Tag Archive for Streets For All

Council candidate calls for Ballona extension, MUTCD comments due Friday, and always ride with adorable kids

Update: That crowdfunding campaign for 31-year old Adriana “Fishy” Rodriguez, who left five young children without a mother when she was killed by a driver while riding her bike in Lincoln Heights last month, has now raised half of the $7,000 goal.

Thank you to everyone who dug into their own pockets to help these kids.

If you haven’t given yet, take a few minutes to donate to the GoFundMe account that was established for Rodriguez before she died.

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CD4 City Council candidate Scott Epstein highlights Streets For All’s proposal to extend the Ballona Creek bike path to the creek’s eastern terminus in Mid-City Los Angeles, where it would connect with a planned Bicycle Friendly Street leading into Hollywood.

Speaking of Epstein, the longtime LA Bicycle Advisory Committee member is raising funds for his campaign to put another much-needed bike friendly voice on the city council.

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Time’s running out to comment on the tone-deaf, auto-centric revision to the MUTCD, the traffic engineering street design manual.

And tell them to throw the damn thing out and start over with something that treats bike riders, pedestrians and transit users like we belong here, too.

 

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Don’t junk your old wheels, turn them into art.

Thanks to Ted Faber for the link.

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

Britain’s immense Bolton Abbey estate continues to deny it has a ban on bike riders and equestrians, but the barricades and security guards blocking a key bridge would argue otherwise.

A London park’s code of conduct tells bike riders not to scare the people in the big, dangerous machines. No, really.

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Local

Metro is offering a chance to win a $200 gift card just for completing their annual bikeshare survey.

Progressive news site KnockLA says we can’t lose a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to plan the future of the LA River, calling the county’s Geary-designed draft LA River Master Plan just flat out bad. I wish I could disagree with them, but yeah.

A working mom in South LA’s Windsor Hills neighborhood has converted an empty parking lot on Slauson Blvd into the RideWitUS-LA bike shop and bike club to serve LA’s long-neglected African American community.

A Chicago journalist arrived in Santa Monica at the end of a 2,500-mile ride from the Windy City, collecting people’s stories about Covid-19 along the way.

 

State

No bias here. A San Francisco supervisor is sharply criticized for comparing efforts to keep JFK Drive in Golden Gate Park carfree to segregation in the 1950s South, because the park is so hard for people from his largely Black district to reach if they don’t drive. Which is a far better argument for better transit than turning the street back over to motor vehicles.

 

National

Gear Patrol looks at long overdue efforts to diversify bicycling and make it more welcoming for people of color.

The Week says there’s a simple and cheap way to make room on the roads for bicycles and transit — just put an end to car supremacy. Unfortunately, like other forms of supremacy, calling to end it is a lot easier than actually doing it.

The people who brought you the Commodore 64 and 8-bit Atari are the designers behind a new ped-assist ebike.

This is who we share the road with. An Oregon driver is on trial for the road rage death of a motorcyclist, after repeated swerving his oversized pickup into the biker’s lane. Although he just faces felony vehicular homicide charges, rather than the murder count his actions would seem to call for.

Oklahoma’s governor has signed that state’s version of an Idaho Stop Law, allowing bike riders to treat stop signs as yields, and treat red lights like stop signs.

Kindhearted cops in a Detroit suburb pitched in to buy a new bike for a Taco Bell employee, after someone stole the bicycle he used as his only form of transportation.

Outgoing New York Mayor de Blasio announces plans to install five major busways and another 30 miles of protected bike lanes this year, in a major move to reshape the city’s streets before he leaves office. Although Streetsblog complains he’s not doing anything to curtail private car use.

Speaking of de Blasio, a Staten Island writer complains about plans to cut the speed limit on a major artery to 30 mph, calling it a traffic ticket money grab on the mayor’s part — even while acknowledging that dropping the speed limit is one of the best ways to halt the rising toll of pedestrian deaths.

And capping off our de Blasio trifecta, the mayor finally got out of his chauffeured SUV and onto a bikeshare bike, suddenly getting a new perspective of the city.

Pennsylvania snowboard maker Gilson Snow has introduced a sustainable wooden bicycle, made with the same laminated wood used in their boards.

Tragic news from Florida, where a bike-riding man and women were killed in a collateral damage crash when an allegedly stoned driver crashed into an oncoming SUV while passing slower traffic in a no-passing zone, knocking the SUV over and onto a bike trail next to the roadway, where the couple riding their tandem bike were sitting ducks.

You know you’re in bike-friendly Portland when business owners sign a petition calling for new protected bike lanes on their street, instead of fighting them.

 

International

Your kid’s next balance bike could be a Bentley.

The Ecologist explains the reasoning behind the Car Free Megacities campaign to transform London, Paris and New York by greatly reducing motor vehicle use. Maybe they can pretty please include LA in that, too.

No surprise here. Drivers and bicyclists disagreed over popup bike lanes in Waterloo, Ontario, with bike riders feeling safer while drivers felt inconvenienced.

A Halifax, Nova Scotia paper argues that poorly executed Slow Streets could be worse than none at all, after a bike rider was hit by a truck driver who claimed he had no idea he was driving on one (scroll down).

A British expat living in Copenhagen strangely calls on bike riders to stop intertexting — using a smartphone while crossing an intersection — rather than just leaving your damn phone alone while riding.

Shimano considers the future of bicycling in bike-loving Belgium.

Clever idea, as German bikemaker Convercycle introduced a new e-cargo bike with a wheelbase that extends and contracts, depending on your needs.

Horrible story from China, where an ebike battery exploded on a crowded elevator, sending four people to the hospital, including a five-month old baby.

Cycling Tips looks at the highlights this year’s Australia Handmade Bicycle Show.

 

Competitive Cycling

American Joe Dombrowski celebrated an early birthday by surviving a long breakaway to win a dramatic, rain-soaked fourth stage of the Giro, while Italy’s Alessandro De Marchi slipped into the pink leader’s jersey.

Meanwhile, VeloNews talks with some of stars of the WorldTour about a stage they describe as “thrilling.”

 

Finally…

That feeling when you get bitten by Jesus of Nazareth’s dog. Forget the speakers, just take your entire DJ deck along on your ride.

And if you want to avoid having angry drivers stuck behind you, make sure to always bring some adorable little bike riders with you.

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Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask

And get vaccinated, already.

Former NTSB official says no deaths should be the only goal, legalize crossing the street, and building the 15 minute city

She gets it.

A former acting chair and board member of the NTSB says we know how to prevent traffic deaths.

And the only rational goal should be zero.

Sometimes I arrived at the scene of a business jet or helicopter crash, other times it was a train derailment, once it was a cargo ship lost in a hurricane — always, it involved a tragic loss of life. But despite the terrible toll of motor vehicle deaths on our nation, I never launched to the scene of a traffic crash. Why? Perhaps because the NTSB only has the capacity to investigate a handful of vehicle crashes each year. Perhaps because there weren’t any crashes classified as major disasters when I was on duty. But in 2019, more than 36,000 deaths were recorded on U.S. roads, so an average of nearly 700 traffic deaths occurred every week I was on duty.

Yet our nation doesn’t think of a traffic crash as a disaster, since deaths typically occur one or two at a time. Many of us don’t believe that every road death is preventable. As a nation, we haven’t yet decided that we can protect everyone, including the most vulnerable among us who use our streets and highways — people who are younger or older, people who are walking or biking, people with disabilities. We accept tens of thousands of deaths on our roads every year as simply unavoidable “accidents,” even though we have proven solutions to prevent them.

It’s worth a few minutes to read.

Because she’s right. There’s no acceptable number of traffic deaths.

And it’s long past time we did something about it.

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Los Angeles Walks is joining with partners across the state on Monday for a national discussion about jaywalking and efforts to decriminalize it.

Like their sponsorship of AB 1238, aka the Freedom to Walk Act, which would get rid of California’s jaywalking law, which is too often used to target people of color.

You can register for the webinar here.

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Streets For All hosts what promises to be a fascinating discussion with the creator of the Paris 15 Minute City Plan on May 11th.

The plan, which is currently being implemented in Paris, promises to put everything you need within a 15-minute walk, bike or transit ride, anywhere in the city.

The LA transportation PAC is also asking for you to take a stand in support for a proposal to make Calfornia’s Slow Streets permanent by emailing the Assembly Committee on Local Government by this coming Wednesday.

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Give credit where credit is due.

Unless you’re LADOT, evidently.

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Bike Talk discusses the bible of traffic engineers this Friday, which is undergoing its first revision in a decade.

https://twitter.com/biketalkpfk/status/1387648749007118344

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A periodic reminder that bicycle are mobility devices.

And bike lanes help older and disabled people get around, without having to rely on a car.

https://twitter.com/AmericanFietser/status/1387647840109879297

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Hats off to a kindhearted Cambridge MA cop, who took a few moments out of his day for an impromptu bike ride with a little boy.

https://twitter.com/CambridgePolice/status/1387107364986363906?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1387107364986363906%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwhdh.com%2Fnews%2Fleft-a-lifetime-impression-cambridge-police-officer-goes-on-bike-ride-with-4-year-old%2F

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

A British bicyclist had to call off a fundraising ride across the country after a group of jerks men pushed him off his bike around the hallway point. Which makes the real victims the cancer charity he was raising funds for, and the people they could have helped.

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

Police in Ontario, Canada are looking for a bike rider who fled the scene after crashing his bike into a trash bin, while towing a trailer filled with 31 pounds of cannabis. And a guitar.

A bike-riding British thief uses his head to balance the spa he just stole.

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Local

No news is good news, right?

 

State

San Diego opens a new South Bay campground and bike park. But not together, unfortunately.

A Bakersfield bike path could be underwater through today, thanks to a water line break.

Speaking of Bakersfield, the city will kick off Bike Month with a solidarity ride this Saturday.

