New plan for 82nd Avenue leaves bike riders out of the picture

Let’s play a game: Look at the City of Portland’s concept for the future of 82nd Avenue in the image above and try to find a bicycle. I’ll wait.

Every mode besides the bicycle is clearly represented in the drawing, but you need to look very closely and use x-ray vision to see a few bikes hidden behind a tree in the center left. Meanwhile, the Portland Bureau of Transportation is so eager to show that car users will still have access to all five lanes they placed three drivers in “Bus Only” lanes. Sigh.

This drawing is from PBOT’s Building a Better 82nd Avenue Plan that was unanimously adopted by Portland City Council on December 4th. We knew PBOT wasn’t going to include dedicated bike facilities on 82nd Avenue. We first reported that fact almost two years ago and followed-up back in August with a story that made it official. The council hearing two weeks ago was another opportunity for PBOT to explain their rationale, and for Portlanders and city council members to weigh in.

In a presentation on the plan, PBOT Planner Julia Reed told Mayor Ted Wheeler and the rest of council that bicycle use on 82nd is a lower priority than other uses due to its lower classification compared to other modes in our Transportation System Plan. Even so, PBOT considered it. They ran the traffic numbers on converting the outermost lane to a protected bike lane and found it wasn’t workable, due to transit delays and automobile diversion. So the PBOT plan will focus instead on cycling improvements on nearby neighborhood greenways, then make sure there are safe crossings and access points across and onto 82nd.

PBOT calls their cycling approach a “bicycle ladder” strategy. Imagine the sides of the ladder being bike-friendly streets on either side of 82nd, with the rungs of the ladder being the crossings.

“We explored the possibility of incorporating dedicated protected bike lanes,” Reed explained at council. “But modeling showed that would result in the Line 72 bus [the busiest line in Oregon] facing major congestion — a more than 50% travel time delay.” In the plan itself, PBOT says their modeling showed the installation of a protected bike lane would also “lead to significant automobile diversion.”

Hearing PBOT so clearly pit transit against bicycling (an unforced error in my opinion) was music to the ears of Commissioner (and council member-elect) Dan Ryan. “I’m enjoying this!” he exclaimed at one point while clarifying with Reed that there would be no dedicated bike access on 82nd Ave. Ryan has long advocated for getting bike users off major roads. He sees streets less as community-builders and more as corridors for commerce and believes it was a mistake for PBOT to install protected bike lanes on SE Division and often cites business owners who agree with him.

“I think sometimes in Portland we try to put too many modes of transportation in a small space,” he said before voting “aye” on the plan. “And we’re not connected to the reality of the importance of arterials to move goods and services around which everyone wants. So I think you’re striking a really great balance.”

Thomas Ngo, board chair of The Street Trust, also expressed support for the plan during his invited testimony. He spoke about how he lives nearby and how dangerous it is to cross 82nd or access its transit stops. He made no mention of the bicycling issue. 

Two leaders from Bike Loud testified at the council meeting and expressed strong disappointment in the plan. Bike Loud Vice Chair Kiel Johnson said, “We are concerned that this plan fails to meet our most basic transportation priorities,” he said. “What you’re being asked to approve today does not include a plans to have a continuous ADA compliant sidewalk, or any bicycle facilities, or a street layout that will create the safe, vibrant Main Street the east Portland community has been asking for.” Johnson said if PBOT really wants to save lives and reach its transportation goals, they should “repurpose car lanes”. He likened this opportunity to the choice former Oregon Governor Tom McCall faced in the 1960s when he decided to remove Harbor Drive and create Waterfront Park. “All the transportation planners told him removing the freeway would lead to ‘carmageddon’… but they decided to buck their own transportation planners and remove the freeway, because it was the right thing to do.”

Kiel and Bike Loud Chair Aaron Kuehn both testified that the lane cross-section outlined in the 82nd Avenue Plan does not comply with Oregon’s Bike Bill, which requires transportation agencies to provide adequate cycling facilities whenever a major road reconstruction or repaving project takes place (and which they know something about as representatives of plaintiffs in a pending lawsuit against the city for not following it).

Kuehn says the plan replaces 82nd Avenue with essentially the same cross-section it has today. At the least, he believes 82nd should have a shared bike/bus lane. Kuehn wants a dedicated bus lane on the entire seven-mile corridor and an explicit acknowledgement that bicycle riders are permitted to ride in it if they choose (much like riders do on current Rose Lanes on Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd and elsewhere)

Kuehn points to current Biketown data that shows a significant amount of people using bikes and electric scooters on 82nd (and its sidewalks). He wants to see the street re-classified as a Major City Bikeway in the TSP to bring it up to par with other modes. Kuehn has sketched out two cross-sections showing how bike riders can be accommodated on 82nd: One shows the shared bus lane, the other shows a bike lane that’s protected from car drivers by a bus lane buffer.

The future of the bus lane is still up in the air. There’s a separate process currently underway to determine exactly what type of transit facility 82nd gets.

Oregon Walks Executive Director Zachary Lauritzen is closely tied to this project, having received sizable city grants to organize support for new sidewalks. He didn’t take a position on whether or not 82nd should have bike access, but he made it clear he’s disappointed PBOT isn’t opening up the conversation about the lane configuration. “The community really wants to have that conversation [about lane dedication],” Lauritzen said. “They want to know what the future of 82nd Avenue looks like. They want it to be slower. They want there to be fewer cars, and they want it to be safer.”

Reed emphasized that there’s nothing in the adopted plan that dictates the type of bus lane that’s ultimately built on 82nd Avenue, or whether or not we allow bike riders on it. I’m reminded of a conversation I had with TriMet Planner Michael Kiser about this subject back in June 2023: “I’d like to say, ‘We did Division, now let’s go bigger’ But we don’t control the right-of-way and want to work with our partners.” Those partners on Portland City Council will be much different starting January 1st. Whether or not they’ll be willing to have this conversation remains to be seen.