Let’s depart with our usual format today, because there are a couple of urgent matters we need to attend to right now.
We’ll be back tomorrow to catch up on anything we missed today.
Pinky swear.
………
First off, I’ve signed onto a letter demanding that Mayor Karen Bass and the City Council declare a Traffic Violence State of Emergency, after the abject failure of Vision Zero in Los Angeles.
Now I’m asking you to sign on to that letter as well.
Below you’ll find the full text of that letter. If you support it, please click this link or scan the QR code in the graphic below to sign on, too.
Dear Mayor Bass and Honorable Members of the City Council:
The City of Los Angeles has not been taking traffic violence and the public health crisis that is, seriously. The facts speak for themselves:
In 2015, the city committed to Vision Zero – its plan to end traffic violence by 2025. In 2025, traffic fatalities were reported by LAPD to be 290, 56% higher than in 2015.
For the past three years there have been more traffic fatalities than homicides.
An audit directed by the Los Angeles City Council found that Vision Zero failed – and thousands of people died – because of a lack of political will and poor coordination between city departments.
Traffic violence is the leading cause of death for children ages 4-14 in LA County.
Between 31 January and 5 February 2026, there were two mass traffic fatality events, resulting in 5 people killed and 7 others seriously injured.
The City of Los Angeles was about to return 100 million dollars in road safety funding to the State of California because it didn’t have the manpower to use the money.
We, the undersigned, demand that the issue of traffic violence be treated with the urgency and importance that it deserves. We request that the City of Los Angeles formally declare a State of Emergency due to traffic violence, thus redirecting resources and prioritizing actions to address this city-wide problem. This includes but is not limited to:
Recommitting to Vision Zero in its entirety – all five pillars, not just one or two.
Take serious and meaningful actions to fully address the failures of Vision Zero found in the city’s own audit.
Properly staff the LADOT, RIGHT NOW, with the personnel needed to use the grants and funding it already has.
Immediately empower the community to make their own roads safer through a community-led traffic safety program.
Fast-track road safety programs and improvements that are already in the works.
Vision Zero cannot succeed if it is treated as a slogan rather than a mandate. Preventable deaths are not unfortunate accidents; they are the predictable outcome of design choices and policy decisions.
Our city’s leaders have the tools, data, and authority to act. Now we are asking them to decide that a commitment to protecting human life should not be negotiable.
Jonathan Hale, Founder
People’s Vision Zero
Damian Kevitt, Executive Director
Streets Are For Everyone
………
Second, Streets For All is asking for your help to support critical Los Angeles City Charter reforms at today’s meeting of the Charter Commission.
TODAY: TELL THE CHARTER COMMISSION TO PASS A CAPITAL INFRASTRUCTURE PLAN
This is it! Today the Charter Commission will be deciding whether to submit language for 1) a Capital Infrastructure Plan and 2) a Director of Public Works.
These reforms are absolutely critical. They will create transparency, accountability, and reform the City’s existing antiquated system for infrastructure delivery. This touches everything we care about, from crosswalks to trees to bike lanes to park space.
We are expecting significant push back defending the status quo. It is important that advocates make their voice heard.
3 WAYS YOU CAN HELP
Thursday, March 12, 4pm (AGENDA)
1) Show up in person and give public comment
City Hall, 200 Spring Street, Room 350, Board of Public Works Session Room
2) Call in and give public comment Please call early, they are limiting public comment to 30 minutes only
Use this Zoom link, or call 1-669-254-5252 (Meeting ID: 161 156 7882)
3) Submit written Public comment via email Add your name and zip code to the bottom, feel free to customize the suggested language.
Allen was riding near near Paseo Del Mar and Palos Verdes Drive West when he went over his handlebars and through the windshield of a parked car, leaving him with a severely gashed neck, along with a broken rib and scrapes on his arms and left knee, disoriented and near death.
There’s no time or date given for the crash, only that it happened at night, roughly four months ago.
KTLA-5 describes what happened next.
Rachel Ebright, a retired nurse, was driving nearby when she spotted James lying on the road. She quickly pulled over and ran over to help.
“I told him to stay with me,” she recalled. “Whenever he flexed his neck, there was massive arterial spray, so I had to restrain a 6-foot-3 elite athlete and try to keep him down.”
John Zabukovec, an officer with the Palos Verdes Estates Police Department, arrived at the scene soon after and also stepped in to help.
“There was an overwhelming sense of chaos,” he said when he first arrived. “I knew immediately that I needed to apply life-saving measures.”
Allen was rushed to a nearby hospital, and recovered after emergency surgery. He’s back on his bike and riding again — and still alive — thanks the efforts of two kindhearted strangers.
AB 2276 would require drivers convicted of particularly egregious or excessive speeding and/or reckless driving violations to install active intelligent speed assistance devices that use GPS and digital maps to determine posted speed limits in real time, and limit drivers ability to exceed them.
Drivers would be required to install the devices for a specific period, based on judicial discretion and offense history. The bill would use income-based fees for device costs and installation to protect low-income drivers from excessive fees.
Similar ISA programs are already in place in Virginia, Washington State and the District of Columbia.
………
If you haven’t participated in LA Critical Mass lately — or ever — tonight might be time to start.
The monthly ride will roll in honor of two victims of needless traffic violence, 36-year old mother Regan Cole-Graham and her unborn daughter Ophelia, who were killed by an 87-year old driver while Cole-Graham was riding ebikes with her husband and two young sons last month.
They were run down from behind on Pershing Drive in Playa del Rey. That’s where a road diet and bike lanes were installed in 2017 to improve safety, then removed a few months later after loud complaints from motorists used to using the street to bypass traffic on the 405.
Here’s a press release from Streets Are For Everyone about the memorial ride.
1500 Cyclists Ride to Remember Regan Cole-Graham and Ophelia Graham
Advocates Call on Mayor Bass to Prioritize Safer Streets in Wake of Multiple Mass Traffic Fatality Events.
