Help ressurect House Bill 68 to enhance penalties on careless vehicle operation

My two cents, followed by some other stuff.

3 January 2012

The Honorable Susana Martinez

Governor of the State of New Mexico

Mr. Henry Varela

Director, Constituent Services

Office of the Governor

Dear Governor Martinez and Director Varela:

During the 2011 legislative session, a bill increasing the penalties available for Careless Driving that results in great bodily harm or the death of another road user was introduced by Representative Rick Miera, House Bill 68. Although it passed the House by a unanimous vote, it did not make it out of the Senate Judiciary Committee at the end of the session.

Governor Martinez has recently commented in the news on how important it is to combat DWI. That is extremely laudable and I thank the Governor for leading this critical fight, but fighting DWI is increasingly only a part of the hazard we face on the road due to bad driving. Increasingly, electronic distractive devices and other forms of driver carelessness are endemic, leading to the notion that driving is not a full time job. The price is often paid in blood and tears.

The message we have to send to the public has to be a comprehensive one: being a good driver means not only remaining sober, but paying attention to one's driving and taking driving seriously. House Bill 68 would send just such a message, and hopefully do so as education rather than after a tragedy unfolds. I am asking Governor Martinez to please support this bill and put it on her legislative call.

Respectfully Yours, and hoping for a happy and productive 2012 for all New Mexicans,

Khalil J. Spencer

Los Alamos, New Mexico

copy: Rep. Jim Hall, Los Alamos

references.

KOB-TV story on Heather Reu's death


Santa Fe New Mexican Op-Ed


To keep pushing this issue forward though, your help is needed. If you haven't contacted Governor Martinez's office about adding this bill to her call list for the 2012 session, please do so today. Contacting your NM Senator and Representative is the next step. These contacts are vital to educate our elected officials about the importance of this legislation.


A huge Thanks to those of you who have already contacted your elected officials.

Khal Spencer (LA Bikes), Jennifer Buntz (Duke City Wheelmen), and the New Mexico Motorcycle Rights Organization.

Lycra and leather stood together at a State Capitol rally last winter. 
Probably need to do it again

Durango's Silver, Door-Zone Bike Lanes, Haven't Changed

But world events may make them quite heavily used.

We got out of Dodge for a couple days, sneaking off to our usual hideaway in Durango, CO.  Durango is a Bicycle Friendly Community (silver), and for a lot of good reasons, although our penchant for heading up there with our tandem is probably not officially on the list. Durango, in addition to being thick with cyclists and cycling friendly destinations, will be hosting the U.S. Pro Cycling Challenge this coming year in addition to the annual Iron Horse Classic. Its newspaper was quite excited about its newly acquired pro-level exposure today.

Carver Brewpub on Main Ave, where I'm
likely to be having lunch and a pint,
reserves the best parking spots for bikes
pic from Acorn to Oak, acknowledged

But Durango, like any real world place, has its warts. Its door zone bike lanes, found on quite a few of its urban arterials, are not its strong suit and that's the stuff on which your local, non-racing beginner or journeyman cyclist trudging off to work or school depends. Nothing seems to have changed since last summer except those lanes are really dirty this time of year from road grunge being swept into them by passing cars and trucks. I found a few hardy cyclists using them, too, riding in cramped space not fit for man or beast. I wish them well. 

If it were up to me, I'd downgrade Durango to Bronze. The level of official cynicism and disregard to the everyday cyclist's safety and legal equity these lanes indicate is depressing. After all, it is these everyday cyclists who do the real work that helps Durango support those high profile races that bring in the big bucks to the hotels and restaurants. If any place on earth should do better, its Durango, given how important cycling is to its economy. I hope they rise to the occasion. I'll keep bugging them till they do so. 

In an age when international sabre-rattling (see link to NY Times story) could drive people out of their motor vehicles via oil interruptions or price instability, not to mention ongoing climate worries, sedentary lifestyle health issues, and the American customer's choices to be increasingly oil-frugal, let's not marginalize utilitarian cycling through bad design. Provide safe, not marginalized, accommodations for Joe and Jane Sixpack. That's what Silver-level BFC status should be about.

Well, that's not all I thought about. This was, after all, a vacation. This eagle in the picture below, sitting on the Animus River by Durango's dog park last night, was really cool. Interestingly, and of course leading back into the interaction of politics and human activity, the dog park occupies a breathtakingly beautiful riverside location on the West bank of the Animus R right across from the heart of town. An older local who has lived in the region much of his life said the reason it is a dog park and not the locus of million dollar riverside McMansions or yet another luxury hotel is because it was the site of an old Manhattan Project era uranium milling operation, and before that a lead smelter. You can see the numerous monitoring/venting pipes sitting in the park. Some interesting pictures and history of the town's mining and industrial past are here and here. 

The dogs and dog owners of the community, not to mention visitors like us with dogs, are beneficiaries of that bit of industrial history. Sometimes a little pollution can be a good thing for the 99%, eh?

An apparently healthy eagle trying to eat, if not for me pestering it. 
Note: No patriotic overtones are expressed or implied by the photo of this bird.
Taken with a Canon T1i, 18-200mm lens, fully zoomed out.

Colorado Supreme Court to hear Black Hawk Bike Ban Case

To keep it from happening here, 
don't let it happen there

Of particular interest to those of us in the West, where roads can be few and far between and the public occasionally cranky. I'll direct you all to Bicycle Colorado for the complete story, which slowly unfolds.


From the BC site:

From the Court's documents, they will hear arguments of the following: 

• Whether municipalities may ban bicycling on local streets absent a suitable nearby alternative bicycling route.
• Whether legislation is rationally related to a legitimate governmental interest, and thus a reasonable exercise of police power, when the evidence on which the legislation is based does not address that governmental interest.
• Whether banning bicycling on the only route connecting Central City to the Peak-to-Peak Highway is a reasonable exercise of Black Hawk's police power.

