Transportation issues loom large over Alpenrose development

The Alpenrose site is the big green zone in the middle.

***UPDATE (6/9/2023, 1:05PM): a BikePortland reader just alerted us to a letter in the Early Assistance meeting packet (page 3 in the 4/25/23 EA pdf here) which indicates that the zoning change requested by the developer would allow for approximately 307 new units to be built. The report from the April Early Assistance meeting showing bureau responses is not yet available, but BikePortland will be following this story as it unfolds.***

What’s up with Alpenrose?

I can’t say how many times I have casually asked people that question over the past year, without ever really doing the work of finding out.

But now I know that the answer is — “a lot.”

So let’s take a tour of what’s going on with this major development in southwest…

The past five years

The Alpenrose campus was home not only to an operating dairy, but also a velodrome, Little League playing fields, and Dairyville—a faux frontier town that would come alive during Christmas. Cyclists had been racing at the Alpenrose Velodrome, and on the grounds adjacent to it, for nearly 60 years before it closed permanently in 2021.

Suffice it to say, Alpenrose has been an iconic location for a number of different communities for many years.

But things changed in 2019 when the Cadonau family, descendants of the farm’s 1891 founder, sold the dairy business to competitors Smith Brothers Farms, with Smith Brothers Farms leasing the dairy facilities and the Cadonau family retaining ownership of the 51-acre property.

The sale was contentious, though. One faction of the Cadonau family sued the other to block it. The sale moved forward anyway, and the judge ordered the family into arbitration to settle their ownership disagreement. What eventually resulted was that a new entity, Alfa Shattuck LLC (controlled by the pro-sale faction of the family), took ownership of the property.

Shortly after the dairy sale to Smith Brothers Farms, the Little League announced that it would be looking for a new venue for its World Series events. And in 2021, Alpenrose permanently closed bike racing events and other uses of the property.

… and here’s the latest

In April of this year, Alfa Shattuck took an initial step forward with its plans to subdivide the property into 193 (UPDATE, 12:57 AM: and possibly as many as 307) single and duplex housing units with an Early Assistance meeting—a pre-application exchange of information in which the developer reveals general plans and the city bureaus indicate what the city will be looking for in a building permit application.

What’s at stake

I spoke yesterday with Marita Ingalsbe, President of the Hayhurst Neighborhood Association (NA), where Alpenrose is located. Ingalsbe has done a truly impressive job of keeping abreast of this very complicated land use process.

She told me that “transportation is the community’s biggest concern.”

SW Shattuck Road outside the Alpenrose site.

Alpenrose sits on SW Shattuck Road, a typical southwest Portland two-lane collector which lacks both a safe walking space and bike lanes. It appears that stormwater run-off from the street flows into open ditches on the side of the road. This means that required frontage improvements, like building a sidewalk or widening the road for a bike lane, might not be possible without putting in an expensive on-site stormwater facility.

“It would be wonderful if we could safely walk and bike on Shattuck,” remarked Ingalsbe. But recent policy statements from the Bureau of Environmental Services suggest the odds are against that happening:

… incremental stormwater improvements may not be possible in SW Portland because of the existing lack of infrastructure and downstream capacity limitations.

Locals are also concerned about the Hemstreet Heights neighborhood to the west of Alpenrose, in Beaverton. The small roads in that neighborhood will lead from the property to SW Oleson Rd and its notorious “six corners” intersection at Beaverton-Hillsdale Highway. Also known as “crash corner,” neighbors worry it cannot safely handle the car traffic from nearly 200 new residences.

Some good news

But neighbors would like to see more than just transportation improvements. They have worked tirelessly for two years to “advocate for a balanced proposal that will make the development the best it can be for the community.” This includes advocating for some higher density, affordable housing on-site, and honoring the legacy of the Alpenrose campus by building sports facilities on the acreage.

Three area neighbors, including Ingalsbe, joined together to form Friends of Alpenrose. They have met with the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, Portland Parks, Washington County, representatives from Commissioners Rubio’s and Ryan’s office, Metro representative Duncan Hwang, Beaverton’s Neighborhood Association Committee—

I’m going to stop, but I’m only about a third of the way through their list of meetings.

Let’s just say they’ve been working hard, and that there is some good news. 10%, or about five acres, of the site is required to be park or open space and Portland Parks parks is interested in acquiring some of that land for multi-purpose ball fields.

And Ingalsbe also assured me that the Red Electric Trail route, which runs through a northern section of the property, would be an improved right-of-way in the development.

Holding the city accountable in a shifting political landscape

But the transportation improvements the neighborhoods would like to see are are coming forward at a time when both the city and state have made recent moves to loosen building code requirements in response to the housing shortage. The controversial HB 3414, currently hung up in the Oregon legislature, limits the ability of cities to deny developer-requested variances (exceptions) to code requirements. Typical variances involve getting out of making frontage improvements like sidewalks and bike lanes.

And recently in the City of Portland, Commissioner Carmen Rubio surveyed stakeholders of the permitting process with the question, “What are the top five requirements the City of Portland should consider suspending or modifying to support increased housing productions?”

So the Hayhurst Neighborhood Association and the Friends of Alpenrose face headwinds as they advocate for safe places to walk and bike. But they are a savvy bunch. At their last meeting, the HNA hosted Joan Frederiksen and Mary Hoffmann from Portland’s Bureau of Planning and Sustainability to outline the permitting process that the Alpenrose development will need to follow. It’s a complicated development path which requires a “Land Division with Environmental Review to create four tracts/lots, and 2) a Comprehensive Plan Map Amendment and Zoning Map Amendment review to change the zoning on the site from R10 to R7.” The advocates are preparing themselves for this process.

