March 9, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Wealthy LA-area man accused of shielding son in deadly crash, cargo bikes and dogs, and ride like a bike messenger
Monique Munoz was killed when a 17 year old, driving a $200,000 Lamborghini at over 100 MPH crashed into her at 5PM. The drivers father, James Khuri, is a millionaire and has been throwing money to get any news coverage of the incident pushed to the back of google and have positive articles of himself populated instead. Meanwhile, following Moniques death Khuri has been posting about his lavish lifestyle on Instagram and deleting and blocking anything in reference to Monique. It’s been two weeks and no charges have been pressed.#JusticeForMoniqueMunoz
Update: Anyone interested in helping please email DA Gascon to move forward with the case at info@da.lacounty.gov and keep the story alive on socials. #JusticeforMoniqueMunoz
This is the difference a well-planned bikeway can make.
Here’s another view of this street. It’s a huge improvement over how it was before. As you can see motor traffic levels are tiny compared to before. And the street is one way now with the cycle lane being a contra flow. pic.twitter.com/PqwOu3orOt
February 19, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on London paper holds ugly mirror to LA bicycling; bike rider brutally attacked with baseball bat; and chef has bike, will cook
With year-round perfect riding weather and a topography that allows both bike commuters to enjoy pedaling without too much strain and experienced riders to explore the nearby mountains and hills, Los Angeles in many ways is a cyclists’ paradise.
But the city’s cycling reputation is tempered by the fact that it is one of the most vexing, difficult and downright dangerous cities in the United States to ride a bike in.
The story goes on to describe LA’s crappy roads, lack of safe bikeways, and drivers who can’t seem to take their foot off the gas or put their phones down — despite city officials nearly dislocating their shoulders patting themselves on the back.
In 2018, Bicycling Magazine gave LA the ignominious title of “worst bike city in America” because of the hazards posed to cyclists by distracted drivers, the terrible shape of most streets, and the seeming willingness of local officials to pay out millions of dollars in lawsuits rather than address the infrastructure needs that could make LA a safer place to bike…
The poor shape of streets in Los Angeles has forced the city to dole out millions of dollars in the last decade to cyclists severely injured by the shoddy road conditions.
In 2017, the city paid $7.5m to a man left quadriplegic after he crashed on a stretch of road where the pavement had buckled because of tree roots. That same year it gave $6.5m to a cyclist who suffered a traumatic brain injury after hitting a massive pothole on his bike, and another $4.5m to the family of a rider killed after he hit a 2in ridge in the pavement.
Phil Gaimon, former pro, author and YouTube star Phil Gaimon sums it all up.
“The weather here is so perfect that you really don’t need a car to shelter like you do in other parts of the country,” said Phil Gaimon, a former professional cyclist turned author and YouTube star. “But LA is also the shittiest city in the most beautiful part of the world.”
It’s not how we want to see ourselves, or how we want others to see us.
But it’s too often true, in far too many ways.
It doesn’t have to be.
But until we can help our elected leaders find the political courage to stand up to LA’s driver industrial complex — or replace them with officials who will — we will continue to put up ghost bikes.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
Boise police are looking for a mountain bike-riding bank robbery suspect who rode off with an unspecified amount of cash after telling the teller he had a gun. No word on whether he made an Idaho Stop as he made his getaway.
Kings County, Washington, home to Seattle, will re-examine its mandatory bike helmet law, after reports indicated that the seldom-enforced law was used disproportionately to target homeless people who can’t afford to buy one.
The executive director of a New Orleans advocacy group predicts this will be a breakout year for bicycling in the Big Easy, where 80% of residents support quickly building a “completely connected network of safe, dedicated bike lanes and trails throughout the city,” while 73% support protected bike lanes.
Cycling News reminisces about five late and lamented North American bike races that bit the dust in the last decade, at least temporarily, including our own dearly departed Tour of California.
Hats off to British Giro winner Tao Geoghegan Hart, who took a knee in support of racial equity — and put his money where his heart is by sponsoring an under-23 rider with his former Hagens Berman Axeons team to promote racial diversity in professional cycling.
Turn your old bike wheel into an otherworldly pan flute. Your next ebike could be a sub-19 pound roadie with the battery hidden in a faux water bottle, for the low, low price of just $14,449.
And the award for best use of a cargo bike goes to…
Happy Fat Tuesday to everyone freezing their ass off down south today.
Not to rub it in, but our weather here in SoCal is sunny and warm, if a tad windy today.
