Cycling, traffic safety, traffic justice, and legal topics; energy, transit and transportion economics
The drama about the legislative session is that legislators finally produced a budget, and that was signed by the governor, thus averting a state government shutdown.
Now that the legislative session is over, we can ask/ponder a bunch of questions regarding Legislative Immunity (scroll down to the original article for references): Continue reading “Arizona Legislative Immunity, yes again”
Arizona has had a significant increase in traffic deaths over the past 10 years or so… where deaths were around 800/yr in the period 2010-2014; they had increased to nearly 1,000 pre-pandemic (2019). Deaths spiked in 2020 and again 2021 with various pandemic-related excuses. Deaths in 2023 stand at 1307. So a 60% increase, far outstripping population growth. Details at [1] Continue reading “Vision Zero is trying to take away our gas stoves”
Spoiler alert: not an outlier in a good way.
This is an Forbes interview about an updated periodic international/global report on traffic safety, it appears to be based on up thru 2022 data Continue reading “Carnage On World’s Roads Drops Slightly, But U.S. Is An Outlier”
UPDATE: council passed yet more rule changes. Dec 2024. Ordinance G-7334, sets a new minimum age for ebikes/scooters.
Class 3 remains banned city-wide. See details here.
The city continues to refuse to deal with things like the motorized play vehicle ordinance which bans, e.g. those little battery powered toys that you’ll see toddlers using. It also (according to the city) effectively bans motorized gas powered bicycles city-wide. Continue reading “Phoenix changes ebike law (yes, again)”
Adding bureaucracy (which is effectively already in place at ADOT, and elsewhere apparently) seems like an odd way to have less government:
“Everything’s less government with me,” said Kern, an Arizona Freedom Caucus member … — azcentral.com
In our area, freeway exits with poor sight lines are signed no turn on red (example: Warner and I-10), but okay sight lines are not (example one mile south on Ray and I-10).
Continue reading “AZ legislator wants to reduce number of no-right-turn-on-reds”
Could it be, Satan?.
So this one caught my eye;
SB1279 – satanic displays; public property; prohibition
Sponsored by Gov’t Committee chair Sen Jake Hoffman (R-Queen Creek). The hearing was a little bit entertaining; you can make your own judgement here, but it seems to have some constitutional problems (i.e. apparently you can build certain kinds of alters on public property, but not satanic ones) — but at the end of the day, were it to reach governor’s desk it would presumably be vetoed. Political theater. Continue reading “Satan and transportation policy”
Having lived to a biblical age, I’ve seen some crazy things. I’ve seen the Prius—whose owners were once mocked and scorned as virtue-signaling eco-weenies—become a counterargument for fossil fuel’s defenders opposing vehicle electrification. Under the hood of the Prius Prime is Toyota’s best argument for what it calls its “diverse approach to fighting carbon”: a high-efficiency (Atkinson cycle) 2.0-liter gas engine; two motor-generators; and a 13.6-kWh battery pack.
[Spoiler alert: As expected, Gov. Hobbs vetoed this bad bill 6/20/2023] Arizona legislature’s merged “prop 400” (a bill to enable a vote on Maricopa county SALES tax for transpo) bill has been passed by both house and senate on 6/13/2023 along straight party lines (i.e. by one vote in each chamber). As I said before, AZ Republican’s war on walking continues.. or rather their war on anything that’s not a car. Continue reading “VETOED: AZ Legislature’s latest emission”
Today I contacted Gov. Hobbs to urge her to veto Sen Rodger’s SB1234, which would further ban all forms of automated enforcement in the state. Including red-light signal, as well as school zone speeding enforcement.
The current status quo would simply allow local authorities to continue to use it where they feel it will improve safety. The state legislators have no business telling localities what to do. Republican’s claims that phot0-enforcement is unconstitutional are entirely unfounded, and unsupported; and their continuing to peddle that lie is shameful.
After appropriating $400MM of GENERAL FUNDS last season in order to widen the I-10 freeway between ~ just south of Phoenix to Casa Grande (towards Tucson); the legislature this year is on track to appropriate ANOTHER $360MM (also general funds) to the project, to backfill currently unavailable federal matching funds.
SB1065 appropriation; widening; I-10
Just to re-cap, general funds come from things like state sales taxes, property taxes, and income taxes. Notably, they do not come from gas-taxes, or other motor vehicle user fees. Continue reading “AZ Republican’s war on walking continues”
Please see:
cazbike.org/arizona-legislation-2023
Mixed in with tweaks that appear designed to increase car-use at the expense of everything else, there are some downright extremist proposals here, including one that prohibit ADOT from building bicycle paths.
Another common-thread in these bills are a group of state legislators, all from the majority party, that complain bitterly (possibly even sometimes rightly) that the feds are “cramming” things down their throats. Hypocracy reigns however, because this same group of legislators want to turn around and cram down their own ideas onto cities and towns. In the case of the Maricopa county transportation sales tax, these state legislators feel it’s ok to dictate how Maricopa county can spend Maricopa county citizens sales taxes. In the case of photo-enforcement, it’s these state legislators attempting to prevent cities and towns from enforcing traffic laws —
In other news: In early 2023, the GOP-led Arizona Senate, and GOP-led Arizona House has exempted itself from open-records laws
Legislature votes to exempt self from state records laws
The new rules allows (mandate?) destruction of legislator’s emails and texts after 90 days, and in the Senate, texts from legislator’s private devices/accounts are excluded altogether regardless of the nature of the content.
This is the opposite of transparancy.
[UPDATE: council passed yet more rule changes. Dec 2024. Ordinance G-7334, min age for ebikes/scooters is not 16 AGAIN. Class 3 remains banned for anybody. ]
City of Phoenix passed an ebike law recently; I was unaware.
Arizona’s state ebike laws, which were passed in 2018, are essentially mum on ebikes vis a vis sidewalks, leaving them in the same somewhat strange boat as bicycles; “what is not prohibited is allowed”. And leads to a lot of confusion as local regulations, if any, regulate sidewalk cycling. See this long discussion of Arizona’s sidewalk laws including selected municipalities. Continue reading “Phoenix e-bike Ordinance (Class 3 Banned!)”
Background: in August 2019, City of Tempe made substantial changes to their local codes dealing with traffic[1]. Although the focus shifted over time (the process began soon after a Nov 2017 crosswalk death of a bicyclist), the ostensible reason to get something passed at that particular time was the feeling that escooters needed further regulation; and it would be mayhem if the fall school session began with “no laws” in place. Continue reading “Tempe’s Local Ordinance — Part II”
The Arizona Republic has been running a series of throwback stories from the files of report Don Bolles who was murdered in 1976, presumably related to mob investigations he was conducting.
This one, unrelated to mob, popped up this week Don Bolles files: The drunken crash that led to tougher Arizona DUI law
The quick synopsis was in the early morning hours of Easter Sunday 1971 a very drunk driver at .251 BAC killed 3 people and left a 4th person in a permanent vegetative state. He was portrayed as being not particularly remorseful. He ultimately served 6 months of a 1 year sentence for a guilty plea to misdemeanor manslaughter. Continue reading “The drunken crash that led to tougher Arizona DUI law”
The political intrigue is fascinating; was Mesnard’s distraction bill just an attempt to derail a cellphone restriction? Did citizens of Arizona really have to wait 12 years for this — even as traffic safety got worse-and-worse — only because Farley was a Democrat and the legislature is controlled by Republicans? Continue reading “Arizona to finally restrict cellphone-use while driving.”