This post was updated November 15, 2024, to reflect new vote tallies.
CalBike endorsed eight candidates for the state legislature and one bike champion in a county race. Six of those nine candidates won their races, one lost, and two are still too close to call.
California State Assembly gets five new bike champions
In the Assembly, we’re excited to welcome five new active transportation supporters that CalBike endorsed:
Catherine Stefani, Assembly District 19: San Francisco
Nick Schultz, Assembly District 44: Burbank
Robert Garcia, Assembly District 50: Rialto
Jessica Caloza, Assembly District 52: Los Angeles
Sade Elhawary, Assembly District 57: Los Angeles.
We look forward to working with these new members and the fresh perspectives they will bring to the legislative process.
Unfortunately, Colin Parent, who we endorsed for Assembly District 79 in La Mesa, has lost. Clarissa Cervantes in Assembly District 58, Corona, is behind her opponent, but the race is very close, ballots are still being counted, and the margin is getting smaller, so we’re still keeping our eye on this race.
A new ally in the Senate
Our endorsed candidate for Senate District 25, Sasha Renée Pérez, will join the California State Senate when the new session begins in a few weeks. Pérez is a strong ally who wants our state to get serious about addressing the state’s housing crisis if we intend to tackle the climate crisis. She told CalBike that active transportation and public transportation funding will be one of her top priorities, and we look forward to working with her.
The Bike Mayor in a tight race for county supervisor
John Bauters was dubbed the “Bike Mayor” during his time on the Emeryville City Council (the mayor position rotates among council members). He is famous for getting to regional commission meetings by bike and documenting his travels on his prolific Twitter feed.
CalBike endorsed Bauters for Alameda County District Supervisor because of his track record of bringing safer streets to Emeryville. The margin between the two candidates in this race makes it too close to call at this time.
Thank you to those of you who volunteered for, donated to, or voted for these candidates.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/i-voted-sticker-lot-1550340-scaled-e1583538108252.jpg6081996Jared Sanchezhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngJared Sanchez2024-11-13 18:20:132024-11-15 17:39:43Bike-Friendly Candidates Elected in California Races
Last week, the California Transportation Commission released staff recommendations for the 2025 Active Transportation Program (ATP). The news is dire: $2.5 billion in requests were made, but the California Transportation Commission (CTC) had only $100 million to award in statewide grants, enough to greenlight just 13 projects over the two-year funding cycle.
Budget cuts that punch down at vulnerable road user safety
The ATP was one of only two transportation programs cut in the 2024 budget, despite the fact that it’s the only statewide funding source for biking and walking infrastructure projects and is chronically underfunded and oversubscribed, even without budget cuts. The governor initially recommended cutting all the funding from this program; negotiations with the legislature restored $200 million, allowing the ATP’s Cycle 7 to proceed, even though it was only able to fund 4% of the applications.
The total funding available for the three components (statewide — $84 million, small urban/rural — $16 million, and $68 million for Metropolitan Planning Organizations) that comprise the ATP is $168 million for Cycle 7 instead of the normal amount, which varies from $300 million to $600 million. This leaves an unprecedented shortfall in funding for the CTC’s most oversubscribed and competitive program.
A tiny but critical transportation program
The projects funded by the ATP are critical to meeting California’s climate, safety, and equity goals. The state budget agreement reached in 2024 leaves room for additional funding that would allow additional projects to be built, though there’s no guarantee the funds will become available. And, even if the legislature finds an additional $400 million for the 2025 ATP, program needs will continue to remain greater than the funding the state allocates for this vital program.
Only nine projects have so far been recommended to receive funding through the statewide component and four for the small urban and rural component in the 2025 ATP. These projects were scored at 95 points or higher, which means only the very top projects got funded, while many worthy applications will have to look elsewhere for funding or may not get built.