So toss some beads and bunting on your bike, put some Mardi Gras music on your earbuds — okay earbud, since California law only allows one when you ride.
And shout out a few heartfelt “Iko Ikos” for our biking brethren left bereft by the pandemic and Mother Nature.
When it’s completely overgrown and no one wants to do anything about it.
This is the bike lane on Mission in El Sereno. I’ve reported this extreme overgrowth year after year. My 311 response is “letter sent to property owner.” This is already a dangerous stretch of speedway. Is this how they handle blocked car lanes? @kdeleon#SafeStreetsNowpic.twitter.com/tyqgUvfgL4
UCLA’s transportation department marked Valentines Day with a neurologist, a digital humanities specialist and two graduate students explaining why they love riding their bikes.
Police concluded a San Francisco bike rider suffered a medical emergency after he was found unresponsive in the street near Golden Gate Park on Saturday, despite social media reports that he’d been struck by a hit-and-run driver. Although it’s also important to remember that drivers don’t have to actually hit someone to cause a life-threatening fall.
Seattle bike groups are hoping to get the county health department to reconsider the city’s mandatory bike helmet requirement, calling the law arbitrary and troubling, while arguing that it disproportionately affects people of color.
A bighearted bikemaker from Pennsylvania surprised a pair of young sisters suffering from a rare neurodegenerative disease by giving them new motorized tricycles; Jason Kraft gave away ten similar bikes to children suffering from the disease last year, and hopes to donate 20 this year.
January 25, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Gaimon gamely tries to regain Everest title, riding 1,000 miles across Yukon in 1900, and bike cops in 1904 DTLA
Phil gave it his best shot.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough.
After briefly holding the world Everesting record — climbing the equivalent of the height of Mt. Everest in a single ride — former pro Phil Gaimon bided his time making another attempt, before finding the perfect hill in Malibu.
Then gave himself one week to learn how to ride before tackling a nearly 1,000-mile journey across the Yukon to Nome, Alaska, hoping to get there before all the gold was gone.
In the middle of winter, with temperatures down to -45.
………
One more week to get a discount when you sign up for this year’s virtual Bike Summit.
Here’s your chance to chuck it all, and live the mountain bike dream.
A great opportunity. Boise High is looking for a head coach for their mountain bike team. The team has 125 student athletes and 50 active parent volunteers! I have attached a job description in case you or know someone that may be interested! https://t.co/3YS4ksXsiv
Bicycles seldom fly off highways and burst into flames. Just saying.
A Mercedes-Benz soars off an LA freeway overpass and erupts into flames. NBC4 teams have been monitoring the crash all day. We’ll have the condition of the driver and what we're learning about the investigation. Watch NBC4 News starting at 4 p.m. https://t.co/HoYDHVrqttpic.twitter.com/jddI9LUJbl
Turning bicycling into recycling, an 82-year old former pension fund manager in Wisconsin is using his retirement to collect and recycle aluminum cans; he recently gathered his two millionth can on his bike, using the profits to benefit environmental groups.
Pittsburgh is calming streets to slow traffic, in a city where ten percent of people still walk to work, and more are riding bikes every year.
Britain’s Busby safety app has seen a whopping 870% increase during the pandemic, as the resulting bike boom has encouraged riders worldwide to download the app that detects unusual movement — like a fall — and calls for help if it’s not deactivated in time.
The crash happened on Monday, January 4th, at the intersection of Adams Boulevard and Nevin Avenue in the Central-Alameda neighborhood.
The driver had just turned the corner when he struck the man as he knelt near the curb. He briefly stopped, then continued on without getting out of his truck.
The crash was caught on a security cam across the street.
But be warned before you click on it, because it clearly shows the innocent victim getting hit by the driver’s truck. And there’s no way to unsee it once you do.
The biggest and most important thing an ally can do is shut up, listen, and amplify the voices of Black and brown folks, who are often silenced.
That’s an important message.
Because too often I’ve heard well-meaning white people explain to people of color what they need, instead of asking them first.
And sometimes, I’ve been one of them.
We’ve come a long way from the days when a friend told me you’d never see him or any other Black person on a bicycle, because everyone would just assume they couldn’t afford a car.
The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes keeps going on.
No bias here. A Singapore news site somehow concludes a bike rider was in the wrong for getting right hooked after stopping a few feet beyond the stop line, as if the truck driver that nearly hit him had no obligation to see or go around him. I would have flipped him off, too, under the same circumstances.
But sometimes, it’s the people on two wheels behaving badly.
