Welcome to the first Video Roundup of 2017! Since I missed a few weeks there are a lot of videos. I watched about 150 videos this week so we can show you the best.
First up is this video from Giant/Liv. I usually shy away from featuring a promo/marketing video, but this is low-key with beautiful footage.
I haven’t heard much about the new law that allows bicyclists and motorcyclists to go through a red light after waiting. It did take effect last year, right? Has anyone been taking advantage, and have any positive or negative responses from it?
Most importantly: do we know yet how to wait for the light to “complete one full cycle,” if by definition you aren’t triggering the light to make it cycle?
The Board of Directors of The Street Trust (formerly the Bicycle Transportation Alliance) just announced that Executive Director Rob Sadowsky is stepping down has been relieved of his duties effective immediately.
The former deputy director of the organization, Stephanie Noll, will take his place as an interim leader until a new director is found. Noll left The Street Trust back in July.
Here’s the full statement from The Street Trust:
The Board of Directors of The Street Trust (formerly the Bicycle Transportation Alliance) announced today that Rob Sadowsky will be stepping down as Executive Director, effective immediately. The Board has asked Stephanie Noll, the former Deputy Executive Director of The Street Trust, to step in as interim head of the organization and has launched a national search for the organization’s next executive director.
After 26 years as the Bicycle Transportation Alliance, the Portland-based advocacy organization is now officially known as The Street Trust.
Actually, according new Communications Director Kate Walker, the name is now, “The Street Trust, formerly The Bicycle Transportation Alliance.” That “formerly” part will remain for the rest of this year.
You might recall that the name change was ratified by the organization’s board and members back in August. But the new name wasn’t fully integrated into the brand until the new year. “With a new year, we’re finally ready to reveal our new brand,” reads a blog post about the change posted on January 4th.
Welcome to Monday.
We’ve got another great week in store. But before we get started let’s take a look at the most noteworthy stories we came across last week…
Cities liable for unsafe streets: In what advocates are calling a “landmark” decision, a state court has found that New York City is party liable for a fatal traffic crash because the street where it happened was dangerous by design.
Jar-gone: “Road diet”, “pedestrian”, “smart cities” — these are just a few bits of jargon that many transpo advocates and experts would like to toss into the wastebin.
Ask him anything: Outgoing US Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx did a Reddit AMA where he called for a “fundamental redesign” of transportation funding and a whole lot more.
The local homeless shelter on Grand Avenue says they need clean socks, underwear, and warm jackets. Any warm clothes, really.
If you have something to donate, feel free to drop it by Rivelo. (401 SE Caruthers St at Water Ave, on the east side of the Tilikum) and we’ll bundle up the donations and take them to the shelter.
If you are new to Portland or new to taking care of a little one, you might not realize how awesome our city’s Safe Routes to School program is. Working with partner nonprofits like The Street Trust (formerly the Bicycle Transportation Alliance), the Community Cycling Center, Oregon Walks, and others, the program serves 180 schools citywide. And it works.
The schools with the best programs are the ones where caregivers, parents, and teachers have built a relationship with staff from city’s transportation bureau. PBOT is the place that can set you up with maps and lots of other resources that will get more of your school biking, walking, and rolling to school. But many people aren’t sure where to begin and don’t know who to talk to to get things rolling.
PBOT has just made that much easier.
The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition is so afraid of how Uber’s autonomous vehicles take right turns at intersections that they’ve posted a warning for bike riders and have started a petition to force the company to end the practice.
Interestingly, the dangerous maneuver being made by Uber-bots is exactly what Oregon law requires — and what Portland’s chief bike planner prefers.
Here’s the deal:
Filling a six-mile gap between Troutdale and Gresham would put a serious dent in the “40-mile Loop” — a trail concept that’s been in regional planning dreams for well over a century. And Metro is creating a plan to do just that.
But where some see an historic opportunity for a new, low-stress place to walk and roll, others see a perfect place for people who live outside to pitch tents and build encampments.
We just gained another iconic cycling brand: Chrome Industries announced this morning that they plan to relocate to Portland in early April.
Chrome is well-known in the bike world for its messenger bags, shoes and apparel. Closely tied to the messenger scene since its start in Denver, Colorado in 1995. Chrome had been based in San Francisco since 2002 and the company opened a retail store in downtown Portland in 2012. The company makes custom bags in its retail stores and they make about 60 percent of all their products in the USA (bags are made in Chico and apparel is cut and sewn in San Francisco). A rep for the company said there are no immediate plans to bring production jobs to Portland.
In a press release, Chrome explained why they decided to move their head office here:
Emotions around street safety issues ran high at the end of 2016. Not only did we have the most road fatalities (45) since 2003, but we lost six Portlanders to traffic violence in the final month alone.
When two of those six happened within just a few hours of each other and on the same, notoriously dangerous section of Southeast Division Street where three other people died last year, the pressure to do something intensified. (Now former) Mayor Charlie Hales and his four commissioners took steps to address the situation at a meeting on December 21st.
You might have missed it due to the holiday break, but Portland’s former mayor Charlie Hales had sort of a mic-drop moment at the final City Council meeting of 2016.
It came four days before Christmas and just before Hales voted yes on an ordinance that gives the transportation bureau permission to spend $300,000 on outer Southeast Division (stay tuned for a story about that). Before recessing council, Hales took the opportunity to give a five-minute speech about what he said are, “The things I’ll be committed to when I’m a private citizen and activists again.” He talked about the scourge of our urban arterial highways in east Portland, his annoyance with ODOT, the urgency to stop planning streets solely for driving, the role of transportation reform activists, and more.
The speech is below, followed by the YouTube clip.