![evan setup](https://bikeportland.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/evan-setup-640x424.jpg)
(Photos: M.Andersen/BikePortland)
Some of the images in this post are not safe for work. Obviously.
There it stood in the middle of SE Woodstock Boulevard, a 42-inch-tall orange breadcrumb surrounded by a bustling commercial district.
The Beaverton 17-year-old who’d leapt out the rolling door of a blue minivan to drop it confidently into place in front of the east curb of a traffic median didn’t tell anyone what he was doing or why. No one asked. Maybe no one even looked twice as he hopped back in the minivan to ride to the next stop, well out of eyeshot.
Seven hours earlier, the boy in question — his first name is Evan — wouldn’t have looked twice at something like that, either. That was before he found out that he was about to receive what was, just for that day, maybe the most closely guarded secret in Portland, Oregon: the route of that evening’s World Naked Bike Ride.
![swag sign](https://bikeportland.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/swag-sign-640x424.jpg)
The approximately 168 volunteers who made the most famous recreational bike ride in the United States happen last night have learned a lot of things from their predecessors, who learned a lot of things from theirs. One of the first things the WNBR team learned after the ride’s official founding in 2004 was that if you want several thousand naked people of every age and shape to have a fun, safe ride that ends at a fun, safe destination, you can’t tell anyone where that destination is.
Even to the people on the ride, the location of the finish line needs to be a secret.
Even to the people on the ride, the location of the finish line needs to be a secret until the moment the first few of them cross it.
But because this is the WNBR, a ride that exists in the glare of the media and survives by the grace of the Portland Police Bureau, there are a few tasks that need to be done beforehand.
That was how Evan and his sister Marie wound up cruising down Woodstock late Saturday afternoon in a borrowed van, retracing the secret route backwards from its even more secret destination. As they drove, they followed a detailed sheet of instructions to drop a dozen cones at seemingly random intersections around southeast Portland — cones that would in a few hours be perfectly understood for the hazard warnings they were when a sea of scantily clad smiling people parted smoothly to either side of them.
Evan and Marie had been drafted into service Saturday by their mother. It was retaliation, in a way, for the way they’d drafted her into being involved with the ride in the first place.
Their mother Luna, a 50-year-old real estate worker who lives in Beaverton, hadn’t known about any naked bike rides four years ago when she and her two sons moved to the metro area where her daughter had already attended college. But the 2012 ride, which happened to be the last one that drew fewer than 8,000 participants, had made it into her youngest son Evan’s media orbit.
“I grew up in the country, so my skills dealing with anybody were — none,” Evan recalled Saturday. “Growing up I was always bullied, I was always outcast. And it was all about my appearance. I’ve always been a pretty slim kid.”
Luna asked her daughter if she knew anything about the naked bike ride. “She said, ‘Oh god, yes.'”
When the then-14-year-old heard that every June in his new city, thousands of people met for a sunset bicycle ride to take off most or all of their clothes and celebrate the diversity of their bodies, he wanted in. So he asked his mom.
Luna, who said she can no longer bike herself due to a hip condition, passed the question to her daughter Marie, then in her 20s.
“I asked her if she knew about the bike ride,” Luna recalled. “She said, ‘Oh god, yes.'”
Luna said Evan could attend (wearing his purple Speedo) if Marie would help escort him. A close friend of Evan’s joined, too, and so did his older brother. And, starting in 2014, Luna began volunteering for the ride that her children were enjoying so much.
“It was more crowded than I expected it to be, and more artistic,” Luna recalled Saturday of her first visit to the gathering point. “After I volunteered the first year, I said ‘That was too much fun.'”
Luna said that because Evan’s friend was out of town on military duty and couldn’t get leave, her son had initially planned to skip Saturday’s ride for the first time since moving to Beaverton.
“But then he was like, ‘It’s my thing. I’ve just got to do it. It’s my family thing.'”
![feeding luna](https://bikeportland.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/feeding-luna-640x424.jpg)
It was 5 p.m., four hours before start time, and Luna was wondering (wishfully, it would soon turn out) whether her first year of service as the World Naked Bike Ride’s volunteer coordinator might be more or less done.
“I’m hoping it’s on autopilot,” she said, standing in front of the volunteer tent at Mount Scott Park, the gathering point for the 2016 ride.
Six weeks earlier, Luna had seen a Facebook post from the WNBR team, asking if anyone would like to serve as a volunteer coordinator. Luna, who specializes in planning and organizing home showings in her day job, said she could do it. Meghan Sinnott, the veteran WNBR organizer who runs the ride’s social media operation, emailed her almost immediately to see if she could attend the meeting coming up in a few days.
