Among the winners so far are AB 954, aka The Bike Highways Bill, and AB 891, Quick-Build Project Pilot Program.
The former would set up a pilot program to connect existing bikeways into bike highways, while the latter would instruct Caltrans to use quick-build designs to improve state roads.
Among the other bills also passing in the Assembly was AB 366, allowing interlock devices for drivers convicted of DUI.
Bills passing in the state Senate included SB 71, streamlining CEQA environmental review requirements for public transportation, bike and pedestrian projects that would reduce car dependency.
Also passing the Senate was SB 445, which imposes a deadline on local agencies to review permits for Complete Streets and sustainable transportation projects.
Dying for this year were a bill that would have placed a statewide bond issue to fund sustainable transportation projects on next year’s California ballot, and one to allow victims of climate disasters or their insurers to sue oil companies to recoup their losses.
Meanwhile, the long awaited Stop As Yield, aka Idaho Stop, law that would allow California bike riders to treat stop signs as yields — and possibly roll through red lights after coming to a complete stop — will have to wait until we have a new governor in two years.
It wasn’t introduced this year because Gavin Newsom already vetoed two previous versions of the bill.
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This is why people keep dying on our streets.
Life is cheap in Los Altos, where a man walked without a day behind bars for the distracted driving death of a 38-year old woman riding a bicycle after he was sentenced to probation and community service; he had faced up to six years for felony vehicular manslaughter. Not a single year, as the story suggests.
And life is equally cheap in Michigan, where a former cop walked without a day behind bars for killing an 83-year old man riding a bicycle, after he was sentenced to 12 lousy months of probation; the victim had just finished a ride across the country, and was on his way back home to Florida.
So what’s the point of even having traffic laws, if overly lenient judges won’t even hold drivers accountable for killing someone when they break them?
Just saying “oopsie” shouldn’t be good enough.
………
Local
No news is good news, right?
State
A San Francisco woman has filed suit against Waymo after she was doored by the passenger of a Waymo self-driving cab, and prevented from taking evasive action by another Waymo cutting across the bike lane.
CNN recommends the best bike shorts for a more comfortable ride, according to “seasoned cyclists.” Which raised the question of how were they seasoned, and whether they should be grilled, baked or air fried.
Hundreds of people turned out for a Slow Roll memorial ride to remember a 38-year old Ohio woman who was killed when an 18-year old driver crossed onto the wrong side of the road, slamming head-on into her and another woman riding their bikes together, along with a third person who escaped the crash. Maybe if we had a turnout like that when someone gets killed here, we could see some real change in LA, for a change.
Streetsblog says if New York’s mayor really wants to improve traffic safety, the city should take advantage of a one-year old state law allowing it to lower speed limits to 20 mph, rather than scapegoating ebike riders, since NYC drivers injure over 9,600 pedestrians each year, leaving less than 40 due to all other causes.
The BBC has finally realized that bicyclists with bike cams aren’t “vigilantes” or “grassing snitches,” belatedly concluding that cameras help bring dangerous drivers to justice and are often the only recourse riders have. Although California law doesn’t allow them to be used against drivers for traffic violations or misdemeanors, technology be damned.
A new Chinese-made ebike conversion kit promises to install the first time in just three minutes, and ten seconds thereafter, while offering one of the smallest and most portable sizes yet; a crowdfunding campaign will launch soon offering an early bird price of just $349. Although how that could be affected by Trump’s on-and-off tariffs is TBD.
April 11, 2025 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on First shot fired in Vermont Ave HLA battle, NYT argues for sprawl, and lack of interest in LA Neighborhood Council elections
Day 101 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
………
And so it begins.
After speculating yesterday that officials were virtually daring someone to file suit alleging Metro’s Vermont Avenue bus rapid transit project is violating Measure HLA, someone did.
I live very close to Vermont Avenue, where my family and I walk, bike, and/or take transit nearly every day. Since 2014, I have attended meetings focused on Vermont transit improvements, where I and many other advocates have pressed for complete streets, including bike lanes that have long been part of the city’s plans for Vermont. I was, and still am, excited that L.A. City voters approved Measure HLA, which requires the city to gradually implement its plan for a more transit-friendly, more walkable, and more bikeable Vermont.
In researching my Streetsblog coverage of Measure HLA and the Vermont Transit Corridor project, I became frustrated encountering repeated instances where the city continues to ignore its own plans for a safe and truly multimodal Vermont.
Linton goes on to say he’s not looking for any personal gain, other than recouping his attorney fees.
Rather, he hopes the lawsuit will result in a settlement that will deliver long-delayed safety improvements that will “save lives, foster public health, stem climate-harming emissions, and improve the quality of life for Vermont Avenue’s pedestrians, bus riders, and bicyclists.”
Linton is represented by a pair of attorneys who should be well-known in the Los Angeles area, former state Assemblymember Mike Gatto and longtime Bicycle Advisory Committee member Jonathan Weiss.
Which suggest LA City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto will have her hands full trying to defend Los Angeles in this matter.
Lord knows I wouldn’t want to go up against either one of them. Let alone both.
The solution is to build more. That’s not controversial — housing is one of the few remaining areas of bipartisan agreement. The rub, as always, is where and how to get it done. Over the past decade, dozens of cities and states have tried to spur construction by passing laws that aim to make neighborhoods denser: removing single-family zoning rules, reducing permitting times and exempting housing in established neighborhoods from environmental rules.
