This week’s Monday Roundup is sponsored by the Community Cycling Center.
Here are the most noteworthy items we came across in the past seven days…
Upsetting norms: US road champion Justin Williams is in “rebel mode” as he forces the cycling scene to embrace young people of color into a sport that is primarily white.
Cycle of dependency: The venerable Todd Litman of Victoria Transport Policy Institute reminds us about the vicious cycle of automobile dependency — and how to break it.
Brooklyn bike history: Learn about the Brooklyn Red Caps, a group of cycling lovers known for their speed, longevity, and pioneering history as one of the first black bike clubs in New York.
Monkey see, monkey do: ODOT isn’t the only agency using the fallacious argument that wider highways are better for the environment: Thankfully, activists in Baltimore are calling their DOT’s bluff.
Cycling for everyone: Great words of wisdom about breaking down barriers to riding from the perspective of someone who cycles with a disability.
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Density = safety?: A Pennsylvania study found that streets in more dense areas closer-in to the city had lower crash rates than suburban areas.
Facebook bike share workers: The social media giant has a fleet of 1,000 bike share bikes at their Menlo Park campus and the people who keep it running want to unionize to get better treatment.
Carmaker testing helmet impacts: Volvo is (surprisingly) the first company to specifically test how its cars impact bicycle helmets.
More good PR for e-bikes: I continue to be fascinated with how e-bikes will transform what we think about bicycling and the potential they have for urban mobility.
‘Quick build’ is music to my ears: The City of San Francisco isn’t satisfied with business as usual when it comes to building bicycle facilities so they’ve streamlined the political process in order to build them faster.
Tweet of the Week: We can only hope that Portland sees more bus and bike lanes like this in the future…
https://twitter.com/InvestinPlace/status/1135765288287260674
— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org
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The “bus only” lane in LA looks really good. Could it ever work in PDX? We can’t seem to keep cars (usually with WA plates) from driving on the bus mall. Has anyone ever heard of a car- or truck-operator in PDX who got a ticket for driving on the bus mall?
Related topic: Is it time to do a story on Uber and Lyft drivers speeding thru your neighborhood? When I see cars speeding on my neighborhood streets, they often have the Uber sticker or the Lyft light on the windshield. Do these companies countenance law-breaking so their non-professional drivers can earn more $$?
You’re allowed to drive on the bus mall (5th and 6th streets.) If you mean that drivers operate in the bus/max lanes in the transit mall, I think it’s because the layout is really confusing for SOV drivers (Transit operators are really good about knowing how to flow through the bus mall.) The answer for me would be to simply bar SOV vehicles from the bus mall and use that space for PBLs, but I know that was a huge fight a decade ago when the Green Line started operating so I don’t see it happening anytime soon.
Also, IMO, it seems even less frequent that drivers travel on the MAX tracks downtown. Even minimal separation on the East/West routes (with those raised pavement markers) seem to mostly do the trick. As such, I definitely think we can have bus only lanes in the central city; we just need to build in separation to force compliance rates.
The bus mall was closed to autos for years. I’ll bet someone here knows why it was reopened.
The wiki explains it a bit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland_Transit_Mall
Personally, I do not find it confusing at all. The lanes are clearly marked and there is a solid line between the two areas. I would argue, instead, that our expectations of drivers is too low.
Maybe I should join the Brooklyn Red Caps to break through blackness, and then I could be celebrated like a rebel like Mr. Williams.
That is some racist, “all lives matter” nonsense. Can you truly not see that people of color are largely sidelined in cycling at every level? Do you truly object to any space within cycling in which white people are not centered?
This kind of comment makes me very sad for and frustrated at the cycling community.
I’m a little bit confused here. Where exactly was the racism in BikeRound’s comment?
Thanks for your patience, I’m just a stupid white guy after all.
That was a pretty good profile of Williams, that manages not to stray into… whatever the headline “breaking through whiteness” is. I suppose I would say it’s lacking finesse at best and clickbait at worst, and would tend to attract inflammatory comments. Speaking of inflammatory comments, if there’s any merit at all in your parent comment, it’s its satire of that wording by Jonathan. (But it’s also pretty careless/reckless and takes no particular pains to differentiate itself from racism.)
