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6/20: Hello readers and friends. I am having my second (of two) total knee replacement surgeries today so I'll be out of commission for a bit while I recover. Please be patient while I get back to full health. I hope to be back to posting as soon as I can. I look forward to getting back out there. 🙏. - Jonathan Maus, BikePortland Publisher and Editor
Whenever a carfree bridge over the Willamette River is being built in our region, it’s worth knowing about — especially when that bridge is the lynchpin that will someday connect 1,000 miles of paths and trails in the Portland region with the 134-mile Willamette Valley Scenic Bikeway.
I’m talking about the French Prairie Bridge project. And it’s time to do some bridge shopping.
Welcome to the weekend!
While our stellar weather seems to have passed, we embrace yet another change in the season. And if you’re a cyclocross fan, this rain is what you’ve been waiting for.
Note: Some events cancel in the event of rain (always double-check event website before heading out), and this week we’ve shared two events happening Monday (10/29) just as a bonus because we like you so much.
Have fun!
In a partnership with the City of Seattle and University of Washington, delivery giant UPS announced today they will use pedal-assist, electric cargo bikes to make deliveries around Pike Place Market and other parts of downtown.
The best part about this news? The bikes being used in this pilot program come from Portland-based company Truck Trike.
Here’s more about the delivery program from a UPS press release:
In an effort to address growing traffic congestion and air quality concerns, UPS and Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan today announced the deployment of an innovative downtown delivery pilot project using pedal-assist cargo eBikes and customized, modular trailers. The cargo eBikes will operate in the historic Pike Place Market and downtown Seattle area on sidewalks and in designated bike lanes.
Alameda resident Mark Holzmann says he was the victim of harassment, vandalism and an expletive-laced tirade following a traffic incident on Tuesday night.
Holzmann emailed me yesterday to share his version of events. Today I noticed Holzmann’s story was published as an opinion piece in The Oregonian and the subject of a local TV news story last night. We’ve also heard he’s posted the story on Nextdoor.
Here’s what Holzmann emailed to me yesterday:
A few nights back, Oct 22, I was on my way to a Blazer game at the Moda Center. My tickets included parking in Moda Center garage, Bonus!!
It’s about 6:00 pm with light traffic. I took the route where I picked up N. Vancouver Ave at N Russell Street and headed South to the front entrance of the parking garage. The approach to the front of the Parking Garage is very confusing with many intersections, Bus only lanes, Bicycle lanes and all sorts of merging lanes. While merging and turning to my right I did not see a Bicyclist, and from what I can tell I turned in front of him and he didn’t like that, I may have cut him off.
I wouldn’t have liked it either, my fault. I’ll own it!! Mind you we did not touch no one was hurt, but someone had to stop short, at low speed. However, what took place after this was disturbing. The bicycle rider was angry and went ballistic. Yelling, screaming, swearing, pounding on my car, I mean screeching at the top of his lungs. Normally I would have rolled down the window apologized, I find it goes a long way. We are all human. This time would have been a bad idea this guy was unhinged. I didn’t react or give eye contact,
I proceeded slowly to the front of the Parking garage. The Bicyclist follows me in to the entrance of the Moda Center still in a tirade, the parking attendants are looking at him and can’t believe it. This man is still acting like he may explode, the expletives still spewing forward, screaming “didn’t you see me at the top of his lungs.” Still laced with expletives! I give my ticket get a receipt and pull into the garage. The bicyclist rides off screaming, I find a place to park, go to watch the game. I tell my story to my friends I am meeting about the crazy bicycle guy, watch the game, (we lost in overtime) and then go home.
End of story?…NOPE!
In the past two days dozens of people have wiped out while bicycling on Williams due to slippery new lane striping that was recently installed after a repaving project.
We started getting reports via email and on social media on Tuesday. The more we asked for your feedback about the problem, the more crashes we heard about.
Here’s just a sampling:
Courtney: Yep! My back wheel slipped yesterday during evening commute. I barely stayed upright and a rider a couple bikes ahead of me slid out. I didn’t see anything else in the road that could’ve caused a skid besides the paint.
Billy: Yep. Last night. Bad crash… I’ve been a bike commuter for 15 years and last night’s incident was the strangest thing. It was like my front wheel was suddenly on ice. I walked the rest of the way home and told my fiancé that it was like I had forgotten how to ride a bike.
Christopher: I saw a cyclist wipe out right there last night during rush hour. Another took a skid trying to dodge the downed cyclist.
“Everyone’s afraid their kid is going to get hit.”
— Jillian Wieseneck
No one was surprised when a sixth-grade student was hit by a car driver while crossing North Flint at Russell near Harriet Tubman Middle School last week.
Both times in the past three years that this school has re-opened to students, attempts have been made to educate the public about the traffic chaos that takes place in front of the school each day during drop-off and pick-up. This year the site houses a middle school and observers say conditions are worse than ever before. And as reported in more detail by The Oregonian this week, parents had flagged dangerous conditions on Flint for months prior to the opening of school.
In a four-page letter (PDF) sent to Transportation Commmissioner Chloe Eudaly yesterday, Portland Business Alliance President and CEO Andrew Hoan offered carefully mixed doses of support and opposition to projects included in the City of Portland’s Central City in Motion (CCIM) plan.
