Photo by Alex Thompson via Flickr For over a year, Critical Mass and the Santa Monica Police Department have been at odds and last month at their monthly ride, an unusual amount of officers monitored the ride of approximately 150 cyclists. A total of 16 officers were assigned to the ride costing the city $3,067.88, according to documents obtained by LAist in a public records request. Nine citations were written for various violations such......

Following up on the story where a bicyclist was attacked and robbed by two men on the Ballona Creek Bike Path, Streetsblog LA finds that this is not a new problem. This month's incident demonstrated that the LAPD had hard time dealing with the incident because no numbered street address could be given. Even when the city's Dept. of Transportation tried to find out the crime statistics for the path, the LAPD could only give......

From Metro's full system transit map For the past three years, public transit has been our guiding way to the Sunset Junction Street Festival. To try to find reasonable parking is just not very realistic. Still, we've felt alone on the subways and buses when en route to the fest. There's maybe only a handful of people with us heading to or from the event (one LAist friend asked us if hipsters hate public......

The City Council has been looking at closing an access gate on the Ballona Creek Bike Path because in the vicinity of the 405 Freeway of crime. One such incident just happened. Via an e-mail sent to Streetsblog LA, here are some highlights: Under the 405 two gang members (this is what the police believe) threw another bike in my path, causing me to crash, and then sprayed me with pepper spray and took my......

Via Streetsblog LA And now CNN has picked up on the Mandeville Canyon bicycle vs. car story.......

A 17-year-old on a bicycle was shot and killed last night when a car with two men inside pulled up and shot the teen in the unincorporated area of Westmont. On Sunday night in the unincorporated area of Athens, four men were shot, leaving two dead, about one-mile away from last night's slaying. Both neighborhoods are located in the South LA area near the 110 and 105 Freeways. Updated: The Daily News reports that three......

Bicyclists Strike back at Santa Monica Uploaded by thepeoplesride Last Friday night in Santa Monica, bicyclists-turned-temporary-pedestrians gathered and protested what they believe is harassment from the city towards monthly Critical Mass bicycles rides. At their latest ride on August 1st, 14 police officers were deployed to monitor the ride resulting in at least nine citations (unofficial counts totaled up to 14). In response to that, around 60 bicyclists planned and executed some civil disobedience by......

Dr. Christopher Thompson of Mandeville Canyon, the man accused of assaulting two cyclists with his vehicle on Mandeville Canyon Road during the morning of Fourth of July, had his day in court today. At 8:30 a.m. he appeared at the airport courthouse, pleaded innocent to felony charges of assault with a deadly weapon reckless driving causing injury (2) and battery with serious bodily injury (2) and the special allegation of causing great bodily injury. His......

Today, Councilman Tom LaBonge announced that he has asked City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo for a legal opinion on including cyclists to ride at the Griffith Park holiday light festival that had once been open only to automobile traffic. Public pressure to allow cyclists on all days that cars use the road has been building up for some time now. “I’d like to include bikes along with automobiles, but my first priority is to protect the......

Tonight is ride number two for Councilman Tom LaBonge's cutely name "Tour LaBonge" bicycle ride series where constituents are invited to come along. At 6:15 p.m., riders will meet at the Mulholland Fountain (Riverside Dr./Los Feliz Blvd.) and embark on a 10-mile ride along the LA River and in Griffith Park. Half way through, it's ice cream time at Travel Town, which is near where a brush fire ignited on Sunday afternoon, and then back......

Glad I wasn't in that aisle when this happened. This is from a security camera inside Incycle Bicycles in San Dimas. In the below video, watch at least 7 people sprint to and out the door. In most cases, going outside is not recommended, but in a bicycle shop where things don't seem very secure in the first place, that might have been the best sort of action. Thoughts?......

Whew! This one's not in LA, but with all the bicycle drama happening around town, it's worth noting that it is a national issue. This weekend in New York City, a cyclist was knocked to the ground by a NYPD officer. "The cyclist in this video was arrested, held for 26 hours, and charged with attempted assault and resisting arrest," according to LAist sister site, Gothamist.......

Keeping in line with being one of the best transit-oriented neighborhoods in the city, the East Hollywood Neighborhood Council voted last night to support Councilman Eric Garcetti's sharrows pilot project motion by giving $5,000 to the project. "If passed by the Council, and enacted by the City's Department of Transportation, the Fountain Avenue Sharrows route would initially run about 1.5 miles from Western Avenue on the west to the Sunset Blvd diagonal on the east--located......

Photo by stop.down via Flickr The LA Times has certainly taken the Mandeville Canyon story and run with it. But that's a good thing, it's a conversation that has been needed for a long time and to see the city's largest media outlet take it head on is a good sign for positive results. Here's some of the latest, which leads today's online California section: With the city of Los Angeles in the early......

Brendt Barbur's Bicycle Film Festival opened strong with an enthusiastic crowd filling the sidewalk of Hollywood Boulevard as the The What Cheer Brigade, a "Luddite Hard Core Marching Band," marched down the street and proceeded to stop traffic, both motor vehicle and pedestrian. After drawing in the crowd, they pulled a Pied Piper and marched into the Vine Theatre, followed by their audience, leaving them pumped up and ready for a Shorts Program that featured......