Quite apart from that, I do have to come to the defense of “all lives matter”… because it happens to be the foundation of the whole Civil Rights movement. It’s what has been taught ever since then, ever since everybody first got to see that picture of Earth from the Moon (“Wow, we’re really all in this together!”). Yes it’s in bad taste to bring it up when someone’s talking about black lives mattering, and especially dubious when used as some kind of retort, but it does happen to be true. All lives do matter – therefore raise up the lives that need lifting, and make them matter. Some people you’re automatically calling racists for saying it, might actually mean this other thing. Slow down and ask more questions, get into a dialog instead of a shouting match. In general mind you. I’m not defending the parent comment.
“Do you truly object to any space within cycling in which white people are not centered?”
Should white people be OK with being excluded because of their race?
Inequity in the name of Justice.
“‘Do you truly object to any space within cycling in which white people are not centered?’
Should white people be OK with being excluded because of their race?”
Well, on one hand, other groups have had that happen for a long time, but on the other, “not centered” doesn’t sound anything like “excluded”. I think “not centered” is an excellent way of characterizing what I think a lot of the sloganized thoughts circulating during the current wave of increased awareness really mean. White folks, stick around, just don’t assume you have to be the cause and reason for absolutely everything.
“Not centered” does NOT equal “excluded.”
Imagine thinking this is somehow a clever to say. What is going on (or not going on) in such a mind?
I ask myself the same question when I hear some of the comments from the posters here.
Maybe you should go try. If they would even have you on their ride, bet they’d drop you pretty quick. They sound like a pretty fast group that does some serious milage on their rides.
But seriously is one minority cycling team and a social group of cyclists of color that threatening that you need to snark about the need to break their mission to make cycling more diverse? FFS, you may or may not be personally racist, I don’t know you and won’t make that judgement, but you certainly sound like you get your hackles raised by any progress in making cycling less of a white, well-off, suburban activity, and that smacks of the INSTITUTIONAL racism that rots within our cycling culture. I personally hope it’s not too long before cycling cuts out this tumor and becomes diverse and equitable enough that CNCPT feels it’s mission has been achieved and can hire a non-minority cyclist, or that group rides everywhere look like a true cross-section of our society and not like the exclusive and oft quoted “cycling is the new golf” meme that is all too true in it’s white + money sameness.
Pat Spearman, a state Senator from Nevada (and also a PoC) said it very well. She was speaking about women’s rights, and getting the ERA ratified in Nevada to be the 37th and final state needed to pass the constitutional amendment ratification threshold of 2/3rds of states, but it speaks directly to anyone in the privileged majority debating, questioning or joking about those not privileged and who are trying to level the playing field.
(thanks to Last Week Tonight for the inspiration)
I don’t see the remark as a disparagement of the group, but rather of the somewhat condescending idea of celebrating people because of their race instead of their accomplishments. I suspect BikeRound hadn’t read the article, however, because that’s not what it’s about.
Amazing. I am curious though, do racist straw men arguments take some careful crafting or are you so blind to your bias that statements showing such a lack of critical thinking come naturally to you?
Do you believe you are not acting with a bias?
You don’t think that a white person suggesting that they “break through” into a group for black cyclists in order to win “easy” adulation for their bravery and perseverance – analogizing their conceit to the life and accomplishments of a black athlete who has worked hard to be accepted by a blindingly white sport – is disparaging, eh? Well, then I really don’t know what to tell you.
I read the original post as a sarcastic comment on a sometimes overly fawning press, and was not at all a comment on any aspect the Red Caps or its members. But then, as BradWagon suggests, I am not so good with critical thinking.
Ah, so you did intentionally craft such a statement.
I addressed what I believe to be a misinterpretation of the original comment in this thread. “Different interpretation” is not what straw man refers to. You might also want to refer to this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loaded_question
Just above you clearly say you interpreted it as “a disparagement… of the condescending idea of celebrating people because of their race instead of their accomplishments.” This is a straw man as nowhere in this topic are black people being celebrated just for their race. You are inserting this idea and thus attempting to invalidate their athletic accomplishments. This statement attempts to discredit the article as only having been written because of their race.
