Melanie Curry

A new law just signed by Governor Jerry Brown will make it possible for bicyclists who are ticketed for certain infractions to attend a class on safe bicycle riding and thus reduce their fines.

This just in: Active transportation is finally getting some love in Sacramento. A bill was introduced today to double the funding available for projects and programs that encourage people to walk or ride bikes by making streets and paths safe and comfortable for them.

California legislators held press events in Los Angeles and San Francisco on Friday to present new bills to boost transit funding as part of the special legislative session on transportation infrastructure.

TransForm has unveiled the Climate Benefits Map, an interactive online tool that provides a centralized source tracking the benefits of California's cap-and-trade program, which helps fund transit and development projects.

In Sacramento, bills are beginning to move more quickly through the committee process as this week's policy committee deadline approaches. Below are highlights on some of the bills pertaining to sustainable streets issues.

The California Bicycle Coalition's 2015 Bike Summit will take place in San Diego in late October, providign an opportunity for bike advocates from across the state to gather and discuss issues of this year's theme: equity.

This week the California legislature was mostly focused on the budget, since the Assembly and the Senate must by law present a budget bill to the governor by midnight on Monday, June 15. The joint Budget Conference Committee succeeded in producing an agreement [PDF] well before the deadline; their budget bill, A.B. 93, should be available later today, ready to be voted on in both houses on Monday.

This week Sacramento saw long hearings in the Senate and Assembly, as both houses pushed to meet their deadline to pass bills. Any bill that doesn’t pass its house of origin by the end of this week is dead–for this year at least.

The California central valley town of Modesto is not usually high on anyone's list of cities embracing cutting-edge pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure. But that may change soon.

Matt Nichols is Oakland's newly hired policy director for infrastructure and transportation. Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf created the position to shepherd her proposed reorganization of transportation planning, design, engineering, and construction into one department, and to oversee the creation of a cohesive transportation policy. Nichols has been in his new job for about two months, and he's excited about this chance to formulate policies to guide infrastructure.