Streetsblog Los Angeles

Bathed in light, Bill Rosendahl addresses Bikeside Speaks! last May at the Bikerowave. Photo:Sara Bond/Bikeside

Today, we approved a Bike Plan which provides more opportunities for people in Los Angeles.

More opportunities for people to discover the benefits of combining public transportation with a bike to finish that last mile.

More opportunities for parents and kids to ride safely on streets.

More opportunities for people to switch from gas to pedal power, burning fat instead of fossil fuels.

More opportunities for visitors to experience our wonderful weather on two wheels instead of four.

More opportunities to decide between a car and a bike for short trips.

And more opportunities to turn fear into confidence for those who are just plain scared to share the road with cars, like me. Read more…

It’s all over but the signing.  And that’s scheduled for tomorrow.

By a 12-0 vote, the Los Angeles City Council approved the Bike Plan sending it to the Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s desk for a signature.  The Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition and Villaraigosa have already announced the signing will take place tomorrow on the steps of City Hall.

Too bad Council Members Alarcon, Parks and Smith weren't present. Especially Alarcon who helped push for progressive planning at the Transportation Committee when the plan was more controversial.

The only drama that remained was how to placate the representatives of the city’s equestrian community who were fighting to get any mention of mountain biking in city parks removed from the plan.  A motion by Councilman Tom LaBonge, which basically re-stated existing city law that any changes would have to go through the parks commission, seemed to mollify the group much to the relief of nearly everyone involved.  There’s already enough progressive transportation planning being held up by lawsuits in this town.

However, if you block out the testimony by the horse people, the meeting was pretty much a love fest.  Councilman Ed Reyes gave shout outs to the Bike Kitchen, Bike Oven and “Pigeon Bike Shop.”  Later, he complimented the LACBC and their City of Lights Program.  Councilman Bill Rosendahl recounted his first story visiting the “Bike<mumble>wave” and twice noted the hard work of Alex Thompson.

While not at today’s hearing, Villaraigosa tweeted his congratulations and released a statement to Streetsblog promising a bright, and well-funded, future for bike planning.

“The 2010 Bicycle Plan is another great example of Measure R funds at work–we are investing in bicycling as a viable transportation option and in the process encouraging Angelenos to lead healthy, active lifestyles. With the addition of 1,600 miles of bikeways, Los Angeles is on the path to becoming a world-class city for bicycling.”

To top it off, city officials were sounding like advocates, or at least adopting our terms.  LADOT Interim General Manager Amir Sedadi referred to the Backbone Bikeway Network and Councilman Paul Koretz talked about the “4th Street Bike Boulevard.”  These terms have been the turf of insiders for years.  But today, everyone was an insider.

As for the plan itself, there are many highlights.  Quoted text via a fact sheet from the Mayor’s Office. Read more…

At 10:00 A.M. today, the City Council will meet to, amongst other things, vote on final passage of the Bike Plan.  Gone is the word “Master” as in Bike Master Plan.  Gone is the word “Draft” as in “Draft Bike Plan.” We’re so close to the finish line that even the Los Angeles Times is calling for a victory lap.

Image from today's article in the Los Angeles Times. I'm guessing its from CicLAvia.

I expect that most of the commentary today will be positive, but there’s always a chance that the debate could revolve around whether or not to consider possibly allowing a review of the city’s rules regarding riding mountain bikes on trails in public parks.  As you may remember, the city’s horse riding community is dead set even the mention of a possibility that the city might one day consider holding a discussion about the possibility of one day allowing limited use of mountain bikes on trails.

At the Joint Transportation and Planning Committee Meeting on the plan, Council Member Tom LaBonge attempted to bring those representing mountain bikers and equestrians to a compromise position which is nigh impossible when one side refuses to budge an inch.  Nevertheless, the Councilman has drafted a motion clarifying that no change could occur to the current law, which bans mountain biking in parks, without the input of the city’s Parks Staff.

