UPDATE, 11/8: Council date has been changed to Thursday, November 15th at 2:00 pm.
October 31st*. That’s when the Portland Bureau of Transportation plans to present their Central City in Motion project to Mayor Ted Wheeler and the rest of city council.
93 percent of respondents said the CCIM projects would make the central city safer, and 85 percent said the projects would make them more likely to take transit, walk, or bike
PBOT made the announcement on Twitter yesterday while explaining that the goal of the project is to, “improve and optimize our transportation system for all users, ensure that people driving, walking, biking and taking the bus know where they are supposed to be on the road and how they’re supposed to use the network.”
Regardless of the diplomatic way they describe it, this could be the most important investment in major bikeways in Portland for decades. With protected lanes as a default and an estimated budget of $30 million, we could finally see a few crucial pieces of the puzzle laid out in relatively short order (the first batch of projects would begin construction next year).
The plan comes into focus as a dire new report on climate change once again raises the stakes of our decisions on issues like transportation. Yesterday on Twitter, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said the report is, “powerful, precisely because it makes clear that we are not yet too late.” “Now is the moment to continue our commitment to transforming our economy,” Wheeler posted, “by embracing low carbon technologies that will create millions of good, local green jobs while providing cheap abundant energy for all and cleaning the air that we all breathe together.”
Wheeler will get his chance to show he’s not scared to lead and make good on those words on Halloween when PBOT staff present the Central City in Motion plan.
The projects
Late last month we reported that PBOT has whittled down the initial batch of projects to 11. Upon closer inspection we know see that the list is 12 projects totaling $33 million. The projects range from a new couplet on SW Broadway and 4th with an estimated cost of $5.8 million to a project that would add safer crossings of West Burnside for around $866,000.
Here’s the list:
Keep in mind PBOT is focused on “1-5 year implementation projects” and just because something isn’t on this list doesn’t mean it won’t get built. There are 18 projects that passed PBOT’s screening process and I could see any one of them moving up the list if necessary (due to controversy, political heat, and so on). What PBOT wants to do is bring a list of “highly implementable” projects to council and use the political endorsement (if it passes) as momentum to push through to the design, engineering and construction phases.
At their most recent (and final) Sounding Board meeting, PBOT revealed results of two recent open houses and an online survey. 93 percent of respondents said the CCIM projects would make the central city safer, and 85 percent said the projects would make them more likely to take transit, walk, or bike. This are positive results, especially given that over 70 percent of respondents said they currently drive into the central city nearly every day or “sometimes.”
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Those open houses also told PBOT that the four most popular projects are: the Broadway/4th couplet that aims to, “create a signature north-south bike facility”; a host of updates to West Burnside including safer crossings and bus priority and protected bike lanes; a permanent “Better Naito; and a project that would create transit lanes on MLK/Grand and safer crossings and protected bike lanes on SE 6th and 7th (note that the MLK/Grand elements of the project have been dropped).
There’s been some confusion around cost estimates shared by PBOT so far. In a presentation to the project’s Sounding Board committee last month, PBOT shared three slides of a potential project on SE Hawthorne Blvd that illustrated a low, medium, and high-cost build options (note: PBOT says current estimates are based on medium-build level):
Girding for pushback
PBOT knows this plan is likely to raise more concerns from people and organizations who fear a change to the status quo. Thankfully, the agency has done some homework in anticipation of these sky-is-falling proclamations that are sure to come.
They’ve done the traffic modeling math to show that, in tandem with other policy shifts expected by 2035, the addition of CCIM projects will lower average motor vehicle speeds in the central city by just 1 mph on average. For people who say we don’t have room on our roads, PBOT has calculated that the total right-of-way in the central city dedicated to transit and bikes will increase only 1 percent: from 3 to 4 percent for bicycles and from 1 to 2 percent for transit vehicles. Put another way, PBOT says if they built all 18 of the projects that survived their initial screening process, the additional 2 percent of space on those affected streets would have 61 percent more capacity.
What about car parking? It’s true that the CCIM projects will lead to hundreds of fewer places to park cars. As we’ve reported previously, PBOT is hard at work on a “parking mitigation strategy” document that will outline, “A multi-pronged approach to help ease the transition [to less parking] during and after project implementation.” This strategy will have three priorities: find more spaces where/if they can, use “operational improvements” to make existing spaces more efficient, and reduce demand.
