Bridge Pedal lures riders of all types to carfree highways

Bridge Pedal first-timers Lee and Chris brought visitors from Africa, Toumany and Ansou, along for the ride.
(Photos: Eric Thornburg)

Thousands of people took part in the 24th annual Bridge Pedal on Sunday.

We sent photographer Eric Thornburg out to catch some of the action. He captured a lot of smiles and his images showed the wide variety of people who take part in this cherished Portland tradition.

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Did you ride Bridge Pedal? How was it this year?

— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org

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Jonathan Maus (Publisher/Editor)

Jonathan Maus (Publisher/Editor)

Founder of BikePortland (in 2005). Father of three. North Portlander. Basketball lover. Car driver. If you have questions or feedback about this site or my work, contact me via email at maus.jonathan@gmail.com, or phone/text at 503-706-8804. Also, if you read and appreciate this site, please become a paying subscriber.

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Mitchell Laurren-Ring
Mitchell Laurren-Ring
5 years ago

I was pretty upset after waiting at least a half hour to get on the Hawthorne Bridge only to find that they had a traffic lane blocked off but were not allowing bikes on it.

Chris I
Chris I
5 years ago

That was so bizarre. We were in the 3rd wave, so we hit the Hawthorne pretty early. The first time through, people were riding in the right lane without issue. After we came back over the Ross Island, they had blocked off the right lane to cyclists for some reason. My only guess is that they wanted the right lane blocked to prevent vehicles from driving next to the sidewalks, but didn’t want cyclists on the deck. This is insane, considering they were routing both rides over the same bridge TWICE. You don’t have to be a traffic engineer to know that the Hawthorne was already going to be a bottleneck. They just need to lay down some carpet or plywood.

Middle of the Road Guy
Middle of the Road Guy
5 years ago
Reply to  Chris I

Were you wearing your cargo shorts when you barrelled through there?

Austin
Austin
5 years ago

They used to put plywood down there, so if the plywood wasn’t there AND they weren’t allowing cyclists in the car lane, it was probably some legal/insurance situation. I guarantee the organizers want to reduce jams anywhere possible, so not really something to be pretty upset about.

Luckily we got through there easily both times – and man, what a fantastic ride even with some jam-up time – It had been a few years since I’ve ridden it, and it was great!

Riding the Marquam and Fremont is a really unique experience (even if hauling a couple of kids via tandem/trailer up to the top of both just about destroyed me, haha), I’m glad we’re given this opportunity.

mh
mh
5 years ago

Gotta love seeing that kind of traffic – and only that kind – on the freeway.

Steve Hash
Steve Hash
5 years ago

Man, my Strava time sure took a beating this year…JK 🙂

Todd Boulanger
Todd Boulanger
5 years ago

Putting the idea out there again: Did anyone collect air quality data along these corridors as a proxy baseline of a city core “car lite” future?

Mark smith
Mark smith
5 years ago

Just remember a lot of car center folks are involved with bridge pedal. so they will do dumb things that car center people do