Construction begins on project that will add buffered bike lanes to North Lombard

The Oregon Department of Transportation has begun construction on a project that will significantly redesign a 1.2-mile stretch of North Lombard. The $16.5 million Lombard Multimodal Safety Project will re-stripe traffic lanes, repave the badly deteriorated street, upgrade signals, add more robust crossings, and stripe unprotected buffered bike lanes between N Huron and N Boston. The project will include new median islands and flashing beacons at N Emerald and Delaware.

The changes are a result of ODOT wanting to improve safety and freight movement reliability. According to state data, Lombard is the 11th highest crash corridor in the city of Portland with a crash occurring every 9 days on average. The existing cross-section has five lanes; two general travel lanes in each direction and one auto parking lane. The new configuration will add two dedicated bike lanes and a center turn lane. The two general travel lanes will be widened from 10.5 to 12 feet in order to facilitate large trucks (Lombard is US30 Bypass and a major ODOT freight route).

ODOT opened an online open house and comment opportunity today that will be available through January 31st.

While work has begun on the project, the repaving and re-striping won’t begin until spring of next year. ODOT says the new buffered bike lanes should be finished by summer 2022.

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