LOS ANGELES, CA — 1500 cyclists, street safety advocates, and family members will gather for a public ride to remember Regan Cole-Graham and her daughter Ophelia Katherine Graham, who were both killed after a driver hit them while they were riding a bicycle along Pershing Dr on 31 January 2026.
This is being done as part of the monthly LA Critical Mass ride held on the last Friday of each month. LA Critical Mass has modified the route so all cyclists will end up at the location where Regan, Ophelia, and her other daughter were hit for a memorial vigil.
The vigil will include:
Gathering of cyclists led by LA Critical Mass organizers
Remarks from Jeff Cole, father of Regan and grandfather of Ophelia.
A live amplified song
Remarks from advocates and LA Critical Mass
A banner calling on the city and Mayor Bass to make roads safer
WHEN: Friday, February 27
Ride departs 7:15 PM from Wilshire & Western
Vigil approximately 9:15 PM – 9:30 PM at Hacienda Playa
8415 Pershing Dr, Playa Del Rey, CA 90293
EXPECTED ATTENDANCE: Approximately 1,500 cyclists
WHO:
Lisa Lundie — President, LA Critical Mass
Jeff Cole — Father of Regan and grandfather of Ophelia
Kat Primeau (vocals) and Ryan Ross (keyboard) singing Ophelia from the Lumineers. Regan and Matt named their daughter after the song, Ophelia.
Damian Kevitt — Executive Director, Streets Are for Everyone
Many of Matt and Regan’s family will be joining the ride when it arrives at Del Rey Lagoon between 8:45 and 9:00 PM.
Now the people on dirt bikes are out to get us, too. A New Zealand man suffered a ruptured anterior cruciate ligament and dislocated kneecap when a motocross biker made a U-turn and deliberately crashed into him as he rode past on his bicycle, for no apparent reason.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Once again, a driver has been violently attacked by a group of teenagers on a bicycle ride out, this time in San Francisco; the assault apparently began when one of the kids groped a woman in the car and she threw her drink on the boy, who responded by punching the driver in the face, as the kids kicked the car and slammed it with their bikes.
Encinitas will move forward with a redesign of the redesigned Santa Fe Drive, which will spend around $3.5 million to widen traffic lanes and remove back-in parking, while exploring “alternatives” to the existing bike lanes; that comes after already spending $4 million on the previous redesign that was completed less than a year ago.
San Diego is considering rule changes that will bar anyone under 12 from operating an ebike, and allow a passenger only if the bike has a permanent second seat. Which will presumably prevent parents from riding their kids to school in a bucket bike, without permanent child seats. Or even carrying their kids in a nonpermanent child’s seat.
A Sacramento public radio station examines the proposed California bill that would require licenses and registration for ebikes capable of going faster than 20 mph, although a researcher at San Jose State’s Mineta Transportation Institute correctly observes that all those shocking ebike injury stats lump legal ped-assist ebikes together with illegal dirt bikes and e-motos.
Seriously, there’s not a pit in hell deep enough for the 18-year old Arizona man accused of stealing a nine-year old boy’s bike at gunpoint; a 14-year old kid busted with him could also face charges.
Sad news from British Columbia, where professional snowboarder Stratton Matteson was killed in an avalanche; the 28-year old Bend, Oregon splitboarder — a snowboard that separates into two halves, allowing the user to climb uphill like cross-country skis, then reconnect them and snowboard down — was a pioneer of the “bike to board” movement, riding his bicycle hundreds of miles with his gear in tow instead of relying on motor-driven transportation.
That’s more like it. Drivers in New Zealand could face fines up to $3,000 for passing bicyclists too closely, though advocates are calling for the distance to be increased to roughly 4.5 feet, rather than the current 3 feet below 37 mph, and 4.5 feet above that.
Speaking of New Zealand, Kiwi researchers followed Māori and Pacific adults for a year to study the health benefits of riding an ebike, concluding it’s an “achievable and enjoyable way of moving,” well-suited to the older and bigger riders, as well as people with chronic conditions like joint pain. Although the site may make you prove you’re human before they let you read it.
Cyclist offers a preview of tomorrow’s Omloop Nieuwsblad, the first true Classic of the new racing season, as the pro peloton takes to the historic cobbles.
Take this remarkably mild-mannered introduction to the story.
To offset the cost of the e-bikes, which can run in the thousands of dollars, the state launched a generous voucher program — one that heavily subsidized, and in some cases completely offset, the purchase price. Demand soared.
That’s when the problems began.
Vouchers were quickly snatched up. A website set up to manage applications crashed amid heavy demand.
Despite wide public interest, the program quietly and abruptly ended last year — a victim, in some ways, of its own success.
Now the state is pivoting, leaving cycling advocates disappointed and those who were able to snag e-bike vouchers counting their lucky stars.
No mention there, or anywhere else in the story, of the three years it took the California Air Resources Board to even issue the first voucher.
Let alone the alleged malfeasance by, and investigations into, San Diego nonprofit Pedal Ahead, which was hired by CARB to manage the program. And failed miserably.
And then the whole damn thing collapsed, apparently because getting cleaner cars on the road mattered more than getting more cars off it.
The demand was apparent. Some cycling advocates say they were under the impression additional vouchers — that would have been funded by the subsequent $18 million in state funding — were on the horizon as soon as a new administrator of the program was secured.
But those dollars were instead diverted to CARB’s Clean Cars 4 All program, which helps lower-income Californians trade in their gas-fueled vehicles for new or used plug-in hybrid electric, zero-emission vehicles or motorcycles, she said.
“California is committed to supporting e-bikes as a clean mobility alternative to vehicles. But, ultimately, the state has a limited budget and many competing priorities,” CARB spokesperson Bradley Branan told The Times.
That’s it.
Apparently, they couldn’t find a single disgruntled applicant willing to go on the record with a single complain against how the program was (mis)managed.
And yes, that’s me over here waving my hand until it falls off.
The whole program was the very definition of a clusterfuck and a shitshow from beginning to end. Because calling it a complete and barely mitigated disaster is being far too kind.
Instead, the Times very belatedly and very politely suggests that it was just one of those unfortunate things.