“They all knew each other already,” Luna said. But she got along perfectly. “It was immediate. It just clicked, and you fit right in with everybody. It’s awesome. They’re very organized. I like ’em like that.”
About once a day for the next month, Luna said, someone would type their information into WNBR’s volunteering page, and an automated email would pop into Luna’s inbox. She corresponded with each and built a massive spreadsheet to track them all, sorting them into categories by skill and interest: merchandise sellers, donation collectors, body painters, ride marshals, mechanics, medics.
Four days before the ride, Luna’s daughter Marie was coming home from a year teaching in Qingdao, China. Luna recruited her to a top-secret job: van driver.
“We communicate well,” Marie said of her mother Saturday as she headed to a cone location. “I understand her when she’s vague.”
![ross barnum](https://bikeportland.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/ross-barnum-640x424.jpg)
On Saturday afternoon Marie and Evan met up with Evan Ross, the tall, angular bike-tour entrepreneur in his first year as WNBR’s route manager and Portland Police Bureau liaison.
Ross was inheriting that role from Carl Larson, who has served as the main planner of WNBR routes for years. This is Larson’s last Pedalpalooza as a Portlander; he’s moving to upstate New York later this year. (Another veteran WNBR organizer, Halley Weaver, moved to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, on Friday.)
On Thursday night, Ross had gone out for one final test ride along the secret 5.7-mile route he and Larson had chosen from Mount Scott Park west on Woodstock, past Reed College and across the new Sellwood Bridge to Willamette Park. But when he got almost to the end of the meticulously planned route that he’d tested a month before, Ross saw two surprises: first, an unfinished joint on the Sellwood Bridge that was the perfect size to catch bike tires; and second, several thick steel plates in the park (which has been closed for months during bridge construction) that ran across the entire width of the path.
On Thursday and Friday, Ross and the WNBR team tensely discussed whether to make the ride’s first-ever last-minute route change.
“The original timeline from the county was that the route was supposed to be finished,” Ross said. But it wasn’t. On Thursday and Friday, Ross and the core WNBR team tensely discussed whether to make the ride’s first-ever last-minute route change.
“We were looking at building a plywood ramp,” Ross said. On Friday night with 24 hours to spare, Ross finally decided to scrap that plan and change the route to end at Sellwood Park instead, a shorter trip but a safer one and one that would let people finishing the ride drift naturally up the Springwater Corridor toward the inevitable string of riverside afterparties.
“I had to make a call,” Ross said.
Back at Mount Scott Park, it was three hours to start time and nobody knew any of those details. Tom Tyler, a Portlander of several years who has never joined the ride himself but volunteered for the first time this year, was distributing red cloth shoulder sashes labeled “WNBR” to people who had been assigned merchandise sales or donation solicitation.
“If Luna says we have a sash person, I’m rustling in your sash stash,” he told Eric Almeida, the second-year volunteer manning the table with him.
Collecting the sash was Tom Hardy, who said he’d seen a naked bike ride in Portland for the first time in 1962, gathering in Coe Circle at NE 39th Avenue and Glisan, when he was 17.
“It was never organized per se, but everybody knew about it,” he said. “I would go over to a friend of mine’s place. We had just graduated from Benson. … We got an eyeful.”
Hardy smiled.
He said he’d heard about the newly aboveboard WNBR in 2008 and ridden it every year since.
“I just think it’s fun that those barriers that kept us from organizing transparently have fallen away. Some of them, but not all of them.”
— Kathy Buss
Another man approached the table to ask which direction the ride was heading.
“I don’t know,” Tyler said.
Kathy Buss, another volunteer coordinator sitting with Tyler and Almeida, chimed in to support Hardy’s extended history of pre-WNBR naked bike rides in Portland.
“It would just seem like it was a random summer night and you would just see people riding past,” she said, her cane briefly slipping off her lap as she gestured excitedly. “Like, ‘What the hell?’ … I just think it’s fun that those barriers that kept us from organizing transparently have fallen away. Some of them, but not all of them.”
A soft-spoken gray-haired woman, already naked, approached the table with a question. She had a disability, she explained, and was worried about being able to make it back to Mount Scott Park if the ride was very long. Where is the destination, she wondered?
“I don’t know,” Buss said.
