She started Trips for Kids bicycling group

Marilyn Price was riding her mountain bicycle through redwood forests north San Francisco one day when she wondered how she could share the experience with disadvantaged kids from the city.

Scoring 10 donated bikes, she started Trips for Kids. Nineteen years later, that dream has turned into an organization with 57 chapters across the US that seek to steer kids away from trouble by getting them outside and away from bad influences ...   more »

A bicycle relay is slowly making its way cross-country to draw attention to the connections between fuel dependency, war and global climate instability.

Called the Peace Transit, the ride started in Louisville, Kentucky, on Nov. 3 with cyclists carrying a baton, a petition and a rock to cyclists in Bardstown. Passed along five more times, the items arrived in Nashville, Tennessee, on Saturday.

No single person is making this tour. This is a very effective way to get hundreds, if not thousands, of people involved in publicizing the problems of being too dependent on oil. ...   more »

South Carolina authorities charged the driver of an SUV with reckless homicide in the deaths of two bicyclists on the last leg of a cross-country, charity bicycle tour.

The 35-year-old Greensboro, North Carolina, woman turned herself in and was released on $10,000 bond, reports the Associated Press.

One of the bicyclists, Lee Anne Barry, 43, was finishing a cross-country bicycle ride called the Brain Injury Greatest Journey (B.I.G. Ride), when she was joined for the last day by Thomas Hoskins. ...   more »

When I lived in Austin about 10 years ago, a nonprofit started a yellow bike program that allowed folks to use a bike and leave for the next person -- all for free -- in the downtown area.

Now I see that Lexington, Kentucky, became one of the latest cities to adopt a yellow bicycle program earlier this year when Lexington Yellow Bikes set out 80 free rides for residents.

Being up north, the group is collecting the bikes for storage over the winter and looking back at the success of the program. In spite of the program being a total success, there were a few problems. ...   more »

Those of you following the case of West Seattle cyclist Peter McKay, who is carrying around a couple of BBs fired by someone in a passing car, might be interested in this story from Maryland.

A 17-year-old student from Bowie, Maryland, faces serious charges in connection with the BB-gun shooting of a bicyclist on a bike trail.

The teen was charged Oct. 25 with first degree assault, second degree assault and possession of a dangerous weapon with intent to injure, according to the Maryland Gazette. ...   more »

Amsterdam is No. 1

A travel website has come up with the 11 most bike-friendly cities in the world.  I'm pleased, and somewhat surprised, to discover that four of them are in the US.

The highest ranked US city at No. 2 overall is Portland, Oregon. Boulder, Colorado, follows at No. 4; Davis, California at No. 5; and San Francisco at No. 6.

The ranking is based on criteria used by the League of American Bicyclists to name cities to its Bicycle Friendly Communties list. The results here are interesting because Davis leads the LAB's bike friendly list as the only Platinum level city ...   more »

Some concerned Seattle area bicyclists have set up a reward fund for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the nitbrains who shot bike commuter Peter McKay, left, last week.

Peter, a member of Seattle International Randonneurs, was riding home to West Seattle after work on Thursday when someone shot him from a passing car.

Amazingly, he completed his ride home after the incident, although he felt pain with every breath. He found blood on his clothes and two small bumps when he arrived home. Doctors at the hospital found one BB pellet had penetrated his left lung, releasing air into his chest cavity. The other just missed his aorta and spinal cord. ...   more »

How did Missouri officials acknowledge more public interest in bicycling after a successful inaugural pro cycling Tour of Missouri in September? They fired the state's bicycle and pedestrian coordinator for the Missouri Department of Transportation on Oct. 2. 

I'm sure there's no connection between the race and the firing, but the timing stinks.

Carolyn Szczepanski writes at The Pitch blog that the state has not posted an employment notice regarding the position at its website, an advisory committee has stopped meeting and former coordinator Caryn Giarratano has filed a grievance against the department for wrongful termination ....   more »

The Seattle City Council unanimously approved the 10-year Bicycle Master Plan on Monday that one local bike activist called the best in the nation.

Mayor Greg Nickels, who just finished hosting the US Conference of Mayors on Climate Change, says he hopes to triple the number of people who ride bicycles in the city.

The plan calls for spending about $240 million over the life of the plan to build a network of bike lanes, bike routes and multi-use trails criss-crossing the city. ...   more »

More than once, I've been cut off by a Metro bus pulling to the curb to drop off a passenger. It's bad driving, but nothing compared to the addlebrained recklessness shown by operators of India's Blueline buses.

The Blueline bus fleet has caused 103 deaths in India so far this year. The country's media calls them variously "killer buses" and "rogue buses," names formerly bestowed on rampaging herds of elephants.

Official enforcement seems ineffective, so local residents are taking matters into their own hands. After the October 25 death of a cyclist who was run down by a speeding bus, a mob torched and gutted the bus as the operator fled ...   more »

The Seattle city council is set to vote on the 10-year Bicycle Master Plan at Monday's meeting, starting at 2 p.m. at City Hall.

People can comment on the master plan at the start of the council meeting, so this would be a perfect time to show up and directly tell council members what you think of it.

The document calls for adding 135 miles of bicycle lanes or bike routes to the city's 67-mile network over the next three years. Also, the "last mile" of the Burke-Gilman bike trail to Ballard would be completed ...   more »

A Ventura County (California) jury has awarded $12.5 million to the family of a bicyclist who died when he was rear-ended by an 82-year-old woman in the fall of 2006.

It was the second rear-end accident in six months for the woman, who had learned about a month prior that she had severe cataracts in both eyes.

The cyclist, Glenn Garvin, was ...   more »

(Update: The Bicycle Diaries blog says the feds bailed out Chicago, 'til the end of the year. If there's no help after Jan. 1, Da Square Wheelman says commuters are emailing their favorite routes to CBF for others to use.)

As Chicago's bus system prepares to make drastic cutbacks beginning Sunday, the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation has prepared a Doomsday Survival Guide that's available online.

Chicago Transit Authority is cutting nearly 40 bus routes and laying off 600 transit workers on Sunday because of funding problems. That means many of Chicago's 1.5 million daily bus commutes will have to find an alternative way to work.

Promoting the wise use of bicycles, Chicagoland Bicycle Federation's guide is subtitled "Car-Free Alternatives for Chicago's Mass Transit Crisis." ...   more »