A marketing push
Since we can’t add more streets to the Central City as we grow, we will need to invest and upgrade the existing transportation system to make it more predictable, reliable and safe for residents and businesses to use other travel modes. #centralcityinmotion pic.twitter.com/mvGVstiey6
— Portland Bureau of Transportation (@PBOTinfo) October 9, 2018
Now that we’re in the final few weeks before the council date, PBOT’s communications team has taken to the web to raise awareness of the plan. With the #centralcityinmotion hashtag on Twitter, PBOT is explaining why these street updates are necessary. Their primary argument is that the central city is primed for major growth in the coming years and — since our streets can’t grow along with the population — we must fit more people onto them. “If we don’t take action now,” reads one of their Tweets posted today, “it’s going to become more difficult to travel around the central city – whether you’re on foot, a bike, riding a bus, or in a car or truck.”
This statement echoes Mayor Wheeler’s contention that “We are not yet too late,” to make bold decisions in the face of imminent climate catastrophe. Giving the CCIM plan a strong vote of support would be a good start.
*UPDATE, 5:10 pm: PBOT just announced that the council date has been pushed back to November 14th.
— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org
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What happened to project #2? In the version portrayed by the CCIM project website, it extended to the Broadway bridge and cost $6.6 million, but here they’ve lowered the price and left an obvious gap between this route and the improved Broadway/Weidler couplet (project #18). The part they’re leaving out happens to encompass an intersection that’s been written about multiple times on this blog as one of the most dangerous (for cyclists) in the city. Why are we ok with this?
My guess is that the Post Office redevelopment project will interface in such a way, as of yet not designed, that it makes sense to delay it.
Well, that’s unnerving and incredibly disappointing. I ride that section every day, and it’s probably the most dangerous part of my ride. My girlfriend was hit by a car (and had her bike totaled) in the exact stretch they’ve removed from the plans. She doesn’t ride it any more.
I was a huge proponent of that project, and thrilled that the city had decided to finally do something to improve the situation there; I should have guessed they’d pull a bait-and-switch.
A north bound lane on Broadway from Burnside to the bridge is long overdue. The parking is dramatically underutilized and there are many vacant buildings on that stretch. Makes no sense not to connect these new routes together at the Broadway Bridge.
Yeah, I was bummed that they didn’t paint a lane there when they resurfaced NW Broadway back in 2016. Real bummed.
Visualized designs for Hawthorne and 6th – not safe for bikes at any cost.
Why bother even putting in a bike lane like this? Just take the car lane and let the gutter go to the scooters, pedestrians, and bus riders.
Floating bus stops: bad design and dangerous for cyclists.
Any facts we can look up to support your opinions?
In the Netherlands, the country with the highest use of bicycle and the lowest rate of cycling injury per km traveled, they almost exclusively use floating bus stops. Copying their designs seems like a smart & safe move, if done correctly.
http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/2011/10/bus-stops-which-dont-cause-problems-for.html
You know, I’ve had the opportunity to ride in Seattle a lot lately, and they’re at least 5 years ahead of us on bicycle infrastructure. I’ve ridden the 2nd ave protected (by concrete) bike lane several times and I have to tell you, it’s almost like being in Amsterdam. I’m really glad to see us taking steps in the right direction, even though it’s going to take several years to get there.
A journey of a safer bike lane begins with a single budget meeting.
Repeat ad nausium.
And I recently had the pleasure of riding in SF. So nice. And so far ahead. Portland is really losing ground.
SE Uplift Board of Directors voted on October 1 to endorse the goals of CCIM and that “PBOT should build as many of the projects as quickly as possible.” There was a significant block of abstentions, but no one against. The biggest concern was not enough dedicated transit facilities.
I’ll be testifying in favor on behalf of our organization and the residents we represent. I wonder if it would be appropriate to be in costume?
Terry Dublinski-Milton
Co-Chair SE Uplift
Instead of a parking protected bike lane, why don’t they just dedicate the right lane for transit only? Seems like the busses are just going to get stuck in traffic with everyone else.
I cannot see any real functional difference between low, medium, and high cost Hawthorne & 6th.
I don’t consider bioswales and moving bus shelters around to be significant.
Let’s go low cost and get more done.
Yes please! Can we use the same basic low-cost, separated design on most of these projects and increase the number of total projects with the extra money?
One issue is that cheap projects are easier to cut later on during the next budget crunch, while the high-end projects tend to be (eventually) implemented even after the cuts. You also need to look at these projects from the point of view of drivers – will they respect the configuration of a low-end project as much as the platinum-level one?
Probably as good a time as any to recall that *all* of these projects represent defensive expenditures, necessitated by the overbearing and ubiquitous auto.
If we banned autos from the central city (some cities are doing this now) we could skip all(?) of these infrastructure upgrades, or?