We’ll live tweet the meeting as it happens and post a story as soon as we can.  In the meantime, the text of LaBonge’s amendment can be found after the jump. Read more…

This picture would be evidence of a crime in many Los Angeles parks. However, this picture is from the San Gabriel Mountains outside city limits. Photo:LoneWhackDotCom/Flickr#

(Note: We’re just covering yesterday’s hearing in this article.  For more on the actual content of the plan, click here.)

Yesterday, the Los Angeles City Council held a joint hearing of the Transportation Committee and the Planning and Land Use (PLUM) Committee to discuss the city’s Draft Bike Plan.  By the end of the hearing, which lasted well over two hours, the Committees had sent the plan to the full Council for final approval along with a five-year work plan and a schedule for City Planning and LADOT to update the Council on the plan’s progress every three months.

But it wasn’t always easy.

Ed Reyes, pictured preparing for an interview at a City of Lights press conference, was credited by Mowery for kicking off this process with a motion for a new Bike Plan...in 2005.

Seven Councilmen sat in the main chambers, Richard Alarcon, Paul Koretz, Paul Krekorian, Tom LaBonge, Bernard Parks, Ed Reyes, and Bill Rosendahl.  All of the Councilmen were supportive of the plan in general terms.  After testimony from Alex Thompson wondering why Sepulveda, a critical North-South route with poor conditions for cyclists, wasn’t in the top ten projects to be completed, Rosendahl became the only Council Member to call for any specific changes in plans for his District.

Also present were LADOT Acting General Manager Amir Sedadi and Planning General Manager Michael LoGrande.  Sedadi didn’t mince words, calling the hearing a “Historic moment in the City of Los Angeles.”  With the exception of staff’s insistence that a plan to extend the Beach Bike Path through Venice not be included in the Final Bike Plan, it would be difficult to tell who was an advocate and who was a staffer.  Even LADOT Senior Bikeways Coordinator Michelle Mowery, who was once the spokesperson for those not wanting to see the Backbone Bikeway Network be a large part of the plan, referred to the Draft Plan, backbone and all, as “the most fabulous plan I could have dreamed of.” Read more…

Last time an army of cyclists descended on Van Nuys City Hall, it was in anger over the Bike v. Hummer Crash and the LAPD mis-handling of the case. What a difference a year and a half makes.

In November, the commission’s hearing was contentious and drawn-out, resulting in a vote to continue the plan, essentially sending it back to Planning Department for revisions. Yesterday’s hearing saw near-unanimous harmony between the bicycle advocacy community and the city staff backing the plan. Michael LoGrande and Amir Sedadi, respectively the General Manager of the Department of City Planning and the Acting General Manager of the Department of Transportation, opened the hearing praising city efforts toward greener transportation and the stressing the importance of bicycling in that mix. Commissioners and staff related that the month’s continuance had been productive, greatly improving the earlier draft in a number of important aspects. Those changes have been enumerated here and here in earlier L.A. Streetsblog articles as well as in this Bike Coalition aritcle.

Speakers in support of the plan included representatives from the city’s Bicycle Advisory Committee, Bikeside, the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition (LACBC), the Valley Bikery, BikeRoWave, and the Safe Routes to School National Partnership. Nearly all of these speakers had testified against the earlier draft plan in November.

The only serious outlier concerned mountain bike access to city parks. More than a half-dozen hikers and equestrians rallied against the “extreme sport,” “inevitable conflicts” and threats to “public safety” involved in mountain biking. Speaking in favor of mountain bike access were representatives of Concerned Off Road Bicyclists Association (CORBA), the International Mountain Biking Association (IMBA), and LACBC. Voices in opposition to mountain biking significantly outnumbered supporters. The anti-mountain bicycling contingent also took the serious step of hiring a lawyer to challenge the plan’s environmental review. Read more…

I’ve been following the debate over the newest Draft Bike Plan at the City Planning Commission this morning on twitter, and the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition just announced that the Commission passed the plan.  You can get details of the hearing by clicking here and reading the tweets from Joe Linton and the LACBC.

