With last week’s headlines about the decline in biking still bouncing around my head, I rolled over to North Rosa Parks Way on Sunday to remind myself that Portland is a still a cycling city. And I was not disappointed!
Yes it was a bit of a stacked deck because it happened to be on the route of the Worst Day of the Year Ride, but still. N Rosa Parks has evolved in a real bright spot of our bikeway network (more on that in a separate post) and I was happy to see this big annual ride routed onto it.
I saw a healthy mix of riders. Check them out below and see what fun little nuggets you can discover. I love this People on Bikes series because it gives us an opportunity to learn about what Portland bike riders really look like — and there are often little nuggets you can see in these images that you’d never notice if just passing by. (Hint: Take a closer look at the leg tattoo on the guy riding the Cinelli and tell me if you know what the message is a reference to.)
Keep riding Portland and hope to catch you out there soon.
See our People on Bikes archive page for more galleries in this series.
Thanks for reading.
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I am surprised how many bikes without racks there are in this collection. I guess that is the difference between a recreational ride an the ‘commute’ collections I am used to
Always happy to see another with a variation of that tat. Just got mine at the end of 2021 above my knees, my artist was clever enough to make it an ambigram that reads “still riding” in the right-side up direction, and “shut u p legs” from my POV when riding.
The e-bike revolution is here…a lot of people can’t ride regular bikes its obvious.
I’m just curious, when you see someone walking around the grocery store using a cane, do you say “a lot of people don’t know how to walk its obvious”?
You need to find a new obsession John, your stalking is pretty weird…
There’s been a steady increase in disc brake bikes in the photo series, mostly mechanical with 6″ discs. Still not very many ebikes. No junky bikes, so the other (poorer) 90% still don’t participate.
I’m sure continued economic eviction and racist/classist displacement in Portland has NOTHING to do with our cratering cycling mode share. The cratering is obviously due to the unfamiliarity of PBOT staff with CROW best practices rather than this city becoming an ever more exclusive playground for the rich.
What struck me about the declining mode share story, aside from the decline, was that PBOT was still relying on data from human counters. Here in NC we are using unobstructive automated infrared readers that operate 24/7, which are showing a steady increase, but from the usual 0.2% low that you see in most US cities. Most of the readers look like utility boxes from the cable company, but put in locations where bicyclists have a history of passing by.
As I recall, they used 24 hr in street counters for ~25% of their data. Even though these counters showed the same trend at all hours, the comments were full of statements attributing the decline solely to WFH. We live in an age of individualistic “belief” where evidence that does not conform to our own solipsistic realities is ignored, ATMO. The litany of recent social media posts from local climate activists claiming that IPCC reports do more harm than good is a perfect example of this.
I rode the full loop, which took me all over town. There is SO MUCH GRAVEL still out on our streets, everywhere.
PBOT is just bringing the popular cycling sub-discipline to the bike lane. Now you don’t have to drive your bike to the forest to go gravel cycling. It’s one of their strategies to reduce the number of car trips.
Gravel riding is the new hot thing.
It was great seeing so many people of all ages and types out enjoying the event. I love the “Worst Day” concept. I also like the way it’s set up–non-competitive, and with such a range of route options.
I may have cracked the “leg tattoo” mystery: I believe it’s a reference to a saying that the German Trek rider Jens Voigt used as his motto back a few years ago…
Not too many steelies…one bar- con spied
POC don’t ride bikes in Portland?
Why would you ask something like that here? This is a tiny tiny sample of one road on one day … and there are likely some people in these photos who are not white.
Three look like they’re enjoying themselves. The rest look gloomy. The weather?
I saw several dozen to hundreds of people riding the south loop. I wasn’t scrutinizing faces, but they generally all seemed to be enjoying themselves.