2015 Archives

How was the Naked Ride for you? (I’m hoping you can fill me in)

Buffered Bike Lane with a bike symbol and arrow pointing forward

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I missed the World Naked Bike Ride this year so I’m hoping you can fill me in.

There are not many things that would keep me away from this ride. It’s not only one of the most fun and inspiring nights of the year for me personally, but the recap and photos I usually post are by far the most popular of the entire year (by a mile).

(Don’t feel sorry for me not being there, I was at another event where love, celebration and optimism filled the warm night sky — the wedding of your favorite bike journalist Michael Andersen to his wonderful partner Maureen Young!)

So… How’d it go?

A man died in this collision on Saturday
on Highway 6 near Tillamook.
(Photo: Oregon State Police)

As long as roadway fatalities and injuries keep piling up, local activists plan to keep protesting.

Fresh of last week’s rally and demonstrations at City Hall, volunteers with BikeLoudPDX will continue their actions with a Death Toll Memorial event tomorrow at the headquarters of the Oregon Department of Transportation in downtown Portland.

“Several of us feel the need to publicly acknowledge that 30 people lost their lives in June on Oregon roads in preventable wrecks,” wrote event organizer Dan Kaufman. Kaufman, the same man who organized the protest on SE Powell Blvd back in May, is fed up with the loss of life and injury on our roads.

This stellar road inside Cape Blanco State Park is now officially recognized as one
of the best places to ride a bike in Oregon.
(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)

Last week the Oregon State Parks Commission unanimously approved two new Scenic Bikeways; the Wild Rivers Coast and Cascade Siskiyou routes. The new routes are the first time the Bikeway program has included the coast and the southern Oregon region.

The Wild Rivers Coast Scenic Bikeway is a a 61-mile route based out of Port Orford. It heads southeast along the curvaceous Elk River and then north up to Cape Blanco State Park, the westernmost point in the entire state. The park includes a lighthouse and the historic Hughes House, both of which you might recall hearing about when I explored the area myself a few years ago during a ride down the coast.

The Cascade Siskiyou Scenic Bikeway begins in the southern Oregon city of Ashland. The 55-mile loop heads east and takes you around Emigrant and Howard Prarie Lakes. There’s even a nice bikepacking option if you’re ready to sleep overnight.

With the addition of these two new Scenic Bikeways, Oregon now boasts a total of 14 routes that have been officially recognized since the program was established in 2008.

The Bikeways program does not come with any funding for infrastructure improvements, except for special way-finding signage. The routes themselves are mostly on standard roads and highways, however the selection committee takes into account the general safety of the road in making their decisions.

You can learn much more about them and the other 12 Scenic Bikeways at RideOregonRide.com.

The Monday Roundup: Turn signal projectors, Nepalese disaster response & more

— This week’s Monday Roundup is brought to you by Spinlister, where you can earn money by listing your bike for rent or choose from local listings to try a new (to you) bike today!

Here are the bike links from around the world that caught our eyes this week:

Signal projectors: The Cyclee lets you signal without raising your hands by projecting symbols onto your back.

Disaster response: In the aftermath of Nepal’s earthquake, its national mountain bike team discovered that it could “ride to remote mountain communities that vehicles could not reach and use their knowledge of mountain trails to deliver aid and gather information.” So that’s what they’re doing.

Austin Crenshaw

37-year old Portland resident Austin Crenshaw died Saturday morning from injuries sustained in a crash on East Haines Road near Corbett.

According to the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office, Crenshaw was riding downhill with a group of friends when he “crashed on a curve” and veered into the opposing lane of travel. Someone driving a car in the opposite direction collided with Crenshaw. Friends attempted to revive him, as did emergency responders, but he was pronounced dead on the scene. The driver of the car remained at the scene.

The collision happened on East Haines Road near the intersection with E Larch Mountain Road. This is a very popular place to ride as Haines connects to Alex Barr and the Historic Columbia River Highway. I’ve ridden this exact same stretch of road myself many times (it’s featured on one of my RideWithGPS Ambassador Routes). It’s very quiet and rarely has traffic; but the curves are sharp and the road is very narrow in some spots.

(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)

If you want to stage a violent protest or go to war, don’t do it on bicycles. Bicycles are inherently non-violent.

Last month, a gang of indignant and ignorant motorcycle riders decided to stage an armed protest outside a Phoenix mosque against the “tyranny of Islam” in response to an incident where two Arizona residents were killed by police outside a Muhammed cartoon-drawing contest in suburban Dallas.

“Armed Bikers Plan Anti-Muslim Protest Outside Arizona Mosque,” headlines read. The protesters strutted in front of the mosque during Friday prayer in t-shirts that said “Fuck Islam” while brandishing firearms.

I was shocked and dismayed by the hate and bigotry. But the headlines got me thinking: what is it about bicycling — in contrast to motorcycling or driving — that is incongruent with what happened in Arizona?

2012 World Naked Bike Ride - Portland-14

Something awesome will happen Saturday night.
(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)

This menu of delicious rides and events is brought to you by our friends at Hopworks Urban Brewery. Their support makes BikePortland possible.

We’re having a heat wave, Pedalpalooza is coming to a close, the Supreme Court just voted to support gay marriage across the land and the largest free bike ride of the year is just one day away.

Suffice it to say this is going to be a memorable weekend.

Whether you partake in the costuming, dancing, nakedness or not, there are tons of options to get you inspired to ride. If you do get out there, pack some cold water or a few bucks to stop and get a cold drink (cough, HUB, cough) or frozen treat along the way. It’s gonna’ be hot!