That shift is important, especially in cities like San Francisco and Los Angeles that have little chance of lowering housing costs or reducing their homeless populations without building up. But cities are difficult and expensive places to build because they lack open land. Adding density to already-bustling places is crucial for keeping up with demand and preventing the housing crisis from getting worse. It will not, however, add the millions of new units America needs. The only way to do that is to move out — in other words, to sprawl.
He goes on to examine what has limited growth over the last several decades, from anti-sprawl legislation and stringent zoning requirements, to the pervasive effects of NIMBYism.
Even if all the regulatory restraints were removed tomorrow, developers couldn’t find enough land to satisfy America’s housing needs inside established areas. Consequently, much of the nation’s housing growth has moved to states in the South and Southwest, where a surplus of open land and willingness to sprawl has turned the Sun Belt into a kind of national sponge that sops up housing demand from higher-cost cities. The largest metro areas there have about 20 percent of the nation’s population, but over the past five years they have built 42 percent of the nation’s new single-family homes, according to a recent report by Cullum Clark, an economist at the George W. Bush Institute, a research center in Dallas.
Admittedly, Dougherty makes a strong case.
But what he fails to consider is the concomitant problems of endless sprawl, as we in SoCal know so well, from crushing traffic congestion and smog to declining inner cities and the ever-rising casualties from traffic violence.
Not to mention living, not miles, but hours from the services you rely on, such as healthcare and courts, and continuing to mandate car dependency while killing walkability and bikeability.
Yes, we desperately need more housing. A lot more.
But we need to build it in places and ways that don’t exacerbate all the other problems that destroy our quality of life at the same time.
Part of the problem, aside from the difficulty of casting a ballot, is an almost total lack of local news coverage in today’s Los Angeles, resulting in a large segment of the population who have no idea what Neighborhood Council district they’re in, or that they even exist in the first place.
The other problem is that for every NC like Mid-City West or North Westwood council that’s responsive to and representative of the local community, you have too many overly dominated by one or two strong personalities, or NIMBYs who just say no to everything.
They should be a place we can go to address city problems on a micro, rather than macro, level, and trust those concerns will be heard and acted on. Especially in a city with far too few council districts, where every councilmember represents more than a quarter million people.
Mayor Bass is reportedly considering ways to reform, reinvigorate or replace the Neighborhood Council system.
But while change is needed, I’m not sure she’s earned the trust to lead this process anymore.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps going on.
A writer for Cycling Weekly says he’s already lost over four pounds and his head feels clearer just a month into exploring sober curiosity. I’m a week into involuntary sobriety myself, thanks to a new medication that’s incompatible with my occasional beer.
Day 28 of LA’s Vision Zero failure to end traffic deaths by 2025.
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The good news is, I don’t seem to have suffered any lasting effects from that knock on the head.
The bad, our corgi ate a grape off the ground, which are highly toxic for dogs, before we could stop her. Although the poison control center tells us up to three grapes “should” be okay for a dog her size.
So now we’re facing 48 hours of watchful waiting looking for any sign of toxicity.
Good times.
Like I said yesterday, it’s just one damn thing after another these days.
Francois Auroux was clutching the large oil paintings on his bicycle as he escaped the fire, which began three weeks ago today, when he encountered Kovacik doing a live remote broadcast.
Kovacik offered to hold the paintings for him — which ironically included Man on a Bicycle by Greek artist Alekos Fassianos — promising to return them at a later date, as the falling ash and embers surrounded them.
The two men met again Thursday as Kovacik kept his promise and returned the paintings, which is all that Auroux has left of his home of 39 years, other than the bicycle he escaped on.
However, lost in that story is another, more important story.
Because as residents struggled to get out with their belongings packed in their cars on the gridlocked streets, Auroux was able to quickly pedal to safety.
Yes, he had to leave most of his things behind, and struggled to ride with the awkward artwork. But he was able to get out when many others couldn’t.
I’ve been told by a number of people, including some who barely escaped other major fires in the state, that no one would ever use a bicycle to flee a raging wildfire.
Yet Auroux did, as did several other people who have lived to tell the tale.
A bicycle may not be the best way to take everything with you. But when you have to get out fast, it may be your best choice.
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Last week, we mentioned that Berkley is looking for feedback on the city’s 2017 bike plan, as they prepare to develop a new one. And asked the obvious question, in light of LA’s failure to build out its plan, of just how much of the old plan was actually built.
But for a change, we actually got an answer. In the comment below, we heard from our old friend Christopher Kidd, who is in now charge of the project.
Ted – thank you so much for picking up coverage of the Berkeley Bike Plan Update! I’m serving as the project manager for the update.
Since the old Plan’s adoption in 2017, the City of Berkeley has implemented almost 11 miles of network facilities (include 3.5 miles of separated bikeways) and upgraded 20 intersection crossings on the low-stress network.
More than that, the City has in queue 4-5 more miles of Bicycle Boulevards going into construction in the next 24 months.
And while we’re on the subject, congratulations to Kidd on being named to the board of the California Bicycle Coalition, aka Calbike. He brings a passionate, and very knowledgeable, voice for bike and traffic safety.
Which means we should be in good hands.
And Berkeley, too.
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Streetsblog posts a lengthy thread of public record documents showing Forest Lawn’s efforts to drum up business by fighting bike lanes on dangerous and deadly Forest Lawn Drive.
