Bicycling became big news in LA this week when a guy suddenly braked in front of a couple bicyclists, causing one of them to crash into the car’s rear window face first. The sudden braking was allegedly an intentional attempt to harm the bicyclists, and now the driver’s been charged with two felony counts each of reckless driving causing injury and battery with serious bodily injury.
Scary and sad as that story is, the accident’s also propelled bicycling issues into prominence at a time when gas prices are high and many people are looking for alternatives to the automobile. In fact, a Cyclists’ Bill of Rights had already been making the rounds in LA. Drafted up by a bike activist group called the Bike Writers Collective, the Cyclists’ Bill of Rights has already been endorsed by the East Hollywood, Silver Lake and Atwater Village Neighborhood Councils, and was introduced in the L.A. City Council meeting earlier this week.
Making bicycles a more recognized form a transport — and correspondingly, making life easier for cyclists and would-be-cyclists in general — is a movement happening across the country, albeit more slowly in some places than others. One dramatic piece of pro-bicycle news comes from New York City. According to the NY Times, NYC’s converting two lanes of traffic to an esplanade, which the city is calling Broadway Boulevard. (via Kottke)
Basically, this project will convert a chunk of Broadway — from 42nd Street to Herald Square — from a 4-lane to a 2-lane street plus “a bicycle lane and a pedestrian walkway with cafe tables, chairs, umbrellas and flower-filled planters.” The project’s scheduled to be completed next month!
No similar project’s happening in LA as of yet — but a teensier idea’s been approved: LA City Councilmember Eric Garcetti’s effort to get sharrows painted on a couple roads is going forward.
Farther north, San Francisco’s considering a law that lets cyclists treat stop signs as yield signs — though there’s actually some confusion as to what exactly this law means. One San Francisco Bicycle Coalition member, for ex, is quoted by CBS News saying “At a stop light they would still have to stop and look both ways, but then they could go through” — which has Kate Trainor at Carectomy wondering how exactly this new rule would change anything for bicyclists.
Top image via bikewriterscollective.com
[crossposted on BlogHer, sort of]
Update, 11/20/08: Bike sharrows and other bike-related items are up for discussion at the meeting of the Transportation Committee of the LA City Council on 11/22.
As some of the replies to the Trainor article point out, bicyclists are required by California law to stop at red lights and wait for the green, just like motor vehicles. But it can be annoying when the sensors don’t detect your bicycle and continually skip you in the rotation … This would allow bicyclists to run red lights after they’ve first made a full stop.
Comment by Brian — July 12, 2008 @ 1:50 pm