is the subject of a public forum
tomorrow.
(Photos © J. Maus)
While many people that love bikes in and around Portland are moving to the constant rhythm of Pedalpalooza, let us not forget that without attention to advocacy, the streets we dance on and ride naked upon wouldn’t be nearly as forgiving.
Beginning tonight and heading into next week, there are several advocacy issues worth your attention. Check them out below and consider getting involved…
Bike Program faces elimination in Vancouver
We’ve been following this closely since advocates sounded the alarm that the City of Vancouver’s draft Transportation Improvement Program called for an elimination of their Bike Program. City Council is set to vote on the TIP tonight at 7:00 pm in City Council Chambers (210 East 13th Street). With Vancouver Mayor Leavitt offering a glimmer of hope that money can be found, advocates plan to show up in force tonight to do what they can to influence this important decision. If you care about this issue, you should show up too.
Active Right of Way is leading the Transport Your Activism ride
Tonight at 6:00, (show up at 5:30), grassroots transportation activism group Active Right of Way (AROW) will lead a ride to examine five biking/walking/transit infrastructure sites “where change is needed.” The bright folks from AROW will talk about the problems, brainstorm solutions, and then share tips and resources on how citizen action can lead to change. More details here.
needs feedback on biking components.
Sellwood Bridge Committee will review project components
Tonight at 5:30, Multnomah County’s Sellwood Bridge Community Advisory Committee will discuss their initial preferences for upcoming design decisions. On the agenda tonight is a presentation on the biking and walking components of the project. Meetings are open to the public and there will be an open period. View our previous coverage of the Sellwood Bridge Project and find more details of tonight’s meeting at SellwoodBridge.org.
Public forum on Holgate Buffered Bike Lane
Tomorrow (6/22), the City of Portland Bureau of Transportation will hold a public meeting to hear feedback on the buffered bike lane on SE Holgate. As we reported again last week, the project has faced criticism from some neighbors and business owners. Reader Nick Christensen from the Lents Neighborhood wrote us to say that,
“There will be plenty of people saying the bike lanes killed their business at Tuesday’s meeting. Without support from the cycling community, it’s hard to justify keeping them.”
The meeting will take place tomorrow at 7:00 pm at the Lents Neighborhood Association monthly meeting (8835 SE Woodstock). More details here.
City of Beaverton public hearing on striping of bike lanes on SW Lombard Ave.
Back in March, the City of Beaverton’s Traffic Commission voted against a project to revise on-street parking and stripe bike lanes on SW Lombard. Advocates threatened to appeal that decision, but the City opted instead to schedule a public hearing to discuss it further. That hearing will happen a week from today (Monday, 6/28). For more information, download this PDF.
Please weigh in below if you have insights or further information about any of these issues. Also, if you go to any of these events, please keep in touch with us about how they turn out. Go Team Advocacy!
Thanks for reading.
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Thanks for connecting all of these important issues, Jonathan!
a great way cyclists can show themselves to be stakeholders in their communities is to advocate for programs that effect other mode share groups. i’ve cut/pasted the following from a recent bikeme! vancouver email. thanks leah!
Some of you may have read in Bike Portland Tim Leavitt’s written response “City transportation and budget staff are presently scouring the budgets of funded transportation projects to find any possible opportunities to continue city support of bicycle education/advocacy, pedestrian safety, and ADA accessability programs during these difficult times of significant budget shortfalls.”
While this is good news, I urge you to attend and make your voice heard. Until the final TIP is approved we need to be actively advocating to fund Bicycle and Pedestrian programming.
The meeting begins tonite, 7pm at City Hall. 210 E 13th St.
One more to add to the list:
The City of Milwaukie is having a Bike Boulevard Design Workshop for Monroe St this Wednesday night.
Monroe St. was identified in the 2007 Transportation System Plan as a bike route and the city is looking to make pedestrian and bike improvements.
The workshop will take place in the Community Meeting room in the Public Safety Building (3200 SE Harrison) at 6 PM on Wed., June 23
Anyone make it to the Holgate Buffered Bike Lane meeting? I had to work late tonight and couldn’t attend. Would love to hear a report, hopefully with good news…
Elliot:
The majority of people who attended ‘wanted their street back’. Spiffy wrote a good summary under the original news story about this meeting.
Jonathan — thanks for this post and update.
Folks — remember, the squeaky wheel gets the grease!
Ted Buehler
here’s a link to my comment in the original story… I also posted it over at ilovelents.com…
Beaverton has a Public Hearing today for bike lanes on SW Lombard.
I got word from a member of the BAC that the bike lanes issue will be determined by THE NUMBER OF CYCLISTS ATTENDING according to a source close to the mayor. This is just a rumor, but I do trust my source.
If you think that Bike Lanes are Important… Please come to tonights meeting at 6:30 PM at the Beaverton City Council.
I wish that I could say more, but I have to run… I hope to have more details later.
STAND UP AND BE COUNTED!!!
K’Tesh