CalBike advocates for more money for the Active Transportation Program
For CTC to have approved projects scoring at least 85, which for the most part are very strong and deserve funding, the ATP would need an additional $1 billion in funding. Two years ago, CalBike advocated for the state to spend $2 billion on bikes and succeeded in increasing the ATP allocation to $1 billion for Cycle 6. That allowed the CTC to greenlight many more active transportation projects, but it wasn’t enough to fund all the worthwhile proposals. However, that year saw a budget surplus, and the governor has tried to claw back those additional funds in the past two deficit years.
The ATP should get at least $1 billion in funding every cycle. That’s not enough, and it’s still a tiny fraction of California’s transportation spending, but it would be an overdue signal that our state understands the value of active transportation in fighting climate change and making our streets safer and more equitable. We’ve said it before — California can’t be a climate leader if it continues to invest in highways instead of active transportation and transit. We look forward to working with state leadership this year to significantly restore the ATP through the budget process and not allow further reductions to the program.
The ATP is a classic example of induced demand, also known as “build it and they will come.” Since the program’s inception, the volume of applications for funding has grown. More significantly, the number of high-quality projects that significantly improve the safety and comfort of people who bike and walk on California’s streets has increased.
This dedicated funding source, which CalBike’s advocacy helped establish, tapped into a deep well of unmet need for separated bikeways, sidewalk gap closures, protected intersections, and more. Californians want and need the ATP. California should fully fund this program, which provides great value for a fraction of the cost of building or maintaining highways.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/thumb-3.jpg367550Jared Sanchezhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngJared Sanchez2024-11-08 13:18:412024-11-08 13:18:42Active Transportation Program Struggles After Deep Funding Cuts
The path to achieving critical safety improvements on California streets is rarely straightforward. CalBike supports and sponsors legislation, but bills are often amended, sometimes in ways that remove the teeth from a measure, and even those that make it through can be vetoed. But a veto or amendment isn’t the end of the road for CalBike. We continue to find ways to help move the campaigns for good ideas forward.
One example is Senator Scott Wiener’s Safer Vehicles Save Lives Bill, SB 961. A provision to require side underride guards on trucks to prevent fatalities during collisions was removed in committee. The remaining provision, the addition of intelligent speed assist (ISA) technology to cars sold in California, passed the legislature but was vetoed by the governor. Neither of these safety campaigns started or ended with this bill, however, and CalBike continues to work with partners to advocate for safer vehicles — and you can join the campaign.
Preventable fatalities in truck crashes
While you may not have heard the term “side underride guard,” you likely know that people on bikes and in cars can be injured or killed if they are pulled under a semitrailer or box-type truck during a collision. The side underride guard is an inexpensive piece of equipment to add to these vehicles that can help prevent serious injuries and fatalities in the event of a crash. CalBike partner Eric Hein, father of Riley Hein, who died in a side underride crash, has detailed the problem of underride crashes and the promise of side underride guards, if you’d like to learn more.
The people who die in these crashes aren’t statistics — an acceptable death rate over a certain number of miles traveled. Riley Hein was driving to high school on I-40 when a semi drifted into his lane on a curve in the road, wedging his car under a trailer that lacked a side guard. The truck dragged Riley for half a mile and caught on fire. Riley died at the scene. He was 16 years old.
Eric Hein has become an advocate for side underride guards on trucks, as have many family members whose loved ones have needlessly died in underride crashes. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has recognized that side underride guards are a valuable safety feature for 50 years. Yet, in the face of opposition from the trucking industry, it hasn’t made a rule requiring them.
California has a chance to take a different approach. The California Highway Patrol has the power to require side underride guards in California, and Eric Hein has spearheaded an administrative petition asking them to do so. You can support this effort by sending emails to Sean Duryee, Commissioner of California Highway Patrol, and Kenneth J. Pogue, Director of the Office of Administrative Law, to express your support for side underride guards. You can send both emails with one click using CalBike’s action tool.
Intelligent speed assist at the federal level
ISA is a technology that’s currently available and required on all cars in the EU. It notifies drivers, with a sound or vibration, when they go more than 10 mph over the speed limit. Speed is a factor in many fatal collisions, particularly those involving vulnerable road users. Giving drivers a safety reminder will reduce speeding and provide calmer streets that are safer for people biking and walking.
