Bicycle Safety
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Santa Clara County Still Plans to Widen Expressways, Despite Lower Traffic
Santa Clara County is still operating under plans that assume it can build its way out of traffic congestion by adding more lanes of traffic, plus new overpasses and underpasses, to the county's 62 miles of expressways -- dangerous arterial roadways that were "upgraded" decades ago with freeway-like ramps and overpasses. This is in stark contrast to the 21st-century approach taken by other cities and transit agencies in the region, which are planning for reduced traffic volumes by centering future urban growth around transit corridors and high-quality networks for walking and bicycling.
July 29, 2014
San Jose Candidates Campaign, Pitch Public Safety at SJ Bike Party
San Jose Mayor or City Council candidates Sam Liccardo, Raul Peralez, and Don Gagliardi all made appearances at last Friday's San Jose Bike Party, pitching improvements to bicycling conditions on the city's streets as integral to public safety. An estimated 2,500 Bike Partiers rolled out from Arena Green Park in downtown San Jose on the 18-mile, patriotically-themed "Stars & Stripes Ride" through the city's East Side.
July 25, 2014
Watch: ABC 7 Talks With Officials, Advocates Supporting Vision Zero
ABC 7 news anchor Cheryl Jennings talked to some of San Francisco's key city officials and advocates about Vision Zero, the campaign to eliminate traffic deaths by 2024, on her show "Beyond the Headlines" Sunday.
July 23, 2014
Safety in Bike-Share: Why Do Public Bikes Reduce Risk for All Cyclists?
What if Yankees legend Yogi Berra had followed a season with 24 homers and 144 hits with one featuring 27 homers and 189 hits? Would the baseball scribes have declared “Yogi Power Shortage” because only one in seven hits was a homer instead of one in six? Duh, no. The headlines would have read, “Yogi Boosts Production Across the Board.” The fact that a greater share of base hits was singles and doubles would have been incidental to the fact that Yogi’s base hits and homers were both up.
July 8, 2014
Will San Mateo County Make Real Changes for a Safer Middlefield Road?
Residents of North Fair Oaks have made it clear that they want a safer Middlefield Road with wider sidewalks, but San Mateo County has yet to commit to a redesign that could make a real difference on this important commercial street.
June 27, 2014
Why Sharrows Don’t Cut it: Even SF Bike Safety Instructor Bert Hill Got Hit
When a driver rear-ended Bert Hill, he was using all of the safe bicycling techniques in the book -- after all, he's one of the most heavily-consulted bike safety instructors in San Francisco. Hill even had a major role in the SFMTA's new video for Muni drivers on how to share the streets with people on bikes.
June 11, 2014
ABC 7: Our Drivers Won’t Follow CA’s 3-Ft Bike Passing Law, So Why Bother?
ABC 7 is back with another blurry watercolor painting of street safety issues -- this time, setting sights on California's new 3-foot bicycle passing law. ABC reporter Dan Noyes went to great lengths to film real-world examples of the issue, setting up a camera to film passing bike commuters and drivers on Market Street, and drawing out chalk lines to measure how much room drivers are giving. Bizarrely, Noyes and crew even rigged a camera to their vehicle to film themselves violating the law.
June 10, 2014
Belmont Council Calls Car-Centric Ralston Corridor Study “Balanced”
A study of Ralston Avenue in Belmont recommends easing the way for cut-through car traffic while shunting cyclists onto indirect routes -- and the City Council seems to think that's just fine.
April 18, 2014
SFMTA Announces 24 Vision Zero Bike/Ped Projects for Next 24 Months
At this morning's Walk to Work Day press conference, SFMTA Director Ed Reiskin announced a plan to implement 24 bike and pedestrian safety projects over the next 24 months [PDF]. This is the most concrete safety plan unveiled so far, ever since city leaders pledged to pursue Vision Zero.
April 11, 2014
Highway Safety Projects Ineligible for Highway Funds in San Mateo County
San Mateo County's Mid-Coast Multi-Modal Trail just barely made it into the list of Pedestrian and Bicycle Program projects approved for funding by the Transportation Authority (TA)'s Board of Directors last Thursday. Despite this step forward, building the trail will be difficult thanks in large part to restrictions on how TA funds can be spent, which hamper walking and biking projects.
April 11, 2014