You, just another California program gone bad. Nothing to see here.
And don’t pay attention to the man behind the curtain.
And once again, they couldn’t seem to find a single traffic safety advocate to talk to. Evidently, no one picked up the phones at Streets For All and Streets Are For Everyone.
Or maybe the Times just lost their numbers.
The best they could do was a traffic engineering expert from USC, who evidently doesn’t consider traffic speed or road design a contributing factor when it comes to collisions.
Consider these milquetoast stanzas.
Many of the worst intersection were designed to take a lot traffic. They’ve been optimized for car movement (so pedestrians, buses cyclists come second to moving cars). This is controversial because some feel the city needs to prioritize getting solo drivers out of cars and onto mass transit and other alternatives. But most of these intersections lack protected bike and bus lanes.
As frustrating as the waits at these intersections can be, Moore argues that the city has generally done a adequate job of moving so many cars and is skeptical much more can be done short the type of “congestion pricing” system being tried in New York and European cities.
While I’m all in favor of congestion pricing, I doubt there are many people who would give LA traffic even an “adequate” grade.
That said, here’s the list in all its glory.
Highland and Sunset
Sepulveda and Lincoln
MLK and Crenshaw
3rd and Alvarado
El Segundo and Hoover
Los Feliz and Griffith Park
Pacific Coast Highway and Sunset
Santa Monica and Highland
Fountain and Hyperion
Crenshaw and 9th
La Cienega and Centinela
Vermont and 28th
Wilshire and Sepulveda
Pacific Coast Highway and Channel/Chautauqua
Two of those are walking distance from my apartment. Which probably explains why I feel like my life is in danger every time I walk the dog.
And I’ve ridden, driven of bused through most of the rest, and can attest that they do, indeed, suck.
But I don’t think you can evaluate any intersection without considering the design of the roadways leading up to it, or the speed of the drivers approaching it.
This list should be a call to action to fix each of these. But if we only address the intersections themselves, we won’t solve the problems that put them on it.
The bill would require that an electric bicycle must have fully operational pedals and an electric motor capable of no more than 750 watts; anything else could not be legally called, marketed or sold as a bicycle or ebike.
What is currently termed a motorized bicycle would be redefined as a moped, with clearer definitions of vehicle design, power output, and a top speed of 30 mph on level ground.
The term motor-driven cycles would include electric motorcycles offering less than 3,750 watts and 5 brake horsepower.
Both categories would require that manufacturers and marketers clearly specify that they are not electric bicycles.
Dirt bikes and other electric motorbikes intended for off-highway use will be treated as off-highway motor vehicles and must display identification plates or devices, and be certified by an accredited independent lab.
And perhaps most importantly, it would not require licenses, registration or insurance for ped-assist ebikes — a requirement that would be the best way to kill the growth of ebikes, and limit their ability to replace motor vehicle use.
Four people were hospitalized with major injuries.
The driver then fled the scene, crashing into the curb as he made his escape. After which, someone in the crowd got their revenge by shooting up a couple of nearby businesses, neither of which probably had anything to do with it.
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
He gets it. A North Carolina letter writer patiently explains that bike riders already pay for the streets, and that anyone who wants to exclude bicycles from the state’s roadways because they don’t pay gas taxes might as well exclude EVs, too — then signs off that he’s “Not a cyclist or an EV owner.”
Los Angeles city leaders have apparently managed to get their collective heads out of their metaphorical asses long enough to request an extension on $100 million in funding from California Active Transportation Program, rather than give the money back to the state after concluding that city staff reductions meant they couldn’t meet the deadline to finish projects in Wilmington, Boyle Heights and Skid Row.
Locals are enraged when an English bike path is closed for two years because someone living in van community did some unauthorized digging in an embankment next to the path.
A travel website says Kyoto and Hokkaido, Japan have joined better known locations like Amsterdam, Tuscany and Mallorca, Spain as the world’s best bicycling destinations. But they bizarrely feel the need to illustrate it with an AI-generated photo of bicyclist riding in front of a spectacular mountain range and temples that don’t exist.
Yesterday’s post featured a Twitter/X post announcing a Thursday night ghost bike memorial for 36-year old Google executive, mom, wife and expectant mother Regan Cole-Graham, who was killed by a 87-year old driver while riding with her husband and two young sons in Playa del Rey earlier this month.
So my apologies to anyone who showed up last night expecting to honor her.
Streets Are For Everyone, aka SAFE, will host a memorial and ghost bike installation for Cole-Graham and her unborn daughter, who the couple named Ophelia, at 10 am this Sunday.
Speaking of SAFE, you can’t blame the organization for taking a small victory lap following LADOT’s announcement that they are finally ready for public comment on the city’s speed cam pilot program, after months of inaction.
Let’s hope they have at least one planned for Deadly del Mar.
On February 11, LADOT officially began a 30-day public review and comment period of the upcoming Speed Safety Systems Program Pilot.
Angelenos will have the opportunity to review the program’s policies and proposed locations of 125 speed safety systems, which are set to be placed in every council district. This is your time to ask the department questions and offer feedback on the pilot program’s policies, meaningfully contributing to the process of making our city safer, together.
To confront rising traffic deaths and injuries, the Los Angeles Department of Transportation (LADOT) is launching a Speed Safety Systems Program pilot across the city. The pilot program seeks to curb speeding and dangerous driving activity to make our city safer. But they can’t do it alone.
Speeding is one of the leading causes of serious injuries and deaths on our streets. In Los Angeles, around one in five fatal crashes in the city were directly attributed to speeding in 2024.
How to Submit Public Comment
You know your neighborhoods best. Your voices are essential to ensuring this program reflects community needs and advances our shared goal of safer streets for everyone.
The full program policies and recommendations are available on LADOT’s website.
To submit comments on the program, please do so through the council file. You can also send questions regarding the program to LADOT staff by replying to this email at ladot.speedsafety@lacity.org.
Thank you for your time and consideration during the process of this critical pilot program launch. Together, we can make our streets safer and reduce traffic deaths.