Secondly, this idea in general is racist as you are downplaying the fact that their race in this context is absolutely a reason they should be a celebrated. Even if they were not “successful” in racing their efforts should be celebrated if only because cycling in ANY form as a POC requires more courage than someone sitting on a keyboard making demeaning comments about “fawning press” or minorities being “celebrated because of race” could grasp.
I agree it is nowhere in the topic or the article, but, as I noted, I didn’t think BikeRound had read the article (which didn’t even have a link at the time they posted their comment), and had guessed wrong about what it was about. That was my interpretation, and upon re-examination, I still think that’s the most valid reading. I see nothing in the comment that could reasonably be interpreted as disparagement of the bike club, which is how others interpreted it.
So that leaves your criticism of my comment that articles fawning over how great it is that POCs can actually ride bikes* are condescending, well, I think they are**. Of course they can ride bikes, and do it well. Why wouldn’t they?
Seeing an issue that involves race a different way than you do does not make someone a racist.
* I know this is NOT what the article is about.
** We can disagree on this point without alleging racism.
If it’s not what the article is about then why did you bring it up? Nobody suggested this demeaning interpretation until you brought it up. And again, it is not condescending to write about someone’s success, especially when that success is exceptionally unique given other barrier like black cyclists face. What is demeaning is your comment of “Of course they can ride bikes well. Why wouldn’t they?” Why wouldn’t they?? Because of literally everything in that article detailing how for POC being a successful cyclist is waaay beyond just being fast on the bike. It’s demeaning to suggest Justin’s success is something to be expected and that we should just brush aside the work he has put in both off the bike AND on it. You are so unaware. Done speaking on this now.
8 likes for this?? There are that many aggrieved white people that post here?
I was also very disappointed in this. That’s the type of comment I’d expect Mr. Maus to remove, honestly.
I found ironic that in a blog posting that had the phrase “Breaking through whiteness” in its title, there was a link to a black biking club.
But let’s examine the biking community’s outreach efforts more closely. In biking related news outlets, online forums, blogs and similar places on the internet, there is frequent talk of reaching out to marginalized communities, centering non-white groups, and amplifying female, minority, LGBTQ, or whatever other voices happen to be the fad of the month. And who is universally excluded from this list, which groups are not even worthy of a mention? The one-half of Americans who are more rural, conservative, Christian, and more likely to be white. No doubt, most regular readers of BikePortland are convinced that the residents of rural western Oregon are less moral, still stuck in their backwards views, and are desperately in need of some comprehensive reeducation, but the reality is that those people and those voters are not going anywhere. And unless we can build a coalition for biking advocacy that encompasses more than just the left-of-center of the American political landscape, our progress will be slow and our success not what it should be.
Biking should be something that everybody should be able to get behind as a healthy, frugal, fun and convenient way of getting around town. There are so many ways that bridges could be built to tie in the conservative half of our country. For example, the Bible says to respect and take of your body; biking is a great way to maintain a healthy physique, and the marketing slogan almost writes itself. An advocacy group cannot become truly successful in one-half of the country is not on board.
We need to think about what impression phrases like “breaking through whiteness” create in small-town western Oregon. Today in America, both sides act as if they just ignore the opposing side eventually some kind of miraculous victory will be theirs. I am here to tell you that this isn’t going to happen. And while younger people and immigrants are more likely to be liberal than the country as a whole, giving the left a boost, fertility rates among conservatives are much higher than among liberals, which over the long term will more than balance out any short term advantage the liberals may have. Look at the fertility rate differences between red states and blue states, and between rural counties and urban areas, and ponder the consequences over the long run. We need to reach out to conservatives, Republicans, and Christians because otherwise we cannot be successful. If only one half of the country, the half with much fewer children than the other half, is going to interested in riding a bike, bike riding will not be the obvious transportation solution that it should be for a large portion of our shorter trips. We cannot afford to alienate white people, an overwhelming majority of the electorate, with condescending remarks.
That should be “eastern Oregon” obviously. Sorry.
Wow, that is a lot of straw men in one post!!
