I know it’s late, but I didn’t have time to get this one finished before I left The Shed around 2 today, so here it is!
It was so fun having Taylor Griggs back in the shed. Remember Taylor? She wrote for BikePortland from late 2021 to May of last year and then the Portland Mercury scooped her up. I only have a few minutes, so I’ll cut to the chase (and won’t capitalize)…
This episode is chock full of great stuff: Fake bike lane citations -under-designed bike lanes – a green ribbon bike network – riding to Troutdale for ice cream – exercise and e-bikes – portland tennis courterly – prank calls – SK Northwest and the Springwater trail saga – I-5 Rose Quarter
Links we mention:
- Deflating tires in the name of climate change
- Why e-bikes don’t give you “legs of steel”
- New path in Troutdale that Taylor rode
- New Biketown e-scooters
- Portland Tennis Courterly home page
- Jonathan’s op-ed on street racing
And here’s a pic of the fake citation Taylor’s friend is giving drivers:
Thanks for listening!
Listen above or wherever you get your podcasts. Have a great weekend and see you back here on Monday.
Thanks for reading.
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I liked Taylor’s column and discussion of the new inner eastside bike facility updates. One other update I’d love to see PBOT take on at that intersection of Sandy & 11th (where they just put in the traffic signals, took out one lane of car traffic on Ankeny, and added a little bike lane protection), is just making that block between 11th/12th a car free plaza. It’s between a bar and that weird little green triangle that has a billboard on it (again super underutilized green space). Currently it’s bi-directional for bikes and one way going west for cars. It doesn’t really make sense as a one-way for cars because there’s no reason a car would take a left on 12th to get onto Sandy going the opposite direction, and the traffic coming from ankeny is already cut off at 14th (so maybe some small amount of people in those apartments?). The only reason people are going to be turning into that area now is to use it as essentially a free parking lot outside of Workers Tap which doesn’t seem like a great use. The bar Workers Tap is a great bar and already have a Sunday all day “bike happy hour,” installed new bike parking, and have said they would be fully supportive of that becoming a new plaza without cars. I know they’ve pushed back on making these plazas without a bunch of businesses there, but I’m sure there intention in these upgrades wasn’t to create a weird little parking lot either. Just seems like it could continue to make Ankeny a real happening bikeway and unite the street that hosts BOTH the official Bike Portland Bike Happy Hour and the unofficial one at Workers Tap who’s shown they want to be more of a friend of the bike community 🙂
Garry oak for native backyard tree! I have one.
CIRCUIT COURT PARKING CITATION OFFICE
P.B.O.T. Park in Bike lane Obtain Ticket
Portland, Oregon 97207-0178
the ticket envelope is 8.5″ x 3.5″
https://www.oregonlive.com/commuting/2015/01/portland_has_written_900000_pa.html
ScootPortland
Jonathan, did I hear you “right”? That you are now pro-street racing? And it’s like just another Pedal Palooza event?! (If yes, then your stance has shifted a lot since your 2021 post.)
I’m not pro street racing. Absolutely not. I’m just trying to express how I respect the spirit and impetus behind some of these activities — not the racing aspect — but the intersection takeovers and meetups and hangouts. I think it’s important for folks to consider other perspectives in terms of why people are drawn to this stuff and what it is. And in some ways it is very similar to why folks like Pedalpalooza rides: It’s about camaraderie and community and loving people who love what you love and a need to reject authority and take over public space and go against the paradigm. I think by understanding it better and being open to why it’s popular, will help us find the most productive way to respond to it. It’s a very complicated issue to address and I don’t think it helps much to just get mad and wish it away and/or just tell police to go and shut it down (not that you are saying that, I’m just saying that’s what I feel like some people say).
I don’t find it helpful to paint all Pedalpalooza rides with such broad strokes. Most do not “reject authority” or “take over public space”– we ride ride legally and respectfully. They are simply bike rides, focused on history or nature or camping or eating pizza.
I for one have zero interest in the WNBR, which seems to be what you’re referring to, because that ride in particular has a history of abusive and disruptive behavior. In that case the comparison is apt: it’s a bunch of selfish people doing their best to irritate and antagonize their fellow Portlanders. Just like the people who bemoan the bad association that “car culture” has to deal with due to street racing, the bike community is judged unfairly because a bunch of drunk people find it amusing to get naked and form an IRL troll mob.
Maybe I’m late to the punch on this one but I finally had the opportunity to listen to this episode of the pod. I am glad ya’ll discussed the Biketown scooters because they’ve been on my mind (and my sidewalks lol) at lot lately.
My gut reaction, like a lot of people, is to hate them. For one, as you mentioned, they are fun but scary. The tiny wheels paired with our terrible pavement and someone who is taller/heavier is a recipe for disaster. As a tall person myself, I feel much safer and more stable on a bicycle any day of the week. They also don’t have a basket like the bikes do, which takes away some of the utility.
I am also anxious that the scooter rollout means they’ll take away the – already difficult to find – bikes. Despite the high cost, I use Biketown pretty frequently in place of Uber/Lyft, when I take my bikes to the shop, or to fill in gaps in night-time TriMet service. So for me personally, a pivot to scooters would be a huge hit to my ability to get around without a car.
There’s also a big part of me that is just being an old curmudgeon about scooters in general. I do have this image seared into my mind of drunk people zipping around downtown exhibiting irresponsible and belligerent behvior – sidewalk riding, going the wrong way on one-ways, riding in front of MAX (!), etc.
The last couple weeks I’ve been really trying to pay attention to the scooter riders I see while I’m out. My thinking has changed a bit because I do see the vast majority of people on scooters using them in a safe and sane way to get around.
I think the problems with Biketown/Lime could be solved in a couple ways. One is the pricing model. Pricing should be distance-based, rather than time based. It is frustrating having to wait 5 minutes for a light to change (like at the Division-Ladd-20th mess), knowing that you’re being charged for it. I think the time-based pricing incentivizes risky and dangerous behavior and makes it hard to predict how much it will cost to get somewhere. I think incorporating some good old-fashioned pedal only bikes into the system would help as well. If they were a lot cheaper (and cheaper to maintain), I’d be more inclined to take one of those for the short 1-2 mile trips.
The other is bigger, but maybe more important. It’s the infrastructure. Every downtown street should have a straightforward, 2-way protected bike lane. It’s insane how convoluted the current bike network downtown is. People complain about how ‘confusing’ it is to drive downtown, but trying to find a bike route from one end to the other that doesn’t involve sharing a lane with 3-ton SUVs is a massive headache. Biking/scooting downtown should be exactly as simple as walking is. It might not stop all the bad scooter behavior but I think it would seriously reduce it.
I have been spending a lot of time downtown at all hours lately, and it’s crazy how little congestion there truly is. Burnside gets really backed up but I think that coverting one lane to a bikeway on every street other than Burnside would have little to no effect on car traffic. They could just have bike use the walk/don’t walk signs as signals too, no need to expensive signal rebuilds. Just put down some curbs, paint, and a few signs.
I’ve seen Central City in Motion, so I know what’s planned. It is a marginal improvement, but still upholds the status quo of good bike routes being insider knowledge.
The other part of the infrastructure equation is just bringing neighborhood greenways up to a state of good repair. It’s crazy how bad the pavement is on the backbone of our bike network. Smooth pavement and a few diverters are really all most of the greenways need.