Received some L.A. City public records today regarding the mortuaries' fight against Forest Lawn Drive safety improvements – a thread. See background at SBLA coverage in December la.streetsblog.org/2024/12/19/c…
The host of the LA in a Minute podcast talks with Streets For All founder Michael Schneider about whether Los Angeles can really become bike and transit friendly.
Ready or Not, L.A. Bike Lanes are Coming!
I sit down with @schneider of Streets For All to debate whether L.A. can REALLY become a transit friendly city:https://t.co/Iro9FSfMwF
If we could get smoking out of bars we can make safe places to ride a bike. Check this out @bikelaneuprising.bsky.social @bikelanesla.bsky.social @bikinginla.bsky.social
A prewar photo of an early British bicycle, and the man who built it.
Cool is right.
A.L. Whale, 82, riding his 'boneshaker' bicycle with iron wheels. He built the bicycle himself in 1871; it was believed to be the second such machine built in England.Tewkesbury, UK16 May 1935
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.
The condition of a Eureka bike rider is unknown, after the bicyclist was the victim of an apparent intentional hit-and-run as a woman in a minivan ran them down, backed over the victim’s bicycle, then fled the scene before causing a number of other crashes; she was finally stopped when two men open the minivan’s doors and pulled her out, holding her for the police. Although it took until the last paragraphs before the story even mentioned that the seemingly sentient minivan actually had someone behind the wheel.
Um, okay. An Indianapolis man faces charges for pushing a 14-year old boy off his “motorized” bike and threatening to kill him if he didn’t stop riding it in the street — never mind that the man was infamous in the neighborhood for yelling at kids to stop riding on the sidewalk, too. Which raises the question of where the hell did he want them to ride.
The good residents of Birmingham, England seem to be fed up with “inconsiderate and dangerous” bicycling and skateboarding, as the city prepares a new public space protection order to address the numerous “near misses and accidents that cause alarm and distress to pedestrians.”
Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s son Pax was involved in another bike crash last week when he “barreled” his BMX into the side of car in Los Feliz, six months after he was seriously injured crashing his ebike. Although it’s unclear from the description if he crashed into the side of the car, or if he was doored by the occupants.
No bias here. A San Diego letter writer, and the former chair of the City Heights Planning Committee, complains about the neighborhood’s empty bike lanes, describing them as “miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles,” while a road project goes unfinished. Never mind that bike lanes are far cheaper and easier to install than road work, and significantly more efficient. Or that drivers still enjoy the lion’s share of the streets.
Over 200 people turned out for a memorial bike ride to honor an Albuquerque, New Mexico bike advocate and city worker, after he was killed by a hit-and-run driver last week. I can’t recall 200 people ever turning out to honor any fallen bicyclist here in Los Angeles, or any other bike-related cause, even though we have nearly six times as many people.
New York has opened its trade-in program for delivery riders to take uncertified e-bikes, mopeds and their dangerous batteries off the streets, and replace them with safer, certified ebikes.
In yet another mass casualty event, six members of the German national cycling team — including former European U23 champ Tobias Buck-Gramcko and World Championship bronze medalists Benjamin Boos and Bruno Kessler — were injured, some seriously, when they were run down by an 89-year old man while on a training ride; fortunately, none of the injuries were life threatening. Once again raising the question of how old is too old to drive, and how the hell can we know before something like this happens.
The mother of 16-year old SoCal pro mountain biker Cash Shaleen says he’s home from the hospital and slowly healing, though sill unable to walk, after he was struck by the driver of an off-road vehicle while he was working on his own in Glamis, California, last month, badly compressing his spine.
December 4, 2024 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Charlie Brown ready to kick ball as CA ebike voucher launch announced — again, and PCH Master Plan meeting next week
Just 27 short days until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.
But not one LA city leader seems to give a damn about it.
So join me in thanking Beverly F, James L, Mitchell G, Walter L and Lionel M for their generous donations to keep SoCal’s best source for bike news and advocacy coming your way every day.
So what are you waiting for? Stop what you’re doing and donate now!
No, really, Charlie Brown. Go ahead and kick the football.
According to Streetsblog’s Melanie Curry, the program is now scheduled to launch on December 18th — 42 months after it was approved by the legislature, and almost exactly one year after the last promised launch date (see below).
Seriously, Charlie Brown, we won’t move it this time.
The income-qualified program is scheduled to go live at 6 pm on the 18th, and continue until all the vouchers have been claimed. Which will probably happen almost instantly, given the pent-up demand in a state of nearly 39 million.
According to Curry,
Eligible applicants must be at least 18 years old, with an income of 300 percent of the federal poverty level or less. That means, for example, a one-person household cannot make more than $45,180, and a four-person household no more than $93,600. More information on eligibility can be found here.
Applicants are encouraged to look at the Implementation Manual provided by CARB and ensure they have the proper documents ready to submit once applications go live. Income eligibility must be proven via any of the documents listed on page 16 of the manual (such as tax forms). Although the website encourages people to create a log-in now, before the launch window, it’s not clear how to do so.
Caltrans is hosting yet another in-person community workshop to discuss the feasibility of safety changes on SoCal’s killer highway through the ‘Bu.
The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) and the City of Malibu invite you to the 7th public workshop for the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) Master Plan Feasibility Study.