As Portland transitions to a new form of government, it is important to keep in mind the historic role neighborhood associations have played—in fact were designed to play—in holding city government accountable. You can see that in the NA notification requirements that are part of permitting building.

Ingalsbe and I broached the subject of whether the accountability workload carried by NA volunteers has become excessive, especially when it comes to land use. She agreed that it might be nice to have paid employees in city council district offices carry some of the load.

And hopefully that will happen, but it will really depend on whom Portlanders vote into office. Southwest Portlanders would benefit from having an elected representative who understands how tightly joined land use and transportation are, and how both depend on adequate stormwater facilities.

Historically underserved community

As best I can tell, government officials use the phrase “historically underserved communities” as a euphemism for racial and ethnic minorities. But when I hear “historically underserved community,” my mind turns to southwest Portland.

The City of Portland began annexing the region from Multnomah County about half a century ago. The County did not require the infrastructure, like drain pipes under the roads, that is needed to build sidewalks, so southwest joined the City without sidewalks or the means to easily add them.

In the intervening decades, the City of Portland has not done enough to rectify this situation. Consequently, this part of town is now ill-prepared to absorb the new housing coming its way.

Metro President Lynn Peterson announces run for Congress

Lynn Peterson in July, 2019. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)

Metro President Lynn Peterson announced her intention to run for Oregon’s 5th congressional district on Wednesday. If all goes according to plan for 54-year-old Lake Oswego resident, she’ll join Portland’s Earl Blumenauer on the Congressional Bike Caucus in 2025.

“I’ll bring a track record of developing common sense solutions and getting things done to Congress. I’m going to fight not only for needed investments in housing, public safety, transportation and education, but also our fundamental rights to vote and seek reproductive health care,” Peterson said in a statement.

The 5th district sprawls over 5,300 square miles from southeast Portland eastward into Clackamas County and parts of Sisters and Bend. Prior to 2022 when Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer narrowly beat Jamie McLeod-Skinner, the district had always been represented by a Democrat. Peterson will look to flip it back to blue. And she’ll likely have plenty of competition from her own party. The Willamette Week reported yesterday that McLeod-Skinner is “seriously considering” running again. As is Oregon State Representative Janelle Bynum.

Regardless of who runs, there’s likely no one who can compete with Peterson’s curriculum vitae when it comes to transportation. She’s got degrees in engineering and planning, worked as a planner for TriMet, was leader of land use nonprofit 1000 Friends of Oregon, was named transportation policy advisor for Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber in 2011, and served as Transportation Secretary for the Washington Department of Transportation prior to being elected Metro president in 2019. She’s also written a book on road design.

Peterson is also an enthusiastic bike rider. She’s participated in several “Policymaker Rides” over the years and in 2018 she embarked on a 24 city bike tour.

But despite her transportation bona fides, Peterson doesn’t have the corresponding legacy at Metro. At least not yet. The big Metro transportation funding measure failed at the ballot box in 2020 and several regional megaprojects Peterson is a major backer of are stuck in public and political quagmires. Despite her alignment with cycling and an ostensibly progressive transportation perspective, Peterson has been a loud voice in favor of the I-5 Rose Quarter Project and Interstate Bridge Replacement Program — both of which include freeway expansions.

At a meeting of the Oregon Legislature’s Joint Transportation Committee on April 13th, Peterson found herself to the right of a coalition of advocates and electeds who are pushing to “right-size” the Interstate Bridge Replacement Program. Speaking to the committee as part of invited testimony, Peterson said, “This project will provide safe and efficient alternatives for travel, freeing up space on the bridge for interstate travel, and helping our community reduce GHG emissions. It is a huge win for active transportation and for climate… We need to do this and we need to do this now.”

Peterson’s transportation positions will likely serve her well in the race for the 5th district nomination. She’s already lined up a very impressive list of endorsements that include a diverse range of advocacy, community, and political leaders from around the region.

Weekend Event Guide: Columbia County century, Salmonberry, knitting, and more

Escape the city and find desolate backroads like this one on the Columbia Century. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)

Welcome to the weekend! Here’s our weekly selection of rides and events worth your time. Please note, it’s Pedalpalooza time! That means there are tons of rides every day. See them all here.

This week’s guide is sponsored by Cyclepath Bike Shop (2436 NE MLK Jr. Blvd). Come for the great service and selection — stay for the shop rides, clinics, parties and welcoming community!

Friday, June 9th

PDX Unity Ride – 6:30 pm at Wilshire Park (NE)
In honor of Pride, this month’s ride has been named “Keep Portland Queer’d” and organizers welcome all LGBTQ+ folks and allies. Expect a 10-mile ride with a store/ice-cream stop half-way through. More info here.

Sunset PaddlePalooza – 7:30 pm at Green Anchors (N)
You know we love some pedal-to-paddle action, so check out this ride if you want to get on the water! And they’ll even provide you a kayak and gear if you RSVP soon enough! More info here.

Saturday, June 10th

Red R Criterium – all day on Swan Island (N)
Fast road racing action is back! Roll down to Swan Island to see all the exciting action in these multi-lap events where racers battle for prizes and cash, in addition to victory. See our coverage of this event from 2021 to taste the flavor. More info here.

Columbia Century Challenge – all day in Scappoose
Head north and discover the fantastic cycling in the wild and wooly backroads far beyond Highway 30. More info here.

