Tag Archive for SB 50

No Chatsworth COLT ride this year, a mea culpa on Friday’s SB 50 post, and Los Angeles Times goes gravel grinding

Let’s start with something that’s not happening.

For the last several years, the Chatsworth Neighborhood Council has held a community ride celebrating the Orange Line Bike Path, called Ride the COLT — aka Chatsworth Orange Line Tour.

It usually happens right around now; last year, on June 12th.

But this year, not so much.

In response to a question from J. Barrios, I reached out to the Chatsworth NC to ask about this year’s ride, and was told there was nothing planned at this time.

I was also told that could change, so there may be hope.

But I wouldn’t hold your breathe.

Photo by Michael Gaida from Pixabay.

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Sometimes I get it wrong.

That may have been the case Friday when I wrote about SB 50, which would ban police from stopping motorists and bike riders for minor offenses, in an effort to prevent pretext stops.

But a comment from someone calling themselves An Observer suggests my understanding of the bill was off base.

Your presumption that SB 50, if enacted, would prohibit “stops for failing to register a bicycle, or rolling through a stop sign or riding salmon” isn’t correct.

The former is already prohibited; Cal. Veh. Code § 39002, as amended by last year’s AB 1909, says that cities or counties “shall not prohibit the operation of an unlicensed bicycle.”

The latter two wouldn’t be affected by SB 50, in which the definition of “low-level infraction” is limited by reference to two sections of the Vehicle Code relating to bicycle equipment and helmets; it wouldn’t cover violations related to bicycle operation in general:

“(E) A violation related to bicycle equipment or operation in Sections 21201 and 21212.”

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240SB50

Peace officers would still be allowed to stop bicyclists for other violations, including Cal. Veh. Code § 22450 (stop signs), § 21202 (right-hand curb or edge), or for that matter, §§ 22107–22111 (hand signals for turning and stopping).

So it may offer much less protection to bike riders, particularly people of color, than I thought.

Mea culpa.

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The Los Angeles Times writes about gravel cycling, with 11 spots for grinding it out around the LA area.

And they talk with our old friend Zachary Rynew, the voice behind the Gravel Bike California videos we frequently share on here.

Zachary Rynew is a longtime Los Angeles cycling advocate who runs the website Gravel Bike California, which details numerous gravel rides in the region. He has been pedaling two-wheelers since he was in grade school and says riding on gravel roads takes him back to when he was a kid. It also makes navigating L.A. more efficient. “I was commuting from the San Fernando Valley to UCLA and cut my driving time in half by doing gravel and going through Fryman Canyon Park, then Franklin Canyon,” he said.

Southern California, Rynew believes, has a ton of off-road opportunities. “You can make your own adventure on gravel in the Santa Monica Mountains to the San Gabriels and in the hills above Redlands and Chino,” he said. “I love the versatility around here.”

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The East Side Riders are hosting a community meeting in Watts tonight.

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Turn out next Sunday to help make Ballona Creek more rideable.

 

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Caltrans is conducting a survey on road safety; Streets For All offers suggested responses to demand safer streets.

Meanwhile, the California state transportation agency has launched a new traffic safety campaign for the state, where someone is killed on our streets every two hours.

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More proof that plastic car-tickler bendie-posts don’t really protect anything.

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Bicycling says the trailer for the new Netflix docuseries about the Tour de France just dropped, “and it’s intense.” Read it on AOL if the magazine blocks you. 

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

No bias here. Slate interviews Oregon Representative Earl Blumenauer, calling him the “biggest bike dork in Congress.”

Police in Cincinnati cited a bike rider for riding salmon after he was struck by a driver, even though he was only riding in the bike lane on the wrong side of the street because the other side was blocked by a construction project.

A half dozen pro-car protestors blocked a Toronto bike lane to demand its removal, forcing riders out into rush hour traffic

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

A 29-year old man was shot by police and arrested after engaging in a running gun battle as he fled a traffic stop on his bicycle; he was booked on charges of attempted murder of a peace officer, several weapons-related charges and outstanding warrants after being released from the hospital.

A London writer complains about dockless bikeshare bikes carelessly strewn across the sidewalks by unthinking riders, calling them Lime Slime.

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Local 

Speaking of Streets For All, the transportation PAC reminds us to comment on the LA County Master Bicycle Plan.

Streetsblog says LA’s BLAST initiative to quickly build bike lanes has failed to launch. Which really shouldn’t surprise anyone, since it was started under the Garcetti administration, similar to other failed projects like Vision Zero and the mayor’s Green New Deal.

Los Angeles firefighters used a helicopter to rescue a 47-year old mountain biker who suffered a severe ankle fracture when he fell from a remote section of the Haines Canyon Motorway in the San Gabriel Mountain foothills Sunday afternoon.

