# Rose Bowl Pelaton Issues



## MTBMaven (Dec 17, 2005)

Many of you must know by now the Pasadena City Council is clamping down on peloton activities at the Rose Bowl.

There is a lot of miss information flying around in the forumsphere about this subject. I highly encourage those interested in this issue to educate yourself more about the issue by going to some non-biking related sources. Here are a few links:

Star News report (local Pasadena paper)
Star News video report

Staff Report - Pelaton Bicyclist - Rose Bowl (This is a report from City staff making recommendations to the City Council how the City feel the Council should vote. Rarely does the Council go against the recommendation from Staff.

City Council Meeting on the issue (The item comes before Council starting at minute 9. This is long but the most important thing to watch. If you want to know what your government is doing then you need to understand what they do, how they do it, and their motivation. We cannot sit back and shoot pop shots from the bleachers, you have to get out there educate yourself and tell those in power what you think.)


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## team_sheepshead (Jan 17, 2003)

As someone who rides hundreds of miles every year in an urban park (Central Park), I wish you luck with this one. I'm shocked, frankly, that you've been able to get away with this for so long. Fast pack riding at 6 p.m. on a weekday??? In NYC, we rarely train like this in groups of more than 10, and that happens in off-peak hours...before 8 a.m. or during the workday.

Why don't they just move the ride to early morning hours? Better yet, start an early morning racing series and make racers take turns standing around to marshal the course.


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## MTBMaven (Dec 17, 2005)

team_sheepshead said:


> As someone who rides hundreds of miles every year in an urban park (Central Park), I wish you luck with this one. I'm shocked, frankly, that you've been able to get away with this for so long. Fast pack riding at 6 p.m. on a weekday??? In NYC, we rarely train like this in groups of more than 10, and that happens in off-peak hours...before 8 a.m. or during the workday.
> 
> Why don't they just move the ride to early morning hours? Better yet, start an early morning racing series and make racers take turns standing around to marshal the course.


I like the idea. It seems a local biking club could work with the City to get a special use permit to run the event. As stated by the Star New video, several members (promonent members) and the Mayor are big cyclist.


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## JSR (Feb 27, 2006)

I looked at the city council video. That was a very interesting discussion!

You have to say that the council and staff, including the police chief, were very much willing to find a solution that continued the ride, while protecting the safety of the other park users. It was evident that without a bona fide organizatioin to deal with, they just didn't know what to do.

I'm actually sympathetic to their POV. A high-speed crit-type event in that environment needs some control. Given the speakers' comments about the number of high-zoot racers who have trained there you'd the SCNCA would want to step forward. 

JSR


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## roadfix (Jun 20, 2006)

Here's a short clip I shot a couple months ago. This was a relatively small group that day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPzWULw-nBU


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## AmoJohnny (Aug 12, 2005)

team_sheepshead said:


> As someone who rides hundreds of miles every year in an urban park (Central Park), I wish you luck with this one. I'm shocked, frankly, that you've been able to get away with this for so long. Fast pack riding at 6 p.m. on a weekday??? In NYC, we rarely train like this in groups of more than 10, and that happens in off-peak hours...before 8 a.m. or during the workday.
> 
> Why don't they just move the ride to early morning hours? Better yet, start an early morning racing series and make racers take turns standing around to marshal the course.



Its not actually as bad as it sounds(6pm on a weekday). It is actually in a remote area that does not see a lot of traffic. It is a closed loop that does not serve any through road purpose. The peleton encounters just a handful of cars per ride. Moving it to 8am wouldnt make much of a difference in terms of volume of pedestrians and cars.

The BEST thing I see happening is making it like El Dorado twilight racing run by CBR. That is a very well organized event that gets a a park ranger to keep traffic/people and racers separate for the duration of the race. Its $7-10 per race, and consists of three smaller 'peletons'. ( pro/1/2/3, masters 40+, and 4/5 ). Thus allowing two abreast to be more feasible.


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## stevesbike (Jun 3, 2002)

as a pretty regular participant in this ride, it's disappointing to see a supposedly enlightened council say such ignorant things about cycling (especially the member who said he doesn't care about people from elsewhere coming to Pasadena--members like that should understand economices a bit better and where city revenue comes from)..

Cyclists are just looking for a venue to use for 2 hours a week, which is apparently too much in car-centric LA. The only problem with the loop is at the start/finish area, where cars sometimes try to make a right turn into the parking lots. Why not just make a partition between the two lanes going West (?) and only allow cars into the South parking lots (a left hand turn from the main merge intersection)? In general, keeping cars out of those lots would make the loop much safer for everyone.

The problem with adding more organization to the ride will be liability. This happens time and again with cycling. Who is going to be exposed in terms of liability? If you start to marshall the event, what happens if a car does get on the course and causes a collision, or if someone rides with an uninspected bike and causes an accident/injury due to something defective about the bike? 

Again, this ride has been going on for a long time with minimal negatives, why not just let cyclists have 2 hours a week for it?


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## MTBMaven (Dec 17, 2005)

stevesbike said:


> especially the member who said he doesn't care about people from elsewhere coming to Pasadena--members like that should understand economices a bit better and where city revenue comes from


 That was Steve Madison from District 6 and Vice Mayor. He is legal council for Occidental Petroleum. Send him an email at http://cityofpasadena.net/district6/


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