🚨 Please note: BikePortland is currently on hiatus and only publishing guest articles. Learn more here. Thank you. - Jonathan 🙏

Join us on the Super Legal Ride

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Tonight is the Super Legal Ride created by super-advocate Elly Blue. The first one got some media attention (Portland Mercury and KGW-TV) and its goal and execution has come into question on the Shift email list.

The debate revolves around whether or not it’s a good idea for cyclists to advocate for a new law that allows us to treat stop signs as yields. This is an important debate because it gets right at the heart of how society and the law think about bikes. We’re already considered a vehicle…but are bikes different enough from cars that we deserve a different set of laws? I think so.

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Help me get to the National Bike Summit

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As I just reported, there’s a contingent from Portland going to the National Bike Summit in Washington D.C..

I’ve been wanting to go the the Summit for years but never really considered it until now. The schedule looks awesome and just think of all the bike people, the ideas, the conversations! Imagine me explaining Chunkathalon, Pedalpalooza, Bridge Pedal, Zoobomb, and Midnight Mystery Rides to some nice folks from Nebraska! And it would be cool to share my perspectives on the creative and diverse Portland bike energy with all those bikey bigwigs.

But I doubt there are many regular guys with blogs that show up to things like this, especially with the travel expenses and the $350 registration fee. The BTA has invited me to tag along with them and share some cheap floor space in their hotel, but there’s still the plane ticket and the $350 to get in. I’m almost committed to going, it’s the lack of funds that gives me some hesitation.

I really don’t have the money to go, but what if just a handful of the 2,662 unique visitors I’ve had in the last three days (and the 1113 of those who visited more than once) pitched in a few bucks via those handy donation buttons in my sidebar? Or grabbed one of the few remaining BikePortland.org T-shirts (now $15 with free shipping)?

I hope to bring you the scoop live from D.C. and pour everything I learn at the Summit right back into this site.

Thanks for reading.

Portland to open National Bike Summit

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Portland has been given the opening slot to kick off the National Bike Summit being held March 1-3 in Washington D.C.. According to the official schedule, a “distinguished panel of Oregonians” will be telling the crowd (a who’s who of advocates, lobbyists and industry leaders) how to make their communities more bike-friendly and how to apply lessons they learned from their recent trip to Amsterdam.

Evan from the BTA tells me that the panel will include him (he’s Executive Director), Bike Gallery owner Jay Graves, urban planner Mia Birk and City Commissioner Sam Adams.

BTA website goes live

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The BTA’s long-awaited website is live. I think you’ll like it. I do. Big kudos go out to the talented folks at Grapheon Design for donating their skills to the cause.

I think it’s pretty cool they’ve got a blog. Evan just posted something about the Albright/TriMet thing that’s worth a read (and I’ll forgive him for linking to the Oregonian’s coverage instead of mine)*. I tried to comment but it didn’t let me…hopefully that will be resolved soon.

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