Welcome news: the Sherriff’s Department is dispatching more deputies on bikes, starting this weekend:

… the added patrols will be primarily centered in the Boystown area, with its heavy concentration of nightlife venues, but Farrell said officers on bikes will cover the entire length of Santa Monica Boulevard.

More cops on bikes is always a good thing. Hopefully they’ll take this opportunity to ticket all of the vehicles that habitually double-park in Santa Monica’s bike lanes at night, forcing cyclists into dangerous fast-moving traffic.

In the midwest alone, more bike-friendly infrastructure could save $7 billion in healthcare costs. That’s thanks to the improved health of the people on bikes, and the improved air with fewer gas-burning cars on the road.

Check out the results of this new study:

A new study offers some hard numbers: If people in the upper Midwest chose to take half of their car trips by bicycle, health care costs would drop by $7 billion. And with better air quality for its now more-fit citizens, the region would end up with an estimated 1,100 fewer deaths each year.

And the amazing part: the researchers only analyzed what would happen if people biked for a few months out of the year, since it gets so cold in the midwest. Imagine how much money and how many lives we could save in a year-round biking paradise like California!

Do you enjoy thumbing through lengthy government documents? Well then, have we got a treat for you! It’s LA County’s brand new Bicycle Master Plan! Check it out here. There’s lots to look at — we’re combing through it now, giggling gleefully because we are big nerds when it comes to stuff like this. Whee!

Oh look, it’s the brand new West Hollywood Bike Coalition! Superb.