Trek CEO John Burke penned a heartfelt ode to his penpal Joe Shami, the 86-year old Legend of Mount Diablo, who was killed in a collision with a driver on yet another ride up the mountain earlier this month.

Bay Area transportation officials marked the beginning of Bike Month by announcing nine Bike Champion of the Year winners, honoring one person from each county in the Bay region for their commitment to bicycling.

The rich get richer. The Sacramento region is planning a bike freeway network connecting area cities, which could require an another 300 miles of trails in addition to the 450 miles already on the ground.

 

National

The Associated Press says give mom an ebike this year.

Outside says it’s time for a federal ebike tax credit.

AARP takes a look a look at bicycling over 55, including what to look for in a new bike, bikes for people with mobility issues, how to be safer on your bike, and eight of the nation’s top rail trails, including the Monterey Bay Coastal Recreation Trail.

Pop Sugar recommends ten padded bike shorts to make your ride — and presumably, your wallet — more comfortable.

Bicycling considers how to advocate for and protect the trails you ride this summer. As usual, you can read it on Yahoo if Bicycling blocks you. And they probably will.

Even Honolulu is building a protected bike lane network.

The newest edition of Oregon’s state bicycling manual gets rid of labels in favor of more inclusive people-first language.

In a common lament across the country, Omaha, Nebraska has more bikeshare bikes than ever. Just not enough safe places to ride them.

They get it. A new survey shows Pittsburgh residents overwhelmingly support bike lanes, walking routes and reduced speed limits. And think traffic injuries are a major problem. Maybe someday someone will finally get around to asking Angelenos those same questions, so our elected leaders might finally see that the car-first crowd is just a very loud minority.

New York has sent a cease and desist order to a new rival to the city’s Citi Bike bikeshare system, saying the privately run dockless bikeshare isn’t authorized to do business in the city.

A New Jersey DJ pleads with lightless and scofflaw bicyclists to stay safe.

In an overly familiar story, DC traffic deaths continue to climb while Vision Zero funding is stuck in limbo.

Camila Cabello is one of us, as she goes for a bike ride through the streets of Miami.

 

International

Road.cc offers 14 tips on how to make your bike more comfortable. I’m a big fan of padded gloves, new bar tape and better insoles myself.

He gets it. A writer for Innovation Origins says we need more and better bike paths, not more helmet laws.

This is who we share the road with. A newlywed English teenager gets a well-deserved year behind bars for stealing a crate of eggs, then driving his car while friends threw the eggs out the window at passing people and cars, permanently blinding a motorcycle rider in his right eye with a direct hit. He took the fall for his friends, refusing to name who actually tossed the eggs.

Princess Di’s “shame” mixte bike sold for the equivalent of over $61,000, which the palace forced her to sell before her ill-fated marriage to Prince Chuck; the bike went for more than twice the presale estimate.

Add this to your bike bucket list, with eleven “of the best and most beautiful places” to ride your bike in Scotland.

Rouleur looks at the 18k gold framed bike famed Italian bikemaker Ernesto Colnago made for Pope — now Saint — John Paul II.

Heartbreaking story from India, where an elderly man was forced to carry his dead wife’s body on his bicycle for hours after villagers blocked him from the local crematorium for fear of Covid-19, even though there was no confirmation she ever had the disease.

 

Finally…

That feeling when God tells you to start a weekly bike night at the local skatepark.

And let’s consign “savages” to the racist dustbin of history. Even in reference to some truly despicable bike thieves.

Oh, and it’s “thief,” not “thieve.”

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Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask

And get vaccinated, already.

Death of DC bike advocate reveals LA safety failures, LADOT bike count up 22%, and arrested for Biking While Black

Thanks to everyone for all the kind words following my surgery earlier this month. 

My fumble fingers are finally functional again, even though the swollen new Frankenhand they’re attached to is still almost, sort of, not really, kind of back to normal.

But it’ll get there. And nearly two weeks after surgery, the pain is already better than it was before, so there’s that.

Meanwhile, we have a lot to catch up on.

It will take a few days to catch up on all the bike news we missed, but I’ll make sure we don’t miss out on anything important. 

So let’s get started on the first installment. 

And my apologies for the near-total lack of credits today; with one exception forwarded by multiple people yesterday, I lost track of who sent what to my attention during my extended downtime, which is going to be a problem until we get caught up. 

Photo by Eva Elijas from Pexels.

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Heartbreaking news from DC, where a longtime bike advocate was killed in a collision, just hours after tweeting about the dangers on the city’s streets.

Here’s how the Washington Post described it.

(Jim) Pagels was struck in a horrific chain-reaction crash along Massachusetts Avenue NW, about a mile from his home on Capitol Hill, his family said. The avid rider and self-described urbanist who was in his second year of a doctorate program in economics, died at a hospital.

Pagels’s sister, Laura Menendez, described her brother as funny, smart and passionate about many things — pursuing his postgraduate studies, playing tennis and board games, and traveling by bike.

“He had a good heart,” Menendez said. “And he was such a huge advocate for bike safety.”

The paper also quotes a friend of Pagels.

“He was so excited about working in that urban space,” said Finn Vigeland, a close friend who met Pagels while the two worked on the Columbia Daily Spectator. “He was well aware of the dangers of cycling . . . but he loved biking, and he wanted everyone to bike. He wanted everyone to feel like this was the best way to get around D.C…

I hope our city leaders hear about Jim and understand the life that was so senselessly taken away on Friday. He cared so deeply about the injustices that led to his death, and he would want us to be furious about it,” Vigeland said. “I hope that knowing that this was something Jim was working so hard to change might prompt people to take bolder action.”

Let’s hope city leaders get the message here, too.

Before it’s too late for someone else.

Meanwhile, a writer for the LA Times took the death of his friend and former college classmate personally.

And used the tragedy as a springboard to call for safer streets, and talk with Michael Schneider, founder of LA street safety PAC Streets For All.

It doesn’t take long for their conversation to get to the heart of the problems on our streets.

ME: Six years ago, L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti set a goal of zero traffic-related deaths by 2025, part of the global Vision Zero initiative. So far, we’re not on track to meet that goal. My colleague Steve Lopez recently reported that 238 people died in car crashes in Los Angeles last year — only a tiny decrease from 2019 despite significantly reduced traffic due to COVID-19, and just 8% less than the first full year Garcetti’s policy was in effect. What is going on?

SCHNEIDER: Our city is very good at plans and goals and not very good at implementation. Can you imagine if you were a heart surgeon and people were coming in for heart surgery, and no one would let you operate? Vision Zero is a laudable goal, but until we have a City Council and a mayor who will spend the political capital to make the tough decisions and deal with NIMBY blowback to make changes to our streets, it’s never going to happen…

ME: Where has Mayor Garcetti been on safe streets?

SCHNEIDER: Absent. He says all the right stuff, and he hires great people, like Seleta Reynolds. He will never risk his neck at all for a bike lane or a bus lane.

But I think we’re on the cusp of some exciting changes, especially because the city of Los Angeles has now aligned their elections with federal elections, and the turnout is so much larger and so much more progressive. I think we are on the cusp of truly having different political leadership, where a guy like Paul Koretz, who’s termed out, couldn’t win in 2022 and beyond. And where someone like Nithya Raman, who had making the city more bikeable in her campaign messaging, can defeat an incumbent.

Then there was this about the recent failed attempt to make iconic Melrose Ave safer and more livable for everyone.

ME: Talking about blowback, I read the post you wrote about the proposed “Uplift Melrose” project, which would have added protected bike lanes, wider sidewalks and shaded seating areas along a 1.3-mile stretch of Melrose Avenue. There was broad support from local businesses, but City Councilmember Paul Koretz effectively killed the proposal. Why is it so difficult politically to get changes like these approved?

SCHNEIDER: Opponents typically say the following: If you remove parking or reduce car capacity in any way, how are people going to shop or get to businesses? You’re going to kill business. They also ask, “Why would we invest in this when no one uses the bike lanes anyway?” People cite anecdotes of driving by bike lanes and seeing them empty.

If we had a beautiful six-lane paved highway that only went for one mile and then became a dirt road with potholes, how many cars would take that road? That is the equivalent of what we ask people to do when they bike around Los Angeles. If we had a network of protected bike lanes, you would see a ton of people using them. One piece of evidence is CicLAvia. Those events bring out tens of thousands of people to ride their bikes on closed streets.

What happened to Uplift Melrose was egregious even by L.A. standards. Koretz basically became a puppet for mostly white, wealthy homeowners who couldn’t see themselves riding a bike or a bus.

Pagels’ death serves as a tragic reminder of what can happen to anyone on the streets — even though the risk to any one of us at any particular time is infinitesimally small.

But if anything ever happens to me when I’m riding a bicycle, I want you to politicize the hell out of it.

Take what’s left of my body to the city council and dump it on the dais, if you have to.

Metaphorically speaking, of course. Or literally, for that matter.

And if it happens on a street marked for safety improvements in city’s mobility plan, I hope those lawyers up there on the right will join together to sue the hell out of the city for failing to keep their commitment to safer streets.

Or maybe just sue over LA’s failed and forgotten Vision Zero plan to force the cowards we foolishly elected to lead us to the changes we so desperately need on our streets.

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LADOT has finally release the results of the city’s biennial walk and bike count, which for years has been done on a volunteer basis by the LACBC and later, LA Walks.

Which is something they should have been doing all along.

The result was a 22% increase in bicycle rates from the last count — in 2017.

And yes, they are just now releasing data collected that was collected two years ago, for reasons known only to them.

It also shows how easy it is to boost bicycling with a little decent infrastructure, with a 73% jump in ridership as a result of the protected and separated bike lanes on the MyFigueroa project.

MyFig also resulted the city’s most heavily-trafficked pedestrian corridor, even above the tourist-clogged sidewalks of Hollywood Blvd.

And it points to how Los Angeles can increase the far too low rate of women riding bikes on city streets.

