong.
Bike riders in the Scottish Highlands are complaining about a “daft and dangerous” decision to remove an important stretch of bike lane near the city center, arguing that it will hit disabled bicyclists the hardest. Even if American drivers don’t believe disabled bike riders even exist.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Two Vermont men were fined $35,000 and ordered to remove any remaining trace of an illegal bike trail they built in a state forest over a five-year period, chopping down 350 trees and drilling into rocks to make the trails. Let’s hope that includes replanting the trees, and at least giving the rocks a nice apology.
Police in Western Australia are looking for a 53-year old hit-and-run bike rider who plowed into a 64-year old woman while riding on the wrong side of the road, leaving her with a “difficult journey ahead” after she was taken off life support; the bike rider stopped to assist the victim, but left before police and paramedics arrived.
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Local
Streetsblog’s Joe Linton calls on bicyclists to provide input in an online survey about Carson’s ambitious Bicycle Action Plan. Although if it’s actually ambitious, I like it already.
State
San Diego avoided disastrous cuts to transportation in the city budget, with a modest half-million dollars to fix the city’s 15 most dangerous intersections, while avoiding the mayor’s plan to cut the Department of Transportation’s entire Multi-Modal Team.
San Diego’s new ebike restrictions will go into effect next month, banning anyone under the age of 12 from riding an ebike, and reinforcing helmet requirements and prohibiting a second rider without a seat built to accommodate two people. Which strikes me as decidedly underwhelming, but what the hell do I know?
The Santa Barbara County Association of Governments, aka SBCAG, is asking bike riders to review an AI-generated bike map. Apparently, they want to confirm it doesn’t have any extraneous legs or fingers, or any other added AI generated errors or hallucinations.
A Bakersfield woman was driving at three times the legal alcohol limit and with a driver’s license that expired two-and-a-half years ago when she hit and killed a 66-year old man riding a bicycle last month.
A new study from a San Francisco professor shows that only protected bike lanes actually cause an increase in bike ridership, unlike sharrows or painted bike lanes.
Sacramento police issued 31 traffic citations during a four-hour bike and pedestrian safety operation, apparently all to drivers.
Bike co-op Sacramento Bike Kitchen will mark their 20th anniversary this weekend with free music, bike polo and beer. And no, the beer isn’t free, or I’d be on my way already.
National
Oregon is considering a proposal to link an existing 20-mile bike path to the famed Rogue Valley wine country.
A Eugene, Oregon middle school teacher rode his bike 1,650 miles down the Left Coast from Canada to Mexico in just seven days, but missed in his effort to set a new world record by a day and a half.
Denver bike riders are fundraising to collect $4,500 to buy a bike-towed street sweeper to clean debris from the city’s bike lanes.
There’s some good news from Detroit today, as the five-year old boy shot by a stray bullet while riding his bike with his father is recovering from his injuries.
An Ohio writer says yes, it matters to see Black riders on the state’s trails.
The NYPD marked the 4th of July by diverting pedestrians from a walkway onto a bike path, with no explanation for where people on bicycles were expected to go; Streetsblog complains it’s another example of the city treating cars like transportation but bicycles like toys.
Streetsblog says it only took New York the deaths of two bike riders to update the pavement markings on the Queensboro Bridge bike lane to reflect a new a pedestrian-only path on the opposite side of the bridge, calling the move “too little, too late.”
Leonardo DiCaprio and his girlfriend, Italian model Vittoria Ceretti, are both one of us, riding bikeshare bikes together through the streets of New York, where they bumped into convicted musical plagiarist Robin Thicke. But hopefully not literally.
Heartbreaking news from Tennessee, where an 86-year old man was booked for last month’s fatal hit-and-run that left a bike-riding woman lying badly injured in a ditch. Once again raising the question of how old is too old to drive, and who should make that decision in a society built around the need to drive.
A DC writer issues a “coward’s guide” to bicycling around the city.
International
If you build it, they will come. A new study in the Journal of Transport & Health shows that building a bike lane or park within about 550 yards of residents’ homes in São Paulo, Brazil was a key factor in keeping them active and encouraging cycling. To which LA drivers shout in unison, “But Los Angeles isn’t São Paulo!”
Cycling Electric says a new cargo bike may be the most advanced one yet. Then again, it should be with a $9,300 price tag.
Road.cc joins the fight over media descriptions of illegal electric motorcycles as ebikes, after police seize “ebikes” that can reach 72 mph.
A writer for Streetsblog says if you want safer roads, all you have to do is take a European vacation.
Three Indian men face charges for stabbing a 30-year old man to death in a petty dispute over whether he had hidden one of the men’s bicycle. As we’ve said before, no bike is worth a human life. Just walk away, for god’s sake.
A Norwegian artist and adventurer is nearing the end of her 300-day epic bike tour through the African continent.
Japanese soccer star Kaoru Mitoma injured a woman riding a bicycle, after both he and the victim allegedly went through a four-way red light on the walk signal.
Competitive Cycling
No charge among the favorites for this year’s Tour de France, as a late bike change allowed Jonas Vingegaard to finish with the same time as Tadej Pogačar, thanks to the Tour’s three-second rule, which oddly has nothing to do with eating something that fell to the tarmac within three seconds; Norway’s Torstein Træen continued his unlikely stint in the yellow jersey with an eight-minute lead over Vingegaard and Pogačar.
British Paralympic cycling star Dame Sarah Storey is calling it a career at age 48, as her 74 world and Paralympic medals make her the most successful British athlete, disabled or otherwise.
Finally…
Blocking an unofficial bike trail with a bolder Boulder boulder. That feeling when bike lanes are “DEI.”
But at least we aren’t tied for dead last in the new City Ratings.
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Be safe, and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.
Oh, and fuck Putin.
