November 4, 20134 Comments on South Bay and Santa Cruz traffic news
The Santa Cruz cyclist who was killed by a reckless driver last Saturday has been identified as musician and librarian Josh Alper. My condolences to his friends and loved ones, of which he apparently had many.
Stanley Roberts (the “People Behaving Badly” guy) observes California stops in Santa Clara, California.
November 1, 20131 Comment on All Saints Carnage
Why do people drive? It’s so dangerous!
Two major accidents on California State Route 17 last night
Early this morning, a Calstar helicopter landed on a closed Highway 17 near my home in Santa Cruz County to transport the seriously injured victim of a hit and run collision.
Calstar helicopter during the day. Calstar is the private, non-profit air ambulance service used to transport accident victims. We have no trauma centers in Santa Cruz County, so those with serious injuries are transported either to the Level 1 trauma center at the Santa Clara Valley Regional Medical Center, or the Level 2 facility available at the Regional Medical Center of San Jose. Both are about 30 miles away from the city of Santa Cruz.
October 24, 20134 Comments on Child endangerment
My friend Janet Lafleur wrote a sweet story for the Mountain View (CA) Voice about family cycling. Most reader comments were positive, but there’s one in every crowd — the one who believes biking with children on a low-speed street such as Castro Street in Mountain View constitutes “child endangerment” and parents who bike with their children should be arrested.
Just two days later, a major car crash in the Central Valley city of Lodi killed three siblings, a pregnant mother and two other adults. Car collisions are a leading cause of death for children in the United States. Over 1200 children younger than 14 will be killed as occupants in motor vehicle crashes this year. About 170,000 children are injured each year.
In the meantime, researchers at MIT finds that vehicle emissions kill 58,000 people every year, and we already know car exhaust is linked to brain damage and pediatric asthma.
Who’s endangering whom?
More carnage below.
October 22, 20133 Comments on Will gas really get cheaper through the holidays?
Numerous news outlets are republishing the AAA prediction that gasoline prices will drop to levels not seen since 2011, when the average price of gas nationwide retailed for under $3.20 per gallon.
The chart above shows the average price of gas in the United States over the past month, as tracked by gas price tracking service Gas Buddy. The AAA points at this chart and the dropping price of crude oil and predicts the price of gasoline will drop another 15 to 20 cents per gallon by Christmas.
I’ve dismissed the opinions of oil marketing expert Trilby Lundberg before, but in this case I agree with her recent assessment that prices won’t drop much more. Thanks to the Federal government shutdown, nearly a million Americans didn’t drive to work during the first two weeks of October, and uncertainty leading to the shutdown put the brakes on economic activity nationwide.
We’re still on shaky economic ground, but it’s marginally more firm than the quicksand of just 10 days ago. More economy = more spending = more driving in America, so I think we won’t see much movement in the price at the pump.
File this under Prognostications. Feel free to come back in January to mock me. Bike and other transportation news below.
October 18, 20132 Comments on Carnage
October 10, 2013Leave a Comment
Local police on the Bay side of the San Francisco Peninsula use a $258K grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety to educate drivers on crosswalk safety after an 18 year old driver killed a 66 year old woman crossing in a crosswalk in the city of San Mateo last weekend.
The fact that drivers routinely violate the law is no surprise. I’m a little bit surprised and irked that some people with an extreme sense of entitlement would actually take offense at this effort to improve safety for people who use the road.