A bike-riding Chicago-area man was busted for allegedly committing 15 car burglaries while wearing ten different shirts and five pairs of pants; whenever he was caught on security cam he’d take off a layer to make himself less recognizable. Didn’t work, though.
January 7, 2021 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on The war on bikes keeps on going, bike riders behaving badly, and that really was Chris Froome riding that bike in SaMo
It’s a light news day in the big, wide, wonderful world of bikes, after yesterday’s DC shit show sucked up all the oxygen.
CityLab looks forward to the incoming Biden administration, saying it could take steps to make motor vehicles a lot safer, especially for bike riders and pedestrians. Let’s start by banning oversized private trucks and SUVs, and redesigning the high, flat grills on SUVs and pickups.
This is why people keep dying on our streets. A Syracuse NY judge undercuts prosecutors by offering a hit-and-run driver a reduced sentence for killing a beloved local street musician as he was riding his bicycle — even though the driver, who was out on parole, was driving without a license.
It’s hard to call 16 years in state prison a slap on the wrist. But this one feels wrong for a couple reasons.
If Wicksted really was suffering from psychiatric problems, she need treatment, not jail; too often we warehouse the mentally ill in jail, which doesn’t benefit anyone.
If not, a 16-year sentence for what amounts to first degree murder is ridiculously low. She could easily be out in half that time, or possibly less under current circumstances.
Either way, it’s yet another example of the outgoing DA’s repeated failure to take traffic crimes seriously.
A 49-year old mother of two remains missing six months after she reportedly rode her bike away from her Southern Colorado home last Mother’s Day, despite massive search efforts.
After a Kansas appeals court threw out his original two-year sentence as too lenient, a driver convicted of using his car to murder a bike-riding man following an argument between the two was resentenced to a still too low ten years and a month behind bars.
This is why people keep dying on the streets. A Toronto-area man got a slap on the wrist for jumping the curb and killing a woman as she rode her bike on the sidewalk, while he was allegedly street racing with another driver who fled the scene; the judge said he hoped the paltry 26-month sentence would serve as a deterrent. Not bloody likely.
October 9, 2020 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on Soda pop cargo bike art in East LA, has Covid-19 affect your bike riding, and the war on bikes just keeps on going
Why does East LA get all the good art?
Aurelio Jose Barrera caught this soda pop delivery truck adorned with a Jariritos-selling cargo bike.
If they didn’t have so much sugar, that would be enough to get my dollars.
No bias here. A London paper gleefully reports that a popup bike lane will be removed after causing traffic congestion, leading to calls to remove others, as well. Although no one seems to consider that it’s all those cars that cause traffic congestion, not bike lanes or the people using them.
Overtaking me at speed, presumably out of frustration, led this driver nearly to miss the fact that someone was already on the zebra crossing in front of her. And then the cycle box. pic.twitter.com/vD8GdcElcq
Bike-riding Downey city council candidate Alexandria Contreras will be on Bike Talk this evening. However, the link in the tweet is dead, but you can find the show here.
One app to rule them all, one app to find them. Lime takes a step towards world domination, or at least the world of micromobility, by offering Wheels scooters through their app, along with the usual Lime e-scooters and ebikes.
A new candidate to replace termed out Bill de Blasio as mayor of New York says bike lanes should be part of the city’s transportation network. But fails to mention that city law requires 50 miles of new protected bike lanes and 30 miles of bus lanes every year. Unlike Los Angeles, where city officials are legally required to build absolutely nothing. And too often don’t.
Maryland drivers will now be allowed to briefly cross a double yellow line to pass bike riders on narrow roads. California drivers would have the same privilege, except Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed an early version of the three-foot passing law because it contained the same provision.
There were apparently no witnesses to the crash; a passerby reported finding the wreckage sometime later. Just a couple more sacrifices to the motor vehicle gods.
And he leaves this world without ever seeing justice for his friend and fellow rider. After a retracted confession and countless delays, Mariah Candice Banks, the woman accused of killing Woon in her high-end SUV, has yet to set foot in a courtroom for anything other than her arraignment.
Her long-delayed prelim is now scheduled for November 4th.
Sims won’t be there; let’s hope he and Woon are riding together somewhere. But maybe some of us can take his place.
This summer, a group of L.A. City Council members filed a motion calling on the city’s Department of Transportation and legislative officials to work with community members and report back on alternative methods of traffic enforcement, collision investigations and other traffic safety duties currently handled by the Los Angeles Police Department.