I guess I did not know there was a “no conservative christian” movement in the cycling world.
I need to get out more…
If I am following you—and I think I am—then you are collapsing two distinct challenges.
– racism, and the ways in which it keeps groups out, and
– cultural divides in our country: urban/rural, blue/red, etc.
Reaching out to conservative Christians is sooooooo different than acknowledging how racism works.
17 likes.
The commenters here—or at least the upvoters—sometimes surprise, and not in a good way.
Huh. I think there is a misunderstanding of phraseology like “breaking through ‘whiteness'” among a lot of white people. It is similar to how a number of men have trouble with “#meToo”. Disclaimer: as white dude, I don’t fully “get it”, but to the best of my understanding—for my fellow Americans of European descent who feel insulted or “aggrieved” by some of the diversity language we hear these days—phrases like “breaking through whiteness” do not mean that being white is “wrong”. To say that we would like to INclude more non-white people in X, Y, or Z doesn’t mean we want to EXclude white people (usually). To highlight the achievements of any minority person or group does not mean that the accomplishments of white folks are less valuable (although their value may have been inflated by bias…). When we say “breaking through whiteness”, it really means “breaking through the assumption of white exclusivity”. We need to be able to tamp down the automatic emotional response and hear what is actually being said.
I don’t feel like I’m being very clear in what I mean, but I will admit that hearing things like “breaking through whiteness” used to trip an emotional trigger in me as well. What we have to keep in mind is that for so many centuries, white folks—and especially white men—have always been assumed to be able to do pretty much whatever they wanted, while, in general, women and minorities have been excluded from many of those same things, e.g., political participation/voting, career and educational opportunities, certain neighborhoods, etc. Under those circumstances, minority groups may have formed their own “exclusive” groups, clubs, what-have-you—exclusive only in that white folks had no interest in joining them. “Society” has continued to ignore and discount many of these minority groups; if not actively, then by implicit assumption that “white is better”—even if we would never say it out loud. We may not feel like we “have anything against” minorities, but if “diversity language” makes us uncomfortable, it should cause us to think more deeply about biases we might not be aware we have. We have to be able to imagine not that we’re letting women or non-white folks into the white men’s club, but that it needs to be everyone’s “club”, with no gatekeeper.
For those who “get it” way more extensively than I do, just be aware of how things might sound to those of us who might be less “woke”. I know that disrupting the status quo requires a certain amount of agitation, but it’s a thin line between thought-provoking and just provoking, regardless of intent.
Way to double down on the incoherent anti-white racism blabber.
Litman’s piece is great, but this quote got me thinking: “If we plan for growing automobile traffic by expanding roads and parking supply, the expected growth will occur…”
Isn’t the same largely true for population growth too? These days everyone is determined to accommodate millions of additional Oregonians, plan for them, build for them, convince everyone that their arrival is assured and that all we are left with is to facilitate it.
Yeah, sure. But the alternative to not planning for more automobiles is just a teeny bit different than the alternative to not planning for more people. Under the existing market system anyway (we can obviously speculate about how things could be different under a radical remake).
For Litman’s Per Capita GDP and VMT for U.S. States diagram, when you have the same variable in both the x and y axis, you will always get a very high correlation or R-value. It’s know in stats as a hyperbola or hyperbull. Obviously this article was not peer-reviewed or it would never had been published.
Back when I was in grad school a long time ago, I noticed that most transportation planning was done around where people settled. I thought it would have been an interesting simulation to see where people would settle if the transportation system had been planned first – within a given land area. Like where would people and businesses locate given their transportation options.
Along those lines, since there would essentially be limits on available acreage for development, there would be some soft limits built into the population limits. Unless this went denser and vertical. Cities could say “sorry, we’re full. Try the next town.”
This was the idea behind the Blue Line: instead of serving existing residential areas, it was built where there was no housing, so that transit-oriented housing could be built around light rail.
I’ve never seen any follow-up studies that show how well the strategy worked, but I’m sure someone has done one.
Just anecdotally, there is new(er) high density development at The Round in Beaverton and surrounding the Elmonica, Quatama and Orenco stations as well as downtown Hillsboro along Washington St. It would be curious if transit use matches up with expectations but on the westside thousands of new residents have at least moved where it is an option.