While the report found that women make up 40 percent of pedestrians on weekdays and 44 percent on weekends, women made up just 14 percent of cyclists.  However, the report also indicated a 120 percent increase in female riders on streets improved with dedicated bike paths.

In other words, all they have to do is what the city already committed to in the 2010 bike plan, and the mobility plan that subsumed it.

Not to mention LA’s nearly forgotten Vision Zero and the mayor’s Green New Deal.

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What the hell.

I’m not sure where this video is from; I can’t make out the the police patches or or the name on the patrol cars.

But something looks seriously wrong about a bunch of while cops taking a young black man into custody for the crime of…wait for it…

…riding a bicycle without lights or licenses.

In the middle of the day, no less.

And while some cities require bikes to be registered, I don’t know any place where police have the authority to seize private property over a handful of minor infractions.

Which would be illegal as hell if they tried to seize someone’s car for an expired license or failing to signal a turn.

Let alone not having their headlights on in broad daylight.

Unfortunately, there’s a term for crap like this — Biking While Black.

And regardless of their motivation, it makes the cops look racist AF.

Thanks to Jon, Megan Lynch and Stacey Kline for the heads-up. 

And if anyone knows where this happened, let me know so I’ll never make the mistake of going there.

Update: Thanks to Al Williams for identifying this as Perth Amboy, New Jersey. Which I will make a point of never visiting. 

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If you live or ride in Beverly Hills, the city needs to hear from you at today’s city council meeting, where councilmembers will consider the city’s proposed Complete Streets plan.

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When is a bike lane not a bike lane?

When it’s free parking for a tire shop.

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

A Texas bike rider bike rider was hospitalized with a brain bleed and facial fractures when he was run down by a drunk driver — while riding on an ostensibly carfree bike path.

Singaporean actor Tay Ping Hui says he’s got nothing against bicyclists, despite complaining when a small group of riders merged onto the roadway ahead of him. Because apparently, it’s asking too much to slow down or change lanes to drive safely around them.

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

No bias here, either. A Singapore motorcyclist calls for banning bicycles from the roads after watching one — count ’em, one — scofflaw bicyclist weaving through traffic. Meanwhile, the website somehow feels the need to point out that 34 bike riders were ticketed for breaking the law over the weekend. Makes you wonder how many motorcyclists got tickets the same weekend. Let alone drivers. But sure, blame everyone on bicycles.

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Local

LA Magazine highlights “cool” bike accessories to keep you riding in style. Too bad they forgot to feature that mirrored helmet in the main photo. Because who wouldn’t want to look like a human disco ball?

LA Taco takes a look at nine kinds of bad drivers you’ll meet on the streets of Los Angeles — and they include kids on scooters in that.

Keep an extra eye open if you’re riding the Arroyo Bike Path through Arroyo Seco Park, where a man walking on the pathway was shot several times by couple men who approached him around dusk Sunday evening.

A proposal for protected bike lanes on Pasadena’s North Lake Ave would keep 98% of the current parking on the street.

LA County Sheriff’s Deputies made a spectacular rescue of a mountain biker who went off the side of the road on Mt. Wilson; the victim was hanging head-first over a sheer cliff, clinging to the rock face like a cat, suspended by a thin cord around his ankle.

Former Lakers star Kobe Bryant was one of us, starting his bike rides at 4:30 am and not coming home until the sun was at its peak.

 

State

A bill currently under consideration in the state legislature would increase the penalties for a fatal hit-and-run from 2 to 4 years to 3 to 6. It’s already been watered down from the original proposal, which would have doubled the penalties for hit-and-run that result in death or permanent serious injury.

Calbike wants your support for the proposed Safety Stop Bill, which would allow bike riders to treat stop signs as yields. Which is exactly what many riders safely do right now. And far too many drivers do unsafely.

AB117, the bill that would create a $10 million fund to help lower income Californians buy ebikes, passed its first test in the Assembly Transportation Committee.

Meanwhile, AB 43 unanimously passed the Assembly Transportation Committee with no opposition; the bill would retain the deadly 85th Percentile Law, but allow cities to consider factors other than drivers’ right feet in setting speed limits, such as the location as well as pedestrian and bicycle safety.

California is joining a nationwide movement to prioritize safety over speed. The question is whether the shift is real, or if the legislature will simply pass a few feel good bills before forgetting all about it and moving on to other matters, as too often happens.

Credit old school police work. Riverside police finally busted the hit-and-run driver who killed 52-year old Brian Sabel two years ago, arresting 34-year old Menifee resident Steven Allen Watson Jr. for the crime, despite the apparent lack of any witnesses or evidence at the time of the crash.

Bay Area bike riders may want to ride with a partner or group around Grizzly Peak Boulevard in the hills above Berkeley, where a number of solo riders have been robbed by armed bike jackers; at least five riders have been run off the road and robbed at gunpoint or knifepoint since late March.

A San Francisco ER physician calls for keeping the city’s Safe Streets, saying they’ve helped empty his emergency room.

A San Francisco woman celebrates seven years of living carfree after switching to an ebike when her car was totaled by an uninsured driver; she claims she’s saved over $50,000 over that period.

 

National

Of course she gets it. Former New York DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan teams with her Streetfight co-auther to call for cities to hold onto the street space reclaimed for people during the pandemic, saying surrendering our cities to cars would be a historic blunder.

My hometown university has now joined the Vision Zero club. Which isn’t too surprising, considering it’s surrounded by one of the nation’s most bike-friendly communities. Even though it didn’t get that way until long after I left, of course.

Apparently writing with all seriousness, a New Hampshire medical worker and self-described cyclist says he worked with a state legislator on a bill that would require bicyclists to ride salmon, but the bill died when he couldn’t get time off work to attend the hearing. Because evidently, riding a bike in New Hampshire just isn’t dangerous enough already.

A Massachusetts man got his fat tire bike back two months after it was stolen, when he recognized it being ridden by a burglary suspect on a TV news story about a break-in.

The Big Apple is getting a belated start on the micromobility revolution, as the city finally gets its first e-scooters.

 

International

In a story that’s scary as hell, a writer for Bike Radar examines whether lane-keeping technology poses a risk to bike riders, after he had to wrestle a car for control to avoid running down a bike rider sharing the same lane.

T3 considers what you get with a high-end road bike that you don’t with a cheap one. Or put another way, is an expensive bike really worth 20 times more than a low-end bike?

A pair of Vancouver business owners are taking their case to the British Columbia Supreme Court to fight the re-installation of a protected bike lane through a park, arguing the decision to swap a traffic lane for a bikeway wasn’t “reasonable, rational or logical.” Seriously. It’s in a park.

There’s a special place in hell for the jerk who stole an ebike from a disabled 13-year old English girl.

A pregnant British driver will spend the next 30 months behind bars for killing an 80-year old triathlete while chatting with her sister on WhatsApp; no word on whether her baby will spend the first years of its life in prison with her.

Life is cheap in the UK, where a 26-year old driver got a lousy 35 months in jail for intentionally running down a 13-year old boy riding his bike after getting into an argument with the kid in a park, and following him for 20 minutes before using his car as a weapon to attack him.

Scottish cyclist Josh Quigley is on his second day of a world record attempt for the greatest distance ridden on a bicycle in a single week, attempting to ride 320 miles a day in an 80-mile loop through the Scottish countryside; he’s aiming for Aussie pro Jack Thompson’s record of 2,177 miles, despite suffering multiple broken bones in a crash three months ago.

France is now allowing drivers to trade their old, smog-belching cars for a nearly $3,000 grant to buy a new ebike.

Last year was even a bad year for bike riders in the Netherlands, with the highest number of bicycling deaths in the past 25 years.

This is who we share the road with. A Kiwi driver is filmed blissfully driving on the right side of the road — which is the wrong side Down Under adjacent — until confronted head-on by a large truck. If your first thought was that it was probably just an American tourist confused about what side to drive on, join the club.

 

Competitive Cycling

Dutch legend Marianne Vos outsprinted the competition to win the one-day Amstel Gold Race on Sunday; Belgian Wout van Aert took the men’s race by a nose in a photo finish.

More proof cycling hasn’t kicked its doping habit yet, after 52-year old California masters racer Vahe Aivazian was banned for four years for testing positive for not one, not two, but ten different banned drugs. But the era of doping is over, right?

 

Finally…

That feeling when your personal traffic bypass bridge turns out to be a pedestrian walkway. That feeling when you’re an elected official with no idea what Bicycle Day is all about.

And who needs to pick a bike lock when you can just blow it up with a hand grenade?

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Be safe, and stay healthy. And wear a mask

US traffic deaths up despite — or because of — coronavirus, LA’s last lonely Jump Bike, and NC ballot deadline tomorrow

If you thought the streets were more dangerous last year, you’re right.

According to an estimate from the nonprofit National Safety Council, traffic fatalities jumped 8% across the US last year.

Around 42,060 people lost their lives, an increase of more that 3,200 people who didn’t make it home to their loved ones, despite a decrease in overall miles traveled due to the pandemic.

Last year’s deaths were the most since 2007 when 43,945 people were killed in vehicle crashes. In addition, the safety council estimates that 4.8 million people were injured in crashes last year.

Federal data shows that Americans drove 13% fewer miles last year, or roughly 2.8 trillion miles, said Ken Kolosh, the safety council’s manager of statistics. Yet the number of deaths rose at an alarming rate, he said.

But all those empty streets just left room for dangerous speeding and aggressive drivers to do their worst.

And even though traffic is now getting close to pre-coronavirus levels, the bad behavior on the roads is continuing, authorities say.

“It’s kind of terrifying what were seeing on our roads,” said Michael Hanson, director of the Minnesota Public Safety Department’s Office of Traffic Safety. “We’re seeing a huge increase in the amount of risk-taking behavior.”

This estimate should serve as a wakeup call to cities and states around the US that merely paying lip service to Vision Zero isn’t enough.

And yes, that includes Los Angeles, where virtually nothing has been done to implement the program since it was announced with great fanfare in 2015.