Cyclepath Bike Shop Ride – Meet at the shop (NE Brazee & MLK Jr. Blvd)
Join a few folks who are training for the Skull 120 race for a shakedown ride on the 20-mile Forest Park/Skyline Rd loop. This will be a “no drop” ride. More info here.

Salmonberry Trail Work Party – 10:00 am at Public Coast Farm (Washington County)
Get involved with the exciting Salmonberry Trail project as volunteers clear the final segment of vegetation along the railroad corridor to complete the first major segment of this rail-to-trail project. More info here.

PSU Farmers Market Ride – 10:00 am Clinton/41st, 10:10 Clinton/26th, 10:30 am East end Tillikum Bridge (SE)
Join a friendly group of folks and get some shopping done at a local outdoor market downtown. Simple, social, fun. More info here.

Knit in Public Ride – 10:00 am at Starlight Knitting Society (SE)
If you’re fit to knit then this ride will be lit. Bring your knitting kit and check out local fabric stores while you make impromptu knit pit stops. More info here.

Sunday, June 4th

Ride Westside #3 – 9:30 at Beaverton 1st Street Dining Commons
Roll down to Tigard and then take TriMet back (if you want) with the burgeoning Ride Westside crew. Route will take you on a mix of Fanno Creek path and bike-friendly neighborhood streets. More info here.

Four City Loop – 9:30 am from Sellwood Park
Join experienced riders from Portland Bicycling Club on a 22-mile, intermediate-paced ride that will acquaint you with Milwaukie, Oregon City, and Gladstone. More info here.

Cycle Cats Do Forest Park – 9:30 am at Vera Katz
Check Forest Park off your biking bucket list and/or see it with fresh eyes as you roll en masse with the Cycle Cats. Join the group for food cart lunch in St. Johns following the ride. More info here.

Adoptees of Color Ride – 5:00 pm at Oregon Park (NE)
This ride is for adoptees of color to connect, share space, and enjoy riding bikes together! Bike ride is open to all BIPOC Adoptees. Allies and supporters, please respect this intentional community space. More info here.

PBOT leaders lobby Congress on Metro-funded trip to D.C.

PBOT Commissioner Mingus Mapps, his Chief of Staff Katie Meyer, and PBOT Interim Director Tara Wasiak. (Photo: @CommMapps on Twitter)

Members of an influential Metro committee spent this week in Washington D.C. in hopes of bringing back federal funding for a host of major projects. The annual trip includes one day of meetings with members of Congress and a visit to U.S. Department of Transportation headquarters.

The 16-member Joint Policy Advisory Committee on Transportation includes county commissioners, mayors and agency directors from across the region. Among those who attended this year’s trip was Portland Bureau of Transportation Commissioner Mingus Mapps and PBOT Interim Director Tara Wasiak.

On Tuesday, the group met with nine members of Oregon and Washington’s congressional delegation. The schedule included meetings with House representatives (and/or staff members of) Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, Andrea Salinas, Cliff Bentz, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, Earl Blumenauer, Suzanne Bonamici, and Val Hoyle. They also met with Senator. Ron Wyden.

On Tuesday night, TriMet hosted a dinner and reception on the rooftop of an office building two blocks from the Capitol where the special guest was Senator Jeff Merkley.

In addition to the requisite networking and rapport-building, they had more serious business to discuss. With Biden’s infrastructure law going full steam, JPACT members want to make sure our region gets as much funding as possible, “and that the funds from the legislation help all our communities prepare for the future ahead,” reads a Metro document about the trip.

In addition to being ready to discuss several high priority issues like climate change, electrification, safety and high capacity transit, the JPACT members lobbied specifically for 12 major projects they hope the Biden Administration will help pay for. Those projects include:

82nd Avenue Transit Project – $250-450M: Replacing TriMet’s Line 72 with Bus Rapid Transit to serve diverse communities in Portland and Clackamas County.

Broadway Corridor Streets – $22M: Constructing two new streets critical to unlocking four million square feet of mixed-use, mixed-income, urban development at the former US Postal Service site in Portland’s Central City.

Earthquake Ready Burnside Bridge – $895M: Replacing an almost century-old bridge to secure one of the most dependable emergency routes in the region and create thousands of local jobs.

I-205 Improvements Project – $550M: Adding a missing third lane, seismic upgrades to a total of nine bridges, and safety improvements to interchanges and on- and off- ramps.

I-5 Rose Quarter Improvement Project – $1.45B: Improving safety and congestion at Oregon’s top freeway bottleneck, while reconnecting the heart of Portland’s Black community.

Interstate Bridge Replacement Program – $6B: A modern, reslient, multimodal span across the Columbia River.

Montgomery Park Streetcar Extension – $80M: A new 1.3 mile transit connection in Portland’s vibrant and growing northwest neighborhoods.

SW 185th MAX Overcrossing – $85M: Building a grade-separated light rail crossing over busy SW 185th Avenue to improve transit reliability, make crossings safer and reduce congestion.

Sunrise Corridor – $500-700M: Planning, design and construction of a community-supported multimodal transportation solution for Highways 224 and 212.

TriMet Zero-Emission Bus Transition – $2B: Advancing TriMet’s commitment to a zero-emissions fleet by purchasing buses and constructing associated bus operation facilities.

Tualatin Valley Highway Transit Project – $250-385M: Improving speed, reliability, accessibility and safety for transit riders, and in particular for communities of color and low-income communities.

Take a look at the official delegation packet here (PDF).

Then on Wednesday, JPACT members attended several meetings at the USDOT where they met with various high-level staff including Director of the Departmental Office of Civil Rights Irene Marion and the Executive Director of the Joint Office of Energy and Transportation Gabe Klein. In the afternoon they could choose between two activities: a visit to the African American Museum (with free tickets from Senator Merkley) or a bike share ride.

