Boring is a small town southeast of Portland. Last night, uber-advocate Jessica Roberts of the BTA met with the Boring Community Planning Organization and they discussed several exciting trails projects, including:
- Finishing the unpaved portion of the Springwater Corridor between Gresham and Boring
- Developing a trailhead park in Boring with trail user info
- Several proposals to extend the current Springwater corridor eastward, eventually to the Pacific Crest trail and Sandy
- A Fourth of July weekend ride with a sleepover at the school, a barbecue, a pancake feed, and fireworks!
The folks in Boring have already got the ball rolling on these projects and support from cyclists here in Portland could be instrumental in making them a reality. For more information on how you can get involved, read this forum post by Jessica.
I’m very Excited about Boring.
Since I live so close to the Springwater, I take regular trips to Boring and found that there’s a huge amount of potential. I attended the meeting with Jessica and found the folks in Boring to be exceptionally kind and accomodating. The advantage that Boring has is that it’s close enough to be unattractive to drivers, but far enough to make a wonderful day’s ride for cyclists. I mentioned Jeff Bernard’s camping trip to them and they were very excited about hosting a similar but smaller scale event.
Ack! Don’t pave that last section of the Springwater corridor between Gresham and Boring! What few pleasant gravel road rides left are slowly being developed and paved! Keep it raw and fun! That 1 mile section alone is worth riding out to Boring for!
Who said it? If you can ride on gravel you can ride on pavement.
I grew up in Boring…when the trains still ran along what is now the Springwater Corridor. I love that it is a bike trail now–even though I no longer live out there, we still ride the trail. I am all for the paving of the last mile. While gravel is fun for some…too many road bike riders have to risk their lives on Telford (the street running parallel to the trail along that stretch) because their slicks can’t handle the gravel. Boring is a land of large SUV’s and they travel those back country roads at highway speeds. Let’s work to pave that stretch and also work to maintain gravel trails elsewhere at the same time.
Boring seriously needs more trails (both paved and gravel). Like Diana, I grew up out there and riding your bike was something to be done in the backyard or the driveway. The drivers are crazy and (for the most part) don’t know how to safely share the road.
There are very few sidewalks out there (an occasional stretch along 212, but that’s all) and little to no shoulder. There’s a free bus service that operates between Boring, Sandy and Gresham; but that’s the only other option out there besides driving and walking.
On a similar note: is there anything about trails to Damascus? They’re about seven miles west of Boring with no bus service at all, the only community considered part of Portland metro without it.
Agent Lapis, I think it would be awesome Portland style for the Sprockettes to strut their stuff if the Boring people do host a summer event…sort of like homecoming crossed with a foreign exchange program.
There’s an idea….