We’ve already badly missed the initial benchmark to reduce traffic fatalities 20% by 2017. And we will inevitably miss the mayor’s promise to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.

As if.

The simple fact is, people will continue to die on the streets in Los Angeles, and throughout the US, until we finally decide that one more death is just one too many.

And that innocent blood on the street is too high a price to pay for the simple act of getting from here to there.

Then do something about it.

Photo of LA’s last Jump Bike by David Drexler.

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David Drexler finds the last, lonely Jump bike on LA’s Westside, still leaning against a lamppost on the south side of Westchester Parkway across from LAX.

He notes that the police and city must think it still belongs to the defunct Jump, and that apparently no one in LA thinks it’s worth stealing.

The popular red bikes were taken off the streets when Uber gave up on the dockless ebikes after mismanaging them into the ground.

………

Streets For All sends word that tomorrow is the last day to request a mail-in ballot for the following neighborhood council races.

This Tuesday is the final day to request a mail-in ballot for neighborhood council elections in Region 5. These regions include: Central Hollywood, East Hollywood, Greater Wilshire, Hollywood Hills West, Mid City West and P.I.C.O.

Speaking of neighborhood councils, Streets For All adds their endorsements for the Central Hollywood NC to those announced for other areas last week.

And if you live, work, attend school or shop in the Mid City West area of LA, the area’s neighborhood council will consider the proposed Venice Blvd For All Complete Streets project at today’s virtual meeting; you can comment during the meeting, or send your comments in advance by email.

………

Once again, Bike Index’ free bicycle registration and stolen bike database proves that sometimes you get a lot more than you pay for — this time with the assistance of the LAPD.

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Hopefully California will be next.

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Start your Monday with an eight minute snowy stunt biking break.

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

Which includes the seemingly intractable battle between bike riders and equestrians, as a horse group in the UK accuses bike riders of going too fast and being abusive to man and beast alike.

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

A bike-riding man faces a murder charge for shooting a Milwaukee driver to death in a road rage dispute, which began when the bike rider punched the man for complaining that he had to swerve to avoid the salmon cyclist.

It takes a major schmuck to deliberately kick a five-year old kid off his bicycle in a New York park.

Unbelievable. A Belgian court fined a bike rider the equivalent a lousy $1.19 for intentionally kneeing a little girl as he passed on a snowy trail, in an attack that caused well-deserved outrage around the world.

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Local

LAist wants to introduce you to David McNeill, the man behind the newly completed 13-mile Park to Playa Trail.

Culver City-based Walk N Rollers is raising funds for a volunteer bike repair hub for kids in need; so far, they’ve raised just under $1,000 of the $10,000 goal.

Coldplay frontman Chris Martin is one of us, taking a scenic ride through the ‘Bu on his Rocky Mountain mountain bike.

 

State

A half dozen “sculptural” bike racks were installed in Oildale, Bakersfield’s neglected neighbor and birthplace of the late, great Merle Haggard, with designs ranging from a coffee cup and electric guitar, to a figure of a racing cyclist and a whimsically-shaped man on a bike.

Streetsblog SF says it’s time to stop painting bike lanes with green paint that wears off, and starting paving them with colored asphalt like the Dutch.

Wheelie-popping teens celebrate the Bike Life every day by riding around the old Santa Rosa courthouse.

One positive to come out of 2018’s Carr Fire is a new and improved 10 Bridges Trail, which was reduced to a one bridge trail after the fire took out the other nine bridges; Redding bicyclists are already riding it, even though the official completion is still months away.

 

National

Don’t hold your breath about getting the ‘bent parts you need anytime soon. Unless you’re standing near me and not wearing a mask, that is, in which case, by all means, hold it until I leave or you pass out, whichever comes first. Thanks to Megan Lynch for the heads-up.

Ebike prices are on their way up, thanks to the expiration of a tariff exemption, as well as bikemakers phasing out promotional pricing.

Las Vegas police bust an alleged drunken hit-and-run driver shortly after the rear-end crash that took the life of a 60-year old bike rider.

This is who we share the road with. A Milwaukee man pled guilty to a hit-and-run crash that killed two young sisters and injured their ten year old cousin, after speeding down a bike lane past cars other drivers stopped at a red light as the girls crossed in a crosswalk. He’ll be sentenced later this year.

A candidate for Manhattan DA calls for treating traffic violence like the epidemic it is.

A Miami cop speeding with red lights and siren killed a bicyclist riding with a group of cyclists last month, yet over a week later, no information has been released.

 

International

Road.cc recommends the tools you should have on hand for basic bike repairs.

Cyclist is celebrating Women’s History Month by highlighting a full month of inspirational women in the bike world.

Scotland signs on to a national Vision Zero plan, pledging to eliminate traffic deaths by 2050. And LA will probably still be struggling to meet their 2025 pledge.

Bicycles become a tool of protest as the head of an Indian political party leads a ride in support of fellow politician targeted by a government vendetta.

A Kenyan website talks with the founder of a Nairobi bike club about riding safely in the country.

That’s one way to do it. A new study shows a reduction in Japanese bike and pedestrian injuries when it snows — because people switch to warmer modes of transport.

A Specialized vice president tells the company’s Asian suppliers to step-up production, insisting there’s millions of dollars to be made once the Covid-19 pandemic is finally over.

Who needs drive-in restaurants when you can ride up to the bike-rack tables at a Manila restaurant and dine on your saddle?

 

Competitive Cycling

Irish pro Sam Bennet apparently finds taking the first stage of Paris-Nice nice, but Aussie pro Richie Porte didn’t make it to the finish line.

No surprise here, as Dutch ‘cross meister Mathieu van der Poel out-sprinted notable roadies to win on the gravel roads of the should be-Monument Strade Bianche.

 

Finally…

If you’re going to ride off with an $11,000 bike, turn off the damn GPS first. That feeling when your delivery ebike goes up in spontaneous flames.

And that feeling when you discover the rusted, jerry-rigged bicycle you’re working on once belonged to Mohandas K. Gandhi.

Yes, that Gandhi.

………

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

LACBC and Streets for All virtual holiday events, big jump in distracted driving, and bust made in Venice bike theft death

Welcome to Week Two of the 6th Annual BikinginLA Holiday Fund Drive!

Thanks to John C for his generous donation to help keep SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy coming to your favorite screen every morning! 

If you haven’t already, take a few minutes right now to join him in supporting this site!

Seriously, don’t make me beg.

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The LACBC will host their free virtual holiday party and potluck this Thursday.

You can register for the event and purchase raffle tickets here.

Meanwhile, Streets for All will host a virtual happy hour this Wednesday to chat with Hayes Davenport, host of the LA Podcast and an advisor to new LA Councilmember Nithya Raman.

He also has the perfect old Hollywood name right out of Central Casting.

………

No surprise here, as Streetsblog announces distracted driving has skyrocketed during the pandemic.

Something anyone who’s spent much time riding or walking the streets can attest to.

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Culver City 311 announces that police have apparently re-arrested the bike thief who killed a 73-year old man while trying to wrestle his bicycle from his grasp; the victim died when he fell and hit his head hit the pavement.

Let’s hope his killer faces the murder charge he so richly deserves.

Thanks to Ted Faber for the heads-up.

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The Hollywood Hills West Neighborhood Council is looking for a few good men or women; we need to get more bike and pedestrian advocates on the council so we can finally see some positive changes around here.

………

In a special shoutout to former pro Phil Gaimon, here’s the LA Times’ tips for making the best holiday cookies.

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

A Montana man pled guilty to booby trapping a popular forrest trail with a nail-spiked board hidden under debris to discourage mountain bikers from using the trail; instead it seriously injured a father walking with his kids.

An Aussie man admits outside court that his idiotic stunt of pushing a shopping cart into a pack of bicyclists riding at speed after a 12-hour bender could have gotten someone killed.

Gee, ya think?

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Local

Angelenos are once again being told to stay home to avoid spreading the coronavirus; the order specifically prohibits travel by “foot, bicycle, scooter, motorcycle, car or public transit,” though there are countless exceptions, and debate over whether they really mean it.

 

State

Bad news from the Central Coast, where a bike rider was killed in a collision with a driver on the 101 Freeway in Arroyo Grande. Naturally, initial reports blamed the victim.

San Luis Obispo’s new active transportation plan commits to completing 100% of the city’s 52 highest priority bike and pedestrian projects within the next ten years — even though 93.5% of the projects are still outstanding. As Los Angeles bike riders can attest, though, a promise like that is only as good as the city’s willingness to live up to it.

More bad news from Tracy, where a 73-year old man was killed in a collision while riding his bike; police immediately blamed the victim for wearing dark clothes and riding without lights after dark, as well as not using a crosswalk to cross the roadway — even though bicyclists aren’t required or even expected to.

Still more bad news, this time from Lake County, where another 73-year old man was killed by a hit-and-run driver as he was riding his bike; the CHP caught the driver several hours later after she abandoned her car at a nearby hotel.

 

National

Gear Junkie looks at the best fat bikes for the coming year.

America’s last remaining Tour de France winner is back in the bike business with a new line of ebikes.

Police in Lincoln NE busted three men, including a 16-year old boy, accused of getting out of their car to mug a 69-year old bike rider and steal his belongings.

Wisconsin’s only Black-owned book store is currently doing business on the back of a big blue tricycle. As usual, read it on Yahoo if Bicycling’s site blocks you out.

Sad news from Philadelphia, where a local community is mourning the death of a long-time neighborhood bike cop from Covid-19.

Life is cheap in Louisiana, where a man got two years home detention for fleeing the scene after slamming his SUV into two kids sharing a bike; fortunately, both recovered after suffering serious injuries.

Florida has completed a study for a bike trail along the state’s coast highway south of Jacksonville where retired ABC News correspondent Tim O’Brien was killed while riding his bike, but it hasn’t been funded.

 

International

Road.cc offers a holiday gift guide for awkward cycling fans, most of which is surprisingly affordable.

