This week’s Monday Roundup is sponsored by Gorge Pedal. Save the date for July 18th!
Welcome to the week. Here are the most noteworthy items BikePortland readers and editors came across in the past seven days…
Keep your license: A bill passed by the Oregon House last week bars the state from suspending someone’s driving license based on their inability to pay traffic fines.
U.S. on wrong track: At a recent global road safety conference in Sweden the U.S. was the only country to issue a dissent to a declaration made by over 140 other countries.
Overweight, under-regulated: So great to see growing awareness of the Big SUV Problem. This article translated from Dutch says, “Yes, let’s start fat shaming those SUVs.”
How to win at urban mobility: There are a lot of aspiring politicians in Portland right now. If you’re one of them, here’s a great primer on how to defend our streets against cars.
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Oh no, Lego: It’s sort of fun that there’s a debate about the lack of bike lanes in Lego world. But it’s also kind of sad.
Good news: The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has taken legendary Slickrock MTB Trail off its list of potential parcels for new oil and gas exploration.
Presidential plans: Interesting to note that of all the major candidates for U.S. president, Transportation For America gave passing grades only to the two who have recent experience as mayors: Pete Buttigieg and Mike Bloomberg.
Trick a Tesla: All it took was a very simple bit of vandalism to fool a “high-tech” car into thinking a 35 mph speed limit sign said 85 mph. What could possibly go wrong?
Climb in polls for climate: A new survey conducted for The Atlantic shows that for Democrats, climate change is a top political issue. The big question is, will traditional Dem talking points (“Electrification is the answer!” “They’re just aux lanes!”) finally give way to the bold policies we need?
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Lyft’s e-bike launch in DC: This summer Portland will launch an e-bike share system that I have a hunch will look a lot like what Washington D.C. just unveiled.
Chew on this: Our friends at City Observatory crunched the numbers and found a strong correlation between the number of chain restaurants and car dependency. Put another way, there’s a reason places like Portland, New York City and New Orleans have strong food scenes: Because we drive less.
‘Bike community’ not monolithic: The only reason the story about a bike shop opposing a carfree street is newsworthy is because of the popular — yet wildly off-base — notion that there exists such a thing as a “bike community” where all people who love biking share a certain bundle of beliefs.
Research beat: Newly published research in the Journal of Transport & Health studied driver yielding behavior in Las Vegas and found that people with higher-priced cars yielded to people in crosswalks at a lower rate.
Tweet of the Week:
https://twitter.com/editorswindler/status/1229630689252741120
— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org
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