California's bicycle clubs organized into a state federation in 1972 to protect bicyclists' interests statewide and to encourage, maintain, and improve bicycling conditions.
CABO (the "A" is pronounced long) fosters and promotes a favorable climate for bicycling in California by representing the interests of cyclists before the appropriate governmental bodies to protect their rights and promoting laws, policies, and actions that treat cyclists equitably.
In addition to the usual officers, CABO has Area Directors which mirror the boundaries of the twelve Caltrans districts. All are unpaid volunteers.
September 21, 2009
Devinder Singh, Secretary
California Traffic Control Devices Committee – MS36
P.O. Box 942874, Sacramento, CA-94274-0001
Subject: Item 09-21 on 9/24/09 CTCDC agenda
Request by the City of Long Beach for Permission to Experiment with Separated/Protected Bikeway on the Left Side of Two-Way Streets (Rte 9-112E)
by email to (address deleted)
Dear Mr. Singh:
The California Association of Bicycling Organizations (CABO) has reviewed the subject Request to Experiment (RTE) and notes that it fails to acknowledge previous trials in California of separated bikeways, particularly in the City of Davis and the City of Palo Alto, both of which were abandoned in favor of the standard bikeways now defined in the California Streets and Highways Code, the Caltrans Highway Design Manual, and the California Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices. In light of this previous negative experience with separated bikeways and the potential problems of traffic safety, traffic operations, and the status of bicyclists as legitimate highway users, CABO hereby requests that CTCDC reject the subject RTE or, if the CTCDC feels that the RTE may still have merit, refer it to the California Bicycle Advisory Committee for a recommendation on action by the CTCDC. The reasons for this request are detailed below. Read more…
I mentioned South San Francisco”s efforts to develop a comprehensive bicycle plan to Dan Gutierrez earlier today and we agreed that the plan should not only identify bicycle facilities, but also improvements on shared roadways such as:
Read more…
In the next week or so, we’re going to be moving the URL for the blog. Unfortunately, that will change the URL for the RSS feed. So please update your RSS reader to go here so you don’t get dropped in the transition. Sorry to all for the inconvenience!
W/in the last month (July and August 2009) or so we have started hearing about more instances of police citing bicyclists for doing what we think the law allows. No, not for rolling stops or other scofflaw behaviors; I mean for “taking a lane” or “riding two-abreast” in situations where the law allows such behaviors, based on our 100+ years of bicycling experiences through the League of American Bicyclists. For instance, we’ve had two 21202 citations that were upheld by the courts in San Diego; that is two that I know about and that I have determined were not reflective of illegal action by the bicyclists. There’s also Chris Z.’s case in Pasadena; he was cited, found guilty and his ($4,000) appeal was denied. Chris is an League Cycling Instructor. Read more…
The so-called “California Stop”/rolling stop is commonly done by motorists and bicyclists. It can often be safely accomplished, though the behavior is illegal because under California law a full stop is required. When challenged about the extent to which I ride a bicycle legally – especially related to stop signs – I disclose that I ride/drive my bicycles in the same manner that I drive my cars. This usually gets a nervous laugh response because the motorists in the audience, although irate about the behavior of “all those bicyclists” realize that they have rolled through stops too. Read more…
The City of Irvine recently applied for to the League of American Bicyclists (LAB) for Bicycle Friendly Community (BFC) status. This application came as a surprise to many club leaders and other cyclists we spoke with, who had no idea that Irvine was pursuing such an award. Read more…
I am pleased to announce that the California Association of Bicycling Organizations will benefit from the Traffic Engineering expertise, substantial history and involvement with bicycling advocacy of Robert (Bob) Shanteau. Read more…
I have been selected by the League of American Bicyclists as the 2009 League State Ambassador for California to help the League and all of us to protect the rights of cyclists. The first California State Ambassador in this new program from the League. Read more…
This was provided about a special meeting of the Calif Traffic Control Devices Committee, an important advisory body to Caltrans. The meeting was about potential trials at expanding experiments at allowing Neighborhood Electric Vehicles (NEV) to operate in Bike Lanes. NEVs are road legal small vehicles resembling gold carts. Read more…