 

State

A San Diego bike rider was hospitalized with a head injury after they were run down by a hit-and-run driver; fortunately, the injuries weren’t considered serious, and police located the driver shortly after the crash. No word on whether the driver was arrested, however.

CalFire used a helicopter to rescue a mountain biker who fell in a remote area while riding Chula Vista’s Sweetwater River trail.

The Fresno Dollar General worker caught on security cam video running down an alleged shoplifter as he made his getaway on a bike says she has been fired, insisting she didn’t mean to hit him with her car. Even though that’s exactly what she did. 

A Palo Alto editor says adding protected bike lanes to El Camino Real is a bad idea, questioning whether they would protect school kids from getting hit by motor vehicles, and whether removing parking spaces would hurt small businesses. Studies have repeatedly shown that protected bike lanes improve safety for everyone on the street, including pedestrians. And that bike lanes, particularly protected bike lanes, are good for businesses, large or small.

Over 2,000 bicyclists set off Sunday on the seven day, 545-mile AIDS/LifeCycle fundraising ride from San Francisco to LA; the ride will end in Los Angeles this Saturday.

A pair of Lodi men are headed across the US on a fundraising ride, three decades after one of the men, a high school geography teacher and track coach, made the same trip on a whim with two friends.

 

National

The best Apple Watch features to try on your next bike ride. Assuming you have one, that is. 

Architectural Digest says a few simple design changes — like safe bike lanes and bicycle garages — can radically cut travel emissions in the US.

Honolulu bike riders offer suggestions to improve the city’s sketchy intersections.

A Portland bike rider commends the kindness and caring he experienced from bystanders and medical personnel when he crashed his bike riding through an intersection, dislocating his shoulder.

Flagstaff, Arizona bike advocates accuse the city of slow walking bike safety improvements.

A 62-year old e-mountain biker died after being found unresponsive on a Utah golf course, where he apparently crashed while riding through a bunker.

Nice story from St. Louis, where a 14-year old boy with sickle cell anemia was given a new ebike after he walked six miles to attend his 8th grade graduation, while his grandfather, who takes care of him and his six brothers and sisters after their mother died, was given a new $40,000 minivan by a local car dealer.

A member of a Chicago-area school board was killed when she was struck by a hit-and-run driver while riding her bike in Highland Park.

She gets it. A Boston University instructor says bike-friendly cities should be designed for everyone, not just wealthy white riders.

Brompton has fittingly opened a micro-bike shop in Brooklyn, at just 70 square feet. Apparently they couldn’t figure out how to make a folding one. 

An Alabama writer complains about a recent report that ranked four cities in the state near the bottom for bikeability for the nation’s 200 biggest cities, with Mobile in the penultimate worst position, just ahead of Jackson, Mississippi.

 

International

The Guardian offers advice on how to score a good deal on a new or used bike.

Wallpaper looks at the year’s best designed ebikes, ranging in price from around $1,600 to nearly $18,000.

Vancouver bike riders held a funeral procession, complete with hearse and coffin, to mourn the recently removed bike lane through the city’s Stanley Park.

British Columbia is the latest city, state or province to introduce an ebike rebate program, with income-based rebates between $300 and $1,400; over 8,000 people signed up for the waitlist in the first 24 hours.

The Havana Times offers a sepia-toned photo essay of bicycling in the city.

A London man needed multiple surgeries after he was severely beaten by a hooded gang that bikejacked his $15,000 Specialized bicycle, leaving him with a broken jaw, collarbone and scapula, and several missing teeth.

Cycling Weekly admires a 1980s British-made Allin roadie, which is absolutely gorgeous.

A bicycle played a key role in the first 24-Hours of Le Mans when a Bentley suffered a punctured gas tank; after the driver ran three miles to the pits, his co-driver borrowed a bike from a gendarme, rode salmon back to the stalled car and plugged the hole with a wooden bung, before eventually finishing fourth.

Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo is one of us, briefly losing consciousness when he fell off his bike while riding with his son. And yes, he was wearing a helmet.

An Indian writer marks last Saturday’s World Bicycle Day with detailed advice on how to ride a bike with diabetes. You, that is, not the bike.

Don’t try this at home. An Austrian judo Olympian will attempt to scale K2 on a bicycle; she’ll be riding up the world’s second highest mountain at 28251 feet.

An Australian couple have been together for over 30 years after meeting during a long-distance bike ride.

Popular Aussie bicycling photographer David Blucher is learning to walk again, six months after a mountain biker lost control at the bottom of a run, hitting him at full speed in a crash he can’t even remember.

 

Competitive Cycling

American pro Keegan Swenson outsprinted Czech rider Petr Vakoč to win this year’s Unbound Gravel, with Lachlan Morton third; Swenson’s win made up for last year, when he was out sprinted for the win.