Good point, and what I am thinking as well. These are expensive projects that try to marginally improve transit, biking and walking while putting as little burden on people driving as possible. We could do so much more with the money if we considered bolder steps, but PBOT certainly is not considering them.
What are the densities of the cities you’re thinking of?
I don’t think those are bioswales in the rendering, but rather planters that hug poured concrete curbs as part of the parking protected bike lanes. In my experience in Vancouver, BC planters like this provide an extra visual to vehicles that there is something (and someones) on the other side of the curb (or painted line), and they make the street and city look a little nicer.
I happen to be on the side of the fence that thinks we should build the deluxe versions of bike lanes to show just how nice they can be, both to attract all ages & abilities riders and for aesthetics (plastic bollards look terrible). In my opinion, which has admittedly been skewed by my time living in BC, this high cost version is only getting close if – and it’s hard to tell from the drawing – the bike lane and sidewalk are on the same level which is raised above the street, and physically separated from cars. I would love to see little trees/benches further separate the bike/ped lanes. And, if all the lanes are separate from each other, they can save all that green plastic for something else. Here’s a just-built example in Vancouver that is a treat to ride: https://vancouver.ca/streets-transportation/quebec-and-1st-ave-street-improvements.aspx
If you look closely, medium and high cost builds have a HAWK light. Low cost doesn’t even have zebra striping. That’s a huge difference on a street that has few natural gaps in traffic (due to right turning vehicles from Grand and the Mult Co parking garage).
You are right. I was focusing on the bike lane part of it.
Agree. Would love a concrete barrier to make a truly protected bike lane like 2nd in Seattle instead of bioswale here and there.
The presentation did not include the $6.6 million federal grant that Portland won in 2013. What happened to these funds?
https://www.portlandoregon.gov/transportation/article/699073
BP piece on $6.6 million grant:
https://bikeportland.org/2013/09/18/city-council-backs-21-million-for-better-walking-and-biking-citing-boost-to-economy-94178
I know you are not going to like this answer, but as I recall when I was sitting on the PBOT Budget Advisory Committee, the $6.6 million Central City Flex Funding was used partly to provide seed money for starting the bike share program downtown and partly to pay for the Williams/Vancouver bike lanes, both of which were controversial projects at the time. That money is now long gone, while East Portland is still waiting for its projects to be completed.
*UPDATE, 5:10 pm: PBOT just announced that the council date has been pushed back to November 14th.
Such a bummer that MLK & Grand were nixed from that portion of the project. A tremendous opportunity to enhance transit service and improve pedestrian access in the area. Here’s hoping it gets revisited in short order.
Hopefully they have enough reflective plastic sticks laying around to deter people from parking in the bike lanes. I ride NE Multnomah a couple times a week and I rarely get to do it without a motor vehicle with its free parking lights flashing being in the way.
Are you freaking kidding me?
So instead of this:
This was supposed to nest under David Hampsten’s comment above.
What we need is an investigative journalist to find out what exactly happened to that $6.6 million. Is it still there? Was it spent? If so, what on?
Now where could we find such a journalist? Hmmm…
According to the article we are commenting on, the project has a $30 million budget, which is quite a bit more than $6.6 million. What’s the problem, exactly?
Did you notice that $33 million wasn’t on the table? Where exactly is the $33 million coming from? How are you going to prevent it from being cut during coming budget shortfalls?
It’s like buying a Surly bike. You know that the bike you want costs $1,200, so your “budget” is for $1,200 plus the Oregon bike tax. But where is that $1,200 coming from? Are you going to forgo rent? Save your money? Spend it on something else?
City Council is happy to adopt a plan that costs $33 million, just as they were to adopt the 2030 bike plan for $600 million. But are they actually committing a penny towards it? Not what I read.
So the problem is that money might get reallocated in the future, not that money has been improperly spent in the past. Thanks for clarifying.
“So the problem is that money might get reallocated in the future, not that money has been improperly spent in the past.”
This part is a strawman.
May 2013
“PBOT has applied for $6 million in regional flexible funding (administered by Metro) in order to improve the transportation network in the downtown core.”
https://bikeportland.org/2013/05/23/citys-6-million-plan-for-downtown-bike-access-taking-shape-87204ke facilities”
This 2013 grant was specifically won to build bike facilities in central Portland. The numerous delays (and firings) related to this project were a topic of discussion on bike portland for years. The fact that this money was re-allocated to other uses in virtual secrecy while bike advocates were wondering WTF was going on is a testament to a fundamental lack of democratic oversight at PBOT.