I’d also be curious to know if levels of car ownership are impacted by living in one of these developments.
Why didn’t you move there?
yeah, but I was thinking about a whole metropolitan area planned around a transportation network. Would have been an interesting modeling exercise. Might have also ended up looking like Houston.
This is a reason I’m not a huge fan of the SW Corridor just paralleling Barber/I5. Not a lot of opportunity to improve density along there or serve existing residential areas along that way. It’s essentially just going to be a commuter rail that won’t have high enough ridership and will be used against additional transit in the future.
streetcar suburbs, anyone? Several of what are now inner SE Neighborhoods were planned as such a hundred plus years ago.
Any city in the US (or Canada) that was of any decent size in 1910 (or had pretensions for such) had streetcars. Freewheeling commercial sprawl. Now those same neighborhoods are the biggest NIMBY barrier to urban density in most of our cities, fighting every high-rise corner by corner. Sigh.
Go to Victoria and you’ll find your question answered in the affirmative. As lovely as the city is the overwhelming amount of vehicles and newcomers is quickly bringing traffic to a crawl and standing-still. Canada does a fine job of putting more people in cars and trying to cram even more people into “condensed” spaces too.
Yeah, so what happens 30 years from now when that growth starts to decline? Nobody seems to be thinking about that. How has Detroit fared as it has shrunk?
https://www.wired.com/story/the-world-might-actually-run-out-of-people/
I don’t think the mechanism is the same, 9w. If we decide not to expand roads, demand for driving drops because there is the immediate disincentive of traffic congestion.
If we decide not to accommodate population growth (by limiting housing, for example), I don’t think it reduces demand for living in a place in the same way. The only way that can possibly work is for housing costs to go up until the point that demand is tempered. There are some problems with this argument, starting with two major reasons why it simply doesn’t work.
First, there is a housing shortage in cities across the country, as every city has practiced restrictive zoning that limited supply, failing to anticipate the demographic-driven demand for rental housing in particular. Allowing housing prices to skyrocket in Portland will not effectively deter people from moving to Portland and instead encourage them to move to Denver or Minneapolis. Those places are facing housing crises too, and also now have very expensive rents. And for people determined to move to the west coast, Seattle and all major California cities are far more expensive than Portland.
Second, rents have to get awfully high – really, San Francisco or New York levels – before they will seriously deter people from wanting to move to a city. In Minneapolis I *frequently* talk to people who are thinking of moving to places like Seattle or Portland. In several instances these people were very determined about this and were close to pulling the trigger. In absolutely ZERO instances has the prospective emigrant seriously looked at housing costs. None. Ever. When a Trader Joe’s employee decides they are going to move to the west coast, they are going to move to the west coast and figure out housing when they get there. Only when housing costs are extreme – again, with places like NY and SF – do people seriously look at them before moving.
And because the head-in-the-sand approach doesn’t work, it carries serious repercussions. The inflated housing prices that are supposed (and mostly fail) to deter in-migration carry tremendous social costs for everyone, not just the new folks. I won’t go into those in detail because most Portlanders are already agonizingly familiar with them.
Is there really a nationwide housing shortage? There may be a shortage in trendy cities, primarily on the coasts, but there are plenty of places where housing affordability and availability is high, just as it was in run-down Portland a few decades ago. These things tend to be cyclical, and as with many things, it is sometimes good to do something other than what everyone else is doing.
https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/07/vacancy-americas-other-housing-crisis/565901/
Well, of course there is a housing surplus in cities that people don’t want to move to. Detroit alone has enough capacity to absorb numerous cities’ housing shortages. But to my point above, that’s not how it works. In cities where more people do want to live – either for lifestyle reasons, or simply because there are lots of jobs – there are serious shortages. That includes Portland, and also the (your bias is showing) coasts, but lots of other cities in between.
Every list of tight property markets I’ve seen is disproportionately populated by the coasts. Does referencing that make me “biased”?
Regardless, “Hot City Gets Expensive” is headline that predates zoning.