Some potential changes that will be explored: replacing LAPD officers with a “transit ambassador program” staffed by unarmed LADOT personnel and/or automated technology to monitor and cite drivers for speeding, illegal turns and other moving violations.
“Such a move would virtually eliminate the LAPD’s role in traffic stops, one of the leading forms of interaction between police and the public,” states the motion, which was filed by L.A. City Councilmembers Marqueece Harris-Dawson, Mike Bonin, Curren Price and Herb Wesson.Breonna
It’s a challenging and thought-provoking read, well worth a few minutes of your time.
Because the current system really isn’t working for anyone.
………
The C40 Cities — a group of 96 cities dedicated to taking action to fight climate change — says the concept of a 15-minute city is rapidly spreading around the world.
The concept of a “15-minute city” is picking up speed globally, and for good reason. In a “15-minute city” residents can meet all of their needs within a short walk or bike ride, making life in our cities more accessible & more sustainable.@CateSarfattihttps://t.co/rUXgquBcUk
WATCH: A car ripped through a crowd of Trump supporters at a BLM counterprotest in Yorba Linda. It was clearly deliberate and the driver did not stop even as the Trump crowd gathered to tend to the wounded. Trump supporters did NOT attack the driver. pic.twitter.com/f9nu6L0WBu
Seriously? A woman who was injured riding a Jump scooter in San Francisco has filed a class action suit against several e-scooter companies, including Uber and Segway, because…wait for it…no one warned consumers that scooters don’t have turn signals. No one tell her about bicycles.
An 11-year old English girl rode a tandem 70 miles with her dad to visit all 12 cricket clubs in the North Staffordshire area, raising more than four times her original goal of £500 for cardiac risk assessments for young people; she’s raised the equivalent of over $2,800.
Once again, a bike rider is a hero. An Indian family is alive today because an anonymous bike rider was in the right place at the right time, leaping into action to pull them to safety after their car went off the road and into a natural drain before simply riding away afterwards; sadly, though, he wasn’t able to save the family’s three-year old girl.
Last week we mentioned defending champ Chloe Dygert was injured after wiping out during the women’s time trial world championships. Turns out that injury was more gruesome than any of us probably imagined.
I remember thinking what if I can get my bike can I still win? The first thing I remember was asking @JimMiller_time if I was done.. Then I looked down and saw my leg.
September 14, 2020 /
bikinginla / Comments Off on People’s Court frowns on wacky driver lawsuit, Oregon bike riders ferry food to burn zones, and biking can be bananas
Maybe the arc of the moral universe really does bend towards justice.
The case of the bike rider who was sued by the driver who rear-ended him finally concluded on Friday, after it was heard in America’s highest court.
And by that I mean The People’s Court, of course.
Rochester NY bicyclist Bryan Agnello was sued for $700 for damage to the schmuck’s driver’s car, despite suffering $2,500 in medical bills and damage to his bike.
In his court filing, (driver Jovonte) Cook stated that Agnello was riding his bike on I-490 at about 60 mph and that he “didn’t see him coming at me at all due to bad weather.” It was raining when the collision occurred.
During an interview with CITY, Cook estimated Agnello was traveling 80 mph and “came out of nowhere and splashed on my front windshield” while Cook was driving on I-490 while on his way to his job delivering pizzas.
Never mind that, according to the police, the crash occurred on a city street, not a divided freeway. And anyone who can ride 80 mph on level ground in a driving rain without an engine would easily be the greatest cyclist of all time.
Then again, anyone who could walk away from a crash at that speed should probably be wearing tights and a cape.
A San Diego missing person’s investigator passed away last month after years of battling liver failure — but even at her sickest, she attached an e-bike motor to her bicycle so she could ride along with marchers on a three-day breast cancer awareness event. And when the engine gave out, she got off and pushed it to keep up.
Somehow we missed this piece from Vogue UK on famous, mostly female bike riders of the past 60 or so years. Audrey Hepburn looks as good on a bike as anyone could, although Bogie is no small shakes himself. And Queen Latifah can ride with me anytime.
A Singapore letter writer says bike riders who use public roads should be licensed, while exempting those who only use bike paths. Apparently assuming the latter will never have to use roads to bridge a gap between bikeways, unlike pretty much everywhere else on earth.
A Belfast paper remembers Debbie Barclay, who blazed the way for women’s cyclists in Northern Ireland until she was paralyzed from the waist down after crashing on a descent in a 1988 English stage race; she died last week of an undisclosed cause.
