Community Corner

New Bike Master Plan, Old-School Safety Tips

The final version of the county's new Bike Master Plan has been released, and it has your editor thinking about safety for biking scaredy cats.

The latest--and final--version of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Master Plan has been released.

You can parse that here.

PUBLIC HEARING NOV. 16 ON BIKE MASTER PLAN

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You can also speak your mind on the plan November 16 at downtown's Hall of Records at a 9 a.m. public hearing.

With all this biking becoming an inevitability, I've got safety on my mind.

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I'm timid in traffic--scared really--and I'm trying to sort all that out.

I happened to stumbled across the above video, produced by REI and featuing an Outdoor School instructor called simply "Dan."

Dan demonstrates the simple hand signals that help you ride safely in traffic, making it easier for other vehicles to predict where you are going.

WILL BIKE SAFETY BECOME MORE OF AN ISSUE?

I recently attended a press conference outside the Angelus Temple on Glendale Boulevard where a biker was killed in 2009. 

LAPD officials there blamed, in part, inconsiderate bikers for some of the perils they faced.

I wondered: was this a case of blaming the victim?

Or are there legitimate bike courtesy measures people are ignoring?

Are bike hand signals one of them?


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