Barb Grover soon after her double
mastectomy last year.
(Photo: Barbara Hart)

Barb Grover doesn’t have breasts any more, and doesn’t mind who knows it.

As part of her cancer treatment, the Portland woman had a double mastectomy one year ago next week. On Saturday, to celebrate, she’ll be joining thousands of other people to ride through the streets of Portland with nothing on.

She’s invited other post-mastectomy women and their supporters to join her at whatever level of clothing they wish. She’s dubbed it “Critical Mastectomy.”

“Once the treatment is over, we go about our lives and look like we’re assuming a normal day to day,” Grover, 54, said in an interview Thursday. “And most of us have scars. That doesn’t get talked about a lot in public. We see Angelina Jolie and she looks like her old self again. But that’s not the path that a lot of women choose, or can choose. … This is what it really looks like, people; this is what it’s really like. It’s not awful. It’s just different. We just need to be a little more open about it.”

Still from KGW-TV video taken at the scene in 2012.

A Portland man who was blamed for a collision on a notorious section of North Broadway three years ago has been absolved in court.

Three years ago 33-year old Karl Zickrick was riding down North Broadway on his way to work. As he approached Wheeler he noticed a large SUV encroaching into the bike lane in front of him as it prepared to turn right. To avoid being right-hooked, Zickrick moved to the left out of the bike lane to go around the SUV. However, just as he made that move the driver of the SUV, 62-year-old Michael McLerren, slammed on his brakes and Zickrick flew into the back window. The impact shattered the window and left Zickrick with severe facial injuries and a broken jaw. (Two months after this collision, former Mayor Sam Adams decided to prohibit all right turns onto Wheeler.)

Adding insult to injury, the Portland Police Bureau blamed Zickrick for the collision. The day the crash occurred the PPB said this in an official statement (emphases mine):

Safe Streets Rally Part 2 at City Hall -19.jpg

An unprecedented day of protests yesterday have yielded their first results.

BikeLoudPDX, Portland’s upstart bike advocacy group that has made lots of headlines in the past few months, started the day with a big rally in front of City Hall followed by several of the group’s leaders giving impassioned testimony in front of City Council. After that, they helped organize several rides and then held another rally on City Hall’s steps last night.

BikeLoud leaders and the people they have inspired to show up to these events share a similar feeling: frustration and anger that city leaders sit idly by while Portlanders risk their lives on unsafe streets. “It’s bullshit!” and “It’s unacceptable!” were just two of the phrases chanted at last night’s rally.

And now it appears those voices are having an impact on City Hall.

Last night City Commissioner Steve Novick, the man in charge of the Bureau of Transportation, penned a lengthy blog post in direct response to the protests. He titled it, “Working together to build safer streets.” (He also shared thoughts about biking and the Climate Action Plan in a separate post.)

Legislators held a special hearing today
to hear testimony and learn about
the new proposal.

Despite growing consensus that the main effect of widening roads is not to reduce travel times but rather to lengthen car trips, Oregon’s overwhelmingly Democratic state legislature seems to be preparing to approve a bill that would spend around $78 million to add lanes and widen several freeways in the Portland metro area.

More widening projects are also planned around the state.

HB 2281, the 73-page bill being debated in Salem today, would raise $370 million through a mix of new vehicle registration fees and a two-cent gas tax increase. About $125 million of that would go to the Portland metro region (ODOT Region 1). The bill also includes 25 earmarked projects — most of which would widen freeways to “improve safety and provide congestion relief” and allow for “freight mobility improvements.”

There’s nothing in the new bill set aside specifically for bicycling or walking, though the multimodal Connect Oregon program would continue, presumably still funded by the state lottery.

City Council members heard calls for safer streets loud and clear this morning.
(Photos: M.Andersen/BikePortland)

Brittany Gratreak

If the 75 or so Portlanders who came to City Hall this morning to kick off a full day of protests could be said to be speaking for any single person, it might as well have been one of the people there: Brittany Gratreak.

On April 8, the 22-year-old Portland State University student was riding her bike to school in Northeast Broadway’s bike lane when a man driving to work accelerated across Broadway from the south, seizing a gap in auto traffic but not considering the fact that he might run into something more fragile than metal. He did.

Gratreak was hit at a 90-degree angle, thrown from her bicycle and knocked unconscious. Once she woke up and received insurance information from the man who’d hit her, she decided to save money by calling a friend, rather than an ambulance, for a ride to the hospital.

She didn’t know at the time that by not paying for an ambulance ride, she was avoiding Portland’s little-known trigger for a police investigation. Two months later, Gratreak remains in physical therapy.

How was the Naked Ride for you? (I’m hoping you can fill me in)

With 40% rise in roadway deaths, activists plan to target ODOT

‘Scenic Bikeways’ now available on the coast and southern Oregon

The Monday Roundup: Turn signal projectors, Nepalese disaster response & more

Portland man dies in collision while riding near Larch Mountain

Column: Whether we like it or not, bicycles are peace machines

Weekend Event Guide: Parties galore, nakedness, MTB racing, and more

‘Critical Mastectomy’: Post-op women will roll together in World Naked Bike Ride

Man wins in court three years after police, insurance company blamed him for collision

Commissioner Novick responds to ‘Day of Protests’ with diverter promise

New transportation bill in Salem includes $78 million to widen Portland-area freeways – UPDATED

At City Hall rally, demonstrators demand action for safer streets

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