I’ve reached out to Commissioner Mapps to see if he’d like to share any reflections from the trip, but he might be traveling home at the moment. I’ll update this post if I hear back. In the meantime, we have a tweet he shared yesterday while standing outside the capitol with his Chief of Staff Katie Meyer and PBOT Interim Director Tara Wasiak. “Air quality here is like Portland circa Sept. 2020, due to fires in Canada. A reminder that new transportation improvements must achieve our climate goals and combat climate change.”

New era begins as Portland passes citywide camping ban

I-205 bike path in April, 2021. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)

Portland City Council voted 3-1 Wednesday on a city ordinance that bans daytime camping citywide. It’s a big shift in policy that could have a major impact on cycling.

For about a decade now, we’ve covered serious concerns from bicycle riders about tent encampments located along major cycling routes. A look into the BikePortland archive shows that our first post on the issue was in February 2014 when a large group of people erected tents and shelters adjacent to the Springwater Corridor path under the Ross Island Bridge.

At that time, we didn’t hear much about safety concerns from these camps. That changed in early 2016 when we did our first story about how people who live around and ride on the Springwater near SE 82nd Avenue felt like the growing camp was “a major public health issue.” We also shared comments from people who said they’d been threatened by people who live along the path and have stopped using it at night as a result. The issue would only grow in size and impact in the years after that. In 2019 after a ride on the I-205 path near Gateway Green I posted a story saying the makeshift homes and trash had created “unacceptable” conditions.

Former City Commissioner Chloe Eudaly commented on that post and agreed that the state of the bike path was, “unacceptable and unsafe for everyone involved.” But she also cautioned against the impulse to force and/or “sweep” the people and their belongings away because, “there is literally nowhere for them to go.”

Portland has made some progress on building affordable housing and boosting the number of shelter beds in the past four years. But the number of homeless people has also increased and there are still not enough places for them to go.

Despite that complicated reality, the ordinance passed yesterday makes it a violation to camp on nearly any public right-of-way between the hours of 8:00 am to 8:00 pm. The plan was proposed by Mayor Ted Wheeler to comply with his interpretation of an Oregon law passed in 2021 that requires all cities and counties to ensure their camping ordinances are “objectively reasonable as to time, place, and manner with regards to persons experiencing homelessness.”

The new “place” regulations are the most relevant to bicycling. Here’s the text of that section of the ordinance that lays it all out:

An involuntarily homeless person may not camp in the following places at any time:

a. On a Pedestrian Plaza
b. Upon public docks
c. In the pedestrian use zone, which is the area of the sidewalk corridor on City sidewalks intended for pedestrian travel or access to public transit
d. In a Park regulated
e. Within 250 feet from a preschool, kindergarten, elementary or secondary school, or a childcare center
f. Within 250 feet from a safe parking site, safe rest village, or sanctioned camping location designated by the Mayor.
g. Within 250 feet of lot or parcel containing a construction site
h. In the public right-of-way along “High Crash Network Streets and Intersections”i. Within 250 feet of an Environmental overlay zone, River Natural overlay zone, River Environmental overlay zone, Pleasant Valley Natural Resource overlay zone, or a special flood hazard area.
j. Areas posted no-trespassing by City bureaus.

While bike lanes or paths aren’t mentioned by name, we can expect the ordinance to apply to things like the Esplanade, Springwater, I-205 path, the Columbia Slough path, and so on. Many of the important bike paths in our network (Peninsula Crossing Trail, Springwater, Esplanade, Willamette River Greenway, and so on) are actually city parks, so they’d fall under that provision. And Mayor Wheeler’s office has told BikePortland that the “pedestrian use zone” language will also capture some bikeways.

Now that the ordinance has passed, Wheeler’s office says the City will create a map that clearly shows where camping is banned. If there are bikeways that are not on that map, they have told BikePortland, “We can follow up to see if there are opportunities that may need further consideration.”

Keeping transportation right-of-way clear of peoples’ homes and belongings should not be a controversial idea (although I acknowledge if not discussed carefully, it can lead to bigoted, insensitive comments). In recent days and weeks, Portland has made it clear that transportation right-of-way is not a place for camping. The ADA settlement that City Council agreed to last week is a good example of this, and even Sarah Iannarone — a former mayoral candidate who know heads The Street Trust — shared on her personal Twitter account this week that while she opposes the camping ban, “The city should clear the right of way for use of our multimodal transportation system…”

The ban is due to go into effect next month; but it remains to be seen how enforcement will play out. Regardless, yesterday’s Council vote marked a major turning point for this issue. Hopefully our city will be healthier for it.

This should be the year you do the Gorge Ride

Imagine you, rolling down the Rowena Curves as the gorgeous Gorge lays out all over you. (Photo: A.J. Zelada)

*This post is part of a paid promotional partnership.*

If you’ve been curious about riding in the Columbia River Gorge, there’s an event coming Saturday, June 24th that should be on your calendar.

The annual Gorge Ride will introduce you to some of the most stunning sections of the fabled Historic Columbia River Highway. This ride is a real gem. It’s been held since 2006 as a fundraiser for the nonprofit Friends of the Historic Columbia River Highway. It begins at the Gorge Discovery Center in The Dalles and the route is a 38-mile out-and-back that will take you through the Mosier tunnels, up and down the legendary Rowena curves (make sure to stop at the view on top!), through cherry tree orchards, and more.

A highlight of the ride will be a rest stop at the historic, 100 year-old Mayerdale Estate.