Cycling News turns the tables on yesterday’s men’s gift guide for bicyclists with a guide for bike-riding women. Because evidently, men don’t use bike tires or CO2 inflators.

An Ontario, Canada woman reached out to other female mountain bike riders three years ago to form a new group; she now has a network of over 100 active riders.

A Toronto letter writer complains that the city spend $240,000 to build, then remove, a protected bike lane, and concludes that building bike lanes that will be used just “four or five months out of the year” is insanity. Who knew Canadians are that afraid of a little cold weather?

Over 300 Montreal residents complained about bike paths and pedestrian streets that popped up in the city during the pandemic. Which means the other roughly 4,220,700 people in the metro area didn’t.

A British writer takes a 1,307-mile bikepacking trip across the entire length of the UK. Which may be the only place Brits can go once Brexit kicks in at the end of the year.

A Hungarian man is all smiles after riding over 8,000 miles from Hungary to India, despite four weeks in a Pakistani jail when he tried to cross the border.

 

Competitive Cycling

Mountain bike downhill legend Rachel Atherton welcomes the pandemic bike boom, saying everyone has finally discovered what she already knew about bikes.

Eleven of the biggest names in women’s cycling are calling it a career, including American Katie Hall.

Cycling scion Axel Merckx, who ought to know, warns today’s top young cyclists not to burn out too early.

 

Finally…

Don’t ride your ebike like a motorcycle. Who needs the power company when you’ve got a bicycle?

And introducing a thousand dollar full carbon balance bike for the weight weenie toddler in your life.

No, seriously.

Photo from Specialized’s website.

………

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

Ped superhero Peatónito studies LA Vision Zero fail; Slow Streets win at LA Council, and bike rider busted for Metro murder

I’ve never been one for the whole superhero genre, preferring to find heroes in real life.

But I make an exception for Mexico City’s caped protector of pedestrians, the legendary Peatónito.

So I was pleased when he popped up in my inbox today, courtesy of an email from pedestrian advocacy group Los Angeles Walks.

Nowadays it feels like we can all use a hero or shero. So we’re happy to introduce Peatónito! He comes to us from Mexico City, where he began his masked work saving lives and slowing traffic. And Peatónito has traveled beyond, from NYC to Los Angeles, fighting against the crime of poorly designed streets & sidewalks and reckless driving through creative public demonstrations and street theater.

This summer, Los Angeles Walks partnered with the crime fighter as we trained future generations of peatónitos and organized for safe street changes. He finished his training at UCLA’s Institute of Transportaiton Studies, where he penned a pedestrian manifesto (or his graduate capstone paper) titled The Pedestrian Battle of Los Angeles: How to Empower Communities to Plan and Implement Pedestrian Road Safety Infrastructure.

And what a manifesto it is.

Even a brief summary nails the city’s gaping equity gap, as well as the experience most of us have had in fighting for a safer city, for people on two feet or two wheels.

• Walking in a non-white census tract increases the probability of being killed or severely injured by a motor vehicle in Los Angeles (Figure 1). Black people are only 8% of the population, but 20% of all pedestrian fatalities. Meanwhile, median income, vulnerable age (children and older adults), and the number of cars in a household do not have a statistically significant relationship with pedestrian road safety.

• City council members are responsive to residents’ demands and threats opposing pedestrian-focused traffic safety. Even when other city agencies and LADOT support these improvements, the city council has more power over deciding the outcome of road safety infrastructure plans. Consequently, there is a need to balance this power dynamic.

• Affluent, car-oriented residents tend to have stronger influence over council members, who prioritize their concerns over those of underserved people. This power dynamic in LA permits small groups of noisy stakeholders to hijack a conversation; they manipulate the narrative to make it seem convenient for everyone. It is vital to give more power to the people that fight for safe streets, whose voices

“The pedestrian is nobody in this city, he has been forgotten by authorities and our own citizenry. The curious and paradoxical thing is that we are all pedestrians at some moment. As such, we have forgotten ourselves.” – Peatónito

 

Here’s how Los Angeles Walks succinctly sums up Peatónito’s recommendations.

• The City must recommit and strengthen the Vision Zero program, a city-wide initiative to reduce traffic fatalities to ZERO by 2025.

• The City budget should adequately fund and staff all of Vision Zero’s goals, including the Dignity Infused Community Engagement (DICE) project.

• The state should get rid of the 85th percentile rule, a state rule that requires speed to be set at the average of ongoing traffic, which has led to what many call “speed creep.”

Couldn’t have said it better myself.

Let’s hope he sticks around. LA pedestrians — and bike riders — could really use our own superhero.

Photos and quotes courtesy of Los AngelesWalks

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Speaking of which, it looks like people won out over cars in the City of Angels for a change.

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They got her.

Twenty-five-year old Los Angeles resident Irma Monroy was busted for the murder of a Metro employee at DTLA’s 7th Street train station, after she allegedly stabbed the victim in the chest following a heated dispute.

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There’s truly a special place in hell for the Arkansas driver who — allegedly — rammed a woman jogging on the side of the road with his pickup, then carried her off and sexually assaulted her before burying her beside a rural road.

Let’s hope he ends up in a very deep, dark pit for a very long time. Thanks to Robert Leone for the heads-up.

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The bike swap meet scheduled for this weekend by the Mid City West Community Council has been postposed until the following weekend.

Which could come in handy now that the bike boom has cleaned out many bike shops.

MCW Neighborhood Bike Swap
Sat. Oct. 31st, 2020 Halloween!!
7765 Melrose Ave, (Sportie LA parking lot across from Fairfax High)
9 am  to 1 pm. 

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This is why you need to register your bike.

Now.

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Here’s your biennial reminder to get out and bike the vote.

https://twitter.com/starryflo/status/1317571256456159234

And yes, I want to be like him when I grow up.

Meanwhile, it’s nice to see a community organization pressing the candidates for LA’s 10th Council District about their stands on active transportation.

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Looks like The New Yorker is catching up on the city’s coronavirus bike boom.

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

Business owners in Bristol, England are calling for the removal of a new bike lane, claiming it’s killing their business. Because evidently, ripping it out makes far more sense than trying to entice the passing bike riders into their shops.

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

A bike-riding San Bernardino County man has been busted for a series of peeping, burglary and indecent exposure incidents.

Heartbreaking news, as a dog died five days after a bike rider allegedly kicked it in the head for no apparent reason as his owners were running with him on a Minnesota trail. Although something tells me there may be more to the story; bicyclists usually don’t kick at a dog unless it’s attacking them.

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Local

Another paper from UCLA’s Luskin Center documents a century of failed efforts to reign in LA traffic.

 

State

Sad news from San Diego, where a man apparently died of natural causes while mountain biking on a canyon trail near the Miramar National Cemetery.

Santa Barbara considers installing a docked ebike bikeshare system on the city’s main street.

More sad news, this time from Porterville, after a hit-and-run driver was arrested for killing a 15-year old boy as he rode his bike Friday night.

Cities Today asks if San Jose’s new bike plan can boost bicycling rates. Only if they actually build it, as LA bike riders can attest.

The family of an fallen teenage bike rider in Elk Grove calls for changes at the dangerous intersection where he was killed; the speed limit there was recently boosted from 35 mph to 45 mph — no doubt thanks to the deadly 85th Percentile Law.

An Oakland construction site is the safest block in the city for bike riders, after workers installed a Jersey barrier on the left side of the bike lane for a change.

 

National

Actually, that new soft, squishy bike helmet looks pretty damn cool. If it actually works, that is.

Bicycling staff and readers share their spookiest bike rides ever, just in time for Halloween. For a change, there’s no Yahoo mirror site for this one, but try opening it in a private window if the site blocks you out.

A new crowdfunded grant program is designed to help BIPOC filmmakers — Black, Indigenous and People of Color — tell their stories.

C|net offers their picks for the best ebikes.

They get it. A Texas magazine says Houston’s Vision Zero program won’t succeed if it’s done one intersection at a time, and that it calls for a “reckoning that the car-heavy city does not appear ready to make.” They could write the same story about Los Angeles.

New York has completed work on a road diet and two-way cycle track on 5th Avenue through Harlem.

Another pedestrian has been injured in a crash involving New York’s Citi Bike. Except this time, a 72-year old woman was hit by a van driver servicing the bikeshare system.

Actress Famke Janssen is one of us, as she rides her bike with a massive plastic bin on the front through New York to pick up some trash bags. And looks pretty damn stylish doing it.

 

International

Cycling News recommends the best saddles for when your ride hits the rocks.

A Toronto letter writer complains that few of the city’s bike riders wear helmets, despite a mandatory helmet law. Although the headline writer deserves to get their knuckles rapped for saying “Bike lanes are only good if cyclists wear a helmet,” which is factually incorrect, and has nothing to do with what the writer wrote.

Belfast, Northern Ireland has been named the most dangerous city in the UK for people on bicycles, with a whopping 71% of people surveyed saying they’d been involved in some sort of crash in the city.

The EuroNews website wonders why Europe’s largest bike-producing country has been so slow to ride them.

This one is going on my bike bucket list. Italy is opening an 86-mile paved bike trail around the country’s largest lake. Or maybe you’d prefer a 260-mile bike path from Paris to the Normandy coast.

How Spain’s fourth largest city became a leading bike city in just 15 years by building out an entire connected bike network all at once. As LA bicyclists have learned the hard way, we’ll never get there with a disconnected, piecemeal approach. 

Now that’s scary. A Singapore driver records himself swerving at the last moment after coming up way too fast on a bike rider taking the lane.

 

Competitive Cycling

The race moto rider Julian Alaphilippe crashed into in the Tour of Flanders says he can’t help feeling guilty about the crash. Although the people who really deserve the blame are the ones who allow motorcycles near cyclists in the peloton to begin with.

Meanwhile, Alaphilippe had surgery on his hand to repair two bones that were broken in the crash.

