Skip to main content
Donate

Santa Monica to Debut a 'Bicycle Campus' on Earth Day

By Zach Behrens
April 20, 2012
Support Provided By
The City of Santa Monica's bicycle campus | Photo: Courtesy City of Santa Monica

Where did you first learn how to ride a bicycle? For me it was a sidewalk outside my house; luckily, I never took a wobbly b-line into the street full of cars. Now if I'm ever in the position to be teaching someone, I can send them to an alternative in Santa Monica.

Photo: Courtesy City of Santa Monica

For Earth Day this Sunday, the city will introduce its permanent bicycle campus, which is being touted as a first for the Los Angeles area. The facility "is an off-street learning area for people of all ages and abilities to become confident about their riding skills," explains a news release. "It features a skills course where users can learn and practice bicycle riding, handling, and street skills with the aid of educational displays.""The Santa Monica Bike Campus isn't quite as elaborate as the 'traffic gardens' used in the rigorous bike education programs of the Netherlands, but it's a pretty good start," notes Gary Kavanaugh on L.A. Streetsblog. "The facility is meant to provide a dedicated space for local LCI (League Certified Instructors), and area schools to teach bike safety principles in a safe space before working up to lessons involving live traffic."

The campus is located south of Ocean Park Boulevard at Santa Monica State Beach. Opening festivities start at 12:30 p.m. on Sunday April, 22 followed by bike training from 1 to 3 p.m.

Support Provided By
Read More
An oil pump painted white with red accents stands mid-pump on a dirt road under a blue, cloudy sky with a green, grassy slope in the background.

California’s First Carbon Capture Project: Vital Climate Tool or License to Pollute?

California’s first attempt to capture and sequester carbon involves California Resources Corp. collecting emissions at its Elk Hills Oil and Gas Field, and then inject the gases more than a mile deep into a depleted oil reservoir. The goal is to keep carbon underground and out of the atmosphere, where it traps heat and contributes to climate change. But some argue polluting industries need to cease altogether.
By Alejandro Lazo, CalMatters
Gray industrial towers and stacks rise up from behind the pitched roofs of warehouse buildings against a gray-blue sky, with a row of yellow-gold barrels with black lids lined up in the foreground to the right of a portable toilet.

California Isn't on Track To Meet Its Climate Change Mandates. It's Not Even Close.

According to the annual California Green Innovation Index released by Next 10 last week, California is off track from meeting its climate goals for the year 2030, as well as reaching carbon neutrality by 2045.
By Alejandro Lazo, CalMatters
A row of cows stands in individual cages along a line of light-colored enclosures, placed along a dirt path under a blue sky dotted with white puffy clouds.

A Battle Is Underway Over California’s Lucrative Dairy Biogas Market

California is considering changes to a program that has incentivized dairy biogas, to transform methane emissions into a source of natural gas. Neighbors are pushing for an end to the subsidies because of its impact on air quality and possible water pollution.
By Emma Foehringer Merchant, Inside Climate News