SE Portland to Tanasborne

[kian777]

I want to start biking from SE portland, close in Hawthorne, to my job near Tanasborne. I bought a BikeThere map and it looks like I can have a pretty safe route. There is just one point i'm concerned about and I'm interested in getting advice from others who take this route.

There is a bike path that runs along hwy 26 from the Zoo exit to around the Barnes road exit. My concern is getting from city center to the Zoo exit. The Bike there map says you can bike on the side of hwy 26 by taking Jefferson under the Vista bridge and on to hwy 26 for about a mile until you hit the Zoo Exit. (See link of sketchy area below)

Sketchy area (http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&hl=en&geocode=&saddr=SW+Jefferson+St+%4045.518600,+-122.695060&daddr=45.507535,-122.718315&mrcr=0&mrsp=1&sz=16&mra=dme&sll=45.510257,-122.713165&sspn=0.006977,0.014291&ie=UTF8&ll=45.517654,-122.695227&spn=0.027905,0.057163&t=k&z=14&om=1)


Riding along 26 makes me nervous even if there is a wide shoulder. What do you think?

[wyeast]

That stretch of 26 is definitely marked as a "caution area" on the BikeThere map.

I'm not terribly familiar with routes across the West Hills, but it looks like your best bets are either cutting over Council Crest or through Washington Park, then parallel to Sunset through Beaverton. But pretty much you're looking at hills or sharing some busy roads.

I'd suggest taking a short hop through MAX but I have no idea how crowded it is during commutes, I'd imagine it's hard to find room for a bike from Goose Hollow to Sunset Transit.

Sorry I wasn't much help. Good luck!

[drosen]

It would seem that going from Jefferson to the Zoo on 26 would depend on your comfort level in dealing with traffic. I personally don't care, but there are a ton of cars going up. You may want to think about taking MAX to the zoo if you're bothered by the traffic.

[kian777]

I'm not really bothered by traffic. But I just wanted to find out from someone who may have taken that route that it was safe. It seems like the shoulder of the road is fairly wide.

[mordac]

Here's one way to get into Washington Park and avoid Hy 26:

http://www.portlandonline.com/shared/cfm/image.cfm?id=99178

This is the route I use on my commute home from downtown.

[norse rider]

26 is scary. If time allows come out Barbur, go strait up past Tewiliger and take BHH out to Milliken. From Milliken look for Hocken, the road runs behind the New Seasons and Powells on Cedar Hills Blvd. Hocken will dump you on Jameson and Jameson turns into Baseline and Baseline hits 185th. Bike lanes on most of this route. Watch the RR tracks on Hocken as well as in and around downtown beaverton. If you are doing this route in the morning between 7:30 and 8:30 there are usually quite afew of us headed to work this way.