(Photos: J.Maus/BikePortland)
Rodney Avenue, already a decent low-stress alternative to the Vancouver-Williams couplet, is lined up for an upgrade to full neighborhood greenway status.
At an open house next Wednesday evening, the Portland Bureau of Transportation will be asking people for their thoughts on the plans.
To make the route comfortable for all riders, the city will need to find good ways to help people navigate two jogs in the street grid, at NE Alberta and NE Fremont (pictured below).
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It’ll also be important to control cut-through traffic. Last fall, responding to worries about commuters driving on Rodney to avoid Williams Avenue construction, the city installed a temporary diverter. But people have repeatedly chosen to drive directly through the barrier rather than following the rules there.
The event is 6 to 8 p.m. on Wednesday, April 1 in the Immaculate Heart Church at 2926 N Williams Ave. For more information, contact Project Manager Rich Newlands at (503) 823-7780 or Rich.newlands@portlandoregon.gov.
For more background on this project browse our Rodney Neighborhood Greenway story archive.
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“To make the route comfortable for all riders, the city will need to find good ways to help people navigate two jogs in the street grid, at NE Alberta and NE Fremont”
Traffic lights stopping traffic (motorized) on each side so bikes can simply have full lane access “in the Jog”
It would be nicer if they’d just make Williams work better by removing the conflicts introduced in the new design.
JL,
Which conflict, and replace with what, and what new conflict would that introduce?
Signals cost $250,000 each. There are higher priorities for a half a million dollars.
I’ve never been to one of these open houses. Is it worth it?
The public coments of those done in person are taken more seriously than e-mails. One example I think is the early Burnside outreach, the road diet came out of the meeting, and the input that diversion was needed on Ankeny, which hopefully will come soon. The more cyclists and local users that go to the meeting and call for diversion, the more likely it will happen.
If your questions are relevant to the specific project, and enough supporters of the project show up, the initial standard (minimum) designs can usually be influenced to be better.
(the quality of the initial design *may* depend on which PBOT group is proposing it, the people driving focused group or the people biking focused group)
Someone needs to ask how the speed bumps are doing at slowing people driving since they seem to have been placed too far apart for NG standards. The exact question to ask is ‘What is the 85th percentile speed since the speed bumps were installed?”. Also, speed counts can be skewed lower if the reported count is one right next to a bump – so make sure the count was taken at least 100 feet from a bump. Anything over 20 mph technically does not meet the NG standard (minimum).
That’s a great question to ask! Most of my thoughts about Rodney relate to diversion and the jogs. I’ll try to make it a point to attend this meeting!
I Live just off of Rodney at NE Cook St. One problem I witness during commute hours is the east/west traffic that comes from Williams and moves toward MLK. The cars will make Rodney dangerous because they are speeding through the neighborhood. I am amazed at the speeds I see people driving over the speed bumps as well.
G,
They should drive around the bumps ;-)? Has the city turned the stops on 9th, stopped all the cross streets yet?