And in a surprising show of dealmaking, Hoan offered up enthusiastic support for a carfree transit mall in exchange for the City’s proposal to add protected bike lanes to SW Broadway and 4th. And instead of using one lane of Naito Parkway for a protected bike lane, the PBA says they’ll support a new bike path that would bisect the iconic Waterfront Park. Neither of those ideas has been seriously considered in the past two years of discussions about this plan.
With less than a month before the groundbreaking investment in central city streets is scheduled for its first hearing at City Council, many project-watchers have been waiting to see where the PBA stands on the proposals. The organization represents 1,900 businesses and has a history of outsized influence at PBOT and City Hall.
Several readers have contacted us in the past few days to share alarming comments made by Portland business owners.
The comments make light of using cars to hurt and/or kill other people.
Tod Foulk has been the producer and owner of Portland Fashion Week since 2005. On October 18th he left a comment under a Facebook post by the Portland Police Association, the nonprofit union that represents Portland Police Bureau officers. The post was about Mayor Ted Wheeler’s attempts to get a handle on recent fights and protests that have led to violence in Portland streets.
Here’s what Foulk wrote:
#TEDWHEELER and his tiny hands cant seem to grasp this situation and nothing will come of it until an irate or hurt citizen fights back. #REGINALDDENNY showed me how to deal with a violent protest and that is to drive right thru killing as many as who will stand in my way
Reginald Denny is a reference to the incident where Denny, a truck driver, was removed from his vehicle and nearly beaten to death in the 1992 L.A. riots.
I contacted Foulk via Facebook and gave him a chance to clarify his comment. Here’s what I asked:
Hi Tod, I’m the publisher of a local transportation news blog. Several people have forwarded me the link to a Facebook comment where you espouse that the way to deal with protestors is to “drive right through killing…” them. Before I share this with the community, would you like to explain why you would say something like this? Thanks.
Here’s his response:
This week’s post isn’t about family biking per se, but kids often come with lots of stuff to haul around. And since parenting helps unlock one’s ingenuity — family biking goes hand-in-hand with strapping loads of crap to our bikes.
This also isn’t a plug to get a cargo bike so you can carry big things — although cargo bikes certainly make carrying big things easy — all bikes are great at carrying more than just their riders…or instead of their riders: one of the best things about any bike is its ability to transform into a dolly/hand truck. It’s fairly easy to pile heavy and/or bulky things on your bike and walk alongside, pushing. The day we moved to Portland (most of our stuff came in a 16-foot PODS moving container) I still had a lot of stuff to bring with us via bus-train-light rail-bus so I used my folding bike as a luggage cart.
Portland Parks and Recreation Commissioner Nick Fish announced at a press conference this morning that the four-month closure of the Springwater Corridor path will last for just 10 more days. The path — a vital connection for thousands of people who walk and roll between Sellwood and downtown Portland — has been closed since July 9th and is now set to open on-time on November 1st.
Here are the most noteworthy stories we came across in the past seven days…
Transgender champion: Rachel McKinnon won a national championship on the track. Some say it’s unfair because she’s transgender. Learn more about her in this Q & A posted by VeloNews.
E-cargo bikes are the future: New Forbes contributor (and veteran bike industry writer and author) Carlton Reid has an excellent update on how electric cargo bikes hold vast promise as urban, last-mile delivery vehicles.
Cars as a safe space: A recent survey from furniture giant IKEA found that almost half (45%) of Americans go outside and sit in their car “to have a private moment to themselves”.
Paris leads on carfree cities: A massive effort to get unnecessary cars and trucks out of the city is being taken on by Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo. Here’s more on the potential of that vision and why the politics are so hard.
Ride-hailing = congestion: A study by the San Francisco County Transportation Authority found that Transportation Network Companies (TNCs) like Uber and Lyft accounted for a whopping 50% of congestion in San Francisco between 2010 and 2016.
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Inspiration from Calgary: Portland could learn a lot from Calgary where a carfree bridge laid the foundation for a successful, quick, and relatively cheap network of protected bike lanes.
Portland is a “smart city”: Bloomberg Philanthropies has awarded the City of Portland $2.5 million to fund “smart city” projects that fight congestion and climate change.
Vehicular terrorism: Citylab delves into the disturbing trend of using automobiles as weapons of mass destruction and offers examples of how to prevent the attacks without making walking and biking worse.
Teach the reach: The UK Highway Code plans to add more instruction to improve the safety of bicycle users — including the use of the “Dutch Reach” which requires using your far hand to open your car door to prevent “dooring.”
Scooter lawsuit: Three plaintiffs who claim to have been hit by scooter users while walking have filed a class-action lawsuit in Los Angeles against Lime, Bird, and other scooter companies for what they call “gross negligence”.
No lane is safe: The fact that someone sandwiched their sedan in a green-colored, physically protected bike lane is a great example of why we need more carfree spaces in cities.
— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org
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“The results suggest scooters are a popular new transit option for Portlanders and visitors alike,” reads a statement released today by the Portland Bureau of Transportation based on a survey of scooter users. 4,500 people responded to the questionnaire which asked 75,000 people about riding habits, safety behaviors, knowledge of riding laws, and more.
Here are the key findings as shared by PBOT:
