(Photos: Community Cycling Center/Flickr)
The Community Cycling Center and their partners are busy in North Portland today putting on the finishing touches to the new “bike hub” coming to the New Columbia neighborhood. The design/build project began just two weeks ago and the big grand opening is slated for tomorrow evening.
Dubbed simply “The Hub,” the CCC says the new building will, “provide affordable repairs, free advice, and act as a community resource center for all sorts of bicycle-based activities at New Columbia.”
The CCC’s Communications and Marketing Manager Melinda Musser says so far the work has gone all according to plan. She also wants to remind the community that they are still hoping to reach their $15,000 fundraising goal by tomorrow. Since August 10th, they’ve raised nearly $9,000. If they can reach $10,000, Bike Gallery will throw in a $5,000 gift and get them to the goal. They’re accepting donations online, so click over and drop a few bucks into this important and exciting project.
The ribbon-cutting is set for tomorrow evening from 5:30 to 7:00. Site tours and speakers are planned and there will be cake and free flat tire repair. Stay tuned for a full report and make sure you donate!
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So cool! Can’t wait to see the completed project. The CCC is doing some effective and innovative advocacy. Excited to see how it turns out.
Anyone gonna start a book for how long until it gets burglarized? I’m thinking Memorial Day 2013 would be a good over-under date.
Wow Allan that’s a seriously negative perspective with some thinly-veiled tones of racism. Why don’t you go up to New Columbia and check the project out for yourself? Maybe you’d meet some of the great people behind the project and the amazingly energetic young kids who are waiting to have their bikes repaired so they can start riding again.
Racism? Just cheap ‘n easy name calling on your part.
As for all those “amazing, energetic young kids” yes, very evident from the flickr stream. But to be clear, it’s not the “amazing, energetic young kids,” I expect will be burglarizing the place.
It’s racist because of your expectations from the people who live in that neighborhood. But I am sure you would say the same about a project like this if it went up in the West Hills, or maybe Laurelhurst, right?
There’s a thing some people use before they write or speak which is often referred to as a “filter.” I suggest you investigate and implement this phenomenon.
First of all, take your lame attempt to “shame” me to the curb.
Second of all, the crime stats for New Columbia are what they are and IMO irrespective of the neighborhood’s racial demographic. But you seem to think that I since I’ve noticed them, and “the horror” commented upon them, I’m a racist.
Yep, that’s the only explanation you can imagine, that I’m a racist.
You got any sources? A cursory glance at portlandonline’s neighborhood crime maps indicate that the New Columbia neighborhood runs about average for the eastside in terms of crime rates, and is considerably safer than the area around the LLoyd District, the 82nd Ave corridor, and downtown. In fact, the half mile around my own neighborhood down here in the “felony flats” could be classified as more dangerous.
Making up more BS to defend you previous BS only proves you should be shamed.
Which part of his comment was racist, exactly?
Crickets.
Either the veil is not as thin as originally suggested, or to say anything negative about New Columbia is ipso facto racist.
Wow, you speak Latin.
I was taking my kid to the park there when it first opened, there was so much trouble there all the time we quit going there for safety reasons. parents there don’t know or care where their kids are or who they are with, what they are doing, behaving…. roudy place, no parental guidance.
Just what we need…more negativity.
This is a great project and a shining example of how the CCC is creating community! Well done!!!
Yeah, only cheer leading allowed! And if it gets broken into, hey, who-couldda-knowed!?! Only a racist would expect such a thing.
Plenty of bike establishments in all parts of town get broken into. Are you suggesting that is a reason not to build something like this? What exactly is your point?
I like the effort and applaud it, and could imagine that projects like this, built with high levels of community involvement stand a higher chance of thriving and persisting than those plunked down by some distant corporate parent.
True, about every bike shop in town has been hit. And a lot of crime is crime of opportunity, so it seems to me putting a tool shed in the middle of a high crime area is absolutely asking for a burglary. Hence the joke. As Homer Simpson says, “it’s funny cuz it’s true.”
As for the community involvement, um, the flickr stream indicates otherwise. Excepting the aforementioned “amazing, energetic young kids,” I saw one person that was obviously a resident in the photos.
Ops, this was supposed to be a reply to 9watts.
Security is a concern of any bike shop / bike repair facility.
New Columbia residents have been highly involved in this project. We All Can Ride, a resident-led bike committee, was the driving force behind the project. They identified affordable bike repair and bike safety education as their top priorities in 2009. Many residents were involved in the design meetings, and several helped out during the construction process. Residents are already leading community bike rides every week, and will be leading repair workshops out of the Bike Repair Hub in the future.
Sounds like a wonderful project! Best of luck to all concerned.
Sounds amazing! Where is this exactly?
Hi Sylvia – The Bike Repair Hub is located on the corner of N. Trenton Street and N. Woolsey Avenue.
I wanted to jump in and address the question about what is racist about some of the previous comments. It is true that crime is a concern at New Columbia and it is true that we are vulnerable, as is any operation with anything deemed valuable inside (or outside for that matter).
Language becomes coded racism when a statement conjures specific images of black people, latinos or any group in the public mind: think Welfare Queens or this deconstruction of Newt Gingrich’s coded racist comments from the Daily Show.
NEWT GINGRICH (12/5/2011): Some people who suggest that the working poor by definition know how to work, which is true, that’s why they’re called the working poor. I was talking about the people who come out of areas of neighborhoods where they may not have that experience.
LARRY WILMORE: Ohh, OK, he’s not talking about poor people, he’s talking about poor black people. Chuck, could you change my…. (graphic changed his title back to Senior Black Correspondent) Thank you.
JON STEWART: But Larry, he didn’t say black.
LARRY WILMORE: No, Jon, those are his exact words. He said “in neighborhoods where they may not have that experience”.
JON STEWART: (stares blankly) That’s… that’s code for black?
LARRY WILMORE: No, it’s code for inner city, which is code for urban, which is code for black.
JON STEWART: It’s a lot of code.
LARRY WILMORE: Well, Jon, it’s 2011, you can’t just call poor black people lazy.
JON STEWART: But he didn’t use the word lazy either!
LARRY WILMORE: Right, he said we “have no habit of showing up on Monday”.
JON STEWART: Code for lazy, I guess.
LARRY WILMORE: Well, technically, it’s code for shiftless, which is code for lazy, which is code for black.
My observation about this thread is that this is a healthy discourse. When people are asking what is racist I find that healthy. People have opinions and they can share them freely (mostly) on blogs like this. Racism in the 21st century is not as overt as it used to be. It has become less easy to pinpoint, which is why it is so insidious.
“My observation about this thread is that this is a healthy discourse.”
Easy for you to say, you weren’t on the receiving end of being called a racist.
What a cool project! A structure and a sculpture dedicated to bikes in a low-income, high-minority, high-immigrant, high-crime neighborhood, and it’s right across the street from the school. It’s a great message in some prime real estate for New Columbia.
But I actually chimed in here to make a quick confession: I go by this spot several times a week, and what’s always puzzled me is the backyard just down the street that has a couple dozens kids bikes in it just sort of tossed around everywhere. I’ve never had the courage to knock on the door and ask why do you have so many bikes in your backyard? Do you keep them for the neighborhood? Do you fix up bikes for kids? I wonder how the Hub and that house will interact now. There’s got to be either 1) natural competition, or 2) serious market potential there.
Chris, We have a group of residents doing community outreach and they will probably have a conversation… Thanks.
🙂
I would encourage as many cyclist enthusiasts as soon as possible to visit this Bike Hub in New Columbia. I first visited this neighborhood for this project and was pleasantly surprised by the experience and the positive outpouring of energy into the hub.
Allan,
I think it is healthy because racism is an uncommon conversation, including what it is, what it means, and how it plays out in the world. All of which can be found in this thread. As you experienced, the topic is fraught with risk — asking a question or saying something that you don’t intend to be hurtful but it is received that way.
I give you credit for being bold, I give others credit for pushing back, and I give others credit for asking questions.
nicely put.
I rode by and then circled around the new structure on my ride tonight. It is a beautiful facility and had a healthy mix of residents gathered around obviously proud of the new addition to the neighborhood. Great work to all involved!