The Bicycle Film Festival takes over the Vine Theatre on Friday and Saturday and wraps with an all day BFF Street Party at Heliotrope and Melrose (aka "The Bicycle District," aka "HelMel"). Valet parking is available (for bikes!) and the line-up includes favorites such as LA BIKE SCENE, KING OF SKITCH and ROAD TO ROUBAIX. Documentaries, Mockumentaries, Comedies, Alleycat Races, Olympic Races, Tests of Bravado and a local favorite, THE BIKE LANE, all come together......

A sign near the intersection of Riverside Dr. and Fulton Ave. in Sherman Oaks. | Photo by Zach Behrens/LAist Further investigation into reasons why a few spots around the city have signs prohibiting bicycle sidewalk riding shows that both Sherman Oaks locations were due to troubles caused by skateboarders. After pedestrians getting hit by boards, cars nearly hitting skaters falling into the street and customers being intimidated, Van Nuys Division LAPD officers requested a......

A sign at Hollywood & Vine | Photo by discarted There's a common law that most bicyclists know in Los Angeles: sidewalk riding is legal as long as you do not have "a willful or wanton disregard for the safety of persons or property." LAMC 56.15 also "disallows the riding of bicycles on Ocean Front Walk in Venice." Reading that, you would think that you can ride your bike on all the other sidewalks......

Bicycle advocate Alex Thompson wrote on his blog that he ran various red lights last night in Santa Monica. He explains his actions. "Because the decrepit signals wouldn’t change for me. Every time I visit Santa Monica City Council I run the light in front of the Police Department. I wait and wait and wait before I realize that the signal is not going to change for me. Then I look around, make sure there......

Although we nagged on Councilman Bill Rosendahl this morning, we had a candid chat with his office this morning afterwards. Things were overlooked and last night's meeting was not meant to be a secret, even if it was closed, they said. In an e-mail update on the meeting, among other things, sent out this afternoon (posted in full below), Rosendahl starts off his message with quite a nice vision: "I’d like to update you on......

Councilman Bill Rosendahl played to the cycling community last week when he announced that he was convening a Community Forum to address issues raised in the aftermath of the Mandeville Canyon "road rage" incident of July 4th. The response to the Community Forum, which was announced last Wednesday, was so significant that the event was moved to a larger venue to accommodate the anticipated crowd. Abruptly, Rosendahl's Office reversed course on Saturday, announcing that the......

Dan Guitierrez and Brian DeSousa of Dual Chase Productions spent the weekend riding Mandeville Canyon and videotaping their experiences, creating a video that demonstrates the relationship between good cycling behavior and good motoring behavior. Dan and Brian are boardmembers of the California Association of Bicycling Organizations (CABO) and are also League of American Bicyclist (LAB) Certified Instructors (LCI) and have a strong track record of performance as educators using their unique approach to video......

Cyclists from around the City were looking forward to Councilman Bill Rosendahl's Community Forum scheduled for tonight and it was that significant citywide interest that may have been responsible for causing the Forum to be canceled. It was last Wednesday that Councilman Rosendahl called for the Forum in response to the significant outcry over the Mandeville Road Rage incident of July 4th that left two cyclists badly injured, the motorist facing multiple felony charges......

Photo by Egan Snow via Flickr After quickly championing the rights of vehicles and bicycles sharing the road in the aftermath of the Mandeville Canyon "road rage" incident, Los Angeles City Councilman Bill Rosendahl has canceled this Monday's community town hall that he quickly put together last week (he even changed locations once to accommodate the expected large crowd comfortably). "At the request of the residents and of the cyclists who use Mandeville Canyon......

Injured cyclist, Ron Peterson being prepped for transport to an area hospital by Los Angeles Fire Department Paramedics. Update #2: The meeting has been canceled. More information here. Update: The meeting location has changed to across the street to accommodate more people. it is not located at Felicia Mahood Multipurpose Center at 11338 Santa Monica Boulevard. After the unfortunate, yet eye-opening incident between an alleged "road rage" motorist, who was arrested, and two bicyclists......

LA Times Road Sage Steve Hymon went on a bike ride last night around the Pasadena area. He hit a red light in an unincorporated part of LA County and sat there waiting for it to turn green. He waited and waited. It never did... until a car showed up and activated the signal loop finally turning it green. "By which time my face is red." One has to ask, will County Supervisor Michael D.......

July Fouth's "road rage" incident on Mandeville Canyon was reported here on Monday morning and the story quickly gathered steam with TV stations clamoring to interview the cyclists, the Police Captain reporting that the case would proceed as a criminal assault case and then culminating with Councilman Bill Rosendahl going on TV (video above) and referring to the Cyclists' Bill of Rights (PDF version), which addresses equality and access as basic civil rights that......

Yesterday, Chuck Henry of NBC contacted LAist to gather more information regarding the Mandeville Canyon "road rage" incident that landed two cyclists in the hospital. This two minute segment aired last night during the 11:00 p.m. news. CBS/KCAL also aired their own version of the story.......

Via L.A. Now, here's the 4th documented freeway bicycle ride. This time, it was a different group of folks (you may remember these crazy photos from Crimanimalz) and they hit the 101 and 110 starting in Silver Lake.......

Regarding the incident reported this morning where a one Dr. Christopher Thompson*, a 58-year-old emergency room physician and resident of the Mandeville Canyon neighborhood, was involved in an alleged road rage incident between two bicyclists, Christian Stoehr and Ron Peterson, on Mandeville Canyon Rd. in Brentwood, there have been some updates. "Captain Eaton, the commanding officer of the West LA station, reports that LAPD believes this was indeed a 'road rage' incident, made an arrest,......