Cycling Weekly explains what to look for in the final week of the Giro.

VeloNews looks forward to the Vuelta, with five ways this year’s race will be unlike any other. Race organizers hope to emulate the Tour de France, which went off without a single Covid-19 infection, as opposed to the Giro, which didn’t.

 

Finally…

That feeling when you take social distancing just a little too far. And maybe naming your saddle after the #1 enema maker isn’t the best idea.

Or is it #2?

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

New Streets for All endorsements, taking on NIMBY group Fix the City, and Calbike rolls out quick-build bike lane guide

It’s a relatively light news day in the world of bicycling, so let’s get right to it.

Photo by Florencia Potter from Pexels.

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Streets for All offers their voter’s guide for next month’s general election, including endorsements for Holly Mitchell for county supervisor, and David Kim in California’s 34th Congressional District.

The active transportation PAC also pulls back the curtain on self-appointed NIMBY watchdog group Fix the City, and their connections to CD4 councilmember David Ryu.

https://twitter.com/streetsforall/status/1316032298077360129

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Bike Talk reprises last week’s conversation with bike-friendly Downey city council candidate Alexandria Contreras.

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Calbike wants to make it faster and easier for your city to build out bike lanes.

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Great idea. Colorado is now providing ebikes to help essential workers get there without driving.

https://twitter.com/COEnergyOffice/status/1316069041501396993

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

A small group of Washington bicyclists were attacked by a man when they stopped at a diner while on a 400-mile ride, when their attacker evidently confused their cycling tights for pantyhose.

A British bike advocacy group says the study we linked to yesterday saying most bike riders don’t know the law is “the sort of nonsense which can create a toxic road environment.”

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

Horrible story from Milwaukee, where a road raging salmon cyclist faces a first degree murder charge for fatally shooting a driver who complained, with his windows down, about being forced to swerve around him.

Police in Belfast, Northern Ireland are looking for a man on a mountain bike who’s accused of attacking five women in a single night, stabbing three of them.

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Local

The founder of Bird calls on Santa Monica to amend the city’s Bike Action Plan to increase the number of protected bike lanes.

Speaking of SaMo, the city wants your input on plans to improve safety and speed bus traffic on deadly Lincoln Blvd, although they don’t include bike lanes — yet.

 

State

Sad news from San Jose, where a 76-year old man died a month after he was hit by a driver who swerved into the bike lane he was riding in to get around another vehicle, apparently while passing illegally on the right. Remarkably, no charges have been filed for what was clearly an unsafe pass.

More bad news from the Bay Area, where a 57-year old Antioch woman was killed in a collision while riding her bike.

The curb-protected bike lane on San Francisco’s Embarcadero is slowly starting to take shape.

There’s a special place in hell for whoever has been shooting people and cars in Davis with paintball guns in a series of drive-bys over the past several days, starting with a pair of 14-year old twin boys who were riding bikes with their father.

 

National

New grants supported by major players in the bike industry are now available for to reduce the barriers to bicycle adventures for BIPOC individuals — Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. Better yet, the recipients get to define just what “adventure” means to them.

Portland officials hope to follow in the path of New York and the UK, and allow doctors to prescribe bikeshare use to Black residents who are pre-diabetic, diabetic or have hypertension.

A Portland bike shop lost nine bikes worth twenty grand when someone smashed the front window with a rock before making off with several bikes, while a delayed police response allowed other people to walk out with additional bicycles.

The coronavirus-inspired bike shortage has manifested in a record year for Denver bike thefts.

For the past 20 years, a Kansas man has been restoring bikes in his garage and giving them to the homeless.

A San Antonio, Texas bicyclist offers five tips on how to become a cyclist. Or you could just get a bike and start riding.

A Milwaukee woman rode her bike 70 miles for a checkup with her doctors, 20 years after she received a heat transplant.

Bicycling deaths are rising and city streets are becoming gridlocked as New York emerges from the coronavirus lockdown, while Mayor Bill de Blasio ignores his own transportation experts.

 

International

Road.cc offers a beginner’s guide to ‘cross.

Bicycling profiles Toronto’s new ManDem Cycling Club, devoted to increasing inclusion and diversity on two wheels. You can read it on Yahoo if the magazine blocks you out.

A new study shows London is the UK’s worst major city for bicyclists; 54% of bike riders say they don’t feel safe on London streets due to the city’s aggressive drivers.

Unbelievable. Gutless English officials ripped out a newly installed multi-bike rack after just 24 hours when entitled drivers complained about it taking up an entire parking space. Never mind that it provided parking for five bikes in the same amount of space as a single car.

That’s more like it. Traffic signals will be reconfigured in three major British cities to give people on bicycles priority over motor vehicles.

City Lab looks at the fight over popup bike lanes on Berlin streets.

The City Fix examines how Oslo reduced bike and pedestrian deaths down to zero, and how other cities can apply what they learned.

 

Competitive Cycling

The NBA put all their teams in a bubble, while the Giro forced cyclists to share a hotel buffet with tourists in the middle of a pandemic.

But seriously, what could possibly go wrong? Other than the entire race possibly collapsing when two entire teams and several top riders were forced to drop out after testing positive for Covid-19.

 

Finally…

Your new bike frame could reinflate your next flat. And yet another reminder that past need not be prologue.

Thanks to Hap Dougherty for the link.

………

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

Strava data shows LA bike rate double last year’s; and gun charges yes, but nothing for driving through Pasadena protesters

One quick note. 

Santa Monica Spoke founder Cynthia Rose informs me that the 5 mph speed limit signs on the beachfront bike path we mentioned on Monday was installed temporarily for a construction project, and have been removed. 

So that’s one bit of good news to start your day. 

Photo by Ekrulila from Pexels.

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Apparently, LA’s bike boom wasn’t an illusion.

According to Strava data, bicycle use in bike-unfriendly Los Angeles nearly doubled in May, jumping 93% over this time last year.

Among the six U.S. cities for which Strava provided data, Houston and Los Angeles, two sprawling metropolises where just .5% and 1% of the respective populations biked to work in pre-pandemic times, stand out. In Houston, the total volume of cycling trips in Houston was 138% higher in May 2020 than in May 2019. In Los Angeles, the jump was 93%. Unlike their peers, these two places also saw cycling increases in April, the first full month of widespread stay-at-home order and economic shutdowns.

Never mind that Strava is still used by a subset of bike riders, meaning the actual numbers could be even higher, as the LACBC’s Eli Akira Kaufman points out.

Eli Akira Kaufman, the executive director of the L.A. County Bicycle Coalition, said the data also likely leaves out many of the essential workers he’s observed hopping on bikes instead of the bus, which could mean that the numbers are even higher than what the Strava data shows. Now his thoughts are towards the future. Cities like Houston and L.A., with their thousands of miles of car-oriented streets, have their work cut out building protected bike lanes and other infrastructure to encourage cycling even after the pandemic ends

“How do we keep the riding coming?” he said. “That’s the question now.”

The obvious answer to that is to provide a safe, convenient and connected network of bikeways that allows riders to traverse the city, and their own neighborhoods.

Which is exactly what LA’s three-tiered 2010 bike plan, now part of the city’s Mobility Plan 2035, calls for.

And exactly what Los Angeles isn’t doing.

Meanwhile, bikes are still booming, as SoCal bike shops report double and triple their normal sales.

………

This is who we share the roads with, protest edition.

A San Marino man who drove through a group of peaceful Pasadena protestors last month has been charged with conspiracy to transport firearms across state lines, as well as making a false statement to police.

During a search of Hung’s truck, police found a loaded semiautomatic handgun, multiple high-capacity magazines loaded with ammunition, an 18-inch machete, $3,200 in cash, a long metal pipe and a megaphone, according to the affidavit.

Evidently, endangering innocent people with a motor vehicle is just dandy, though.

………

This is who we share the roads with, hit-and-run edition.

The LAPD is looking for a hit-and-run driver who ran down a 70-year old woman in Chinatown as she walked in a crosswalk with the right-of-way, leaving her with a brain bleed and a broken neck.

Security video shows the heartless coward get out of his Mercedes to look at the victim, then get back in and simply drive away.

As usual, there is a $25,000 standing reward for any hit-and-run that results in serious injuries in the City of Los Angeles.

Thanks to Jeff Vaughn for the heads-up.

………

Streets for All has released their endorsements and Voter Guide for the November election, in both English y Español.

………

They get it.

………

LADOT has begun work on a curb-protected Complete Streets project on Reseda Blvd in Reseda and Northridge.

………

Then there’s this.

https://twitter.com/may_gun/status/1308948399929143303

Secure bike parking is a good thing. But maybe we can do a better job of considering the needs of disabled riders next time.

………

Germans know how to promote World Car Free Day.

https://twitter.com/BirgitHebein/status/1308390818756079618

That tweet translates to,

Take public transport, walk or cycle and thus set an example for more space in the city.

………

It’s not everyday a hospital ad is worth sharing.

………

Bike stunts, without the bike.

………

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

A London bike rider suffered a broken shoulder when a road raging bus driver allegedly swerved into him, knocking him off his bike; passengers on the bus reportedly begged the hit-and-run driver to stop.

An Aussie man faces charges for pushing a friend in a shopping cart into a group of bicyclists traveling at over 25 mph, taking out a number of riders. The man, who had been drinking for a dozen hours, claims his actions weren’t deliberate and he just lost control of the cart, despite how it looks on security cam video.

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

In a tragic story from Milwaukee, a 54-year old man was fatally gunned down by a bike rider in a dispute over a traffic “mishap.” There is no excuse for violence, especially at the risk of someone’s life. Just suck it up and ride away, already.

………

Local

Los Angeles joined with New York, London, Berlin and eight other cities in Europe and North America in pledging to divest from fossil fuel companies to fight climate change.

LADOT wants your help in identifying low-stress travel corridors in Central Los Angeles.

