Los Angeles: A step in the right direction

Los Angeles has a new police chief named Charlie Beck. (Left.) 

Just into his third month as chief, he has already met with community leaders promising to make "good policing and civil rights" the foundation of his LAPD legacy.

It was at one of these meetings Chief Beck was presented with a Cyclists' Bill of Rights and a challenge to put his leadership team to work towards making Los Angeles a better place for cyclists to ride.

As a result a LAPD Cycling Task Force has been formed headed by Commander David Doan. They recently met for a marathon session with representatives from various LA area cycling advocate groups.

These included, the Bike Writers Collective, illuminate LA, Sustainable Streets, Bikeside, the Voice, (a Bike Working Group) and the Los Angeles Bicycle Advisory Committee.

Commander Doan (Right.) convened the meeting saying, "The LAPD is committed to making our roadways safer for all commuters with an emphasis on our most vulnerable commuters, cyclists. We are committed to working with the cycling community to improve police cyclist interactions and to find ways to make our streets safer for everyone." 

One of the first orders of business will be the education of LAPD officers who patrol the streets and the LA public as a whole on the rights of cyclists on streets of Los Angeles. Better investigation of accidents involving cyclists, and also “crimes” against cyclists was called for.

When a motorist "asserts" himself against a cyclist, it is not a simple traffic violation or traffic collision, it is a crime. Crimes against cyclists need to be treated as real crimes, not as simple infractions that are simply part of everyday traffic in Los Angeles.

A hit-and-run motorist that leaves a cyclist behind needs to be pursued and prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

The recent Mandeville Canyon road rage incident that resulted in several felony convictions for Dr. Christopher Thompson wasn't the first reported incident for the doctor, it was the third, and it wasn't investigated as a crime until it got political. That must change.

On the civil rights issue - Cyclists riding alone and late at night sometimes find themselves in handcuffs while the LAPD check their information.

LAPD officers report that this is simply for the safety of the officers but critics call it "bias based policing" or "profiling" and that riding a bike should not be a cue for handcuffs.

Many of these cyclists ride for economic reasons; they are workers in low paying jobs simply riding to or from work. They may not have lights and may ride on the sidewalks late at night.

The opportunity here would be to have the LAPD pass out blinkie lights and a copy of the Cyclists' Rules of the Road rather than to assume that late-night cyclists are involved in crime.

This is a huge step in the right direction; when a major city like Los Angeles starts to take cycling seriously, then other municipalities are more likely to follow suit. You can read a complete and more detailed report here

Eugene

 

I returned this week from a brief trip to Eugene, Oregon. In 1994, a year after I left the bike business, I moved from Southern California to Eugene.

I lived there until 2001 when I relocated to Charleston, South Carolina. The reason for my trip, to visit my wife’s family.

Eugene is a city where a person could manage quite easily to live without a car; in fact I did just that for the first six months I lived there. They have an excellent public transport service, and they make it easy to ride a bike.

Like many US cities, Eugene has streets that are laid out in a grid. Numbered avenues run east to west, and named streets run North to South.

I always admired the traffic system in Eugene, simple but effective, and coming from Southern California I wondered why other cities, and especially Los Angeles did not adapt a similar system, when a grid street layout is already in place.

In Eugene, 6th Avenue has four traffic lanes one way going west. 7th Avenue has four lanes going east. If you are driving these are the routes that take you from one side of the city to the other, and also link with the freeways.

One block south is 8th Avenue a main bus route east and west, and the next street over which is Broadway, is a bike route.

Cars are not banned from using Broadway, but are simply discouraged from using it as a through route. This is done very effectively by blocking the street every so often in the manner shown in the picture at the top of this article. (Sign indicates right turn only, except bicycles.)

Cars are forced to make a detour over to the next street; however, a narrow opening allows bicycles to ride straight through.

This means residents on Broadway have access to their homes and can park on the street, but cyclists enjoy a route with very light traffic.

Similarly, bicycles are not banned from using other streets, but a person would be crazy to ride a bike on 6th or 7th Avenues, with the high volume of motor traffic, when they can ride in relative peace and safety just two or three blocks over on Broadway.

There are many traffic lights on the main one-way through routes on 6th and 7th Avenues. However, they are timed in such a fashion that if you drive at the speed limit you will hit a green light every time, from one side of the city to the other.

Locals soon learn this, and there is no point in driving over the speed limit to be stopped at the next light. It is an almost magical experience to drive keeping the needle on the speed limit, and watch every light, one by one, turn to green as you approach.

What a simple idea; bicycles, buses, and cars are separated from each other, and people drive the speed limit. All done by encouragement, incentives if you will, rather than by law enforcement.

I have only touched on a small part of Eugene's bike route system; there are many other streets with bike lanes as well as bike and pedestrian paths.

Other cities, including my adopted home town of Charleston could do well by considering a similar traffic system to Eugene, Oregon. It has been in place many years, and it works.

I’m sure residents would initially be opposed to having their street blocked to through traffic and designated a bike route.

However, they would soon realize that there are advantages too, like easy parking and the relative peace and quiet of living on a street without cars constantly driving past.

Dijon Vu

I get many hits from bike forums where a page on this blog is often linked to a topic under discussion. I am amazed at how many “Fixie” forums there are from all over the world.

This youth craze that appears to have started in the US has spread to all corners of the globe. (Does a globe have corners?)

I see fixie forums from countries as diverse as the US, UK, France, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Israel.

