august 01, 2011
ghost bike for nancy ho.
via similacra
Ghost Bike Memorial Ride - 2011 by Dmitry Gudkov on Flickr.
via hihelloimally
P1090660 Ghost Bike For Jack Layton by Martinho on Flickr.
Ghost Bike in memory of Robert Townsend off Campus Parkway and University Way.
University District, Seattle
via streetseattle
For Joe, creating the bike was a cathartic experience. The loss of his best friend spurred him into action, and he spoke to a few close friends about a memorial for Dan. “We kind of thought, we need something manly to do; we need to build something to get Dan’s friends together,” explains Joe. “So we thought we should build a bike.”
ghost bike for Detective Duane Parkinson, killed August 10, 2011
Shady Canyon Drive, south of Quail Hill Parkway
Irvine, CA
from the OC Register:
Parkison was cycling northbound on Shady Canyon just south of Quail Hill Parkway about 1 p.m. when police say he was struck by a Mercedes-Benz SUV traveling in the same direction.
Two other bicyclists were reportedly performing CPR on Parkison when officers and firefighters arrived.
Cyclist killed by SUV in Irvine Wednesday afternoon
Local detective killed when car, bike collide
Ghost Bike for Duane Parkinson, 8.20.11
via zkofilms
Every time you are driving, remember this: your actions have consequences. The size of your vehicle amplifies your actions and their resulting consequences. We all make choices, and sometimes we make mistakes, but we are all required to take responsibility for our actions.
My thoughts and prayers are with Sherry Anderson and her family during this difficult time.
Sherry Anderson possesses a deep inner strength and an outward grace that I hope to achieve and maintain in my own life. She has been a positive presence in my life and in this film, offering strength and wisdom while enabling me to continue work on the project.
I was introduced to Sherry Anderson through Jennifer Buntz, whom I met through the magical esoterica of the internets. Jennifer and her partner Steve Matthias founded the Duke City Wheelman Foundation and launched the first organized large scale ghost bikes project in Albuquerque. They have been tremendous supporters and participants in the film project. They are awesome people and I am grateful to have them in my life.
My friendship with Jennifer and Sherry affirms that the thing to do in the face of loss is to create something beautiful and meaningful.
ghost bike for Dan Cox, Hackney, London
first ghost bike in Italy, in memory of Eva Bohdalova, on Fori Imperiali, Roma.
now it’s just a frame, picked apart by bicycle thieves, but if you want to see it when it was first installed, visit Nicolò Paternoste.
meaghan was able to visit Rome and meet with one of Eva’s friends for an afternoon in mid-June.
Mother seeks justice for son killed in hit and run »
CHARLOTTE, NC (WBTV) - Wednesday marked the one-month anniversary of the day Charlotte resident Joni Webster lost her son.
Webster says she’s received a lot of support since the first of May, but she can’t ever have closure until the person who ran over her 29-year-old son, Carl Hedrick, is caught.
“The person responsible for this really needs to come forward,” Webster said while standing near the spot of the accident Wednesday afternoon. “It amazes me that someone can live with this knowledge and not be completely torn up inside.”
The accident happened early in the morning on Sunday, May 1. Webster says Carl had been hanging out with some brand new friends all night.
He and two other guys were bicycling to one of the men’s homes. They were in Charlotte’s Sedgefield neighborhood, turning left onto Poindexter Drive from Lawndale Road.
Carl fell off his bike while making the turn. As his two friends were helping him, a car heading west on Poindexter came towards them and wasn’t slowing down.
“One of [the friends] was holding Carl’s brand new chrome bike above his head, frantically waving it to get the attention of the driver,” Webster said.
But the car didn’t stop. It ran Carl over and killed him.
Webster points out that the accident happened right under a streetlight, with another one nearby. She says she doesn’t know if the driver was texting, drunk, or didn’t stop for some other reason.
“If you’re in a car and you can’t see under a streetlight that there are three men and three bicycles in the road, then what are you doing?” she said. ”You shouldn’t be behind the wheel of a car.”
The friends were unable to get a good look at the driver or the car. They describe it as an older model, light blue or silver sedan.
Hedrick grew up in Cumberland, Maryland, but before moving to Charlotte in January he was a bicycle courier in New York City. He was staying with Webster while he was in Charlotte. She says he was one week away from moving back to New York when the accident happened.
Local bicyclists, many of whom had never even met Carl, held a memorial ride in his honor. Friends in New York City also memorialized him at an event Webster attended.
She said his fellow cyclists in New York repeatedly told her how much they’d loved him and how much fun he was to be around.
Days after the accident Carl’s new friends and other members of Charlotte’s bicycling community put what’s called a “ghost bike” on Poindexter Drive.