Moreover, your claim that this project has a budget of $30 million is irrelevant because these funds come from sources that were not available in 2013 (FOS and a different federal grant). I could argue that this project should have had a budget $36.6 million were it not for PBOT’s grant funding shenanigans.
I guess we now know why Rick Browning was fired in 2016:
https://bikeportland.org/2016/02/11/rick-browning-out-as-pbot-bike-project-manager-174701
Soren, I apologize. I thought you were talking about an earlier $6+ million grant.
So this grant was not re-purposed? I still want to know what happened to the funding…
One has to love the vague polling that lets people claim they would be more likely to walk or ride. This isn’t the first such poll in PBoT’s history. Have they ever followed up? A decade of non-growth says these “I’d ride if…” responses are BS. It’s like people who claim they would exercise and watch their food intake if… Years later, they’ve made no changes.
It sure looks like everything has been done to fake support for plans that are at best uninspiring and at worst a way to lock in a car-centered PDX for as long as possible.
Hear, hear.
Lots of crappy tax-payer funded survey questions have been surfacing here lately.
Prediction: ebikes will result in a brief increase of cycling modal share in PDX and elsewhere over the next five years. PDX will probably get to double digits for a year or three. Shortly thereafter, modal share will drop and keep dropping back to 6% or so (maybe less) as the built-in conflicts and car priority of these separated facilities create more problems than people can contend with.
Also, cyclist and pedestrian slaughter will continue unabated. Notice the emphasis on no loss of speed for motorists in PBoT’s analysis.
I ride NE Multnomah every day. Is it just me or so protected bike lanes like depicted above leave cyclists more vulnerable to right hooks due to obstructed visibility from parked cars as well as passenger side door swings?
Nope, not just you. This is the reason I’m fully against “parking protected” bike lanes.
Third.
Since you ride Multnomah every day, and we are talking about polls, I’d like to poll you. Do you stop for people crossing in the mid-block crossings at 6th and 8th? Or am I the only one?
I do!
It is definitely a challenge for parking protected lanes. But I’d argue a bus stop at the corner is probably the best version of such a set-up, since it is clear the vast majority of the time. I don’t have a ton of experience with them, yet, but riding the new parking protected setup on Rosa Parks, with parking setbacks, it seems to work well (i.e., no worse then the typical risk of right hooks as drivers punch it to get slightly ahead of me then turn).
The way Seattle’s left-hand side bike land on 2nd ave works is simple- if the bikes have a green light, left turners have a red light. And vice versa. If we remove the legal ability for cars to careen to the right at will, we remove the risk of a collision at that intersection when everyone follows the signals.
The solve is so simple, and yet we have not implemented it. The closest thing I can think of is the signal on b’way and Williams, but there’s no protection there. At all.
Oh yes, there’s another one at the west end of the b’way bridge, but you end up sitting there for what feels like minutes- the lights in Seattle are timed so I could hit about 5 of them in a row, wait 30 seconds, then hit another 5.
On those Hawthorne designs, if you’re going to turn left (as I often do to get a beer at the Lucky Lab), how are you supposed to get out of the bike lanes? Swerve out at an intersection? And when drivers want to turn into the parking garage, will they see cyclists hidden (but moving quickly) behind a parked car?
Do what I see a lot of people choose to do now, take a right at the light and then U Turn when it’s safe in order to cross Hawthorne with the light. Sucks, and I see it as the only option if this comes to fruition.
Separate and unequal. Would we ask drivers to do this?
Nope. It sucks. Heading left from that right sided bike lane within the span of two blocks is not a pleasant experience for many. What about a brightly colored bridge that arcs over Hawthorne that drops right into the bikelanes heading North? That would be rad.
What does Roger think of all this?
All the incompetence I hear about ODOT, PBOT, this and that, makes me think, really, does anything work in America anymore? For sure, the federal govt. has come apart. But you would think the locals could at least get something right (carbon tax, higher gas taxes, sales tax?). The future looks grim.
My German-made Schwalbe tires seem to work real well. I like the fact that I can now easily buy 45mm wide 700c/29er rims. The 1787 US Constitution seems to be working pretty well on limiting Potus’ power to screw things up, as well as balancing Congress and the courts into stasis. In spite of downtown city government incompetence, both yours and mine, our water still flows, our toilets flush, the phone still works, the power’s on. In spite of global warming, the Walking Dead, the Matrix, and Russian hackers, somehow life continues…
Folks will have a wonderful view of the sacred line of parked cars, while they sit in traffic in a bus during the PM commute right along with all those SOVs trying to go home.