Add in a pre-made lunch option and fully-supported route with snacks, mechanical support and even a SAG wagon, and you’ve got the making of an excellent day of riding for all types of ages and abilities.

Longtime Gorge riding advocate A.J. Zelada helps organize the ride. He says even if the elevation profile of the route looks daunting, there are no grades above 5%. “When you encounter a hill, just ‘gear down’, take it one pedal stroke at a time, and remember that it’s taking you to a view even nicer than the ones on the way up! The variety of scenery is amazing.”

One thing you won’t have to worry about on this ride is a lot of car traffic. Much of the route is on carfree sections of the Historic Columbia River Highway State Trail. And when the road is open to drivers, the volumes are low and people are usually out for fun and not in a hurry.

I can personally recommend this route and can vouch for the fine folks like A.J. who put on this event. You will not be disappointed!

Tickets for the event are $45 for ages 12 and up and $15 for those 6-11. Online registration closes June 19th. Check out A.J.’s excellent photos of past rides here. Learn more and get links to register here.

Are bike-friendly speed bumps worth it?

The Portland Bureau of Transportation wants to know if bike-friendly speed bumps are worth the trouble and treasure.

With an aim to slow down drivers and improve conditions for bicycle riders on neighborhood greenways, PBOT installed the first bike-friendly speed bumps (which they refer to as speed cushions) on SE Clinton street in 2017. The design includes two channels through the bumps that allow bicycle riders to roll through smoothly. Almost as soon as they hit the ground, the reviews from bike riders were very mixed. Some people love them, others say the channel is too narrow, can lead to crashes, and encourages drivers to swerve into them. Despite all that, PBOT has continued to use the not-yet-standard design citywide.

As we shared back in March, PBOT put out a survey to help determine whether or not they should continue to be part of the city’s traffic calming arsenal. The survey evaluated three things; rider preferences, the cost implications, and whether or not they actually reduced driving speeds.

PBOT Bicycle Coordinator Roger Geller brought results of the survey to the May 9th Bicycle Advisory Committee meeting and asked for feedback to inform a final report he’s working on.

Slides from Geller’s presentation to the May BAC meeting.

Of the 540 survey respondents, 80% said they prefer riding through the channel. Geller also did observations at seven different locations and found a similar number of channel-choosers. “People are voting with their wheels. That tells me the channels create a more comfortable cycling environment,” Geller said at the BAC meeting. And since Portland city policy is to create the highest-quality cycling environment possible, Geller says these bike-friendly speed bumps are more closely aligned with city goals than conventional bumps.

When it comes to the accompanying pavement markings, most people who took the survey said they prefer a sharrow marking to be aligned with the channel. Geller says this is important for two key reasons: 1) the sharrow will lead riders toward the channel in dark or low-light conditions and 2) the sharrow will encourage people to ride closer to the center of the lane, which he believes is the safest choice when using a neighborhood greenway.

According to the city’s survey and evaluations thus far, the bike-friendly bumps and traditional speed bumps have about the same impact on lowering driver speeds. So if they seem preferable to most cyclists and they accomplish the traffic safety goal, why not close the case and make them a standard treatment?

Because they cost more. About 20% more on average according to PBOT estimates.

Bike-friendly speed bump on the Alameda Ridge. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)

And bumps (of any sort) are likely to only go up in price since PBOT will contract out even more of them in the future. The majority of bumps in Portland are already installed by private contractors, and with PBOT’s budget in the hole, their maintenance crews are likely to do even fewer of them in years to come. Geller shared at the meeting that it costs PBOT crews about $2,500 to install a traditional speed bump and $4,000 to install a bike-friendly cushion. When they contract that work out, the price balloons to $7,000.

Add in the fact that PBOT must install more bike-friendly speed cushions to the get the same speed reducing impact as traditional bumps, and the cost goes up even more. A comparison of nine recently completed neighborhood greenway projects showed that PBOT installed 104 of the cushions when only 90 bumps would have been required — spending a total of $746,050 on the bike-friendly ones when they would have spent just $625,400 on bumps without channels. That’s a 19% difference.

When PBOT asked in their survey if a 10% cost increase for the bike-friendly speed cushions would still be worth it, 51% of people said yes. 40% of respondents said it would be smarter to save the money.

There was also grumbling from BAC meeting attendees that folks would rather have diverters instead of bumps. Geller acknowledged that bumps aren’t intended to reduce car volumes like diverters are, and he also said concrete diverters are much more expensive. (Keep in mind PBOT considers those round concrete barrels to be only temporary solutions and the more permanent treatment of a median diverter, including design and signage is estimated to coast around $30,000 a piece.)

When you factor in the cost issues and PBOT’s unprecedented budget crisis, I won’t be surprised if we don’t see any more of these bike-friendly speed cushions in Portland.

We should know their fate soon. Stay tuned for Geller’s final report.

TriMet board member accuses nonprofit partner of ‘pageantry’ and paid testimony

A protest to some. Pageantry to others. (Photos: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)

“I get scared that they’re creating a pathway where any organization with a 501(c)(3) status can start utilizing programs to crowd out a public forum with a position.”
– Ozzie Gonzalez, TriMet Board member

A member of the TriMet Board of Directors has doubled-down on serious allegations against a Portland-based transit advocacy nonprofit that were first made public at a board meeting last month.

TriMet Board Secretary and Treasurer Ozzie Gonzalez was appointed to his position by Oregon Governor Kate Brown in 2018. Late last month he voted along with five other board members to raise transit fares by 30-cents. Before doing so, Gonzalez delivered a speech about why he believed the fare increase was the right move. He also went out of his way to sharply criticize OPAL Environmental Justice Oregon, a nonprofit that organized a rally and protest against it.