The Safer Vehicles Save Lives Bill, which would have required ISA in California, got a veto from the governor this year. In his veto message, he said this should be regulated at the federal, not state, level.
NHTSA recognizes the effectiveness of ISA in reducing speeding but has not recommended requiring it on all cars in the U.S. CalBike joined with America Walks and Families for Safe Streets to send a letter to the president and vice president, asking them to require ISA on vehicles in the federal fleet.
Washington, D.C. recently adopted ISA and some cities, including D.C., have ISA on their municipal fleets. Installing speed warnings on fleet vehicles is an excellent way to pilot this technology, and it will have the effect of slowing traffic as other drivers travel behind cars equipped with ISA.
CalBike will continue to join with our partners to advocate for this safety technology.
I grew up in downtown Sacramento in a household without a car. From a young age, I understood that transportation was how we accessed opportunity. If something was close enough to walk or bike, or a bus or light rail route went there, we could access it. If not, that was not an opportunity open to us.
Experiencing the world through this lens — you could call it the opposite of the windshield perspective — made me want to build a world where car ownership wasn’t the key to unlocking opportunity. It led me to a career in planning and, in 2023, to a leadership position at CalBike.
While my household does own one car, the milestones in my life are more centered around active transportation: my toddler’s first ride on the back of my bike, her first balance bike, her first walk around the neighborhood on her own two feet. But I never forget the experiences that led me here, which are common to so many Californians who rarely get a voice.
Car-free adventures
As a kid, it didn’t seem odd to me that my family did not have a car. My mom still rode the road bike she’d had since the 1970s to get to work and took the bus or light rail longer distances. Everything I needed to do seemed to be a walk, bike, or bus ride away.
Transportation often felt like an adventure, and getting to the destination was part of the fun. At times, it could be inconvenient to need to plan several bus connections to get to a weekend swim meet on the other side of town or ride my bike to school with my heavy backpack, but it was part of my family’s way of life, and I didn’t think much about it.
As I headed toward adulthood, I started to notice that there were plenty of opportunities that weren’t open to us as a household without a car. We never really went on vacations; our common out-of-town trip was to visit San Francisco by Amtrak, a journey I enjoy to this day. As a single mother, my mom’s job opportunities were limited to employers within biking distance or on bus or light rail routes, and changes in weather or bus routing and schedule could easily change her ability to get to work on time.
Advocating for families like mine
My childhood memories include my mother getting stuck at the end of a light rail line when the bus stopped running after regular commute hours and having to get a cab home she couldn’t afford. When we got free tickets to Disney on Ice, we had to take a cab from the suburban arena. My mother said later that she wouldn’t have entered the drawing for free tickets if she had realized the bus to the arena didn’t run as late as the show. Where and when we could go on public transit were limiting factors in our lives.
My experiences growing up in a car-free household that depended on public transit and biking to get around helped lead me into a career working to make it safer and easier for people to get around without a car. As an advocate for integrating land use and transportation planning early in my career, I worked to help local and regional planning better meet the needs of families like mine, who couldn’t just hop into a car to get to work or the doctor.
Working as a transportation planner for over a decade, I focused on developing plans for safe, convenient, and connected bicycling and walking facilities in cities and towns throughout California, as well as programs to help people feel empowered to bike and walk to access their daily needs.
Coming to CalBike is the culmination of a nearly 20-year journey to make California communities better for people like my family — people who can’t afford to own a car or aren’t able to drive. I work with our dedicated staff to craft policy to facilitate the design of better bicycle infrastructure, more funding to build it, and more programs to get people on bikes. We work with partners throughout the state who are on the frontlines, impacting local policy and projects, getting more biking and walking facilities in the ground.
And I connect with our members and supporters, who all have their own reasons for being part of the movement: combating climate change, making communities safe for kids getting to school, creating economic prosperity and community health, and ensuring that collisions don’t take the lives of any more loved ones.