Around the park, the energy was picking up. Ken Marshall, who described himself as the 2015 California state mountain-bike racing champion, applied body paint in exchange for donations to support the ride. He said he’d driven 14 hours from Pasadena with a friend to make this year’s WNBR. He also explained that they’d constructed lampshades to wear during the ride.
“It’s like being a kid again,” said Marshall, adding that he was 71 years old. “No inhibitions. Everybody’s happy and it’s just, like, fun.”
Nearby, two young men who said they couldn’t give their names decorated each other with matching face paint. One said they’d driven from Boise to join the ride for the third year in a row after checking the ride out on a whim in 2014.
“We expected to enjoy, but nothing like this,” he said.
I asked if there was anything like this in Idaho.
“Nudity is illegal in Boise in any form,” he answered, seeming maybe less sad than frustrated.
As the start time got closer, more and more people were applying body paint.
Some onlookers seemed more confused than others.
Across the park, a naked couple (one painted almost entirely in gold) enjoyed jumping through cascades of bubbles that a man was blowing.
Bill Chin, an IT project manager in his day job and a man who very likely holds the world record for most Pedalpalooza rides in a single year, was in his first year as overall project manager for this year’s WNBR. With his daughter hovering nearby and waiting for his boyfriend to arrive, Chin stood for a mostly naked media interview with David Ashton of East Portland News. Elsewhere, a documentary team visiting from abroad worked the crowd.
Russ, a gray-moustached security guard working WNBR for the first time, arrived early to his evening gig carrying a styrofoam box of General Tso’s chicken that he said was left over from dinner at his favorite Chinese restaurant in Troutdale.
“I did Ben Harper last night at Edgewood,” he said. “I had another gig this morning — I did the gun show down at the Expo Center. Then I went to my mom’s and took a nap.”
On Sunday, Russ said, he’ll be working a drag show at Washington Park.
“It’s my favorite part of the job, because I’m always doing something different,” he said.
At 8:30, just as a van rolled up blasting music, Ross gathered WNBR’s mobile volunteers — medics, mechanics and ride marshals — in the park’s empty tennis court. Solemnly, he passed around a stack of maps of the still-secret destination, Sellwood Park.
“You look so dour!” one woman said.
“Wooo!” Ross replied obediently, raising his arms. Then he was back to business.
“When we get to the park and we see people starting to slow down, your biggest goal is to say ‘Keep going, keep going,'” Ross explained. “Use exaggerated arm motions.”
When the briefing was over, Ross headed to his own bike.
“I’m basically concentrating on getting painted and taking my clothes off,” he told another organizer.
Finally it was almost time to roll. Precisely at 8:45, the row of police motorcycles lined up neatly in the southwest corner of Mount Scott Park became a row of police officers, then peeled out of formation and headed west on Woodstock.
Immediately south of the park, another officer backed his car into the middle of an intersection and began directing westbound cars to turn south on 73rd. The night’s automotive detours had begun.
One mile west, at 52nd and Woodstock, the orange cone Evan had set in the middle of the road a few hours before was still sitting there unsuspiciously. But the jig was up. When police motorcycles arrived at each intersection along Woodstock, residents started to poke their heads out of doors. One couple, riding their own scooter up from the South Waterfront in search of the fun, spotted the police, deduced the route and staked out the parking lot at 7-Eleven.
A few minutes after 9 p.m., people on bikes were still converging on the park. Most were still clothed, but — to the delight of two young children from a quartet of families who had set up along Woodstock as soon as they saw the police arrive — one man was headed there already naked.
“We’re going to see naked people!” one child squealed.
“We got one!” one of the men shouted.
Across the street, a man tried to convince his tiny, yapping dog to sit as the woman he was with looked eastward, waiting.
“The anticipation is palpable,” the woman, Krista Bruun, said in a stage whisper.
Then, led by a flashing squad car, they were there.
Thousands of them were there.
Some were on skateboards or longboards. Some were jogging. A few were on rollerblades. A few were in wheelchairs.
They hollered. They jingled. They jiggled.
More than anything else, they smiled.
Then they came to Evan’s orange cone, marking the spot where the center curb began. And then, effortlessly, they parted.
— Michael Andersen, (503) 333-7824 – michael@bikeportland.org
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A great piece, Michael! Thanks.
Loved reading this Michael! It came out great. I was so nervous being away for so long and especially not being able to cover WNBR… But obviously I had nothing to worry about. Thank you for sharing this story with us.
What great coverage! I’ve been interested in the ride since we moved here in 2008, and I spectated and cheered last year, but getting naked in public just isn’t my thing (not at this point in my life, at least). Volunteering sounds like a great way to be involved and show support while remaining clothed.