The first three public workshops (Round One) gathered input from residents, businesses, and other stakeholders to identify safety priorities for the highway. Based on that input, the 4th, 5th, and 6th workshops (Round Two) focused on presenting and soliciting feedback on design alternatives and other recommendations to improve safety on PCH. Following Round Two, Caltrans developed a draft of the PCH Master Plan Feasibility Study. The upcoming 7th workshop (Round Three) will present the draft Study’s key findings and release the document for a 30-day public review period.
Which means it’s your chance to tell them the busway improvements are great, but they need to do more to protect people on bicycles.
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Works for me.
A Toronto advocacy group has hired to lawyer to explore their options, as a new provincial law allows Premier Doug Ford to overrule local officials and rip out popular bike lanes.
So excited for this! The fight will be waged on all fronts.
Slate examines why it’s so darn hard to stop driving, finding that people tend to get stuck in their habits until something happens to make them find a better alternative. Gas shortage, anyone?
A former employee of a Richmond, Virginia TV station is trying to find the Good Samaritan who helped him while he was unconscious following a mountain bike crash 16 long years ago, calling for help and even returning his bike to his workplace.
More proof that life is cheap in the UK, where a 75-year old double-decker bus driver walked without a day behind bars for fleeing the scene after crashing into a 13-year old boy riding his bike, but at least he won’t be able to drive again until he’s 76. If you want to know why no one is safe on the streets, this is a good place to start.
From the Remco Evenepoel crash place, Remco was unable to avoid an opening car door from the postal vehicle and the doctors said it can be broken shoulder and broken wrist.
If the city won’t change the signs to prevent parking in a bike lane, just change ’em yourself. When you’re already drunk and riding your bike with an open bottle of purloined wine, it’s not the best idea to threaten to bite the cops busting you.
March 15, 2024 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Feeling suckered by CA ebike voucher program, CD4’s Raman wins re-election, and why people keep dying on the streets
Just 291 days until Los Angeles fails to meet its Vision Zero pledge to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.
Then share it — and keep sharing it — with everyone you know, on every platform you can.
As of this writing, we’re up to 1,017 signatures, so let’s keep it going! Urge everyone you know to sign the petition, until the mayor agrees to meet with us!
The program is now scheduled to launch by the end of July, which is something we’ve heard before. Like, this time last year.
So go ahead Charlie Brown, kick the football. They’re serious this time.
No, really.
Yesterday the California Air Resources Board, aka CARB, held a virtual meeting to get still more feedback on the program. Because evidently, three years of input just wasn’t enough.
The team held a public workgroup today to update progress on the program, and there’s not much to report. The official program launch is now “sometime in the second quarter of 2024,” but it’s hard to trust that information when the team has been promising to “launch soon” for more than a year.
The main purpose of today’s meeting was to get feedback on a proposal to accept applications via multiple “application windows,” rather than all at once with a single application deadline. The point would be to provide more opportunities for people to apply for the incentives, as well as “the opportunity to fine tune the project between application windows,” according to CARB staff. There was no word on whether the fine-tuning would be an opportunity for CARB staff, for its contractor Pedal Ahead, or both.
Despite the many heart and thumbs-up emojis that floated past while team lead Shaun Ransom was explaining the question, only two of the people who were able to comment during the workshop’s time frame responded to it.
That comes to between 500 and 800 individual incentives for that first batch of funding, maybe 1500 for the total amount.
Meanwhile, Denver’s program has funded nearly 8,000 ebike vouchers worth a minimum of $1,250 each, even before this year’s latest round of vouchers.
Which means you’re not likely to get one, even if you qualify.
Then there’s this, as the voucher program continues its failure to address key issues, despite having nearly three years to get everything buttoned down.
Top issues with @AirResources — non-UL certified e-bikes allowed to purchase via voucher; bike shops not near lower income communities; consumer direct brands provide little to no service after purchase; no way of tracking impact on reducing car trips; how to communicate program.
Not to mention that the program was supposed to be run through local bike shops, rather than online sales, to boost their business and provide a local source for service.
So if you’re starting to feel like you’ve been suckered, you’re probably right.
And you’re not alone.
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Bike and traffic safety friendly incumbent CD4 Councilmember Nithya Raman won re-election in last week’s primary election, narrowly avoiding a fall runoff by edging over the 50% mark despite being massively outspent by opponents to her right.
The other ethically challenged incumbent, CD14’s Kevin de León, will face off against tenant rights attorney Ysabel Jurado, who edged de León in the primary; de León has repeatedly refused to resign, despite being the only councilmember left who participated in the infamous racist phone call that toppled also toppled then-Council President Nury Martinez.
Unelected CD10 incumbent Heather Hutt will face attorney Grace Yoo, who previously lost to Mark Ridley Thomas and Herb Wesson for the same seat; Ridley Thomas was forced to resign after he was convicted on a federal bribery charge.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
London’s Telegraph complains that the city is building more floating bus stops, even though some bicyclists don’t stop for pedestrians like they’re supposed to. Seriously, don’t do that. It only takes a few seconds to observe the right-of-way, and let pedestrians pass.
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Local
Alhambra’s city council unanimously approved a new bike and pedestrian plan, which was delayed for two months to get more community input. Although as we’ve learned the hard way, getting a plan approved is meaningless unless it’s actually funded and implemented, regardless of apparent support.