Believing in a better world — with lots of protected, connected bikeways
To me, being a bike advocate is an exercise in radical optimism. I hold a vision of the future where people are able to feel the wind on their faces and enjoy the journey to work, school, and other destinations without fear of traffic violence — where people from all walks of life can get physical activity and stay healthy through transportation, supporting our environment, and saving themselves money in the bargain.
I’m working to make the world a bigger and more welcoming place for the millions of people like my mother who can’t afford a car or choose not to drive. I want all Californians to do or be whatever they can dream up without the need to drive a car to get there.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Kendra-with-bike-cleaned-e1730850461882.jpg10722049Kendra Ramseyhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngKendra Ramsey2024-11-05 15:40:382024-11-05 15:48:51Why I’m a Bike Advocate
In a state where 4,000 people die annually and many more are injured due to traffic violence, some California cities are freaking out because teenagers on e-bikes…did a wheelie? The ultra-conservative enclave of Huntington Beach enacted a draconian law last year that allows police to impound bicycles of youth found to have violated its (probably unconstitutional) provisions. Now, Santa Barbara is considering an ordinance based on the Huntington Beach law.
The popularity of e-bikes — and the confusion of small motorbikes with e-bikes — has led some local governments to declare states of emergency and restrict and penalize people on e-bikes. There have been very few fatalities, almost exclusively caused by car drivers hitting people on e-bikes, so the car is the problem in those cases.
There have been increased interactions between people riding e-bikes, including out-of-class bikes that might more properly be classified as mopeds, and pedestrians on shared paths. This can be scary, especially to older pedestrians, and it’s understandable that communities want to create an atmosphere of safety on mixed-use paths. Criminalizing e-bike riders doesn’t solve this problem and, in fact, creates more safety hazards than it fixes.
CalBike has created a toolkit advocates can use if local elected officials propose regulations that will discourage or prevent people from riding e-bikes (and all bikes). Scroll to the bottom of this post to download it.
6 reasons to oppose criminalizing e-bike riders, even if you don’t ride an e-bike
To paraphrase a famous saying, “First they came for the e-bikes….” Over-policing of e-bikes hurts everyone in the bicycling community and impedes public safety. Here’s why everyone who supports active transportation should speak out against unfair e-bike regulations.
All bike riders will be targeted. Some e-bikes are obviously electric, but many look very similar to acoustic bikes with a battery tucked discreetly against the frame or even hidden inside the frame. When police target e-bike riders, they are bound to harass some people riding acoustic bikes as well.
Bike police stops are racist. An in-depth investigation by the LA Times showed police disproportionately pulled over Black and Latino bike riders, and data from other municipalities has revealed the same pattern. Who is most likely to get pulled over for a suspected e-bike infraction? Who is most likely to have their bike impounded? Riders who are “other,” “outsiders,” or “a threat” — in other words, BIPOC bike riders.
Traffic stops can have fatal consequences. Police encounters, especially for men of color, can turn deadly. E-bikes almost never kill anyone, but police officers do. Even nonfatal stops can leave bike riders physically and emotionally traumatized. No one should have to go through that to ride a bike. California has moved to decriminalize things like “jaywalking” to reduce the frequency of police encounters; criminalizing e-bike riders is a move in the wrong direction.
Demonizing bike riders makes everyone less safe. Studies have shown that when drivers view people on bikes as less human, they are more likely to drive dangerously around them. Cities that treat e-bike riders as criminals invite car drivers to drive too close, cut off bike riders, or menace them with their cars, increasing the risk of injury or death.
Criminalizing any kind of bike riding makes people less likely to ride. Getting around on any kind of bike is economical, healthy, and fun. But getting on a bike is less appealing if you think you might be subject to a $500 fine or have your bike impounded. If you are forced to ride in fast-moving traffic or restricted from bike paths, going out for a ride might not seem like much fun.