Once this Supreme Court decision is made, we can see how much damage control needs to be done. If this court overturns the ordinance, that is probably good news for cyclists in other states, who can cite it as precedent if needed, at least at an appellate level. Note that in the successful Selz vs. Trotwood appeal, the appellate court referenced a case not even having to do with bicycling:  Lott v. Smith (1980), 156 Ga. App. 826 275 S.E. 720. (from the Selz appellate decision "...That court held that an operator of a corn combine could not be found to have violated the statute...")

And, of course, this once again reminds us to support our local, regional, and national cycling advocacy organizations, who often end up leading the fight in these kinds of cases. We can bicker all we want, but at times, we need to circle the wagons and make sure the guns are pointing out rather than in.  I like how Warren Devon would put it:

Black Ice!

You think he looks rattled...

Well, I rode to work today on the La Cruz, which is presently shod with 700-40c Schwalbe Land Cruisers. These tires have nice big lugs but no studs. Bad move. As a result of the last storm, a lot of melting, and County efforts to clear sidewalks, there is not only a lot of black ice on the shoulders and bike lanes, but a lot of black ice hidden under snow that has been moved off the sidewalks. I took it very careful this morning, including a rather humorous crab-walk past the North Community Fire Station while riding on snow that turned out to be covering glare ice.


Some suggestions. First, unless you are mentally and logistically equipped for ice riding, consider using another form of transportation until the roads dry out a little. If you are mentally prepared but not fully logistically prepared and insist on riding, consider forswearing bike lanes full of ice and take the lane instead if it is clear and dry. Its legal and logical.  Its better to be predictable than suddenly floundering horizontally into other traffic;  avoiding glare ice on a shoulder or bike lane falls under the caveats of our As Far Right As Practicable laws.  I found it wasn't worth trying to move into and out of the lane on Diamond today, as it confused motorists and had me making steering corrections on ice.


Secondly, beware of Canyon's and Diamond's south sides, as well as other risky bike lanes that collect water by day and ice by night. Some lanes are better than others. Some are a horror show.


Thirdly, and most importantly, if you insist on riding right now, take command of the situation and invest in a good set of studded snows, such as the Schwalbe Marathon Winter or one of the numerous Nokkian ice tires; both brands are described and photographed on Peter White's bicycle shop site. Peter has done an excellent, exhaustive job describing a wide variety of these tires, with recommendations for road, off road, plowed vs. unplowed, etc. I doff my tinfoil hat to Peter's patience and generosity with his knowledge.


You can order studded bike tires through Jim Rickman's Little Jimmy's Wheelhouse , REI, or elsewhere, including, obviously, Peter White. They weigh a psychological ton (close to a kg per tire) but hey, its winter. You need the exercise, right? More importantly, you need to stay upright so spring doesn't find you on the mend from a senseless crash. Actually, some of the studded tires are not that much heavier than my 720 gram per hoop Land Cruisers.


Of course, studded snows don't replace common sense. Be extra conservative out there when riding in icy conditions. While studs can stabilize you on ice, they do so in cooperation with your conservative riding style for such conditions. Besides, as Peter White says, riding aggressively on studded bike tires while on dry pavement will damage or ruin them. That's an expensive hobby.


I made it to work this morning upright but a little rattled from the stress of constant dancing on black ice on a bike not properly equipped for the Los Alamos Ice Follies. I stopped at Hot Rocks for a ceremonial breakfast burrito.  Here, I was cautioned by a fellow bike commuter, who stopped to analyze my bike (yeah, we all do that...) who then told me he had once crashed suddenly on black ice in an intersection in Albuquerque and was temporarily paralyzed from slamming down on his tailbone. He now swears by studded bike tires.


Sheesh. That last one is a scary thought. Lets be careful out there.

Storm drain reconstruction to close portion of West Jemez Road

Construction of a new storm drain will close a portion of NM 501 (West Jemez Road) for about 10 days beginning December 22. The majority of the work is scheduled to be done while Los Alamos National Laboratory is closed for the holidays, which should minimize traffic disruptions. But motorists traveling west on NM 501 will have to take an alternate route of travel to get to the Jemez Mountains, including NM 4 through White Rock and past Bandelier National Monument.

The work area is west of Camp May Road (i.e., in the immediate vicinity of Water Canyon --Khal Spencer addition per a conversation with Mr. Gonzales) so traffic to Pajarito Ski Area shouldn't be affected, said Mark D. Gonzales of the Manager of Functions (MOF) Division, adding, that this stretch of NM 501 also will be closed to bicyclists, runners and other pedestrians. The new storm drain off NM 501 in the Water Canyon area replaces a smaller culvert that was destroyed during a heavy rainstorm in August after the Las Conchas Fire. Workers will remove the existing culvert before installing the new structure that is designed to accommodate larger amounts of storm water flow, said Gonzales.

During the construction period, signs and other traffic control devices will be in place to alert motorists, bicyclists and pedestrians to the work. Weather permitting, work is scheduled to be completed by January 2, 2012. The Laboratory's annual winter closure begins at the end of the work day December 23 through January 2, reopening on Tuesday, January 3, 2012.

 Note by KJS in addition: Since this will involve serious construction, you will surely meet up with construction vehicles en route to and fro, mud, and grunge. If you ride out there, please be careful and use good judgement. Thanks.

Bike to work day? Not...

Quite the snowfall today. I'm not sure I'll brave the commute tomorrow on the MonsterCommuter. Maybe.

Taken at about ten this morning using the Blackberry.
It just kept on coming all day.