Yes, great piece Michael! And clever how you started with the fascinating look into pre-ride traffic cone deployment. This is great journalism!
Who knew how much work it could be to help people on bikes have fun in the nude?!
I share that same appreciation Luna stated about being a middle aged person not of this world and the acceptance and encouragement offered. When Bike Summer 2002 occurred in Portland ( predecessor to Shift and Pedalpalooza) I, like Luna, was a middle aged suburban parent and little in common with others working on Bike Summer . My appreciation to all who accepted and encouraged me. My ego may not have withstood challenge. Fortunately there was none. Instead, I experienced growth and had a lot of fun.
I wish the same for Luna, and all others. Total inclusion is not just a goal but a needed step to creating a city with true relevance and utility.
AARP WNBR anyone? Suits us, lol.
The Naked Bike Ride was a great success this year! All do to dedicated volunteers like those profiled above and the others not mentioned.
I always feel sorry for those people who get caught up in the traffic through. I think the ride is big enough now to be able to broadcast the route beforehand. Or at least the general area like “SE Portland from Mt. Scott park going west”.
Thank you all that volunteered for this event. Now that I see it’s possible to volunteer and participate, I plan to sign up for next year.
The vast majority of those people “caught up in the traffic” could have been riding a bike. I feel more sorry that they weren’t on a bike on such a gorgeous night than that they had to wait in a car while 10,000 people protested the excessive use of cars. I wasn’t expecting the ride to cross my route home, but it didn’t matter because I was just slightly overdressed on a bike, not dragging 2 tons of metal and couches around.
Cheers to everyone who helped. Maybe next year the bikeshare rebalancing vans can follow along to give people “caught up in the traffic” an option.
Tow a basketball team of 15 year olds after a game on your bike with your “excessive” self righteousness. I was on my bike, btw.
The vast majority of our traffic is high school sports busses? No wonder congestion is so bad. There are just so very many legitimate excuses to drive.
mran was mentioning one example of a case where bicycling wasn’t a practical alternative to biking. Obviously he wasn’t saying that “the vast majority of our traffic is high school sports busses.”
And in fact, nobody needs “legitimate excuses” for driving anyway, especially those driving at night on a weekend, when the impacts of driving are less than if they were driving at rush hour, and when transit service isn’t a practical alternative for many areas.
As this event grows, traffic conflicts will become more of an issue, and it’s a lot better to understand the concerns and address them–which it sounds like the organizers and City are totally willing to do–than to dismiss and blame.
The typical occupancy rate is 1.4 people per vehicle. There are situations where cars (or I guess in your example, a large van) are necessary.
Any reason why those 15 year old basketball players can’t ride their own bikes?
You’re not supposed to make those kinds of suggestions, Adam H.
Why, too pragmatic for this forum? 😉
Obviously you are not on a bike, but a high horse!
I’m sure many (although not necessarily “the vast majority”) “could have been riding a bike” and would have if they’d been given notice about the route. But since it wasn’t disclosed (with valid reasoning) it’s hard to fault them for not planning ahead and choosing a bike for their trip, or for that matter for driving at that time and being unhappy with the delay from an event on an undisclosed route. In fact, if people are going to be out driving, I’d rather have them out when street use is typically low, such as a late weekend evening.
Great behind the scenes story! Any word on estimated attendance this year?
Spokesman Stephen Upchurch estimated in the 7,000 range, but he really wasn’t working from much information. They’ll do a formal count using video footage in a few days.
Now I understand why the end was at a terrible location (Sellwood Park) – that was beyond the control of the organizers. Thanks for considering safety.
I saw more wrecks than I have in previous years, especially on long hill through Eastmoreland – someone on a gurney, and a helmet-less person who lost control and went over the handlebars.
Kinda seems that WNBR is, like Filmed By Bike, jumping the shark. Of course many will disagree.
Put me down as one of the many.
This was a really interesting glimpse behind the scenes of one of Portland’s signature events. Thanks for covering this, Bikeportland.
Another great ride! Yes, the ending was a tad abrupt (I had to ask a sash wearing volunteer if that was, in fact, the end of the ride). Still, it continues to be a joyous occasion!
I had thought about going, but 10k people? That seems like a recipe for disaster. I hope nobody got too hurt.
Yet, no disasters!
Are any motor vehicles still made without a reverse gear? Surely that trick will get you out of most tight spots, no?
Ironic to see this comment right after my wish that people wouldn’t dismiss legitimate concerns.