Carolin Schiff dropped the competition like freshman English, sweeping to a mud-soaked 60-mile solo breakaway to win the women’s Unbound Gravel by a remarkable 15-minutes over second place finisher Sofia Gomez Villafane, with Sarah Sturm in third.

France’s Arnaud Demare won the 103rd Brussels Cycling Classic in a close sprint, following a 23-man breakaway that managed to stay ahead of the remainder of the peloton.

A 70-year old man was killed when his race motorcycle collided head-on with a competitor in a German triathlon, while the bicycle rider suffered severe injuries, and a camera operator on the back of the motorcycle was treated for shock. Yet another example of why race motos should be banned from bike races.

Road.cc says pro cycling needs to ditch its obsession with “hardness.”

 

Finally…

Who needs pedals when you have solar power? Your next roadie could retail for north of fifteen grand.

And where to shop when you’re in the market for “Strappy Cycling Culottes.” Or maybe just one of the world’s most expensive bikes.

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

Oh, and fuck Putin, too.

Bill banning pretext police bike stops passes state Senate, Pride Rides roll this weekend, and happy National Donut Day

Pretext stops could soon be a thing of the past.

The California Globe is reporting that SB 50, which would prevent police from issuing tickets for low-level violations, has narrowly passed the California state Senate.

The bill would ban police stops for a number of violations, such as vehicle registration or wrongly positioned license plates.

It would also prohibit stops for bicycle equipment or operations — which presumably means no more stops for failing to register a bicycle, or rolling through a stop sign or riding salmon.

While the safety effects of that can be argued, the idea is to prevent minor violations from being used as a pretext to stop motorists or bike riders to search for evidence of more serious infractions, which have unfairly targeted Black and brown bike riders in the past.

Los Angeles revoked its bike licensing law after city officials learned it was being used by the LAPD as an excuse to stop and search people of color as they rode their bikes.

And the Los Angeles Times has reported that seven out of every ten bike riders stopped by LA County Sheriff’s deputies were Latinos, who complained of police harassment that prevented some from riding their bikes.

Then there was the killing of South LA bike rider Dijon Kizzee, who was shot 15 times by sheriff’s deputies after he dropped a gun while attempting to flee from a traffic stop for riding salmon.

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A couple of Pride Rides will roll this weekend, with one in Culver City tomorrow, and and another heading to the WeHo Pride Parade on Sunday.

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Streets For All is hosting a fundraiser and community ride in Venice this Sunday.

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This is who we share the road with.

A 21-year old Florida woman was lucky to survive with serious injuries when she drove up the ramp of a tow truck stopped for another crash, then went airborne for over 100 feet before her car tumbled end-over-end.

But by all means, tell me again about that bike rider who rolled a stop sign.

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

Police in Turlock are looking for whoever is responsible for a series of drive-by paintball attacks targeting bike riders and pedestrians; the mother of one of the victims alleges the paintballs are being frozen to inflict more serious injuries.

A 39-year old Albuquerque man faces murder and hit-and-run charges, accused of intentionally running down a man riding a bicycle following an argument between the two men; he was already on pretrial release for a pair of drug charges.

A Scottish driver faces charges for allegedly flipping off a 60-year old man before pushing him off his bicycle, apparently for the crime of riding in the street, or maybe just being on the planet; the defense tried to claim the victim intentionally swerved his bike into the car, evidently assuming we all enjoy pain.

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

A London bike rider calls for the hit-and-run “MAMIL” — aka Middle Aged Man In Lycra — who left him unconscious following a bike-on-bike crash to be arrested, named and shamed.

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Local 

Streets For All reminds us to take the SCAG survey we mentioned recently — that’s the Southern California Association of Governments, representing the six SoCal counties north of San Diego County — to set priorities for regional governments.

Speaking of Streets For All, the transportation safety PAC urges you to tell LADOT you’re on board with extending the LA River bike path to the edge of Griffith Park, which would provide the first legal way to exit the pathway at Forrest Lawn Drive. And presumably enter it there, as well.

 

State

The Bike League is out with their latest list of 45 new and renewing Bicycle Friendly Communities; the only California cities on the list are Coronado, Solano Beach and Chula Vista, each of which renewed their previous status.

Santa Cruz County officials approved plans to encourage more bike riding with a voucher program offering $800 off the purchase price of an ebike, and $1,200 for a cargo or adaptive e-bike; the program also includes a $300 voucher for regular bicycles.

Police in Concord are looking for the hit-and-run driver who critically injured a 39-year old man riding a bicycle Wednesday night.

Two couples were injured when they were trapped under a construction fence while riding on a Berkeley bike path, after the fence was apparently toppled by the wind.