I just don’t get it. Are the of 30-40 parking spots, and varied business interests on this stretch of lower Hawthorne so awesomely powerful as to render us impotent to use that space for something- anything- more constructive? I thought by now the combination of magic fairy dust, unregulated TNCs, thousands of electric scooters, dockless bikeshare, and billions of dollars in transit, would render parking moot at this point in Portland’s history. Otherwise, remind me again why did we did all that?
I know this image of Hawthorne is just one of many under consideration, but it is emblematic of a failure of imagination on a grand scale, one that will prove both costly and cruelty ineffective at solving our problems now and in the future. I am left to question the value of a masters in planning if these are the best solutions they can come up with. God help us.
Indeed. Move that curb over one lane and have a curb-separated bus lane, which also protects and provides a clear visual for the bike lane. Then let the line of cars watch a stream of buses and bikes cruise by. Just a few dozen parking spots.
1. Business interests are incredibly powerful.
2. Active transportation interests are very weak.
Why are business interests anti-active transport?
soren… that depends on who is assessing the power.
from my view, “active transpo interests” are incredibly powerful because they represents the vast majority of Portland (when the issue is framed corrrectly). “Business interests” are weak by comparison because they don’t represent a large number of people and the values they stand up for do not jibe with the values our city has adopted as local law/policy direction.
like i’ve always said… Gov’t gets to decide who has the power. Unfortunately, in our case, PBOT too often gives the power to the wrong group based on their own fear of political consequences rather than what’s needed to change the status quo.
Political consequences is the power.
The other thing I dislike about this design is that there is no good way for cyclists to pass one another. Given the number of riders on this section, wouldn’t it make sense to make the bike lane wider?
Especially as scooter users will be moving in the opposite direction.
Right, it’s as if the folks that designed this have never ridden a bike through here in the afternoon commute.
Changing a few blocks of side streets to one way with angle parking on one side could offset parking loss along the main corridor.
Should there not be some disclosure about what you do?
I might be wrong, but you certainly come across as a PDOT or ODOT employee.
I could appreciate your comments more if you simply stated who you work for?
Or we could respond to the idea presented instead of hinting people have some kind of agenda. Not sure it makes a difference who this commenter works for if you want to engage with the idea and decide whether you agree with it or not. This is a bike advocacy website not congressional testimony
There’s actually a lot of commentators on this blog who currently work for government agencies or have done so in the past (such as myself). I for one appreciate piakiala’s comments, even when we disagree, as the writer often presents well-informed and sometimes inside information to PBOT projects (but not so much for ODOT projects). I think many advocates both inside and outside government use these blogs to test new ideas before they blow up on them or hurt end-users. And most commentators are using pseudonyms to protect themselves for various reasons, whether they work for government or not. I use my real name because I’m proud of what I do, even when I screw up. How about yourself?
Agree, but the plan is surely to move bicycle traffic off of Broadway; onto some two-way contra flow MUP nonsense once they figure out how to fit in some superfluous, signalized road crossings across the Post Office site once it’s redeveloped. /s
//s
Sorry this was a response to user Old Town’s comment.
Old Town October 9, 2018 at 8:18 pm
A north bound lane on Broadway from Burnside to the bridge is long overdue. The parking is dramatically underutilized and there are many vacant buildings on that stretch. Makes no sense not to connect these new routes together at the Broadway Bridge.
Amsterdam: wider paths allow passing for multiusers (mopeds even), but for left turns, it’s at intersections via bike signals and only at key spots. Works great for thousands and thousands.
Why did 7th steeet bikeway proposal shrink by 11 blocks? It used to reach Wiedler in the original map..
I’ll double your sample size and say that I in fact stop there as well. I stop at any crossing when a pedestrian shows intent t cross.
What is the cost difference between medium and high? The addition of plants instead of a solid concrete curb certainly cost too much. The improved bus shelter may or may not be necessary. A medium-high cost option of a standard bus shelter plus plants on the curb seems reasonable. It provides more visual distinction between bike lane and parking lane, and is generally more pleasing aesthetically.
*Certainly can’t cost too much
It’s a bit hard to see, but in the high-cost version they moved the gutters (and presumably the sewers), putting the green bike lane on the sidewalk level rather than the street level. Thus the median planters now have water for the plants, from run-off. As you might recall from the 82nd portion of the Powell-Division BRT project, “moving curbs” triggers a huge increase in costs, basically doubling the project price, since you also have to move the sewers. In addition, a lot of the underground conduit work also has to be moved or shifted.