(Photo by J. Maus/BikePortland)
Biketown is back.
After over 20 percent of the system was taken offline two weeks ago due to vandalism, Biketown says all 1,000 bikes are back in operation.
The City of Portland and bike share operator Motivate were caught off-guard by the scope of the vandalism. Sources told us they didn’t have enough parts on-hand — or enough labor to repair them. Thankfully, our community stepped up to help. Local bike business owners and employees lended a helping hand by rebuilding wheels and doing whatever it took to nurse the bikes back to full health.
In an email sent to members today, Biketown said, “We would like to extend a huge thank you to you, Portland. The support you’ve shown for bike share in this city is overwhelming. The team at Biketown is very grateful to know that the work we do is appreciated by so many of you. Now, let’s ride!”
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And the timing is perfect, because May is National Bike Month and that means thousands of Portlanders — many of them new to biking — will participate in the Bike More Challenge. Organized each year by The Street Trust, the Challenge is a friendly competition that pits individuals, teams, and workplaces throughout the region agains each other to see who can complete the most bike trips. This will be the first year Biketown is available during the contest.
In other Bike More Challenge news, the locally developed smartphone app Ride Report is now the official way to log trips. Once downloaded, you’re able to join the Challenge right inside the app and all your trips will be logged automatically — there’s no need to press start or stop. Not only is this an easy way to log your trips, because Ride Report shares ride data with the City of Portland, it will increase their knowledge about who’s riding where and how they feel about the trip (Ride Report users share trip quality).
As for the people responsible for the Biketown vandalism, we don’t have any new information to report. Sources say Portland Police had a lead on a suspect car; but we haven’t gotten a confirmation about that yet.
— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org
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The suspects were driving in a CAR? Those big-car corporation supporting pigs!
It could have been made out a mud and waddle with pedal power (or wood fired boiler)…
A dozen years ago or so there were a couple of so-called eco-terrorists who torched a handful of SUVs at a Eugene car dealership who went by the nick-names Free and Critter. I literally laughed out loud when they got caught the night of their crime. The break in the case came in the form of a traffic stop for a broken tail-light. Yes, their escape vehicle from a crime designed to protest cars was a car.
I get also chuckle at people holding “No War for Oil” signs who arrive at their protests by car. Big blind spots in our culture involving cars and such.
The recent trend of “I Stand with Standing Rock” bumper stickers sort of pisses me off. I presume the cars they’re stuck to are filled with gas that’s never traversed Indian land?
I think they would argue that they don’t have a general issue with fossil fuel production, but rather, certain dirty forms of extraction, and a pipeline routing process that ignores the concerns of first nations people and their sovereign land.
Oh, I’m sure they would argue that, but it’s a specious argument, which is why it pisses me off.
Obviously, they had a thing against bikes…
True…it may have been better / smarter / more poetic to use Biketown bikes to travel to each Biketown crime scene…thus getting a free ride, free parking AND using the tools of “da man” against “da man”!
Good! Let’s hope these left-wing extremists don’t strike again.
Go BikeTown!
Meanwhile in Belfast.
“More than one third of the fleet of Belfast Bikes are currently out of action due to either theft or vandalism…”
http://bikefast.org/2017/04/19/belfast-bikes-the-end/
I wonder if there’s something larger going on. Bike share does threaten the transportation status quo and those that make money from it.
But maybe I’m just paranoid.
Sounds like Belfast Bike’s problem is theft, and between the article and the comments it sounds as though either the lock-up system or the user interface aren’t doing their job.
The article actually said “a suspect car.” A car did this? Well, we know cars don’t like bikes, and after all the victims were, exactly, bikes. Cars don’t like signs, kiosks or buildings either, they hit them all the time! 😉
“In other Bike More Challenge news, the locally developed smartphone app Ride Report is now the official way to log trips. Once downloaded, you’re able to join the Challenge right inside the app and all your trips will be logged automatically — there’s no need to press start or stop. Not only is this an easy way to log your trips, because Ride Report shares ride data with the City of Portland, it will increase their knowledge about who’s riding where and how they feel about the trip (Ride Report users share trip quality).”
This is awesome news! I already use Ride Report so I don’t have to download a new app. Is Ride Report working to be included in the National Bike Challenge (also starts May 1)? I deleted Strava because I prefer Ride Report, but I can only use Strava to participate in the National Bike Challenge.
I thought vandalism would put an end to Biketown. Maybe if it keeps up.
The big important question is do we pronounce it “bikeytown” so it rhymes with Nike? I do.
No.
I pronounce it Nick E Bic E
In other Bike More Challenge news, the locally developed smartphone app Ride Report is now the official way to log trips.
The article actually said “a suspect car.”