Gonzalez expressed not only his disagreement with OPAL’s advocacy style, he accused them of tokenization, of paying people to testify, and he directly questioned whether their tactics ran afoul of nonprofit lobbying rules. “We’re confusing democracy by having paid advertising brought to the public forum,” he said during the meeting. “And I believe that anybody who’s a tax exempt organization needs to be very careful when they’re leaning into tax policy in this way.”

Gonzalez then expanded his criticisms in tweets from the bus on his way home from the meeting:

“It’s a dark day for democracy when special interests pay people to disrupt meetings. Buying t-shirts, making signs, paying stipends, & Tokenizing youth, POC [people of color] and disabled people for political gain is gross! And many [of the meeting attendees] were paid over $700 a pop to show up and make a spectacle for cameras being told this will affect them. Low income riders and frequent riders are now getting a BIGGER subsidy, but truth matters little to paid activists looking for a spectacle.”

These accusations are based on what Gonzalez saw and heard at TriMet’s board meetings in April and May. His assertions about people being paid comes from OPAL’s Seeding our Liberation program. That 12-week leadership development program (which began in March) paid participants $2,160 over three months ($720 per month) and required them to attend weekly educational workshops and testify at three TriMet board meetings (the last one being the fare increase vote on May 24th). Participants were also required to testify and/or take part in some sort of activism effort at least four times in the three months.

Given a chance to respond to Gonzalez’s tweet, OPAL wrote to BikePortland via email: “We find the accusations Gonzalez made immediately after the TriMet Board Meeting deeply disturbing and unfounded. We view his tweet as trolling and we do not feel it is necessary to respond to this behavior directly.”

OPAL has pushed TriMet for a fareless transit system for years. In 2019 a few TriMet board members appeared to briefly consider the idea; but there’s never been support for the idea from TriMet’s top leadership. For his part, Gonzalez says he agrees with OPAL that a fareless system would be ideal (he often frames the issue as “our cause”). What he objects to is how OPAL goes about making it happen. The way Gonzalez sees it, OPAL is more concerned with “trying to get a base riled up” than making progress.

Ozzie Gonzalez at the May 24th TriMet Board meeting.

In a phone call after the May 24th meeting, Gonzalez said OPAL has had many opportunities to help TriMet achieve lower and/or free fares. “For years I’ve seen OPAL present demands at the [Transit Equity Advisory Committee, TEAC], then utilize it to say nothing when it’s time to discuss ideas and solutions,” he said. “There’s an overwhelming emphasis on making sure that the pageantry looks like they’re championing a cause; but when it comes time to do the work, and actually affect the change, that’s not quite as important.”

Central to Gonzalez’s beef with OPAL is that they are a partner of TriMet. He says the group is paid to sit on the TEAC and to help the agency do community outreach (I’m working to clarify the nature of this financial partnership and will update this post when I learn more). “If you’re paid by an organization and you’re helping lead demonstrations where the premise is disruption, I would certainly like to have them come and explain how that will help advance our goals.”

“The heckling at the meeting this month was coming from voices [leaders of OPAL] that chose not to speak up during the public forum and have chosen to stay silent when they’re sitting in the committee meetings that are discussing this topic,” Gonzalez continued. “To me, this is the misuse of a process and the overwhelming emphasis on pageantry and optics.”

That OPAL might be running afoul of federal tax law that puts their nonprofit status in jeopardy is Gonzalez’s most serious accusation. Nonprofits are allowed to do some lobbying, but they can lose their tax-exempt privileges if it becomes a “substantial” part of their work. OPAL’s work on the fare increase appears to fit the definition of lobbying laid out by the IRS, but it’s unclear if the money and time spent reaches the “substantial” level.

“It doesn’t feel to me like they are acting within those [legal] confines,” Gonzalez told BikePortland. “And I get scared that they’re creating a pathway where any organization with a 501(c)(3) status can start utilizing programs to crowd out a public forum with a position.”

As for his claim of tokenization, Gonzalez accused OPAL of “throwing folks into a process that they have been under-informed about” and not giving them complete or accurate information about the issue. At the two most recent board meetings about the fare increase, Gonzalez alleges that, “Over half of the testimonials were coming in with a script in hand from an organization that that facilitated their arrival to that space.” (OPAL says a majority of people who testified were not affiliated with their organization.)

“Right now it feels more like our partners want to see us fail, then they want to see us succeed,” Gonzalez said at the May board meeting. Now he’s questioning whether or not TriMet should have any relationship with OPAL at all. “I don’t think they’re benefiting the cause in the grand scheme of things,” Gonzalez shared with BikePortland. “Right now, there’s just a lot of distrust and disregard for the transit system and the transit agency at-large that’s been cultivated and I don’t understand what the objective of that could be.”

I gave OPAL another opportunity to respond to what Gonzalez shared with me on the phone, but I have not yet heard back.

In their statement responding to Gonzalez’s tweet, OPAL said, “The [fare increase] vote demonstrates that the un-elected TriMet Directors are comfortable operating undemocratically in their decision-making process and moving forward with policy that inherently makes accessing and using transit in Portland more burdensome.”

Note: In a sign that this feud between OPAL and TriMet goes beyond Gonzalez and the board, this morning I received an email from TriMet Director of Communications Roberta Altstadt. Totally unsolicited and in response to our podcast, she wanted to make sure I’d seen Gonzalez’s tweet and she shared a link to OPAL’s Seeding our Liberation program website to back up his concerns.