LA County will spend $250 million to widen the Old Road in Stevenson Ranch to six lanes, while adding a protected bike lane in each direction. It costs an average of $1 million a mile to build a protected bike lane, which means they could build ten miles of protected lanes on both sides of the roadway, and still return $230 million change.
Santa Monica once again learned the hard way that free parking isn’t free; it cost the city $26,000 in lost revenue to provide free parking in city lots the last three days before Christmas, which resulted in exactly no benefit to local businesses.
Denver promises to plow bike lanes, as the city prepares to get up to 20 inches of snow, though bike riders are warned they may have to share traffic lanes with motorists. And yet, we’re somehow told that no one will ride a bike during LA’s temperate winters.
In it, Linton takes the Los Angeles Planning Department to task — deservedly — for producing what he calls “an astonishingly vacuous report” that’s ostensibly a status report on implementation of the city’s mobility plan.
Yet one that he says ignores all the multimodal facilities included in Planning Department’s own plan.
Almost as if they are, in reality, the LA Lack of Planning Dept.
According to Linton,
In 2015, the city approved the Mobility Plan, with hundreds of miles of new bus and bike lanes, pedestrian improvements, and a Vision Zero policy to end L.A. City traffic deaths by 2035. Safe streets advocates loved it. Reactionaries hated the plan so much they sued to block it.
Yet the Planning Department somehow gives itself an undeserved pat on the back, claiming to have accomplished 76% of the mobility plan’s Action Programs.
While that may sound like they’re making real progress, those Action Programs have nothing to do with putting paint on the street. Let alone the long-promised barriers and networks that might actually provide some protection and connections for people on bicycles.
Instead, Linton describes them this way.
“…a sort of obscure plan appendix that lists 173 tasks assigned to various city departments. The Action Plan includes things like: roadway safety outreach, wayfinding, analysis of unpermitted mountain biking in city parks, and periodic updates of LADOT’s Manual of Policies and Procedures.”
He ties their massive success in rearranging the massive pile of papers on their collective desks back to last year’s fiasco with the city council’s non-approval of the Healthy Streets LA initiative — which does nothing more than require the city to live up to its commitments, and build out the mobility plan they already passed when streets in the plan get resurfaced.
That’s it.
But evidently, that’s just a bridge and resurfaced roadway too far for the city.
He describes how the city council, led by now-disgraced racist Council President Nury Martinez, voted to adopt their own ordinance mirroring Healthy Streets LA.
One that wouldn’t contain the requirement to build out the mobility plan, but would, in actuality, leave it up to the council to decide whether or not to actually fulfill their obligations.
And you can probably guess how that would go, if you’ve been paying attention so far.
Last August, the council made it sound like the ordinance would happen right away. Then-president Martinez stated that city staff would “report back on my motion within the next few weeks.” Councilmember Nithya Raman spoke of the council “match[ing] the urgency that I hear from all of you [safe streets advocates] today.”
That’s exactly what the city’s bicycling community heard from an LADOT official within weeks of the 2010 bike plan’s passage, which was later subsumed into the city’s mobility plan.
We were told, while still celebrating our hard-fought victory, that the whole damn thing was merely “aspirational.”
Something the city has more than lived up to by living down to their extremely limited aspirations.
As Linton mentions above, we’re still waiting for that draft ordinance mirroring Healthy Streets LA to come back for a reading, let alone a vote, a full eight months — not weeks — after it was promised.
There was hope after the last election that the city’s new progressive councilmembers would light a fire under our sleepy governing body, and we might actually see some action on our streets.
But it seems just the opposite has happened. And the council has managed to douse whatever fire they might have had.
As I said, it’s a must read. So what are you waiting for?
No description was available for the suspect or their vehicle. Or for the victim, apparently.
As always, there is a standing $25,000 reward for any hit-and-run resulting in serious injuries in the City of Los Angeles. Although there’s not a lot to go on this time.
But there may be hope, according to The Thousand Oaks Acorn.
The survey found that 75% of drivers empathize with cyclists’ frustrations, such as being overtaken too closely, while 81% of cyclists said they understood the challenges that drivers must deal with while navigating busy local streets.
So there’s that, anyway.
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Gravel Bike California stops to sniff, if not the roses, the superbloom of flowers brought on by the recent rains on the Carrizo Plain.
When you hear superbloom, California thinks #CarrizoPlain:
— Gravel Bike California (@GravelBikeCal) April 13, 2023
Thanks to Zachary Rynew for the heads-up.
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The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on rolling.
San Francisco Streetsblog says a proposal for bike lanes on a commuter route and tourist attraction between Sausalito and San Francisco is already seeing a bikelash.
After a British bicyclist is understandably outraged and profane when a van driver cuts him off in the country’s left-handed equivalent of a high-speed right hook, the driver threatens a defamation case when he gets review bombed. As if you can somehow be defamed over something you actually did.
But sometimes it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
An Edinburgh columnist applauds anyone who has the courage to ride a bike on the city streets, but begs bike-riding men to cover their butt cracks. Or “bahookie” in the local parlance, apparently.
No bias here. A WeHo paper says the city wants to take away your “right” to make a right turn on a red light, while saying the maneuver is a factor in just 1% of crashes. Which means it’s responsible for around 400 deaths every year, which probably matters to the victim’s families, even if it doesn’t matter to them. And I don’t recall right on red being included in the Bill of Rights, but maybe I missed that day.