Reverse doesn’t help you when your destination is on the street the ride is on, or on you have to cross that street, or when you don’t know alternate routes and it’s dark, or when you’re picking someone up who’s counting on you to be there at a certain time and you don’t know if the street will open up in one minute or ten… It also doesn’t help when there are cars behind you that are also confused, and that are blocking you from backing out.
Again, I’m not criticizing the ride or the reasoning for not publicizing the route, but telling people to use reverse isn’t the way to build support for next year.
Those legitimate concerns seem to be more complicated with 5-10 people in cars than just 10,000 people on bikes. I would say “funny how that works”, but clearly some people do not find it funny (“quit complaining and get on your bike” is also not funny.) Thanking car drivers for their patience and respect, or sense of humor…
some good points there, q. I was with you almost ’til the end –
“telling people to use reverse isn’t the way to build support for next year.”
Is this ride lacking for support? I am not averse to courtesy, but why is it that human powered events are the ones fingered? Funeral processions – does anyone complain? Traffic jams due to an overabundance of single occupancy vehicles? Sports events? Sales at the Woodburn outlets? No, for those we reflexively build—at taxpayer expense–extra infrastructure to supposedly handle the seasonal or diurnal demand. Digital signboards, cloverleaf intersections, extra lanes….
The ride obviously has lots of support. But as it grows, it’s going to have more impacts. Luckily the organizers sound great, and I have no doubt they’ll listen to concerns and do what they can to minimize problems. I bet they’re not responding to concerns from drivers with “they should have been on bikes” or “why can’t they just use reverse”, or similar dismissals.
You can try pulling in the idea (not true anyway) that human-powered events are the only ones that generate complaints, that cloverleaf exchanges are expensive, etc. but to me anyway, those don’t legitimize dismissing concerns related to traffic impacts.
You’re a curious one, q.
“You can try pulling in the idea (not true anyway) that human-powered events are the only ones that generate complaints,”
Well here we are fielding complaints about a human powered once-a-year event causing disruption for the motorized.
“that cloverleaf exchanges are expensive,”
Do you disagree? Where can I buy one for less than several million?
“but to me anyway, those don’t legitimize dismissing concerns related to traffic impacts.”
The point I was trying to make is that there seem to be traffic impacts, and traffic impacts. Some we spend taxpayer millions to ‘solve’ (Woodburn cloverleaf); while others get our dander up (WNBR?)
I don’t see anyone getting their dander up about traffic impacts of the event–unless you mean things like the statement, “I always feel sorry for those people who get caught up in the traffic through” that started this discussion about impacts. To me, that was a completely valid, innocuous and non-controversial view. But the immediate response was dismissal of the concerns, which I don’t think is productive.
The fact people raised concerns or are discussing them doesn’t mean that human-powered events are the only ones raising concerns or complaints, as you claim. And certainly none of this means I’m trying to argue that cloverleafs aren’t expensive, etc.
Having some sympathy for people caught in the traffic, and thinking their concerns could be valid and should be considered (as again, I’m sure the event organizers are doing) are very normal views. The fact that we spend millions fixing some traffic problems doesn’t mean people should dismiss the small concerns about one event’s impacts.
I couldn’t tell from the article exactly how the delayed opening of the new trail between the bridge and Willamette Park factored into the decision to shorten the route. Perhaps the joint at the bridge, and steel plates (couldn’t tell exactly where they were) were enough to shorten the route? Or, if they hadn’t been problems enough in themselves, would the new trail’s being closed have caused the route to be cut short?
If so, impacting an event with 10,000 participants is a pretty big negative impact of that trail failing to open when promised.
There was never any intention to send the ride down the trail. It was just going to cross the bridge and turn right on SW Macadam.
Carl–thanks.
Two organizers from the Philly WNBR attended this year, to see how PDX pulls of this monster ride.
I am curious though, why the ride seems to be moving further away from commercial areas, almost by design so as not to disrupt auto traffic. I’ve read a lot of comments from folks who want to go back through downtown PDX, drunks be damned.
I was thrilled when Luna took the roll of volunteer coordinator! I was originally in that roll, but because of my move, I had to relinquish it (and at the time, I couldn’t really talk about why I was moving, so I had to do it very politely) – but when I heard that Luna wanted to do it, who has been a rockstar volunteer the last couple of years, it was a breath of fresh air!
There it stood in the middle of SE Woodstock Boulevard, a 42-inch-tall orange breadcrumb surrounded by a bustling commercial district.