City ordinance would ban camping on some bikeways and crack down on ‘chop shops’

City contracted crews clear out an alleged bicycle chop shop on SE Alder in May 2022. (Photo: Taylor Griggs/BikePortland)

“Everyone is sick of the open-air chop shops that have been allowed to operate around here with impunity.”
– Bryan Hance, Bike Index

At Portland City Council tomorrow (6/7) Mayor Ted Wheeler will call a vote on an ordinance that would ban camping in Portland between 8:00 pm and 8:00 am. It’s part of a major shift on homelessness at City Hall following years of Covid-related restrictions on how the city can address encampments and a political swing among commissioners and the general public that not enough progress has been made to reduce the number of people sleeping outside.

The new camping restrictions are highly controversial, and many people worry that they will unfairly criminalize an already highly vulnerable population of Portlanders. And according to Street Roots, this approach is doomed to fail. Despite this, Wheeler is pushing forward and the conventional wisdom is that he has the votes to pass it.

There are two provisions in the ordinance that relate directly to bicycling. The first is where people will be prohibited from camping. And the second is what they’ll be able to possess while doing so.

If the ban goes through, people will no long be able to camp: overnight on a pedestrian plaza; in the “pedestrian use zone” which is defined by the, “area of the sidewalk corridor on City sidewalks intended for pedestrian travel or access to public transit”; in a park; within 250 feet from a preschool, kindergarten, elementary or secondary school, or a childcare center; within 250 feet from a safe parking site, safe rest village, or sanctioned camping location designated by the Mayor; within 250 feet of lot or parcel containing a construction site; in the public right-of-way along “High Crash Network Streets and Intersections” identified by the Portland Bureau of Transportation; or within 250 feet of an Environmental overlay zone, River Natural overlay zone, River Environmental overlay zone, Pleasant Valley Natural Resource overlay zone, or a special flood hazard area.

These areas include many places where there are bike lanes and bike paths. The ordinance doesn’t include specific language about off-street bicycle paths like the I-205 path or the Springwater Corridor — both of which have become home to hundreds of people in the past several years. However, the environmental overlay zone language is notable because it could mean that the City of Portland will be able to enforce no-camping zones along the Springwater and Eastbank Esplanade paths along the Willamette River, the Columbia Slough path, Marine Drive bike path, and others.

The other part of the ordinance that caught my eye was a specific restriction about the ownership of bicycles. Under the new rules, people who live outside will not be able to,

“Assemble, disassemble, sell, offer to sell, distribute, offer to distribute, or store three or more bicycles or two or more automobiles, a bicycle frame with the gear cables or brake cables cut or an automobile with the battery or one or more tires removed, two or more bicycles or automobiles with missing parts, or five or more bicycle or automobile parts.”

This is an attempt to address “chop shops” where people process many stolen bicycles in order to obscure their identity and prepare them for resale. Chop shops have a long history in Portland. The Police Bureau and city service providers have recovered hundreds (thousands?) of bikes from homeless camps over the years.

In May 2022, neighbors filed multiple complaints about what they believed to be a large chop shop operation on SE Alder near 30th. That encampment — along with dozens of bike frames and parts — was ultimately cleared away.

But determining what is stolen and what is the property of people who live in tents is not easy and Police have had trouble navigating the issue of stolen bikes in homeless camps in the past. In 2013 we reported that despite appearances, the police cannot just assume every bike in a camp is stolen. “The issue is more complicated than you might think,” PPB Sgt. Brian Hughes told BikePortland. “Just because they’re living outside and have a lot of bikes, doesn’t mean they’re bike thieves. They’re entitled to work on a bike just as much as anyone anywhere else.”

Royal Johnson, president of the Timberwolves Cycle Recovery group that helps people get stolen bikes back, told us he’s just happy to see some steps being taken in the direction of more enforcement. “I think that this policy could be beneficial if it actually brings results,” he shared with us in a message last week. “Bike thieves and chops only exist because their is no accountability as long as this stays consistent and there are no loopholes it would be great.”

And Bryan Hance from Bike Index, a site that lists stolen bikes and allows people to register serial numbers, is skeptical the new ordinance will change anything:

“It’s hard to believe there is going to be any actual enforcement. The cynical side of me says this won’t make much of a difference, but at least there’s some sort of acknowledgement of the issue. Everyone is sick of the open-air chop shops that have been allowed to operate around here with impunity.”

According to Wheeler, the ordinance requires written warnings before any penalty is doled out. And people will only receive a citation after two documented warnings. After that, violation of the ordinance could result in criminal penalties and fines.

Read the full ordinance here.

Find a Pedalpalooza ride near you with this handy map

Screenshot of map. View interactive version below.

Excited to take part in the daily rides going on as part of Pedalpalooza right now, but don’t have a lot of time to get to the start location? Curious which parts of Portland are host to the most meet-up spots?

A new map created by Portlander Aaron Kuehn can help. Aaron just shared this cool map that lists all Pedalpalooza rides by location of where they start. You can click each pin and find the name of the ride, date and time, and a link to the ride listing on the official Pedalpalooza calendar.

This excellent resource can not only come in handy when making plans, it also helps tell us where most of the bike fun culture happens in Portland. As we strive to extend the bike fun beyond the central city and inner neighborhoods, we can look to fill Pedalpalooza ride deserts with more bike fun in the future!

Check the map below or via the link here.

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Job: Warehouse Worker – Castelli MVC (filled)

Buffered Bike Lane with a bike symbol and arrow pointing forward

Sorry. This job has been filled.