A San Diego TV station reports city council members responded to a recent hit-and-run by continuing to discuss the city’s Vision Zero Plan “to eliminate but also prevent traffic collisions, bicycle and pedestrian injuries and deaths,” which seems to be the same thing. Although I would be overjoyed just to hear Vision Zero discussed in the Los Angeles council chambers.
The San Jose Mercury News’ Mr. Roadshow explains why bicyclists don’t pay for the roads the same way drivers do. But then the paper hides it behind a paywall as “premium” content, reflecting a basic misunderstanding of how the internet works. Although you can read it for free if you’re willing to accept their daily emails.
February 11, 2022 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Metro picks cars over bikes in NoHo, Flax says bicyclists really are entitled, and bus/bike lanes proposed for SaMo Blvd
Happy International Winter Bike to Work Day!
Even if it goes completely unnoticed here in Southern California, where we don’t have to worry about chipping the ice and snow off our bikes.
Let alone ourselves at the end of a sunny winter’s ride.
The massive project, which sits right next to the connecting point for the Burbank-Chandler and Orange Line multi-use paths, will erase a popular bike path connecting to the pathways. And replace it with a convoluted series of bike lanes that will encourage bicyclists to dangerously break the law by riding against traffic.
Here’s what Linton has to say.
Currently cyclists – including me and my daughter – heading from NoHo Station toward Burbank utilize the existing bus plaza sidewalk (which is going away) to get to Metro’s bike path (which is going away) that runs along the north side of Chandler Boulevard between Fair Avenue and Vineland Avenue.
LADOT expects eastbound bicyclists to go out of their way to cross four to five lanes of traffic on Chandler, then to make an uncomfortable left turn onto Vineland (where lots of drivers are turning right) to get to the Burbank-Chandler path. Cyclists will likely choose to salmon-ride against traffic in the westbound bike lane (or on the sidewalk), because that will be more direct and faster. (Similarly ridiculous circulation is shown on Chandler west of Lankershim. LADOT somehow expects cyclists to cross to the north side of Chandler at the station, then cross Chandler again in 500 feet to go to a median bikeway on the south side of Chandler.)
To make matters worse, the bike path is due to be replaced by, you guessed it, a parking garage.
And not just any parking garage, but a concrete behemoth with spaces for 3,300 drivers and their vehicles. Which would suggest that Metro has given up on getting Angelenos out of their cars, even as the world is literally burning.
It also suggests that Metro believes bike riders have a place on the road, but only if we don’t inconvenience all those important people in cars in any way.
Here’s Linton again.
Why wasn’t this path, a big active transportation priority, part of Metro’s site requirements? It sure looks like bike circulation was a non-priority – an afterthought – something to be half-assedly shoehorned in after cars took up lots of space.
(And, frankly, this is how Metro treats stations, bikeways, and transit-oriented development. With no public notice or input, Metro yanked an approved bikeway from its Rosa Parks Station revamp, while allowing drivers to speed through the middle of the station complex. The Expo Line bike path has an awful, dangerous gap at Culver City Station where cyclists are dumped out to onto busy streets just before they reach the station. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: “Nobody bikes to these stations anyway” because Metro makes them inhospitable to bicycling.)…
The project really should be re-worked to include a continuous bike path from Vineland to at least Tujunga Avenue. Ideally the path would bridge over Lankershim and Vineland. That continuous path was shown in renderings circulated in 2016. If Metro and (Councilmember Paul) Krekorian are serious about passing a habitable climate along to the next generation, this feature should be put back in.
We’ll look forward to future public meetings when we’ll have the chance to offer some very negative feedback.
In the meantime, maybe it’s time to tell Krekorian, who singlehandedly canceled shovel-ready plans for a lane reduction and bike lanes on Lankershim Blvd, he needs to do better.
Except he says our primary entitlement is the right to get home alive.
And he’s got the t-shirt to prove it.
Here’s how it gets deployed. Someone sees a rider pedaling in the street and perhaps even gets delayed 15 seconds, and so cyclists are entitled. Or maybe 17 parking spaces were reapportioned to make room for a bike lane, and so cyclists are entitled. Or someone makes the quite novel observation that bike riders don’t pay registration fees or taxes on the gasoline they don’t use. Or somebody sees a rider roll through a stop sign or maybe filter past gridlocked traffic with a smile on their face. You all know the chorus: Cyclists are entitled.
Of course this is total rubbish. The people who do all this moaning about cyclists are drivers who are oblivious to all the obscene entitlements that they enjoy. We are talking about trillions of dollars and decades of subsidies. We are talking about hundreds of millions of free parking spaces. We are talking about the most lurid fantasies of the petroleum and automotive industries being transmogrified into policy. Motorists have been lavished with VIP privileges for so long that they don’t even perceive them.
In order to reclaim that misused term, Flax says we need a bill of rights, including,
Cyclists are entitled to get home alive
Cyclists are entitled to safe places to ride
Cyclists are entitled to travel to work, schools, and local businesses just like everyone else
Cyclists are entitled to legal protections
Cyclists are entitles to have lawmakers, police departments, and the judicial system acknowledge and protect people who ride bikes
Cyclists are entitled to ride on the road
Like anything Flax writes, it’s a good piece. And more than worth a few minutes of your time.