A new self-guided audio bike tour through DTLA leads you through the hidden histories of Latino Los Angeles, while the slower pace on a bike allows you to take it all in.

Metro is pulling the plug on its smart bike bikeshare program on LA’s Westside, replacing them with “classic” bikeshare bikes in Venice, Palms, Playa Vista and Santa Monica, while adding nine more docks.

REI is offering adult classes on how to ride bike in Redondo Beach next month, as well as one-on-one adult instruction in Redondo Beach and Santa Monica; the outdoor co-op is also offering kid’s classes in Santa Monica.

 

State

California Governor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order banning the sale of gasoline-powered vehicles in the state by 2035. Unfortunately, he didn’t take any action to encourage bike riding, walking or transit use to make those vehicles unnecessary.

Hold your pony in check. Newport Beach adopts an ordinance aimed at ebike users on the city’s boardwalk, stating that no one may exceed the posted 8 mph speed limit, regardless of what they’re riding.

Orange County sheriff’s deputies will crack down on traffic safety violations that endanger bicyclists and pedestrians in Dana Point today, regardless of who commits them. The usual protocol applies — ride to the letter of the law until you cross the city limit lines, so you’re not the one who gets ticketed.

San Diego’s new Mid-City Bikeway project is nearly half-finished, as the city unveiled eight new traffic circles installed to improve safety at intersections.

Condolences to San Diego bike riders, who will soon be stuck with the city’s first sharrows on a three block section of Hancock Street. As we’ve said before, sharrows only serve to help drivers improve their aim in an effort to thin the bike riding herd.

Our friend Michael Wagner of CLR Effect visited Santa Barbara’s newly closed State Street, saying restaurants and businesses are benefitting from the carfree foot and bike traffic, and comparing it to a 24/7 CicLAvia. Which sounds like a damn good idea to me.

I’ve found lots of things while riding a bike. Fortunately, a human skull on a Tahoe bike trail ain’t one of them.

 

National

Good news for my fellow diabetics, as a new study shows bike riding reduces cardiovascular mortality in diabetes, as well as mortality risk from all causes. If the coronavirus doesn’t get us first, that is.

The Verge visits the makers of Rain-Bow bike fenders.

C|net reviews Garmin’s new rearview bike radar systems and rides away impressed.

Mashable says Ridepanda is your one-stop shop for all things ebike and e-scooter.

Specialized gets spanked by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, which has rejected the company’s trademark application for its latest bike, ruling it’s too similar to a tire brand.

Singer-songwriter Laura Veirs is one of us, riding her bike “all over Portland” to cope with her divorce after 20 years of marriage.

A manager with the Washington Traffic Safety Commission patiently explains why allowing bike riders to treat stops signs as yields is better for everyone.

Add this one to your bike bucket list, with an easy bike tour around Aspen and Snowmass, Colorado.

A new Indianapolis mural will honor Black cycling legend Major Taylor — even if it means removing another mural that has been there for 45 years.

Kindhearted Connecticut cops pitched in to buy a little boy a new bike after his was stolen.

A New York State assembly member says the state must subsidize ebike purchases. The same goes for California, except more so.

Nearly 130 people rode their bikes 300 miles from New York to DC last month to protest police brutality and racial injustice as part of the March on Washington. As usual, you can read the story on Yahoo if you’re blocked by Bicycling’s draconian paywall.

DC adopts a Vision Zero bill intended to eliminate traffic deaths within the next four years, including plans for red light and stop sign cams, as well as bus lane cameras. Let’s hope they have better luck with it than we did, since LA’s Vision Zero has devolved into a nearly forgotten footnote in city history.

I want to be like him when I grow up, too. A Georgia man on the cusp of 90 has been buying and refurbishing bicycles for the past decade, giving away the finished bikes to children, schools and charities.

They get it, too. Miami is planning to permanently ban cars from the city’s beachfront Ocean Drive, while prioritizing pedestrians first in the city’s entertainment district, followed by bicyclists and transit, with personal vehicles last.

 

International

Medical staff with Britain’s National Health Service continue to be targeted by bike thieves, as one man has now had two bikes stolen in just the past three months.

Electric cars won’t solve the UK’s pollution problem. Or California’s, for that matter.

Blue-tired, Netherlands-based Swapfiets is reportedly taking Europe by storm with its long-term bike rental business model, and a promise to fix your flats for you.

Cyprus intends to invest half a million euros to encourage more people to walk and bike. However, that only equates to $585,000, which won’t go very far.

Los Angeles could soon get lapped by Tehran, as Dutch officials offer recommendations to get the city on the right track for bicycling, while noting that several Iranian cities have the potential to be bike friendly.

Talk about not getting it. A Philippine city is considering a proposal to mandate helmets and reflectorized vests for bike riders, as well as limiting riders to carrying minimal loads, since “bicycles are not designed to carry much cargo.” Which would come as a hell of a surprise to many bike commuters and cargo bike owners.

 

Competitive Cycling

Rouleur profiles Trinidadian cycling star Teniel Campbell, saying she’s on the brink of breaking big in women’s cycling.

Red Bull shares the playlists that get mountain bike, ‘cross and cross-country pros ready to ride.

Former Vuelta and Giro winner Nairo Quintana has denied any wrongdoing in a doping investigation targeting members of his entourage. Then again, that’s what Lance said. And Landis. And Contador. And…

 

Finally…

If you’re going to propose on the Brooklyn Bridge, tell your photographer to stay out of the bike lane. If you didn’t drive on a narrow bike trail, your Jeep wouldn’t need to be rescued in the first place; thanks to David Drexler for the heads-up.

And you be you.

………

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

Alleged San Diego hit-and-run driver pleads not guilty, and more on NIMBY Koretz killing Melrose project

Twentynine-year old Mauricio Flores pled not guilty to felony hit-and-run in San Diego on Monday.

Flores is the minivan driver who allegedly slammed into a 66-year old bike rider near the city’s airport last month, leaving the victim with a life-threatening head injury.

In actions captured on video, he allegedly got out of his van, along with a passenger identified as 50-year old Jessica Bailey, examined the victim lying in the roadway, then calmly removed his bike from under their van and drove away.

They were captured in Kern County less than two weeks later.

There’s no word on whether Bailey is in custody, or if she will face any charges.

And no word on the identity or condition of the victim.

There are several stories from other news outlets, like this one, but they’re all virtually identical. Thanks to Phillip Young for the heads-up.

………

Streets For All founder Michael Schneider lays out in painful, step-by-step detail just what went wrong with the Uplift Melrose plan to improve the iconic, if deadly, LA street.

And how the environmentally friendly project was killed by a single LA councilmember, acting on behalf of a notorious NIMBY group.

Just after the Mid City West meeting, the NIMBYs sprang into action. They viewed Uplift Melrose as a threat to the sacred space of vehicles in this city, and were outraged that a project would even be considered that would rellocate space from cars for a bike lane. Those bike lane thieves, trying to take away sacred car space! And while the project was so much more than a bike lane — it was wider sidewalks, new trees, raised crosswalks, new lighting… all they could see was the bike lane.

Jim O’Sullivan, co-founder of Fix The City — a litigious organization that sues over nearly every bike lane and high density housing project using money from questionable funding sources — started sending threatening emails to Councilmember Koretz and eventually to the entire city council. They also posted misinformation on Next Door. When NIMBYs can’t win on the merits of something, then they simply resort to the tired and true “there wasn’t enough outreach” argument.

It’s worth taking a few minutes — okay, nine, according to the article — to read the whole thing.

Because this is what we’re up against.

And what we will continue to confront — and too often, lose — as long as we continue to elect regressive leaders in environmentalist sheep’s clothing.

Speaking of which, Bike the Vote LA is encouraging you to phonebank for CD4 candidate Nithya Raman this Sunday to support an actual environmentalist.

………

Something is seriously wrong when the person charged with enforcing a state’s laws doesn’t obey them himself.

South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg killed a man riding his bike Saturday night, then continued driving home without bothering to stop, later claiming he thought he’d hit a deer.

An excuse used by countless other hit-and-run drivers, in a usually failed attempt to avoid responsibility for their crimes.

It remains to be seen whether Ravnsborg, who has a long record of speeding and other traffic violations, will be held accountable. Or if his position will shield him from blame.

Although it doesn’t bode well that the state’s Department of Public Safety is withholding key details of the investigation.

Ravnsborg was reportedly driving home from a Republican fundraising dinner, where he swears he didn’t drink.

Even though any rational and sober person would stop to see what they hit after an impact like that.

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Still more proof you can literally carry anything on a bicycle.

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

An American marine biologist in the Philippines with a bad case of windshield bias questions why road space is being given to bike riders when motor vehicles bring in much more “revinue” for the government. He may be many things, but an environmentalist clearly ain’t one of them, regardless of what the headline says.

………

Local

Bruce Willis is one of us, riding his Trek ebike through the streets of LA, even if the story somehow comes by way of Islamabad. Yippie-ki-yay, indeed.

Olympic boarder Shaun White and Vampire Diaries actress Nina Dobrev are two of us. Or make that three, as they went for a bike ride through the ‘Bu with her dog in his arms.

 

State

A recovering Newport Beach stroke victim reached his goal of swimming 100 miles Labor Day weekend, then walked a couple miles to where he’d left his bicycle to ride back home.

A San Diego letter writer questions the city’s 42 percent increase in bike ridership, saying it’s meaningless without knowing how many riders there were before. Hate to say it, but he’s got a point.

 

National

Washington state is adopting the Idaho Stop Law next month, allowing bike riders to treat stops as yields — but not treat red lights like stop signs, as is legal in Idaho.

This is how it works in other places. Austin, Texas is going to make permanent a popup bike lane installed during the coronavirus crisis after it proved successful. Unfortunately, unlike countless other cities around the world, auto-centric Los Angeles never bothered to install any temporary bike lanes during the lockdown period to begin with.

Dozens of Louisville KY residents rode to apartment where Breonna Taylor was fatally shot by police, who were looking for her former boyfriend, to see where it happened and demand justice for her.