City recommends major transportation and land use changes for lower southeast

Time to get lower southeast out of the mud. (Photo: City of Portland)

One of the most underdeveloped parts of Portland has taken a big step toward catching up to the rest of the city.

After two years of planning and public outreach, the City of Portland has released a draft plan for how they’d like to hasten development of the lower southeast — an area that includes the Brentwood-Darlington, Lents, Ardenwald-Johnson Creek, Mt Scott-Arleta, and Woodstock neighborhoods.

With a mix of land use and transportation changes, the idea behind the Lower SE Rising Area Plan is to boost neighborhood businesses, create more — and more affordable — housing, and make it easier to walk, bike and take transit. The ultimate goal is to give people the opportunity to meet daily needs without having to drive. Last week the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability (BPS) and the Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) released a draft version of the plan and it’s our first look at what city planners recommend for helping this part of the city catch up to the rest of Portland.

Portland’s lower southeast wasn’t annexed into Portland until 1986 and prior to that it was “yellowlined” — a federal designation on loan maps right above “redlined” that made it hard to get home loans. There are some good bones from historic rail service (both urban streetcar and proximity to the former train that ran on the Springwater Corridor), but for the most part lower southeast remains behind other parts of Portland when it comes to business access and active transportation infrastructure.

“Lower SE Portland shares many physical characteristics with East Portland: gravel streets and missing sidewalks; a disconnected street network and limited bus service; and few neighborhood stores, restaurants, and other conveniences, so that residents must drive to meet their daily needs,” reads the draft plan.

To lift up the area, BPS and PBOT recommend a two-part strategy of zoning code changes and transportation projects.

Land use and zoning

Preferred centers and corridors scenario.

On the land use side, BPS proposes a new business district around SE 72nd and Flavel that would, “serve as a hub for commercial services with additional housing options” and “fill in a substantial gap in access to services in this area of Portland.” That district would be part of a new neighborhood center that would extend east along Flavel to 82nd. This would help give the Brentwood-Darlington neighborhood something on par with how 72nd feels just to the north at Woodstock and at Foster. Currently the Flavel/72nd intersection is bordered by parking lots and/or car-related businesses and low-density housing.

The city also proposes zoning code changes to the area around 82nd and Flavel that would allow for mixed-use instead of the commercial and light-industrial uses it has today in order to, “encourage a small commercial hub that is more pedestrian oriented and allows businesses in mixed-use buildings with housing on upper floors.”

Example of how zoning changes could impact SE 72nd Ave.

72nd would become a much more prominent and pedestrian-oriented street as part of this plan. The current “neighborhood center” and “pedestrian district” that exists on the street at Foster would be extended south to include the Mt. Scott Community Center and Arleta Triangle (which not boasts a public plaza). The city is also proposing to allow 3-4 story buildings along SE Woodstock instead of the 2-3 stories allowed today. And around the new public plaza at the Arleta Triangle, the plan recommends a zoning change that would allow for commercial and mixed-use developments to, “support its emerging role as a community hub.”

52nd would also see changes if the proposals in the plan are adopted. It would become a “neighborhood corridor” (along with 72nd), which opens it up to zoning changes that would allow more housing, neighborhood businesses and small, 2-3 story multi-family developments.

Transportation

To support the land use changes, the city is also proposing transportation improvements to make it more attractive to walk, bike and take the bus. Since the area was annexed so late and historically underinvested in, then went from being dominated by streetcars in the early 20th century to being car-centric by the 1950s, it still lacks sidewalks and bike lanes on many streets. The plan uses a combination of changes to busy streets (52nd, 72nd, and Woodstock) and neighborhood greenways to, “bring every corner of the Plan Area within a few blocks of a safe and low-stress walking and biking route, focusing on the Brentwood-Darlington neighborhood.”

Using a standard approach used elsewhere in the city, PBOT would build more neighborhood greenways to act as alternate routes to busy streets, then create safer crossings when the streets intersect.

PBOT is also leaving the possibility of bike lanes on the busy streets open. “Given the narrow busy streets in this district, where a Corridor Improvement project calls for enhanced bike lanes, parking removal on one or both sides of the street will often be necessary,” the plan states. The plan recommends which streets should have new or enhanced bike lanes, though in most cases no cross sections for these streets are included.

Like similar “In Motion” plans in other parts of the city, PBOT has recommended a set of transportation projects split into Tier 1 and Tier 2. One of the Tier 1 projects (estimated cost $800,000) would fill sidewalk gaps, improve crossings, and “enhance” existing bike lanes on 52nd Ave between Flavel and Duke. This section of 52nd is slated for repaving in 2025 — a project that “will be the key near-term opportunity” to make these changes a reality.

Another Tier 1 project is a $9.7 million upgrade to SE Woodstock between 52nd and I-205 that would tackle the dangerous off-set intersection at 69th, add protected bike lanes, and more.

The list of nine Tier 1 corridor improvement projects have an estimated cost of over $22 million. The seven recommended Tier 1 neighborhood greenway projects — with new greenways on Tolman and on 60th playing starring roles — have a total estimated cost of $6.1 million.

The plan also makes recommendations for bus service expansions and includes details on how to fund and implement all the projects.

What’s next

The plan is currently in “discussion draft” form which is a final step to garner public feedback before the “proposed draft is released.” That’s expected to happen in August when there will also be a public hearing at the Planning Commission before a final adoption by Portland City Council. Comments on the current draft are being accepted through June 23rd.

This is a thorough and (thoroughly) exciting plan for a part of town that has been left behind for too long! Take time to check out the plan and share your comments. Get all the links you need to learn more and comment here.