My cheap Suzue hub fell apart this morning after over six years of abuse, but at least I still have my manly parts.

The city of Los Angeles published a bikeway plan and cyclists have until June 12 to review the plan with proposed new bikeways and offer their suggestions.

More at LA Streetsblog.

In the meantime, the city considers eliminating the LADOT Bikeways department altogether because of budget problems.

Elsewhere: Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition.

Caltrain staff have modified their proposals to help the peninsula commuter rail agency save money. Gone are the proposals to eliminate weekend service and hike fares. Instead, Caltrain staff will bring to the Caltrain board meeting tomorrow their proposals to:

• Reduce weekday midday service to one train per hour.
• Increase the price of the Go Pass from two zones to three zones.
• Increase parking prices to $3/day and $30/month.

Murph has these further proposals for Caltrain:

• Going to a limited schedule on the weekends, instead of serving all stops like they currently do.
• VTA, SamTrans and Caltrain coordinate weekend bus and train schedules for service to and from the un-served stations.

If you want to comment on the plan, show up at the Caltrain Joint Powers Board meeting 10 a.m. Thursday morning at the SamTrans building in San Carlos (one block away from the San Carlos Caltrain station).
More here.

That’s German for bicycle tube. There’s a bicycle innertube vending machine at a bike shop in Cologne, Germany. Photo credit.

Check out these bicycle handlebar grips. Via.

MAKE: Bicycle painting tips.

Bike Intelligencer on Backcountry.com’s foray into bike retail.

CB Design Case Study: Pedal powered hot dog launcher.

Journalism: How to cover a car crash.

Ally Bank uses bicycle riding as a metaphor for banking…

The U.S. Highway Trust Fund will be broke by August, according to Obama administration officials. The Wall Street Journal reports of a $7 billion shortfall for transportation projects that is funded by the Federal 18.4 cent gasoline tax. Last year, Congress transferred $8 billion from the general fund to the highway fund. “User fees” such as fuel taxes pay less than 50% of the cost of building and maintaining roads; the rest comes from other revenue such as income and sales taxes.

Former Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta recently disclosed that his greatest disappointment was President Bush’s refusal to consider any kind of funding increase for the U.S. Department of Transportation. The result is that last year’s record gasoline prices resulted in over $100 billion in profits for the top five oil companies, of which very little went to direct public benefit. The highest earner, Exxon, made $150 for every U.S. resident, while gas retailers continue to display signs like this on their pumps.

President Obama continues the Bush administration policy of subsidizing the U.S. highway system from the general fund. Last year, several politicians joined the clamor for gasoline tax ‘holidays’ to give consumers relief from high prices. In 2009, some states — such as Michigan, New Hampshire, and Maine — now consider raising their fuel taxes to fix their crumbling roads. A fuel distributor tax in Vermont went up on June 1.

June 2 2009 Pearls Before Swine.