Month: January 2009
Join us for a “Get Together” in St Johns
We’re excited to announce the first in what we hope are many BikePortland Get Togethers. The first one is happening this Tuesday (2/3) in St. Johns (details below).
The idea behind these new events is simple. We want to meet up with you off-line and give you an opportunity to connect with your neighbors for a lively discussion about local bike issues.
Anyone who lives, works, commutes, or otherwise spends time in the neighborhood is invited to join us.
Each month we’ll hold one in a different part of the city and we’ll bring in folks who are involved in the local bike scene to help kickstart the conversation.
Don’t kill the messengers: Inside the health of the industry (Part Three)
[Note from Publisher: Welcome to the final installment of our three-part series on bike messengers in Portland. This series is written by BikePortland contributing writer Erin Greeson (bio).
In Part One, Greeson laid out the tough working conditions faced by Portland’s messengers. Part Two focused on health care and the negative stereotypes often associated with bicycle delivery professionals. Today, Greeson concludes her story by taking a look at attempts to organize and improve the industry.
Thanks to everyone for the vigorous discussion on this series thus far, and a special thanks to Erin Greeson for her work on this story.]
Reader photo of the week: Bike tracks in the snow
Reader Steve Durrant took this photo during Tuesday morning’s snow flurry.
Two years and counting; Master Plan update effort picks up steam
Ellen Vanderslice (committee co-chair
Mia Birk in background).
(Photos © J. Maus)
It’s been nearly two years since the Bureau of Transportation kicked off an effort to update Portland’s Bicycle Master Plan.
Since that time, the plan has gone through quite a few speed bumps. In April of 2007, just two weeks after the update effort started in earnest, former Mayor Tom Potter slashed its $100,000 of funding. Thankfully, Potter realized the error and restored the plan’s funding a few weeks later, but that episode is just one of several things that has temporarily diverted attention from update process at one time or another.
Vancouver collision update: Boy clings to life, investigation continues
“All I know is that she was distracted. She didn’t see him somehow, that’s all we’re being told.”
— Keith Miles, Kristopher Miles’ grandfather
14-year boy Kristopher Miles clings to life this morning in a Portland trauma center, one week after 28-year old Andrea Dickinson ran him over with her SUV while he rode home in a marked crosswalk just two blocks from his middle school in Vancouver.
According to a story filed last night by The Columbian, Miles underwent surgery yesterday to relieve swelling on his brain and “the outlook remained grim.” The boy has been in a drug-induced coma since the crash and he has severe brain injuries, a broken femur, a punctured lung and a broken rib.
Don’t kill the messengers: Inside the health of the industry (Part Two)
[Welcome to Part Two of our three-part series on bike messengers in Portland.
This series is written by BikePortland contributing writer Erin Greeson (bio). In Part One, Greeson laid out the tough working conditions faced by Portland’s messengers. In the article below, she shares finding health care coverage for a messenger who’s also a mom and she delves into the impact of the messenger stereotype.]
60,000 free bike maps: A look at Transportation Options’ survey results
the ones who deliver the
SmartTrips packets to
your door by bike.
(Photos © J. Maus)
The Transportation Options Division inside the Bureau of Transportation is a key piece of Portland’s success as a sustainable city. “Options” (as it’s known around here) is the marketing arm of the city’s transportation program and there the ones you see at street fairs and hundreds of events throughout the year. Their mission is to provide information, resources and tools to encourage Portlanders to, “make good choices about how to get around.”
One of their primary responsibilities is to send out bike maps and other bike information whenever someone requests it. When I moved to Portland in 2005 (totally unaware of the institutional support for biking in this city) I surfed the City website and found the Options page. Wanting to know how to get around by bike, I filled out a request for some free bike maps (now they have this handy online form).
Don’t kill the messengers: Inside the health of the industry
[Publisher’s note: This is the first in a three-part story on Portland’s bike messengers by new contributor Erin Greeson.
When her friend Zak Kovalcik crashed and broke his collarbone last fall, Greeson came face-to-face with the tough reality faced by Portland’s bike delivery professionals. In this in-depth, three-part series, Greeson shares how the deck is stacked against messengers and how they are trying to survive in a challenging profession.]
“The paradigm of the typical messenger service business model is problematic. It’s a pyramid-shaped scheme where the workers are on the bottom.”
–Ira Ryan, former messenger
As Portland’s reputation as a green business boomtown gains momentum, bike-centric ventures emerge as quickly and viably as organic brewpubs and cafes. While a new era of entrepreneurs seeks to capitalize on this evolving economy, one of the oldest bike-based businesses, bicycle messenger services, faces challenges that impact workers and business owners alike.
Blumenauer will work to improve bike commute tax benefit
I’ve gotten many emails over the past few weeks wondering why I haven’t covered the Bike Commute Tax Benefit that became law on January 1.
One reason is that I’m just not all that enthused about it; and it turns out I’m not the only one.
After 7 years of effort by advocates and bike-friendly politicians, the bike commuter benefit was ushered through as a way to curry favor and votes for passage of the controversial, $700 billion financial bailout package. To make matters worse, the benefit is only good for $20 per month (a pittance compared to the benefit for driving a car), you can’t get it if you also receive the transit benefit, and to add insult to injury, no one seems to be able to figure out exactly how to implement it.
Baltimore rolls with bike-friendly momentum
[Publisher’s note: This story was written by Managing Editor Elly Blue during her recently completed East Coast Tour. Read more of her travel dispatches here.]
It’s not on the annual lists of biking hot spots, but during my recent visit to Baltimore I realized they might just become the next big bike city. They’re not quite Portland (yet), but they’re gaining fast.
sets off for a tour of the city.
– More photos below –
(Photos by Elly Blue)
Like many cities, Baltimore’s bike-friendliness begins at the top. Bikes are buoyed by the city’s Bicycle Master Plan (that was adopted in 2006) that is wholly supported by their mayor Sheila Dixon. Dixon was elected in 2007 and she’s an avid cyclist. Dixon leads weekly morning rides (which are open to anyone) and last year she put the city’s dollars behind biking with the hire of bike and pedestrian planner Nate Evans.