It’s there as a memorial to Carl, but it’s also there in the hope that the driver who didn’t stop that night will see it and be shamed into confessing to police.
“This bike will serve as a constant reminder to that person,” Webster said. She said it’s possible the driver lives near where the accident happened and still uses the road a lot.
She also believes the driver may have told someone else what happened. She hopes either the driver turns himself in or someone comes forward with information leading to the driver’s arrest.
“This person has ripped a part of our family away from us,” Webster said. “And I want that person found and to be held accountable for his actions.”
Ghost bikes aim to honor fallen cyclists, raise awareness
Around the globe, all-white bikes are being chained to street signs near the sites of fatal accidents involving cyclists.
They are called ghost bikes — somber reminders of tragedy and intended as a quiet statement in support of a cyclist’s right to safe travel, proponents say.
One of the latest emerged this month on a sidewalk on Telegraph Road in Ventura near where Nick Haverland, 20, was struck and killed by an alleged drunken driver as he was riding to Ventura College.
Like most ghost bikes, the Ventura memorial was installed anonymously and without anyone seeking permission from the grieving family or authorities.
The bike — with handlebars, pedals and wheels intact, but stripped of its cables — was placed within days of Haverland’s death on May 11. It was installed among dozens of bouquets of flowers, part of a roadside shrine that has deeply moved Haverland’s parents and family, said Ventura Mayor Bill Fulton, a family friend.
“They have been touched by what’s been a profound outpouring of support,” he said.
The first ghost bikes were created in St. Louis in 2003. The memorials since have appeared in at least 150 locations throughout the world, according to Ghostbikes.org, a website managed by a group of volunteers in New York City that tries to track the sites.
“We know there are many more locations,” said Danny Gamboa, 37, a Long Beach-based documentary filmmaker who is making a film on the subject.
In California, there have been 29 cyclist-involved deaths since the beginning of the year, he said.
“That’s like one every week and a half,” said Gamboa, a cyclist and father who has installed ghost bikes for fallen strangers.
How long the iconic memorials remain in place often depends on the situation and community response. In New York City, where dozens of ghost bikes have been placed, New York’s sanitation department proposed removing the memorials, which it called eyesores. In California, it’s technically illegal to leave a bike locked to a street sign like the one on Telegraph Road.
Ventura will allow the bike to remain for at least the short term, said Tom Mericle, Ventura’s transportation manager and acting city engineer. The city is considering installing a bike bollard at the site. The ghost bike could be locked to it, rather than the street sign. The bollard would be painted white out of respect for the memorial, Mericle said.
As for the long term, it would be up to city leaders, Haverland’s parents, Jim and Susan, and the community on how to treat such public displays, he said. Road safety also would be paramount, so it would have to be removed if it were to become an unintended distraction to motorists, Mericle said.
The Haverlands could not be reached for comment for this story.
Gamboa sees the ghost bikes as pieces of art, and believes they can have a profound positive impact as memorials that raise awareness about road safety. He pointed to a ghost bike installed for a 12-year-old girl struck and killed on a street near her home in Compton in Los Angeles. That bike became a rallying point for a grieving community, leading to a large candlelight vigil, new signage and greater communication.
“It’s a way for the community to come together and heal,” he said. “These are unnecessary deaths.”
Two bicyclists have been killed on Ventura County roadways this year, according to the Ventura County Medical Examiner’s Office — both by alleged drunken drivers.
A ghost bike was installed for Jose Luis Carmona, 40, of Santa Barbara, who was struck and killed March 5 on the Pacific Coast Highway near Faria Beach Road.
Haverland graduated from Foothill Technology High School in Ventura in 2009 and was remembered by friends and family as a lover of learning and the outdoors. A public memorial will held for him at 3 p.m. June 5 at Arroyo Verde Park off Day Road in Ventura.
The suspect in his death, Satnam Singh, 49, of Ventura, has pleaded not guilty to all criminal charges.
The death of both bicyclists has hit home with Ventura’s close-knit cycling community.
“Nick’s death was heartbreaking,” said Rachel Morris, an avid cyclist and executive director of Ventura nonprofit group VCCOOL.
Morris sees Haverland’s ghost bike as a touching memorial. She hopes it helps reinforce a needed change in culture that fosters mutual respect among all who share the streets.
“We (cyclists) all travel the same unsafe streets and face the same risks. Many of us have those close calls every day,” Morris said.
She was among several riders who wore pictures of Haverland pinned to their jackets during last week’s annual Ride of Silence, an event held in cities across the country to honor cyclists killed or injured by cars.
Gamboa rejected the suggestion that ghost bikes are installed for notoriety.
“This is not something we like doing,” he said. “I hope this is not a trend or a movement. I wish we would never do another one. We hate seeing people die.”