The City Council Transportation Committee and Planning and Land Use Committees will not meet again in 2010, so the City Council won’t act on the plan until early next year.  When details on the Council schedule emerges, we’ll post them here.

Streetsblog wishes to congratulate everyone that worked on making the final plan what it is, especially Joe Linton, the LACBC, and Bikeside which made improving the plan their life’s work.  There’s more work to do to get the plan passed, but even six weeks ago it seemed unlikely that Los Angeles was going to end up with a plan this good.

The Backbone Bikeway Network, now part of the plan...

Since November’s continuance, the City Planning Department (DCP) has worked with the commission and with local cyclists and made additional modifications to the plan. The newly modified Bike Plan is anticipated to be approved when it is heard by the City Planning Commission this Thursday December 16th at 8:30am. The meeting will take place at the Van Nuys City Hall, 14410 Sylvan Street, Van Nuys 91401 – located three blocks north of the Metro Orange Line Van Nuys Station.

There are quite a few modifications listed in the staff report on the city’s Bike Plan website. A flurry of important changes were made during negotiations the day of the November Planning Commission hearing, and detailed in this earlier Streetsblog article: elimination of proposed/potential categories implying burdensome environmental review, specifying minimum lane widths, and others. Read more…

Nearly three years ago, Mia Birk, a principal with Alta Planning and Design, stood in front of a skeptical audience and promised that the final Bike Master Plan would be something that all Angelenos would celebrate.  What followed was a three year slog which saw repeated battles between cyclists, LADOT, cyclists, City Planning, and cyclists.  But now the end is in site.  A new draft of the plan was released yesterday to the cheers, yes cheers, of our city’s bike advocates.  The first hearing on this draft will be held next Thursday, December 16th at 8:30 am. at San Fernando Valley City Hall, 6262 Van Nuys Boulevard, Van Nuys, California 9140.

When we last checked in on the Bike Plan, Joe Linton reported that a broad coalition of cyclists took over a City Planning Commission Hearing and managed to delay the plan’s passage until a host of issues were addressed.  Following the meeting, City Planning met with the organizers of the protests at the Commission, Los Angeles County Bike Coalition’s Alexis Lantz and Aurisha Smolarski, Bikeside’s Alex Thompson, and Linton to hammer out the details that were holding up the plan.  The result is that yesterday the plan was released, and for the first time in three year’s, Birk’s long-forgotten promise became reality.  Finally, everyone appears happy.

Looking at this plan, Linton sounds happy, but not overjoyed, “While it’s not perfect, it’s good enough to be a tool for the next phase of improvements to LA streets.”

Granted, the plan is still a long read, and the devil could still emerge from the details.  Streetsblog will have in-depth coverage of the plan next week, and the Bike Coalition promises an in-depth review on Monday.  But for now, let’s take a moment to enjoy not just the progress, but getting to watch everyone celebrate.

The most obvious winner is Bike Working Group, that labored so hard to create the Backbone Bikeway Network (BBN).  The newest draft of the plan is full of references to the BBN, as well as the Neighborhood Network, and the Green Network.  Via email, Thompson writes, “The bike plan has turned around three times now, but this last one was a pirouette.  It’s a great document – this is what can happen when experts of all sorts get together and work it out.”  A full copy of Thompson’s statement can be found at the end of the article. Read more…

Since we won’t be doing a lot of publishing today, I wanted to give Streetsbloggers something to do besides sending the Petition for a National Search for LADOT General Manager to all of your friends.

Streetsblogger Vicki Karlan had the idea that one way to improve the city’s Draft Bike Plan was to improve the images in the plan. While its not a panacea, it does sound like a fun project. So, Karlan sent the above slide show, in Power Point format, to City Planning. Planning responded that they loved the picture and asked for more.

So here’s your Veteran’s Day homework, find some pictures of cycling in Los Angeles and link to them in the comments section. This entire thread will be passed on to City Planning and maybe your picture will make the plan.

Also, a quick note for parents, if your child is in one of these pictures and you’d like us to remove him or her from the submission.  Just let us know.