Why we do what we do – From the lens of Elyse Bejasa

Have you ever heard someone slam a car door really hard? Four years ago, as I was riding my bicycle, that was the sound I heard as a driver trying to enter a parking lot crossed two lanes and failed to yield to me as I rode in the bike lane.

With a loud slam, the car hit the left side of my body.

The accident happened at around 4 p.m. on Thursday, March 18, 2021 (what I call “A Very Bad Day”). I was heading toward the Senator Ted Hickey Bridge on Lakeshore Drive, which has “sharrows”–bike lanes shared with cars.  

I had hoped to get in a quick workout before I headed to Mid-City to pick up my farm share. Nothing exciting, just a regular ride, like I had done many times. I didn’t know that that day was going to change my life so drastically.

The impact of the car on my body broke two bones, the  tibia in my lower left leg and the humerus in my left upper arm, leaving me wheelchair bound for about three months. I’m not exaggerating when I tell you I cried almost every day during those three months. After surgery on my tibia, hours of physical therapy, and a PTSD diagnosis, I was back on the bike in August, with a newfound fear of … well, everything.

Prior to my crash, safety was something that I had taken for granted. I had used my bike to commute, race, meet up with friends, and just get around town. I gained a lot of experience riding bikes in New York City and felt like a pretty competent cyclist when I moved to New Orleans in 2016. I felt safe knowing my own skill-set and ability to navigate hairy situations. I wore a helmet, carried lights with me everywhere I went, and cautiously followed the rules of the road to the highest standards.

But this was different. My crash prompted me to redefine what it meant to be safe. ‘

I am significantly more invested in the safety of ALL road users, whether they are walking, biking, in cars, or taking public transit. We all deserve to move around this city safely, without fear of a car driving directly into them. The lack of safe road infrastructure is a human-made problem. If you build a road through a house, you can’t get mad at the house when a car crashes into it. You built that road; You set it up to fail. 

Even as I write this guest column in a coffee shop, I am suppressing the tears in my eyes. Because I can still hear the loud thud of my body being hit by a car, I can still feel the pain in my leg, I can still feel the sadness. 

Even more sadly, I’m not alone. As a recent New Orleans Advocate article noted, 2025 is already turning into another perilous year for our community with too many stories of crashes, injuries and fatalities. Previously, between 2019 and 2023, car crashes killed nearly 300 people and injured another 47,000, according to city data. I’m heartened by the city’s efforts to address this issue, which include the upcoming Safety and Mobility Summit on Saturday.

And while I still feel the sadness, I also still ride my bike – proudly, happily, and albeit differently. I am also a proud member and current president of the Bike Easy Board of Directors. It’s in that spirit that I ask that you join us first at the Summit on Saturday, and then on Sunday, at Bike Easy’s second annual Ride to Remember at Metairie Cemeteries (see below for more details). 

I consider myself a lucky one because, had A Very Bad Day gone a little differently, I wouldn’t be here to move this work forward.

Elyse Bejasa is president of the board of directors for Bike Easy, which works to make bicycling easy, safe, and fun for everyone in Greater New Orleans.