And reminiscent of this Cyclists’ Bill of Rights we mentioned earlier this week, which nearly became law in Los Angeles, before it didn’t.
A Florida lawyer with a keen sense of the obvious says the recent drawbridge accident that killed a 79-year old woman walking her bike across the span should never have happened.
Great news, as two-time Grand Tour winner Egan Bernal is back on his feet — literally — after suffering critical injuries when he slammed into a poorly parked bus while training in his native Colombia.
Some good news for your Thursday: Egan Bernal is walking again, a little over 2 weeks after a major crash while training in Colombia.
He posted this video to his @eganbernal Instagram account today, captioning it “Surprise! My first steps”.
May 18, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on National masters road champ killed in DUI crash, CA still dangerous place to ride, and Bike Index helps recover SaMo bike
Forty-six-year old Gwen Inglis was riding in the foothills west of Denver, most likely headed home after an early morning ride, when a 29-year old driver drifted into the bike lane and slammed into her from behind.
The Bicycle Racing Association of Colorado, part of USA Cycling, released a statement mourning the loss of Inglis.
“Colorado cycling lost one of their best yesterday,” the organization said. “There are few words that can express the feeling of loss for any of our cycling community, and Gwen was a particularly special person. She was a multiple National and State Champion on the bike and very well known across the cycling community in Colorado. Even more impressive was her character off the bike. Knowing Gwen, you would immediately be aware of her strongest qualities. She consistently brought joy into all her relationships, and she openly accepted everyone.”
The paper reported that her killer had previously been arrested on multiple drug-related offenses, including DUI.
Just one more example of officials keeping a dangerous driver on the road until it’s too late. Every one of whom should be held responsible for her death.
When comparing the old list from NHTSA, that use per capita data, to the revised list from StreetLight Data, the top 10 most dangerous states have been mostly shuffled around—particularly the top four, which list the same states in both but in a different order. New Mexico ranks the same in both, in fifth place. And California makes both the old NHTSA list and the new StreetLight Data list, but it ranks sixth on the former and tenth on the latter.
Delaware, South Carolina and Florida top the list of dangerous states, followed by Louisiana and New Mexico, while Massachusetts, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Utah rank as the safest.
Streetsblog California’s Melanie Curry picks up last week’s bizarre story about respected bike safety advocate Pat Hines’ opposition to California’s AB 122, the proposed Stop As Yield law.
As recently as a few weeks ago, Race Across America posted the supposed origin story on Facebook, writing that Hines and her friend, Sue Latham, were “riding together when Latham was struck by a car and killed. They were training for the 1984 Olympics. This heartbreaking event propelled Hines into public service. She became one of the nation’s most vocal and best-recognized activists in the area of traffic and bicycle safety.”
BIKE RECOVERY: "Santa Monica Police did a fantastic job by being quick, effective, and on point. Registering with Bike Index and keeping the serial number were instrumental in retrieving the bike." @bikinginla@TrekBikespic.twitter.com/WMc6tRCLeh
Yes, you can recharge your bike through the kickstand while you’re parked. But unless it offers a lot more security, it’ll never fly on this side of the pond.
No bias here. A San Jose letter writer complains that road diets are inconveniencing drivers for the sake of bicyclists, while a columnist explains that they’re installed to improve safety on dangerous streets, and bicyclists and pedestrians benefit from the improvements. Just like drivers who want to get home in one piece.
A San Antonio councilmember is accused of inappropriate conduct by attempting to influence the judge and DA, sending a letter asking them to refuse any plea deal that doesn’t include a meaningful prison sentence for an accused drunk driver who killed a popular bike rider.
August 17, 2020 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Car-centric LA weakens plans for bike/ped friendly Union Station, Mulholland Hwy closed by fire, and cars cost everyone
Is it really any surprise that Los Angeles is watering down plans to make the entrance to Union Station more walkable and bikeable?
For the past half-decade, Metro has been planning upgrades to Union Station to make the site easier and safer to access on foot and by bike. The L.A. Union Station Forecourt and Esplanade Improvements project includes upgrades on the Union Station grounds, which Metro owns, as well as upgrades to nearby streets, which are controlled by the city of Los Angeles.
The latest version of the project plan removes and waters down some core pedestrian aspects of the project. Why? Because, even in its most transit-accessible and most heavily walked core downtown areas, Los Angeles city departments are unwilling to prioritize the safety and convenience of people walking – instead they are insisting on car-centric standards that foster more driving.
Then there’s this.
What is perhaps most sad about the new design is that it ignores the significance of connecting Union Station and El Pueblo. If the city of L.A. won’t prioritize walkability at the front door of the region’s most heavily-used transit hub and at in its historic walkable core, is there anywhere where Angelenos can expect safe and convenient places to walk? Continuing to apply outdated late-20th-Century one-size-fits-all standards erodes what already works in these precious historic places.
As Linton points out, it takes leadership to fight for safer, more walkable and bikeable streets.
And that’s exactly what’s missing right now.
Former CD14 Councilmember José Huizar was an advocate for Complete Streets, and might have fought some of these changes. But with a federal indictment for bribery hanging over his head, he was effectively out of the picture long before his fellow councilmembers kicked him out.
And don’t get me started on LA Mayor Eric Garcetti, who should be stepping up to fight for the original Metro plan as part of his LA Green New Deal plan to reimagine the way we get around this city.