Ireland’s bus drivers union gets its Irish up calling for mandatory hi-viz for bike riders, insisting it would make the roads safer by making us easier to see. Even though people still manage to crash into such hi-viz items as road signs, bridges and emergency vehicles.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
The Loyola Marymount University student newspaper reports campus theft has returned to pre-pandemic levels, with thieves snatching everything from laptops to Labubus — including almost as many bicycles and skateboards as motor vehicles.
Sure, let’s go with that. A South Carolina woman was arrested for a hit-and-run that left a bike rider with a broken leg, as well as cuts and abrasions, insisting she had no idea she had crashed into someone because she was busy looking down at her phone and thought she just hit a sign; she was not charged with DUI, despite appearing “grossly intoxicated” when police arrested her two hours later. Never mind that distracted driving is illegal in South Carolina. Or that most rational people would have at least stopped to check for damage if they thought they’d hit something.
If you build it, they will come, part two. In an annoyingly paywalled story, a Scottish paper reports that for the first time, there were more bicycles than cars on a Glasgow street during both the morning and evening peak rush hours. But at least the first two paragraphs are worth reading.
Competitive Cycling
Former pro Phil Gaimon says he’s got leaked information detailing the full route of the road cycling race for the 2028 Olympics, and says he couldn’t have designed a better course himself.
But will he be on the side of the road handing out fresh cookies to the competitors? Only time will tell.
Here is a press release from Streets Are For Everyone and Domestique Cycling Club, providing details on DCC’s Saturday Unity Ride, which promises to be one of the largest in the LA area.
ALEX PRETTI UNITY RIDE IN SOLIDARITY
WITH MEMORIAL RIDES ACROSS THE US
LOS ANGELES, CA — Alex Pretti was a nurse and a cyclist who loved the outdoors. This Saturday, cyclists from across Los Angeles will join cyclists from across the U.S. and around the world for memorial rides honoring Alex Pretti, in unity with the Minnesota cycling community and in solidarity with @angrycatfish, the cafe and bike shop Alex frequented.
From @angrycatfish:
“Alex was one of us. He rode bikes, he believed in community, and he believed in justice. Whether you’re 5 or 80, you remember the first time you rode a bike—because bikes are magic, and joy itself is an act of resistance. Today, with tens of thousands of cyclists expected nationally, we are showing not just grief, but unity. We are stronger together.”
The Unity Rides are taking place simultaneously across time zones, with riders gathering and rolling together to demonstrate collective grief, unity, and resolve within the cycling community.
Domestique Cycling Club is organizing a slow 10-mile ride leaving from the parking lot of the Veterans Administration in collaboration with dozens of cycling clubs and advocacy groups across Southern California.
Additionally, several smaller rides are independently organized by local cycling groups and bike shops as part of a national and international effort led by community organizers.
📍 VA Med Center Parking Lot 6
304 Dowlen Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90025
Hundreds of cyclists are expected (between 150 and 500). This will be an easy, calm, no-drop ride focused on unity, respect, and showing up together as a cycling community.
OTHER LOS ANGELES–AREA RIDES
Friday
• Allez LA Bike Shop & CA Chicken, 7:30 AM — Boyle Heights
Saturday
• West LA Bicycle, 1:00 PM — Bike Path & Main Street
• Trash Panda Cycling, El Mariachi Plaza
Sunday
• Mom Ridaz BC, Downtown Los Angeles
To be honest, I don’t care what your politics are, or where you stand on immigration.
This is about the violation of the right to assemble, protest and report what’s happening guaranteed by the 1st Amendment, as well as Pretti’s right to legally bear arms, as guaranteed under the 2nd.
And the needless killing of our fellow Americans under the color of authority.
Evidently, San Diego has the same fights over increased density that we do.
Except their city leaders are fighting for it, rather than opposing greater density in most of the city, like their neighbor to the north, while retaining single-family zoning and fighting SB 79, which overrides local zoning to allow dense, multi-family housing near major transit stops.
Lawrence Herzog, a writer and lecturer on urban studies and planning at San Diego State University makes the case for the mixed-use Midway Rising project, a medium density development that would replace the current sports arena and warehouses with housing and an entertainment district that opens onto the bay.
The project includes bike and walking paths connecting the various villages that make up the development, as well as connecting to a transit station less than a mile away.
The difference is that San Diego has been fighting a CEQA lawsuit filed by an anti-density group, which recently won its appeal over a failure to conduct an adequate environmental review of the height of some of the buildings.
Never mind that the city had placed the project before the voters, who narrowly approved it.
Meanwhile, Los Angeles continues to fight for an exemption to SB 79, despite a severe housing shortage in the city, affordable and otherwise, leaving us no choice but to increase density, despite what our city leaders seem to think.
Even though that increased density would effectively shrink the city, allowing it to become more walkable and bikeable, and reducing the need to drive everywhere.
And maybe even freeing up road space for better transit and safer bikeways.
Maybe someday our city leaders will stop kowtowing to residents desires to seal Los Angeles in amber and preserve it as it is today, and begin fighting for the healthy growth we so desperately need for the people who are already here. Let alone those who will inevitably come.
It’s a good read, even as Schneider patiently explains that you really can ride a bike to LAX.
But what really stands out is this section —
Disrupting the existing automotive order can mean more traffic and less parking, of course. So Schneider has angered some people over the years.
In 2022, he was on a neighborhood council championing a proposal for a dedicated bus lane along La Brea Avenue. The proposal passed, but in the run up, he says, one guy got pretty mad about it: “He put up a mugshot of me along La Brea at different establishments saying, ‘This guy’s about to ruin your neighborhood,’” Schneider recalls. When his mother-in-law saw the flyers, she “thought her grandkids were in danger.”
Matthew Tallmer says he did post — though not create — those flyers. “Obviously, the businesses were very concerned that they were going to lose business because there’d be no parking,” says Tallmer, now a member of the Mid City West Neighborhood Council, though at the time he was just a guy going door-to-door opposing a bus lane.
