[Hawthorne Boulevard]
Photo by VirtualTourist.com
Photo by VirtualTourist.com
Next Monday (7/17), the City of Portland Office of Transportation will begin a major construction project on SE Hawthorne Blvd. The 35-block Hawthorne Boulevard Project will add safety improvements from 20th to 55th Streets.
Hawthorne Blvd. is the second busiest east-west corridor in SE Portland and is the heart of a major business district.
According to the official statement, the year-long project hopes to improve pedestrian and bicycle safety, transit operations, and traffic flow by installing curb extensions, upgrading traffic signals, re-aligning intersections, and adding covered bicycle parking areas.
Does this mean we’ll be seeing the fabled “bike-oases” sometime soon? I’ll keep you posted.
I think that curb extensions, upgraded traffic signals, and alligned intersections are not going to be enough to make Hawthorne safe enough.
One idea I’ve had for Hawthorne is to make each direction one lane for cars plus a bike lane (or have a really wide sharrow so that cyclists could avoid parked car doors), with a turning lane in the middle. The crosswalks also need overhead signals or alert lights. It’s just so congested that it’s hard to see if people are trying to cross the street.
I agree with Sara. These improvements are a very meek effort to make the city look better without actually having to inconvenience the allmighty car driver. These ‘improvements’ will do nothing to ensure that drivers follow the speed limit and/or give pedestrians the right of way to cross the street. Let’s see sharrows and a few pedestrian refuges at least.
Just remember…the more east-west through traffic is inconvenienced (or “calmed” in city parlance) on Hawthorne, the more they will find their way to Salmon, Lincoln and Clinton for a less inconvenient/congested route. That could make our bike blvds worse. As the city implements “calming” on Division and Powell, we will probably see all of our SE bike boulevards get a lot busier with cars.
Sara’s suggestion is identical to one made many years ago by the BTA, the BTA still has a poster in their office with an artist’s rendition of this lane configuration on Hawthorne. This idea was nixed by PDOT engineers and the Hawthorne Blvd. Business Association during Advisory Committee meetings for this project because they felt it would cause excessive delays for motorists.
The drawing Randy refers to is beautiful and inspiring, and it’s hard to believe it was rejected. Jonathan, sometime when you’re in the area stop by the office and we’ll see if we can get a good photo for you to post.
Jessica Roberts
Metro-Area Advocate
Bicycle Transportation Alliance
Important Hawthorne safety improvements were resisted by Hawthorne Blvd Business Assoc in 2006.
“This idea was nixed by PDOT engineers and the Hawthorne Blvd. Business Association during Advisory Committee meetings for this project because they felt it would cause excessive delays for motorists.” comment
Source: http://bikeportland.org/2006/07/10/city-begins-hawthorne-boulevard-project-1610
From the comments:
Sara July 10, 2006 at 3:28 pm
I think that curb extensions, upgraded traffic signals, and alligned intersections are not going to be enough to make Hawthorne safe enough.
One idea I’ve had for Hawthorne is to make each direction one lane for cars plus a bike lane (or have a really wide sharrow so that cyclists could avoid parked car doors), with a turning lane in the middle. The crosswalks also need overhead signals or alert lights. It’s just so congested that it’s hard to see if people are trying to cross the street.
Randy July 11, 2006 at 11:00 am
Sara’s suggestion is identical to one made many years ago by the BTA, the BTA still has a poster in their office with an artist’s rendition of this lane configuration on Hawthorne. This idea was nixed by PDOT engineers and the Hawthorne Blvd. Business Association during Advisory Committee meetings for this project because they felt it would cause excessive delays for motorists.
Jessica Roberts July 14, 2006 at 9:16 am
The drawing Randy refers to is beautiful and inspiring, and it’s hard to believe it was rejected. Jonathan, sometime when you’re in the area stop by the office and we’ll see if we can get a good photo for you to post.
Jessica Roberts
Metro-Area Advocate
Bicycle Transportation Alliance
Feeding into this problem location is SE 50th where the posted speed is 35. SE 50th is posted 35 from Hawthorne to Powell. I don’t know of any comparable street with this speed being legal. It is certainly not safe and makes for a poor transition in speed awareness.
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.5047584,-122.6215486,15.75z/data=!5m1!1e1