Southwest school principal: Fewer driving lanes is ‘best ever for safety’

More space for biking, less space for driving outside Markham School in southwest Portland. (Photos: City of Portland)

We get the feeling around here that public opinion around street design is shifting in Portland. A statement from a local school principal released by the City of Portland this week validates that feeling.

The rate at which the City of Portland is redistributing street space throughout the city (and the confidence they’re doing it with) seems to have normalized what used to be a controversial thing. From the bus lane on SW Madison to the changes in Gateway and East Glisan, our transportation bureau is slowly but surely reducing driving space in order to make streets work better for everyone.

The latest location of major road striping changes is in the West Portland Park neighborhood. With a $275,000 budget, PBOT has made changes to a one-mile stretch of SW Capitol Hwy between I-5 and Portland Community College Sylvania. The aim of the project is to tame drivers on Capitol Hwy so that it’s easier to cross and reach transit stops. Other goals are to reduce speeds and crashes and improve the existing bike lanes. To do this, PBOT has reduced the number of driving lanes from four to three (including a center turn lane), has created wider bike lanes protected by a painted buffer and plastic bollards, reduced the speed limit from 35 to 30 mph, and plans to install median islands and extensions, adjust signal timing, and add a new marked crosswalk.

This week the agency released a statement from Shawn Garnett, the principal of Markham Elementary School (which is located directly adjacent to the newly restriped lanes). Here’s what she said:

“I had some reservations at first thinking it could end up being a traffic jam nightmare in the mornings and afternoons with all the school buses, pedestrians and cars.

The changes made in front of Markham are the best ever for students and everyone else’s safety. This has been a long time coming, but it has finally come. The changes respect the lives of children and adults. The reduction to two lanes on Capitol Hwy in just that small stretch emphasizes the importance of people’s safety, especially in front of a school. This makes it so much easier for our safety patrol students to do their jobs and helping me to breathe easier.

I could not be happier with the new configuration.

Thank you PBOT!”

It’s a very good sign to see this type of comment come from a school principal.

What I’ve also noticed is that PBOT is pushing through on these projects, without allowing them to be derailed by opposing voices. I asked PBOT Spokesperson Hannah Schafer about opposition to the road diet on East Glisan and I appreciated her matter-of-fact response. “Some people are struggling with the change,” she said. “But we are committed. We have a responsibility for safety in our city. That’s our job as the transportation bureau, to make sure our streets are safe. So we’re going to do that to the best of our ability.”

— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter or jonathan@bikeportland.org.
— Get our headlines delivered to your inbox.
— Please support this independent community media outlet with a one-time contribution or monthly subscription.