Letters: E-bike threat | Don’t blame bikes | Writer’s bias | Jan. 6 tapes | I-980 answer

East Bay Times Letters to the Editor for March 7, 2023

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E-bikes pose threat
to other trail users

Re: “E-bike trail ban is divisive issue” (Page A1, March 2).

While e-bikes are touted as a pollution-free car alternative, for those who are able to ride them, they play a more sinister role on open-space trails than on city streets.

In a recent disturbing incident, bicyclists riding in a group event in Berkeley and Oakland were menaced by hostile motorists, who succeeded in knocking some down. The criminal motorists should be charged with assault with a deadly weapon and be sent to jail.

But how many bicyclists — predominantly male and young — realize that we hikers and equestrians are in the same vulnerable position when menaced by speeding, aggressive cyclists on the trail?

The first e-bike-on-hiker fatality occurred last September in Marin County. Sausalito resident James C. Gordon died of his injuries days after being hit by an e-bike.

Park agencies’ plans to build narrow trails designed for multi-use compounds this threat to hikers and horse riders.

Amelia Marshall
Oakland

Don’t blame e-bikes;
blame bad riders

Re: “E-bike trail ban is divisive issue” (Page A1, March 2).

I continue to read about people complaining about allowing e-bikes on the trails in the Bay Area. A small group of people argues against e-bikes saying one thing: E-Bikes go too fast. Before e-bikes, it was road bikes, which still go faster than a majority of e-bikes.

I have ridden for the East Bay Parks Bike Patrol for five years. I’ve ridden a regular mountain bike as well as an e-bike on a majority of the trails as I patrol. The problem that has been occurring on all trails in the Bay Area and on other California trails has been occurring since bikes were invented. Some bike riders do stupid things.

I find that a majority of people are polite, share the trail and are informed of the rules to follow when walking or riding. Don’t blame the bikes, blame the riders.

Allan Petersdorf
Discovery Bay

Letter reveals
writer’s bias

Re: “Moral decay is hurting teen girls” (Page A6, March 2).

Mike Heller, you try to sound reasonable, but the underlying biases behind your arguments are alarming.

In your comments March 2 you wrote of young women: “run from their own biology,” and “frenzy of single activity, including sexual promiscuity.” A few weeks ago, you wrote that Georgia voter suppression does not exist because blacks voted in high numbers, reporting no major problems in the 2022 elections. In fact, the Georgia Legislature did implement laws attempting to suppress Black votes. Due primarily to the efforts of people like Stacey Abrams to get out the vote, Blacks made the extra effort. That doesn’t mean those suppression laws weren’t written, just that they weren’t effective. The sources and intent of voter ID and suppression laws are well-documented.

Your misogynistic comments about young women are truly scary. Your bias and lack of respect for those you disagree with are all too clear.

John King
Concord

No First Amendment
issue with Jan. 6 tapes

Re: “Giving Carlson Jan. 6 video violates First Amendment” (Page A7, March 2).

Professor of law Michael I. Meyerson makes the legal argument that the government is not legally obligated to provide these videos to a private party. Here, however, Tucker Carlson isn’t demanding the videos, the government is voluntarily handing them over.

Professor Meyerson says he’s concerned that the government shouldn’t be giving them to Carlson because of the possibility of a “serious risk” to Capitol security. He doesn’t explain how he personally knows this to be true, and more importantly, doesn’t suggest how this problem might be overcome.

The legal process, with which a professor of law is surely familiar, often requires that a judge review materials to determine if any need to be kept from the public eye. One wonders why the professor isn’t suggesting it here.

Daniel Mauthe
Livermore

We can keep I-980
and reunite communities

Re: “Caltrans to study I-980 removal” (Page A1, Feb. 28).

Perhaps there is a way to reunite the two sides of I-980 and still keep the freeway.

The northern aboveground portion from the I-580 interchange to Sycamore runs in parallel with BART so its removal would not accomplish anything. The portion from 18th Street to 11th Street is below grade. For that portion, Caltrans could look at building over the freeway, creating an at-grade park/residential area above the freeway that people could walk through while still supporting the existing 11th, 12th, 14th, 17th and 18th streets roadways that cross I-980 today. I-980 traffic would continue as before but now through a 2,000-foot tunnel (the Caldecott Tunnel is about 3.000 feet long).

Yes, there would be some disruption during construction, but that would be far better than the permanent loss of I-980. Such above-freeway communities have been built elsewhere in the United States; perhaps it’s worth a try here too.

David Tateosian
Martinez