San Carlos safety advocates place 'ghost bike' to honor bicyclist killed while riding on overpass

SAN CARLOS, Calif. (KGO) -- A fatal bike accident in San Carlos is bringing safety advocates together and renewing their push to make a busy overpass safer.

Cycling instructor Tim Ryan was holding the photo of 31-year-old Andrea Vallebueno.

"Frankly, we're fed up that this overpass continues to be such a dangerous place--several deaths, several injuries," Ryan said.

The Stanford researcher was killed last month while riding her bike off Holly Street near the 101 freeway interchange.

"Bicyclists and pedestrians continue to cross this overpass, riding right across on and off ramps to the freeway. It's just utterly dangerous," Ryan said.

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On Thursday afternoon, Ryan and other community members placed a ghost bike in of honor Vallebueno.

"It's to remind all of us whether we're walking by, whether we're bicycling, driving by, that something really awful happened here, a preventable death," Ryan said.

Street safety advocates say they've been pleading with city officials to make this overpass safer.

Safety advocate Mike Swire is involved in local advisory committees.

"This is the only means of crossing 101 unless you bike 20 minutes north and 20 minutes back up to Belmont," Swire said.

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The city had plans to build a separate bicycle and pedestrian bridge but that changed during the 101 Express Lane project.

Former San Carlos Mayor John Dugan addressed what happened to the pedestrian bridge during a city council meeting two weeks ago.

"We were close. At one point, the project was delayed because of the 101 express lane project and by the time that project was concluded, we're left having to re-lineup the regional and state funding sources so just to be clear this remains a top priority of San Carlos," Dugan said.

Swire said they're now back to square one. He and other advocates hope local officials at least find a short-term solution.

"The really sad part of this is, nobody listens to us unless somebody dies. It shouldn't be that way. When we say the streets aren't safe, unfortunately, we don't get a lot of positive feedback," Swire said.