I came across the above video from Dijon, France. And these “Shit fer Brains” riders really think they are mustard. (Pun intended.)

Riding at night without lights, they switch randomly from the street to the sidewalk as it suits them, weaving between pedestrians.

Blasting through red lights without so much as a cursory glance to the left or right.

One guy is shown using parked cars as an improvised slalom course, as he zig-zags from the inside to the outside of the line of cars.

My thought is this; what if there are passengers exiting or entering one of these parked cars from the passenger side as this lunatic comes zipping by?

This craze shows no sign of ending soon although it is bound to end sometime as all youth crazes do.

LA road rage doctor gets five years

Update on my story posted November 4th 2009.

The California physician, convicted of assaulting a pair of cyclists with his car, was sentenced to five years in prison at the close of a hearing in Los Angeles Superior Court this morning, Friday 8th January, 2010.

Sixty-year-old Christopher Thomas Thompson, found guilty of six felonies and a misdemeanor, has been in custody since his conviction in November.

Prosecutors had asked that Thompson be sentenced to eight years for crimes mostly relating to a July 4, 2008 incident in which he severly injured two cyclists when he abruptly stopped his car in front of the riders descending Mandeville Canyon road, near Los Angeles.

He told the first police officer on the scene that he intentionally hit his brakes in order to “teach them a lesson.”

Thompson was also convicted of misdemeanor charges relating to a similar incident that occurred months earlier, but did not result in injuries.

Thompson took the stand Friday and accepted full responsibility for his actions, expressed remorse and apologized to Peterson, Patrick Watson and Josh Crosby, who were in attendance on Friday.

“I would like to apologize deeply, profoundly from the bottom of my heart,” he told the three cyclists.

The jury found that Thompson’s actions were criminal and convicted him of assault with a deadly weapon, reckless driving causing specified bodily injury, battery with serious bodily injury and mayhem.

Thompson’s troubles will probably not end with his Friday sentencing. His medical license was suspended last month, and a permanent revocation is probable, pending a hearing by the state’s medical licensing board.

Although now reportedly near bankrupt, the founder of a successful medical records technology company, Thompson still faces likely civil action from the victims in the case.

I stated in my previous post on this incident:

Thompson told police, “I just wanted to teach them a lesson.” I think more than anything, the doctor has taught himself a lesson, one that I hope other drivers will get.

Deliberate dangerous moves like cutting cyclists off or slamming on brakes in front of them, have serious consequences.

The full story in Velo-News whose reporter Patrick Brady was in court for both the trail and the sentencing

The Wappoo Cut Bridge

We are indeed lucky in my adopted home town of Charleston, South Carolina.

We have a local newspaper that is sympathetic to the needs of cyclists.

An example is this week when the Post & Courier reported the death of a bicycle rider, and used the incident to draw attention to the plight of local cyclists.

The unfortunate man fell while avoiding construction obstacles and was struck by a passing car. The driver was not charged and no police report of the incident is forthcoming.

I am speculating that the usual situation exists where one man is dead, and the only other witness is the person who hit him.

The reason drivers are expected to pass a cyclist giving ample room, is because of the possibility the cyclist may swerve or fall because of obstructions in the road.

Common sense dictates if there is a combination of road construction and a cyclist, drivers exercise even more caution.

Much of the South Carolina coastline is made up of a series of islands, separated by a maze of inland waterways, and of course bridges connect them all. This limits the number of routes you can take to get from one place to the next.

The old City of Charleston is a peninsula, with the Cooper and Wando Rivers merging to the North East, and the Ashley River to the South West.

South West of the Ashley River, are the Stono River and the Wappoo Creek. (Actually a good size river, in spite of its name.) These rivers separate James Island and John’s Island, both favorite riding areas for local cyclists.

To get to James Island you cross the Wappoo Cut bridge on Folly Road. (Picture above.) This is where the cyclist was killed. It is a drawbridge, and the road surface of the part that opens is a steel grid, extremely treacherous to ride on with skinny road tires.

It is quite wide, three lanes one way and two the other. I rode over this bridge one Sunday morning when traffic was very light. I rode in the center of the inside lane, leaving two other lanes for people to pass. One driver didn’t like this arrangement and skimmed by missing me by inches.

Another time it was raining and I opted to dismount and walk my bike over. The sidewalk is barely 18 inches wide, hardly enough room to walk and wheel a bike.

The only other option over the Wappoo Creek is the James Island Express Way. (Pictured above.) It is essentially a freeway, although bikes are allowed and I have ridden it, it is not for the faint hearted.

Sometime in the far distant future this Expressway will connect with the 526 Freeway to the North, and I suspect when that happens, bikes will not be allowed.

So the Wappo Cut Bridge is it for now; it could be made safer by making it four traffic lanes (Two each way.) instead of the current five lanes. This would make room for a good width bike lane in each direction.

Put a speed limit on the bridge, enforced with cameras. There are a series of traffic lights in both directions, on either side of this bridge; a speed limit would not slow the flow of traffic. Why race over the bridge to then sit at the next red light?

Another great alternative that would not cost a great deal of money would be to pave the West Ashley Greenway; I wrote about it here.

This bike path that is already paved part way, starts less than a mile from the Wappoo Bridge, and runs ten and a half miles south to exit near the Stono River Bridge. This bridge goes over to John’s Island and many quiet rural roads that are favorites with Charleston area cyclists.