Chicago is responding to the increase in bike riders by installing a curb and post protected bike lane on a busy street, removing 100 parking spaces to make room.

Boston is raising Austin’s ante by making an entire Downtown popup bike network permanent. Although Boston’s bike boom has also been reflected in a corresponding jump in bike thefts.

Now that’s how to campaign. A New York state assemblyman is riding his bike 116 miles across the state’s 116th Assembly District to raise funds for his campaign.

A 73-year old Franciscan friar in Pennsylvania is riding nearly 400 miles along the Erie Canal to raise funds for an outreach center serving people struggling with rural poverty; it’s the stage-4 colon cancer survivor’s tenth annual ride.

Billy Connolly is one of us, too. The Scottish comic, who suffers from Parkinsons, suffered an eye injury falling off his ebike near his home in Key West.

Unbelievable. Authorities dropped aggravated assault charges against a Florida driver who aggressively drove into a crowd of protesters, then pulled a gun on them when they surrounded his car.

Police in Florida have arrested four men for the January, 2019 shooting death of a man riding his bike, who was apparently collateral damage in a shootout between the occupants of two cars.

 

International

The World Resources Institute says 80 percent of urban freight begins or ends in cities, and it’s time to take it seriously — including using e-cargo bikes to make deliveries.

A bike rider goes skitching, hanging on to a semi-truck trailer on a Toronto highway. Although someone should tell Narcity that there’s no need to pedal when you’re being pulled by a truck.

A Canadian woman explains how Covid-19 finally encouraged her to learn how to ride a bike at the ripe old age of 33.

Financial Times profiles famed British bike rider and designer Paul Smith, calling him the most loved man in fashion.

He gets it. An English cycling instructor says a new protected bike lane isn’t intended to make it easier to drive, but to improve safety for people on bicycles and in cars.

France ie encouraging more people to ride bikes by paying them the equivalent of nearly $60 to get their bikes repaired.

 

Competitive Cycling

Defending Tour de France champ Egan Bernal dropped out after Sunday’s 15th stage, complaining that he just didn’t have any power.

Cyclist looks at Slovenian cyclist Tadej Pogačar, calling him cycling’s newest sensation.

An excerpt from a new book examines the troubled legacy of cycling great Marco Pantani; the 1998 Tour de France winner died of a coke overdose just six years later.

Women’s cycling is still going strong, despite the media’s best efforts to ignore it, including the longest ever stage of the Giro Rosa.

 

Finally…

That feeling when the disabled parking is in the middle of the street. Your next bike could be a folding mountain ebike for just 600 bucks.

And what does it say when the streets aren’t safe enough for police to conduct a bike safety sting?

………

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

Streets For All talks with CD4 challenger Nithya Raman; and bike riding celebs — possibly including the next president

Streets For All is hosting an online conversation with CD4 candidate Nithya Raman, who’s challenging first term incumbent David Ryu in November.

While the coronavirus has taken a lot of the energy out of this year’s election, it remains one of the most important elections in memory.

And this race is no different.

Ryu spent most of his first term blocking progress on street safety projects, before becoming a fair weather convert to urbanism in the past year, as he faced a pair of urbanists and homeless advocates in the primary election.

One of those was Raman, who forced him into a runoff this November. And whose election could be a game changer for the City of Angels

And yes, she’s got my vote as soon as my ballot arrives.

 

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Today’s common theme is bike-riding celebs. And one that maybe won’t be for awhile.

America’s Got Talent and former American Idol judge Simon Cowell fractured his back in several places after crashing his new ebike in front of family members in the courtyard of his massive Malibu mansion; he should make a full recovery after a six-hour surgery to install a metal rod to stabilize his spine. Although someone should tell People that a broken back does not a “minor accident” make.

The new Batchelor is one of us, taking a ride in Florida as he waits for the show to resume filming.

Bohemian Rhapsody and Mr. Robot star Ramy Malik is one of us, as he goes for a casually dressed ride in London.

Former Oasis frontman Noel Gallagher is one of us, saying he goes offroad riding four times a week. Even if he’s not a fan of wearing his “fucking helmet.”

And presidential frontrunner Joe Biden is one of us, too.

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Anyone see the problem here?

https://twitter.com/EntitledCycling/status/1292652497538936832

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Keep your eyes peeled for a purloined cargo bike.

https://twitter.com/jessicabasic2/status/1291810474942554112

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Bikes are the means of protest in Belarus, as citizens took to the streets to demand an end to the country’s corrupt government in advance of Sunday’s election.

Although someone should tell the cops there that it’s kind of hard to catch bike riders when you’re on foot.

Or better yet, don’t tell them.

Not that it did any good; experts say it was rigged from the start.

Thanks to Megan Lynch for the heads-up.

………

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

No bias here. An editorial in the conservative Santa Barbara News Press calls for licensing and taxing bike riders, while complaining about traffic lanes being taken from those poor, suffering drivers and given to people in bicycles, as well as a long, long list of other grievances.

Residents of Bristol, England, are accused of moving construction barricades and posting signs to keep bike riders out of their neighborhood.

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

Life is cheap in Britain, where a wrong-way bicyclist got just six months for slamming into a pair of pedestrians while riding drunk and without working front brakes; one of the victims, an 81-year old woman, died from her injuries five months later.

……..

Local

Yes, the beachfront Marvin Braude Bike Trail is open for its full length, from Pacific Palisades to the Palos Verdes Peninsula. But the Ballona Creek Bike Path will be closed for maintenance work during the day all next week.

LA Taco offers the gut-wrenching story of the aftermath of a hit-and-run that seriously injured a homeless man in LA’s Historic Filipinotown. And the inaction of police as investigators don’t have the time or staffing to follow up, even after getting the license number of the driver’s car.

The Mid City West Community Council will consider a much needed $50 million makeover of moribund and traffic-choked Melrose Avenue, including the city’s first Dutch-style curb level protected bike lanes. Fortunately, the MCWCC is one of city’s most progressive neighborhood councils; the online meeting will take place tomorrow starting at 6:30 pm.

 

State

San Diego’s $177 billion, 30-year anti-LA style transportation makeover is in jeopardy thanks to the coronavirus pandemic.

Hundreds of mostly maskless people defied health officials and turned out for Santa Barbara’s annual Fiesta Cruiser Run informal bike ride. So if Santa Barbara Covid-19 cases spike in a couple of weeks, you’ll know why.

 

National

Bike Snob isn’t exactly onboard with bicycle shops and bikemakers boycotting police bikes.

We mentioned this one before, but it’s worth a reminder. A Portland study shows that even slow bike riders in the traffic lane don’t delay drivers more than a few seconds. So tell ’em to chill, already.

Um, no. A resident of a Washington island called police to say someone on a bicycle was trying to crash into cars.

He gets it. A Utah bike rider says bicyclists only act entitled because we are — pointing out that bikes have a right to the road under state law. That’s true in every other state, as well.

Kindhearted Arkansas cops teamed with a local motorcycle club to buy a special needs boy a bicycle trailer so he can ride with his mom.

A 22-year old man from Minneapolis is riding 84.6 miles a day for ten days to honor Black people killed by police.

 

International

The owner of a British Columbia driving school says some of his best friends may be bike riders, but he hates a trial project that restricts two-way automotive traffic to a single shared lane, while providing bike lanes in each direction.

A bighearted Calgary neighborhood organization gave out 280 refurbished kids bikes.

This is why you should register your bike. Police in Ottawa, Canada are looking for the owners of 30 bicycles recovered from bike chop shops following a month-long investigation, but only one was registered. Which means the other 29 owners may be out of luck.

Nearly one thousand people turned out for a Black Unity Bike Ride through the streets of London, in what’s planned to be an annual event.

Business is booming in a UK town after the city closed off a roadway, blocking motor vehicle access through the business district while opening the street to diners, bike riders and pedestrians.

That’s more like it. A British truck driver got a well-deserved eight years behind bars for killing two people while playing video games behind the wheel.

New protected bike lanes are popping up on Dublin’s coast.

Lots of kids ride bikes. Not many discover what may be an actual miracle while doing it.

After a young mountaineer was killed in a hit-and-run, an Indian newspaper says separated bike lanes are urgently needed, and those responsible for her death must receive appropriate punishment for the crime.

Officials in Bengaluru, India, are asking bicyclists to crowdsource the routes where they want bike lanes by using tools like Strava and Google Maps, as bicycling picks up steam in the city during the coronavirus crisis.

He gets it, too. A Bangladeshi architect challenges the callous carelessness of the country’s drivers, and a system that lets them get away with it with a wink and a smile.

Add South Central Vietnam to your bike bucket list.

The worldwide coronavirus bike boom has even reached the Pacific island nation of Guam.

A New Zealand man pled guilty to multiple DUI charges for killing a father riding bikes with his daughter last April; tests showed he was high on meth and Valium, and had tossed a handgun and ammunition out of his car following the crash.

 

Competitive Cycling

Remco Evenepoel won the Tour of Poland; the 20-year old Belgian cyclist has won all four of the stage races he’s started this year.

Evenepoel’s fellow Belgian Wout van Aert out sprinted Julian Alaphilippe to win the rescheduled one-day Milan-San Remo spring classic.

Doctors believe Dutch cyclist Fabio Jakobsen will be able to return to racing despite suffering a crushed palate and windpipe, as well as other major facial injuries, after he was hip-checked into the road barriers by another rider as he sprinted for what would have been a likely victory in the first stage of the Tour of Poland. Meanwhile, the cyclists union is repeating their call for standard barriers at all races so this doesn’t happen again

 

Finally…

No, a red Camaro didn’t flee the scene after hitting a six-year old boy riding his bike, the unlicensed heartless coward behind the wheel did. Your next foldie could have full-size folding wheels.

And if you’re going to ride off on your bike after stealing a bottle of booze, wear a damn mask.

And some clothes, maybe.

………

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