 

National

Outside launched their new Velo website yesterday, with a focus on roadies, gravel, ebikes, urban bicycling and the catchall, news.

They get it. The Atlantic writes that President Biden is ignoring the dangers of “Mega-EVs,” adding that environmental hype is crowding out any concern for people outside the vehicle. However, you won’t be able to read more than a few paragraphs without a subscription.

German bike tire brand Schwalbe has opened a program to recycle inner tubes at select bike shops around the US.

If you miss your childhood Beatles lunchbox, you can slake your Fab Four urge with a new line of Beatles-themed State bikes and gear — including an Abbey Roadie.

In a refreshing change, an Idaho sheriff reminds bike riders they don’t have to stop for stop signs, and don’t need to wear a helmet, even if it is a good idea.

An Iowa woman facing charges for the alleged drunken hit-and-run that killed two women walking on a bike path — yes, a bike path — and seriously injuring another man now faces additional charges for assaulting another woman in a jail brawl.

A Michigan court has postponed the trial of a woman accused of the drugged-driving crash that killed two people and injured three others; 43-year old Mandy Marie Benn allegedly plowed her car into a group of bicyclists participating in a charity ride last summer.

A Richmond, Kentucky woman has been hosting bikepackers riding the 4,200-mile Transamerican Bike Trail for the last nine years through the Warm Showers website.

New York apparently caved to drivers who didn’t want to be inconvenienced by a planned bike boulevard, backing off the most aggressive plan to remake the street.

A Tallahassee, Florida man who uses his bike as his only form of transportation after suffering a TBI 25 years ago has topped 405,143 other bicyclists using the Strava app by riding 5,000 miles during May’s National Bike Month.

 

International

Don’t forget that Saturday is World Bicycle Day.

Fortune cites experts warning that we’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg when it comes to ebike injuries, as riders reach speeds they wouldn’t be able to on a regular bike. Although at least some of the rise in bike injury rates can be attributed to the rapid rise in ebike use; it would be far more accurate and useful to compare ebike injury rates to injury rates on regular bikes.

Someone stole a Vancouver ghost bike, then returned it two weeks later with no explanation following a public outcry.

In an unusually intelligent move, an English active travel organization will now be consulted on any housing development consisting of more than 150 units.

He gets it. A Glasgow writer says no one owns the roads, and we all pay for them whether we walk, bike or drive.

This is who we share the road with, too. A music producer and heiress to the banking Rothschild fortune will have to find another way to get around for awhile, after being banned from driving for six months because a woman on a bicycle spotted her illegally using her phone while driving. Although she can probably afford an Uber. Or a chauffeured limo, for that matter.

Bike-friendly Amsterdam announced a winner in the city’s Tunnelvisionair competition to create ways to make the city’s “scary, drab and sinister” bike tunnels more inviting.

A Nigerian professor writes that bicycling could be a boon for densely populated Lagos, but it’s being held back by a lack of safe infrastructure, personal fears over safety, and an attitude that rich people drive and poor people ride bikes.

Australia’s Tasmania state announced a $1.2 million incentive plan to encourage people to buy ebikes, e-scooters or EVs, though they still have to determine what form it will take.

 

Competitive Cycling

Twenty-five-year old Belgian pro Julian Mertens has been placed in an artificial coma following successful spinal surgery, after he suffered multiple injuries in a serious crash while training in Belgium Wednesday.

Bicycling says you can stream the Critérium du Dauphiné, which they term the Mini Tour de France, by subscribing to the Peacock network for $4.99 a month, or $9.99 for ad-free service. As usual, read it on Yahoo if the magazine blocks you. 

Volunteers from a US Army base helped out with the penultimate stage of Japan’s largest international bicycle race, the Tour of Japan.

The Gravel Cycling Hall of Fame introduced its latest class of inductees, including California gravel race organizer Miguel Crawford, and former pro cyclist and TBI researcher Allison Tetrick.

Shamefully, WorldTour Team Bahrain Victorious has signed 21-year old Italian cyclist Antonio Tiberi, the former Trek-Segafredo rider who was let go after he tested his new rifle by shooting a neighbor’s cat, claiming he somehow didn’t think shooting it would kill it.

No surprise here, as fake accounts are popping up on Twitter purporting to represent bike races, attempting to scam you out of your money and personal information.

 

Finally…

Now you, too, can buy your very own ebike conversion kit for the price of some ebikes. Your next bike could be painted in liquid gold — but presumably not the wood care product.

And happy National Donut Day, which should be considered a religious holiday for bicyclists.

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Thanks again to Matthew R for his generous monthly donation to support this site, and keep all the best bike news and advocacy coming your way every day. 

Donations of any amount are always welcome and appreciated, regardless of reason. Or frequency. 

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

Oh, and fuck Putin, too.