Tallmer’s larger objection is that Schneider’s unique lifestyle just may not work for everybody: “The whole idea that people are going to bike all over the place is an elitist fantasy, to be honest.”
So someone who sits on the Mid City West Neighborhood Council posts wanted posters with a photo of Schneider’s face, for the crime of daring to contest the automotive hegemony on La Brea.
And yet he somehow calls Schneider elitist for riding a bicycle, and thinking other people might want to do that, too?
Um, sure.
And I thought the Mid City West NC was one of the good ones.
The Argonaut looks at the weekly Venice Electric Light Parade and founder Marcus Gladney, who leads bicycle riders on a musical tour of the city that draws participants from around the world — including the Australian group RÜFÜS DU SOL, who hosted the listening party their fourth album on the parade.
State
The National Law Reviewexamines California’s new regulations regarding ebikes, including a ban on converting new ebikes to exceed legal limits, as well as the regulatory gaps in the law that should be corrected. Like defining an ebike as at least partially human powered, and anything that’s not as an electric motorbike.
Newsweekexamines why bicycling feels easier than walking and remains the world’s most energy‑efficient mode of human transport, more than five decades after Scientific American first reported it. Which is truly shocking. Not that bicycling is so efficient, but that Newsweek is still a thing.
Escape Collective says Trek is in deep doo doo as it marks its 50th anniversary, with layoffs, overstock, retail decline and debt making this its most challenging year yet. I bought my first adult bike from the company when they were just five years old. And I still have it, even if it’s not in rideable condition these days. Then again, neither am I.
That’s more like it. A 22-year old Texas man faces up to 20 years behind bars after being convicted of manslaughter for killing a high school student as he rode his bike in a crosswalk; investigators said he never touched his brakes before slamming into the boy’s bike. Although in California, he would only face a maximum of six years for vehicular manslaughter.
“We’re out here today because the city of Los Angeles signed Vision Zero as a directive in August 2015 to prioritize saving lives on our roads — to achieve zero traffic fatalities by 2025,” said SAFE founder and executive director Damian Kevitt, who lost his right leg in a violent traffic incident in 2013. “Not manage or reduce [them] but eliminate traffic fatalities. We are a decade later and we are at 290 traffic fatalities. … It’s a 26% increase in traffic fatalities since the start of Vision Zero…”
“The city has tools, it’s just not using them,” Kevitt told The Times. “In 2024, voters approved measure HLA by a two-thirds margin. It requires the city must follow its own mobility plan … to make roads safer for cyclists, for pedestrians, for better transit.” He also cited state measure AB 645, which in 2023 authorized a pilot program for speed cameras in a handful of California cities including Los Angeles, as “a tool the city could be implementing — it’s speed safety systems.”
In a perfect illustration of just how unserious the city is about ending traffic deaths, CD 13 Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez was the only member of the city government who bothered to show up.
But hey, Mayor Karen Bass issued a statement.
No, wait. Her office did.
Apparently Mayor Bass had better things to do.
Mayor Karen Bass’ office said in a statement that Bass, who took office in December 2022, “has made street safety a priority by accelerating the implementation of hundreds of new speed humps, signage and intersection treatments which help ensure drivers are traveling slowly and with control near schools. Vision Zero started in 2015 and requires intensive coordination across departments.”
The office pointed to Bass’ October 2024 executive directive to facilitate street repairs, clean parks and infrastructure and city services enhancements ahead of the 2026 World Cup and 2028 Summer Olympic Games in L.A.
So, evidently, we need a World Cup or Olympic Games to justify saving human lives.
Oh, and clean parks.
Got it.
Kevitt had one parting comment for The Times: “Don’t use the word traffic ‘accident’ when writing about this,” he said.
“In the road safety arena, it’s ‘crash’ or ‘collision,’” he said. “ ‘Accident’ implies non-responsibility. It’s just an ‘oops.’ But when you’re driving drunk or distracted, that’s a choice. If you hit and kill or severely injure someone, it’s not an ‘oops.’ We’re trying to say: This is preventable.”
There’s a lot more to the article, and it’s worth a few minutes to read the other comments from people who have lost loved ones. Or fear exactly that.
Particularly since the Times appears to be the only media source that even bothered to cover it.
Evidently, our deadly streets are no more important to the people who report on them than they are to the people we elect to fix them.
Looks like the joke’s on us.
Because nothing will ever change until city leaders care enough to do something about it.
And the media, and the people, care enough to hold them to it.
Just got this photo from a friend of mine: #Seahawks legend Marshawn Lynch casually riding a bike en route to Lumen Field for today’s NFC Championship Game.
Then again, my beloved Broncos finished a broken ankle and a snow storm short of the Super Bowl, too.
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
No bias here. A Scottish city lived up — or maybe down — to its reputation as “hostile to anyone outside of a car” by scrapping plans for a bike lane through the town center because it would put the “economic vitality” of the town “at serious risk” due to the loss of six whole parking spaces. Yes, six. Never mind that studies have repeatedly shown sales go up when protected bike lanes go down.
LAistexamines Long Beach’s Vision Zero failure, as traffic deaths in the beachside city climb to their highest level in a decade. Although the public radio website may require your email address to read it.
What a long, strange trip it wasn’t. A local leader of San Francisco’s World Naked Bike Ride was arrested when he and several other people showed up naked for a tribute to the Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir, in the mistaken assumption their bare bodies would be seen as a tribute to the band.
I want to be like him when I grow up. A 94-year New Zealand man who survived the Holocaust in Nazi-occupied Holland will attempt to set a new age-group hour record, after already exceeding the record time on his own.
December 9, 2025 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on SAFE takes Long Beach and Los Angeles to task for failing on speed cams, and how to request improvement on county roads
Day 343 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
Thanks to Brian, Kathleen, Steven and Lisa for their generous support for SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy!
So what are you waiting for? It only takes a few clicks to donate via PayPal, Zelle or Venmo, and guarantee our spokescorgi will find a little kibble in her stocking this year.