You’re right that “Hot city gets expensive” isn’t new, but there are huge variations within the umbrella of “expensive”. Portland is NOT a huge city, and shouldn’t have to be ridiculously expensive. The reason it’s expensive is a housing shortage caused by the economic distortions of past zoning policies.
Anyway, my point still stands that deliberately limiting the quantity of housing will not stop anyone from moving to Portland. It just creates misery for those living in Portland.
There’s no link for the Brooklyn Red Caps story.
Assuming it’s this article, behind a NYT semi-paywall (you get a couple free articles to read) https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/07/nyregion/black-cyclists-red-caps-brooklyn.html
The push towards multi-modal transportation is becoming especially critical because in addition to climate, congestion and energy depletion issues the private automobile is becoming increasingly unaffordable to the average person. The average new vehicle transaction price has risen to $37,185 in may of 2019 while the average used vehicle transaction price is north of $18,000. This on top of increasing fuel, insurance, repair and parking costs is adding up to more than many people can afford. There a few cheap reliable old cars left that are keeping some people on the road, but as they hit the junkyard many people will find themselves needing to get around other ways, even if they still love the lure of happy motoring.
Good point about the cost of automotive dependence. Not only is society paying through the nose as a whole, both financially and otherwise – pollution, congestion, energy wars, staggeringly expensive road construction – but individuals are paying crazy amounts from their pocketbooks just to own and operate their vehicles.
And to your point about cars aging out of service, a couple years ago the average age of a car in the US reached a new record of 11.6 years old. This is mostly a good thing, and spun as an indicator of how much more reliable cars have become. This may be true, but unless the economy collapses again I fear there is a lot of pent-up demand for newer cars that will keep new-car sales strong for a long time to come.
Like it or not, automakers keep “improving” their products with better performance, new styling, gadgetry and safety features. I know a number of people who’ve recently bought new cars specifically to get the new active-safety features like automatic emergency braking, lane departure warning and all the rest. Consumer Reports is flat-out recommending that no one buy a new car without these features. Which might seem okay since they’re available on most cars now, but on less expensive vehicles you usually have to upgrade to one of the top trim levels to get them. Even on an economy car, it’s hard to get these features without spending $25-30k. And I’m constantly amazed at how many people are willing to do that. Then again, living in a city where people have a lot more money on average than Portlanders, I’m constantly stunned at how many of my neighbors are driving luxury-make cars that cost between 40k and 60k.
It’s easy to point out that people spending that much on their vehicles are voluntarily throwing their money away, and that’s true (even though many of those folks still complain about how hard it is to make ends meet), but it just goes to show how much the auto industry and society in general have convinced most of us that we need to not only have a car, but a nice one.
Resilient Justin Williams: You are a role model. Keep up the great work!
“This feeling of wanting disruption in a sport that doesn’t often welcome change is not a sentiment just felt by Williams, he says, and that they’re not going to wait around for someone to tell them they can change things. “Everyone in this sport is longing for change. If we can be heroes in America, we can influence the next generation of kids that ride bikes.
“We’re going to wear Jordans. We listen to rap. We’re really loud at races. And we’re also going to be a part of the conversation. I’m full on rebel mode right now.”
Read more at https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/latest-news/us-road-champion-justin-williams-sport-primarily-white-hard-not-feel-alone-broke-425990#FY1DqoHLyhIE0LRq.99“
FYI, your ignorance and lack of interest in correcting it is showing. If, as a white dude, you want to break some ethnic barriers, why don’t you go to Japan and try to make it as a sumo wrestler? That might actually give you some appreciation of what Justin Williams has faced.
This is the first comment I’ve seen stating that BikeRound is a white male. I did not make that assumption.
Are we seriously defending racist language?
I don’t know about you, but I’m not, seriously or otherwise. I explained my interpretation above.
I recall reading that the Orenco MAX station is the busiest on the westside. Tons of new multi-family housing there.
Rats. I saw “car company testing helmet impacts” and thought someone was finally taking driving helmets seriously and testing the impact of helmets on driver safety. I guess they were testing impact ON helmets. Assumption of “impact” is still a little disturbing, but at least somebody is paying some attention.