But in typical Garcetti fashion, has been largely missing in action.
And politely suggest that LA get its collective head out of its piston-driven ass, and return to the original plan.
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Calbike is urging you to reach out to your state representative to support SB 288.
New bike lanes and improved public transit are critical to California’s recovery. Now is the time to fast-track key sustainable transportation projects, but environmental regulations more appropriate for oil refineries than bike lanes can delay such projects by years. We don’t have years.
Senate Bill 288 would make it easier to build bike lanes, bus lanes, and light rail lines by eliminating unnecessary review regulations, while preserving important opportunities for public involvement.
If your planned riding route takes you on Mulholland Hwy, check to make sure the road is open after a fire closure on Sunday.
Mulholland Hwy remains closed between Las Virgenes & Cornell Rd due to Rockpool Fire earlier today. Malibu Cyn Rd is now closed again from PCH to Piuma Rd due to fatal traffic collision that caused a separate fire. Fire is out – crews remain on scene. CHP handling investigation.
The next time someone says bicyclists should have to pay for the streets we ride, show them this.
And tell them maybe we aren’t the ones being subsidized.
If walking costs you $1, we all pay $0.01. If biking costs you $1, we all pay $0.08. If bussing costs you $1, we all pay $1.50. If driving costs you $1, we all pay $9.20. Via @thediscourse study.
Advocates continue to call on bikemakers and retailers to stop selling to police departments, accusing police of using their bikes as weapons and shields.
Like this confrontation in Chicago Saturday afternoon.
Unfortunately though, that prediction about police not getting any bikes this time was wrong.
A woman came to grab a bike and was told to leave. A high ranking officer says they were confiscated bc they were abandoned property. pic.twitter.com/wDTxHLXbWc
I’m of two minds when it comes halting the sale of police bikes.
While we’ve all been shocked at the way they’ve been used by some departments — and continue to be used — I believe bike cops are a net benefit to the community under normal conditions, getting officers out of their cars and closer to the public they’re supposed to serve.
The question is how to limit the use of those bikes to those normal conditions.
Megan Lynch also forwards word that the director general of the Mexico City mayor’s office is actively destroying the commercial bikes people rely on to earn a living.
¡INCREÍBLE! El director General de Gobierno de la Alcaldía Miguel Hidalgo, presume más de 140 triciclos confiscados, lo que significa que a más de 140 familias este señor “Hegel Cortés Miranda” les quitó el sustento que llevan día a día a sus familias. @Claudiashein#Polancopic.twitter.com/qizRvzyY2m
For those for are Español challenged, like me, that translates to
AMAZING! The General Director of Government of the Mayor’s Office Miguel Hidalgo, presumes more than 140 confiscated tricycles, which means that more than 140 families this man “Hegel Cortés Miranda” took away the livelihood that they bring to their families every day.
Another tweet describes the owners as men and women who perform a service to the community by selling “water, sweet potatoes and bananas, coffee and bread…tamales or atole.”
Call me crazy, but maybe the middle of a worldwide pandemic isn’t the right time to put struggling merchants out of business.
A Santa Clarita bike rider was apparently injured in a collision Sunday afternoon. Although it’s hard to tell from an article that just says a “patient” was sent to the hospital, fails to mention if the car had a driver, identifies the rider as a pedestrian on a bike, and somehow blames the bike rider for “accidentally” running into the car — yet with enough force to shatter the windshield.
Disappointing news from Santa Monica, where the city has pulled the plug on the popular Breeze bikeshare, after concluding that there’s no way to make it work under the current conditions. That comes on the heels of UCLA, Pasadena and West Hollywood also cancelling their docked bikeshare systems, raising the question of whether LA’s Metro Bike can survive in its current form.
The last surviving Denver newspaper says the popularity of ebikes is skyrocketing, with one user observing that “you don’t realize how fabulous they are” until you try one.
Heartbreaking story from India, where the relatives of a 71-year old man suspected of dying from Covid-19 were forced to carry his body to the graveyard by bicycle after local authorities refused to send an ambulance.
February 7, 2018 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Morning Links: Don’t blame bike lanes for bad pavement lawsuits, and a call to ban cars from Rose Bowl loop
In fact, only one of the seven recent bike-related settlements with the city was due to a crash that occurred in a bike lane.
The rest took place on the sort of infrastructure-free streets most LA bicyclists have to ride every day due to the lack of a even the most basic bicycle network in most of the city.
And on the same crappy streets you’ll find on most city streets.
Which is the city’s failure to build out the 2010 bike plan as promised. And the failure to the maintain streets we all have to use.
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He gets it.
A writer for the Pasadena Star News says instead of adding stop signs to the Rose Bowl loop, which would effectively put a halt to the popular cycling, why not ban cars instead?
Why not, indeed.
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We’re less than a month away from the annual Oscar ceremony. Which brings up the annual question, will anyone bike to the red carpet in Hollywood?
But no word yet on whether anyone will do it this year.
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Local
In news that should surprise absolutely no one, a new report shows Los Angeles has the world’s worst traffic congestion for the sixth year in a row. And it will only get worse unless the city and county provide people with viable alternatives to driving.
A British city noticed that 68 near-identical bike-hating comments about a road closure came from a single computer. And 50 more came from just three additional IP addresses. In case you’ve ever wondered why there always seem to be so many public comments from people who hate bikes.