It’s the wrong solution to the wrong problem. Our planet is heating and we need to drive less and bike, walk, and take transit more. If there are too many e-bikes clogging up a city’s streets, treat bike congestion the way you would treat car congestion and build more bikeways, bike paths, and shared-use paths. If there are conflicts between pedestrians and people on e-bikes, build even more bikeways with fast lanes or bicycle highways that provide limited-access through routes. Restrict where people can drive cars and make space for active transportation. These measures aren’t as easy as writing a law blaming everything on people riding e-bikes, but they will make streets safer for everyone.
What is and isn’t an e-bike
One of the challenges with e-bikes is that California regulations haven’t caught up with the surge in the popularity of e-bikes. That has allowed new companies to bring out models marketed as e-bikes that have settings like “off-road” that allow the bikes to travel faster than the maximum 28 mph of a Class 3 e-bike. Many of these vehicles don’t fit California’s definition of an e-bike.
CalBike supported bills this year to clarify e-bike classifications and require safety certifications for e-bike batteries to prevent fires. We are working with legislators to develop additional sensible regulations to keep everyone safe on e-bikes in California.
We believe regulating the e-bike market and e-bike use should be done at the state level. For example, if age limits on e-bike riding change from city to city, a rider could break the law, without realizing it, just by crossing a municipal boundary.
And, as noted above, the local ordinances that have been considered or put into effect don’t address these safety concerns but rather penalize all e-bike riders — and everyone who rides a bike.
How to use CalBike’s toolkit
We wish we could weigh in on every new e-bike ordinance, but in a state the size of California, it’s not possible. We’re counting on local bicycle coalitions, advocates, and concerned citizens to stand up against anti-bike regulations.
In the toolkit provided in the pdf below, we include common provisions we’ve seen in e-bike regulations and responses to them. We also include talking points you can use when testifying at a city council meeting about a proposed law and a template letter to send to your local elected representatives.
Thank you for being a bike champion and standing up for the rights of all bike riders.
The 2023 Daylighting to Save Lives Bill, AB 413, authored by Assemblymember Alex Lee and co-sponsored by CalBike, prohibits parking within 20 feet of most crosswalks. It allows cities to use that space for other purposes, such as bicycle parking, that don’t restrict visibility. Its provisions took effect on January 1, 2024, and cities are allowed to ticket violators starting January 1 of next year.
Giving car drivers better sightlines at intersections will make walking and biking safer — this law is a significant step forward for Vision Zero. However, passing the bill is only the first step. It allows communities latitude in signage, painted curbs, and enforcement, so effective implementation is vital to the success of this new law.
Assemblymember Lee follows up
Following up on the hundreds of bills that become law in California each year is a daunting task that is usually left to state agencies and administrative staff. But Assemblymember Lee is continuing to work on this critical measure. His office recently issued an implementation guide to help local governments put daylighting into effect.
“AB 413 saves lives through a simple and effective solution to improve road safety,” Assemblymember Lee said. “Intersections are some of the most dangerous portions of our roads, and daylighting will make them safer for everyone. More than 40 states have already implemented daylighting laws prior to AB 413, and I’m glad that California is joining the rest of the country on improving road safety.”
CalBike is working with Assemblymember Lee’s office to spread the implementation message. We’re coordinating with local bicycle coalitions, who will be the main drivers of implementation, through their relationships with local elected officials and public works staff.
Even if a city doesn’t add signage or red paint to indicate the daylighting area, police can issue tickets. However, in most cases, daylighting intersections is an inexpensive fix that CalBike and other advocates hope public works departments will implement so drivers know where they are and aren’t supposed to park. It will take all of us — advocates, interested residents, and local governments — working together to ensure this vital measure gives maximum protection to vulnerable road users.
https://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/ab-413-cropped-scaled.jpg12402560Jared Sanchezhttps://www.calbike.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/calbike-logo.pngJared Sanchez2024-11-04 12:43:112024-11-04 13:27:31Daylighting Law Will Save Lives