And yes, that’s the same photo of our official spokescorgi that we used yesterday, because it’s after 4 in the damn morning and I want to go to sleep, already.
Speaking of SAFE, the organization takes Glendale, Los Angeles and Long Beach to task, along with Oakland and San Jose, for failing to implement the state’s speed cam pilot program, over two years after it was signed into law.
Only San Francisco has actually placed speed cams on the streets, getting a 100% A+ grade in SAFE’s scoring system, while seeing a dramatic decrease in speeding where the cameras have been installed.
Los Angeles, on the other hand, gets a D grade, with Long Beach only slightly better at D+.
Although, while I can’t speak to Long Beach, that’s probably being undeservedly kind towards LA.
Malibu, which was added to the plan a year later as residents clamored for speed cams on deadly PCH, has done much better at implementing the program, already achieving a B+ in SAFE’s scoring.
………
Thanks to Luc for forwarding a response from LA County on how to request safety signage or other improvements on country roads.
Report a Problem: Bike Path: Hi – Not a problem but a proactive measure to enforce safety for all. Now that the Rockstore section on Mulholland is finally open to all traffic:
Who do I ask for a sign to be placed showing to “share the road with cyclists”?
Thank you!
Answer: Thank you for contacting the website for Los Angeles County Public Works. We provide services to the unincorporated areas of L.A. County. Your concerns have been forwarded to the Traffic Investigator for the subject location, who should be contacting you shortly. You may also contact them at 626-300-4848.
And no, “more protected bike lanes everywhere” is probably not quite what they’re looking for.
But still.
………
Gravel Bike California discovers some some hidden trails and camps in the Verdugo Mountains in the inaugural Tour de Dugo.
………
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
Once again, business owners try to shoot themselves in the foot, protesting new curb-protected bike lanes in Chicago while alleging they were losing business after just 45 days, even though studies show protected bike lanes usually result in increased sales if they just give it a little time.
A Fresno driver was on the wrong side of the roadway when he struck and killed a 51-year old anthropology professor three years ago as she was riding with three other bicyclists, according to a woman riding with her; the 50-year old driver faces a vehicular manslaughter charge, as well as a couple misdemeanors for her death.
A 24-year old man pled not guilty to DUI and hit-and-run charges in San Mateo County, after he allegedly hit a 15-year old boy riding an ebike in a bike lane, and dragged the kid several blocks before crashing into a couple parked cars; police found half gram of meth and 14 empty beer cans in his car after the crash. No word on how the boy is doing, but he can’t be good after that.
The New Jersey legislature advanced a bill that would reclassify all ebikes, including ped-assist bikes, as motorized bicycles, and require a drivers license for anyone over 17 to operate one, or a motorized bicycle license for anyone 15 to 16. A perfect example of how lumping all forms of electric bikes, including motorbikes and dirt bike, together as ebikes can result in a crackdown that harms everyone.
Amsterdam considers a ban on fat-tired ebikes, hoping that restrictions on tire widths will substitute for a ban based on engine power or potential speeds.
A South African appeals court called for a new inquest into the 2016 death of a woman who fell off a cliff while mountain biking with her husband, after a magistrate had ruled that her husband was implicated in her death “on the face of it,” without hearing any testimony; she supposedly fell when he turned his back after stopping to take a photo.
December 5, 2025 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on The abject failure of Vision Zero in America, the dangers of conflating ebikes and e-motos, and Calbike’s 2026 agenda
Day 339 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
Thanks to Phaedrus and Michael for their generous support to keep SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy coming your way every day, and ensure the corgi will find a little kibble in her stocking this year.
So don’t wait. It only takes a few clicks to donate via PayPal, Zelle or Venmo.
And no, she won’t stop staring until you give her something. So start clicking.
And deadly Vista del Mar, aka Deadly del Mar, in particular.
And I do mean heartbreaking.
LOS ANGELES — As the sun set over the Pacific Ocean one Sunday this past spring, Cecilia Milbourne returned from a walk on the beach with her dog, Gucci. To reach her parked Tesla, she had to cross a road that city officials have known for years poses a danger to people on foot.
Eight years ago,as part of a nationalinitiative to stemtraffic deaths called Vision Zero, the city shrank the number of lanes on the road, Vista Del Mar, and several connecting streets in the shoreside community just south of Venice. But they restoredit to four lanes after an uproar by drivers— among them Octavio Girbau, who railed against a city official in a 2017 Facebook post stating he wasstuck on one of those intersecting roads“in the traffic hell you created.”
On March 16, Girbau was driving south on Vista Del Mar as Milbourne was about to cross in a spot with no crosswalk and no sidewalk — just a concrete curb separating her from the moving cars. Girbau bumped another car, lost control and struck Milbourne on the side of the road, sending her flying as his Mercedes flipped onto the beach, according to a police report. Milbourne, 29, a hairdresser and actor who had moved to Los Angeles from Atlanta, was pronounced dead at the scene. Her dog died with her.
In addition to pushback from outraged, or even slightly peeved, motorists, WaPo cites too little funding for the death of Vision Zero.
Like the $80 million called for initially in Los Angeles to even put a dent in traffic deaths, which never materialized.
And that has led to endless delays in making the safety improvements the city already knows we needed. Like in Koreatown, for instance.
In some cases, Angelenos have died as planned safety upgrades stalled.
It has been over a decade since the city decided to put a roundabout at the corner of 4th Street and New Hampshire Avenue in Koreatown, a neighborhood where 34 people have been hit by cars and trucks and killed between 2015 and 2023. But there was a dispute between the city and the stateover funding, and some objected to the plan to include bike lanes. The roundabout was delayed.
On July 31, Nadir Gavarrete, a 9-year-old, was killed at the intersection while crossing the street on his scooter by a driver in a motor home.
LA guerrilla activists responded by painting their own DIY crosswalk at the intersection days later, working in broad daylight.
After all, she’s only had three years to come up with something.
Anything.
But back to Deadly del Mar, which Los Angeles is considering for one of the speed cams authorized by a state pilot program passed and signed two years ago.
