Los Angeles finally lowers speed limits on some streets and ‘woke’ repeal of Seattle’s bike helmet mandate

It might be time to check the snow conditions in the underworld.

For the first time in memory, if ever, Los Angeles officials rescinded drivers’ rights to set speed limits, lowering limits slightly on 177 miles of LA streets.

And by reversing, however slightly, the ever-increasing speed limits imposed on them by the deadly 85th percentile law.

The move came in response to legislation sponsored by Burbank State Assemblywoman Laura Friedman that allows cities to lower speed limits to less than five mph.

This is not the legislation we need to repeal the 85th percentile law. But it’s a start.

Now we only have 6,323 miles of streets to go.

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They get it.

However, not everyone does.

Jason Rantz, a conservative and curmudgeonly Seattle shock jock, appeared on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show to complain that this is just one more example of “everything is racist”.

Rantz accuses a “woke” professor of using a small sample size to show the law disproportionately verbalized people of color, while suggesting that some of those tickets were probably just homeless people on stolen bikes, from anyway.

Schmuck.

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She gets it too.

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A reminder of Walk ‘n Rollers’ 10th anniversary celebration next month.

The Culver City-based organization deserves a lot of credit for teaching kids to walk and ride safely.

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This might be the coolest century-old bike I’ve ever seen.

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GCN wonders if a British company’s decision to ban bike helmets from its delivery workers is scientific or just plain stupid.

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

No bias here. An Italian cyclist has been fined the equivalent of $380 after being almost pulled over by a reckless cop because cyclists aren’t required to wear a Covid mask in the country, but pedestrians are – which is what he became when he got off his bike to argue over the point with the cop.

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Local

Glendale Police have arrested three men for attempting to steal bicycles from an underground parking lot at the Americana at Brand mall.

Norwalk has dropped the final version of its draft bicycle master plan.

State

Calbike is coming back against AB 371, which would effectively end the rental of self-service bicycles and electric scooters by imposing an “unprecedented insurance requirement”, after killing a similar proposal two years ago.

PeopleForBikes announces the schedule and speakers for next month’s Bike Leadership Conference at Dana Point.

Business owners in San Diego’s North Park neighborhood continue to complain about loss of business due to the removal of parking spaces for a protected bike path on 30th Street, even though a nearby parking structure remains under -used. Which suggests the real problem isn’t the bike lane, but drivers who don’t want to pay to park.

A Folsom letter writer says it’s time to allow bikes on a local 11-mile trail because mountain bikers outnumber horse riders in the area.

national

As if the company didn’t have enough trouble these days, Peloton users faced a major service outage yesterday.

It’s more like that. Denver traffic engineers and planners challenged a woman in a wheelchair to walk with her to see what her daily experience on the streets was really like.

Colorado is considering a bill to legalize Idaho’s entire stop law, which would allow cyclists to treat stop signs as yields and red lights as stop signs. The state currently has a confusing patchwork of local ordinances that allow passengers to make stops in one jurisdiction, while risking getting a ticket for the same in the next.

Kind-hearted students at an Iowa community college dipped into their own pockets to buy a new bike for a cafeteria worker, after discovering his was worn out.

A Chicago chef feels vindicated after a jury awarded her more than $212,000 for the door that left her severely injured with a concussion, bruises and other injuries.

Get $900 off the provocatively named, Detroit-made Babymaker II e-bike.

bicycle retailer says there’s still hope that the dilapidated building that housed the Wright Brothers’ first bike shop can be saved, despite a committee in Dayton, Ohio approving a permit to tear it down.

New York police have arrested an ambulance driver for the hit-and-run that killed a beloved teacher last year while driving a Rolls-Royce he may have rented; he also seriously injured a cyclist in another crash in 2017.

North Carolina sheriff’s deputies have bought another bike for a nine-year-old girl, after one they bought her following her involvement in a hostage situation was stolen.

There’s a special place in hell for an Alabama man accused of sexually abusing a young child, two years after he killed a cyclist in a collision.

International

pink bike examines why bike companies are changing hands like playing cards these days.

After discovering how essential bikes are in Havana, a travel writer overcomes his childhood fears and learns to ride one to see the other side of the Cuban city.

More on the move by Paris to install traffic camera-style noise sensors to detect and photograph noisy vehicles in a bid to reduce noise levels, calling it a public health concern. Can we please have them here in Hollywood? Pretty please?

Australian cyclists are being asked to log their crashes and near-misses on an app to provide data to researchers trying to understand how and why crashes happen and how to avoid them.

Competitive cycling

It was time. The 2022 Tour of Flanders will offer equal prize money to men and women, joining a global movement for equal scholarships.

Ultimately…

If you’re thinking of using a stolen credit card to buy an $8,200 bike, don’t leave a paper trail going from New York to Pittsburgh and back. That feeling when a tree swallows your bike and a myth grows with it.

And I still want a fucking Pashley Guv’nor, already.

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Be safe and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.

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