None of which have yet been installed in the City of Angels, as city leaders continue their usual dithering and obfuscation.
One of the first locationsbeing considered is the spot where Milbourne was killed on Vista Del Mar. This fall, Kevitt and some of his colleagues did their own radar testing on the road. They found that about half of drivers are going above the speed limit during rush hour. In the morning, more than a quarter of cars are going over 50 miles per hour.
Milbourne died near two sets of stairs that lead from the wide expanse of Dockweiler Beach to Vista Del Mar. At the top, there is barely space to stand between the sandy bluff and the road. Cars whip by fast enough to be heard over the sound of planes taking off at Los Angeles International Airport, which sits just east of the beach.
Inevitably, the first response to complaints about speeding drivers is to call for greater enforcement. Except, of course, from the speeding drivers themselves, who fear getting ticketed because they’re unwilling to actually slow down.
But there aren’t enough cops in California, let alone Los Angeles, to patrol every street in LA 24/7. Or even enough to make a difference.
The equation is simple. Lane reductions, aka road diets, slow drivers, sometimes by causing greater congestion at peak hours. But drivers don’t want to slow down, and definitely don’t want to get stuck behind other drivers, blissfully unaware that they themselves are the cause of that congestion.
When a teenager crashes an “e-bike” at dangerous speeds, communities call for sweeping bans. When batteries ignite and cause a fire in apartment buildings, local governments restrict where electric bikes can be charged. And when pedestrians are struck by riders on sidewalks, cities work swiftly to cut riding speeds or discuss implementing licenses.
The problem? Many of these e-bike injuries and incidents can be avoided if only we defined what makes an electric bicycle.
Several of these incidents involve what cycling advocacy group PeopleForBikes calls an ‘e-moto’: electric motorcycles and mopeds sold as “street legal” e-bikes that don’t need a license or registration.
Many – but not all – of these e-motos sell new following standard e-bike Class 1,2, or 3 speed classifications. But with some modifications, they can reach speeds of 30, 40, or even 50 miles per hour, and are causing growing problems nationwide.
The solution, they say — as does People For Bikes — is federal legislation classifying anything with a built-in capability exceeding ebike specifications to “be classified as a motor vehicle, period.”
That’s just the first step.
They also call for requiring more truthful advertising as to what is actually “street legal,” as well as standardizing state laws regulating ebikes, just like bicycling regulations are virtually identical from one state to another.
It’s worth taking a few minutes to read.
Because as long as anything with an electric motor is considered an ebike, regardless of power or speed capabilities, we risk ill-informed crackdowns on, and condemnation of, all of us.
Sixty-two 3rd graders in Fayetteville NC got new bicycles, after telling the assembled that four kids earned one of the new bikes by winning in an essay contest, then announcing that everyone else would take one home, too.
………
………
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
No bias here. Chicago residents complain about new bike lanes causing traffic to overflow onto surrounding streets and alleys — except what’s causing the backup is the construction work to build the bike lanes, not the bike lanes themselves. And a former daily bike commuter says he doesn’t think bike lanes are even necessary, apparently not grasping that bike lanes are for the people who don’t feel comfortable mixing it up with motor vehicles, rather than those who do.
A CicLAvia-style open streets event is coming to East LA next weekend, when about 1.6 miles of City Terrace Drive and Hazard Ave will go carfree for the benefit of pedestrians, bicyclists, joggers and runners. As well as just plain, you know, people.
Life is ludicrously cheap in Montana, where a driver walked with a gentle caress on the wrist for killing a seven-year old boy riding his bicycle in a crosswalk, after prosecutors reduced a negligent homicide charge down to misdemeanor careless driving, and he was sentenced to a lousy $1000 fine — which the judge deferred for a year, meaning it could be dropped entirely if he keeps his nose clean.
In news that is equal parts heartwarming and heartbreaking, the family of a 13-year old Huntsville, Alabama boy who was killed by a driver while riding his bicycle have installed a Christmas tree at the roadside memorial marking where he was killed, and asked the public to come place an ornament on it.
International
Road.cc argues that the bicycle industry is not sustainable by design, and they could do their part to save the environment by returning to steel frames instead of carbon fiber, without sacrificing performance.
A “passionate cyclist” from the UK is suing Lime over a crash that snapped his leg in four places, claiming the rear wheel unexpectedly skidded out when he braked to avoid pedestrians, leaving him with life-changing injuries.
That’s more like it. A British distracted hit-and-run driver got nine years behind bars for killing a bike rider, after swearing he didn’t know he hit anyone and just thought his van’s engine had blown up; he’d avoided a previous driving ban for distracted driving by claiming he needed to drive for his job. Yet another example of keeping a dangerous driver on the road until it’s too late.
Bicycles provided by World Bicycle Relief are giving Kenyan farmers a route out of poverty by providing a safe alternative to paying for dangerous motorbike trips to get their produce to market.
Day 330 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
………
Just a quick note before we get started.
As usual, this will be our last regular post for the holiday week. I’ll be taking tomorrow and Friday off to spend with family, so we’ll see you back here bright and early on Monday.
Although if you’re not too busy hitting the Black Friday sales — or better yet, getting out on your bike and avoiding the hell out of the whole mess — come back Friday for the kick off of our 11th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive.
I’ll do my best to put the fun back in fund drive, while simultaneously begging you to part with a small portion of your own hard-earned funds to help keep this whole thing going for another year.
Today’s photo depicts yours truly signing the original petition in support of Measure HLA, corgi in tow, with Streets For All founder Michael Schneider.
………
Okay, one more quick note.
Because I’m thankful this year for a lifetime on two wheels, which has led me to so many of my best experiences and memories.
And I’m even more thankful for you, and everyone else who reads this site. Because I couldn’t do what I do without you.
So in all sincerity and with deepest humility, thank you.
………
To the surprise of absolutely no one, LA’s Board of Public Works rejected the overwhelming majority of Measure HLA appeals heard on Monday.
First round of appeals: The Board of Public Works partially sided with the appellant in one appeal and rejected the other six. Joe Linton, in his capacity as a resident and not as editor of Streetsblog L.A., filed all the appeals heard on Monday. “It’s the very first time, so we’re kind of throwing a lot of spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks,” Linton told LAist. “Not a lot stuck.”
One appeal approved: Linton partially won his appeal claiming the city did not adequately install pedestrian improvements along a nearly half-mile portion of Hollywood Boulevard that it resurfaced last year. The city said it will publish an “appeals resolution plan” to fix sidewalks there within the next six months. “It was really obvious to me that the city’s justification … was not true, so I was glad that that was acknowledged,” Linton said.
Per the text of the Measure HLA ballot measure, the city does not have to implement its mobility plan if the city is only completing “restriping without other improvements.” This exemption is listed alongside pothole repairs, utility cuts, and emergency repairs. In the six appeals that the board voted to reject, the city did not “restripe” the existing configuration, but installed new lane striping to change traffic patterns, added parking, bike lanes, turn lanes, etc.
The appeals argued that these changes go beyond “restriping without other improvements.”
The city disagrees.
The city’s position appears to be more or less along the lines of: if a street reconfiguration project included installed pretty much any kind of lane striping, then it’s exempt from HLA because it’s considered “restriping without other improvements.”
Not that their prospects look too good right now, with or without it.
Meanwhile, a writer for a surf site puts tongue firmly in cheek to discuss the “grom immolation terror” brought on by the recall, while questioning why the Consumer Product Safety Commission is even still around following the Trump budget cuts. “Grom” being slang for a young or inexperienced surfer, and by extension, any inexperienced and/or overly enthusiastic teen — the opposite of what waits for me in the mirror every morning. And you’re welcome.
………
Thanks to the generosity of a fallen bicyclist’s family, all donations to Streets Are For Everyone will be matched dollar-for-dollar through the end of the year.
Calbike examines how Metro’s Nina Kin, Tech Lead on LA Metro’s Digital Experience Team, is building more reliable data and trust for transit riders on bicycles, as Metro begins to recognize that transit and bikes are two “halves of the same promise.” And no, that’s not an exceptionally awkward and unwieldy job title at all.
Pasadena approved a contract of up to $4.8 million to move forward with a new design for the Pasadena Ave and St. John Ave Roadway Network Project, including a safer and more accessible bicycle and pedestrian network — without removing existing traffic lanes, of course.
Santa Monica announced plans for a Holiday Sweater Community Ride on Saturday, December 6th, offering guided bike tours of the Bergamot Area First/Last Mile Improvements, departing from the 17th Street/SMC Metro Station from 10 am to noon.
The Riverside County District Attorney’s Office urges parents to think twice before buying ebikes for their kids, warning that they can be held criminally liable for whatever mischief the little miscreants get up to with them. And once again, conflating electric dirt bikes and motorbikes with regular ped-assist ebikes, to the benefit of no one.
The New York Times also talks with French ultracyclist Sofiane Sehili, who spent 50 days in a Russian hoosegow after trying to cross the border despite Russian border guards refusal to acknowledge his previously approved visa, while attempting to set a new record for the fastest crossing of Eurasia.
November 24, 2025 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on 16 years for killer Santa Ana DUI driver; Burbank approves $3.3 million Chandler Bikeway extension “with trepidation”
Day 328 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
………
It’s kind of a quiet news day, as the holiday week doldrums hit the bike world. Or at least the press that usually covers it. So let’s just dive right in, for those of us who are still around this week.
Thirty-year old Ceferino Ascencion Ramos was convicted of driving at nearly three times the legal alcohol limit when he ran down the entire family of five last summer.
According to KTLA-5,
The incident took place on Sunday, July 7, 2024, shortly after 7 p.m. Angel Ramirez and Angela Hernandez-Mejia were riding e-bikes with their three young children near Haster Street and Twintree Lane. Angela led with the couple’s 7-month-old daughter in a bike trailer, while Angel followed with a trailer carrying their 5-year-old son, Jacob, and 6-year-old daughter.
A witness told police that the family was riding on the right side of the road when Ramos struck all five members and drove away. The witness followed Ramos until authorities could stop him. His blood alcohol level was later measured at .22, nearly three times the legal limit of .08.
Jacob died at the scene.
The family’s bones and abrasions may have healed by now.
Police in Cambridge, Massachusetts continued their search for the thumbtack-wielding anti-bike terrorist who tossed the tiny tacks across a bike lane, resulting in flat tires for several riders. While it may sound like a relatively petty form of protest, it can be expensive and inconvenient to replace a tire, and potentially dangerous — or worse — if a tire pops at speed.
A San Francisco med student makes the case for AB 981, which would create a test program requiring Intelligent Speed Assist systems for serious or repeat speed violators — in other words, using software to cap speeds for drivers who can’t keep their damn foot off the gas; the bill was left hanging in the Appropriations Committee when the last legislative session ended, and will need public support to move forward.
Life is cheap in Hamilton, Ontario, where a bicyclist says “the laws are not there to protect you,” after prosecutors allow the driver who fractured his hip off on a lessor charge; the bike rider complained he was struck during an aggressive pass, while the driver insists he never actually made contact with the victim. Which shouldn’t matter, since a close pass can do as much damage as an actual collision.
Life is even cheaper in the UK, where the mayor of an English town walked with a fine of 3,000 pounds — the equivalent of $3,900 — for the drunken hit-and-run that knocked a man off his bike; the mayor denied hitting the victim until police found the passenger mirror from his car at the scene of the crash.
A Milan bike lane represents the dividing line in Italy’s politics, with the right promising to rip it out, and the city’s center-left mayor calling the conservative head of the country’s senate a NIMBY. In other words, kind of like the left-right divide in much of the world, and especially right here in the good ol’ USA.
Once again, a pro cyclist has been struck by a driver, as 28-year old Frenchman Thibault Guernalec suffered multiple fractures, as well as a concussion, when he was run down while on a training ride this this week, only days after Dutch cyclist Lorena Wiebes was also struck by a hit-and-run driver.
