The latest sign of Washington County’s burgeoning bike scene is a group protest ride planned at the end of May that organizers are calling a “Critical Mass party ride.” Details are still being finalized, but according to the group organizing the ride, the plan is to assemble as many riders as possible and roll en masse from Beaverton to Hillsboro. The route will intentionally use major arterials typically dominated by car users.
A group ride of this nature, planned specifically as a large-scale protest of cycling conditions and an attempt to bring about political change, will be a first for the westside.
Critical Mass, which began in 1992 in San Francisco, holds a significant place in American cycling history. The event galvanized cycling activists and helped push for safer cycling conditions in cities worldwide. Portland’s Critical Mass happened weekly from 1993 to 2007. It fizzled out (even after an attempt to revive it in 2014) as many of its organizers opted to pull different levers of cycling activism that didn’t require an overly policed, high-profile protest in peak-hour traffic.
“A piece of paint on a 55 mph road is not enough for a family to feel comfortable enough to want to go on a ride.”
– Rob Lewis, Ride Westside
Critical Mass almost never happens in suburban areas like Beaverton and Hillsboro in Washington County, but it’s not for lack of demand. Bike advocacy groups are typically more conservative in suburbs and activists who would be interested in protest rides are spread over a wide distance and lack a central, dense commercial area or meeting place they can all identify with. However, as cities like Tigard, Beaverton and Hillsboro have grown in recent years, so has the esprit de corps among a new guard of advocates who feel they’ve been left with no other choice to get their messages across.
“Yes, we’re in a suburb of Portland,” said Ride Westside volunteer Rob Lewis in an interview Monday. “But we still have a boatload of cyclists out here — there’s people out here with families that would love to cycle with their kids — but they don’t feel safe.” Lewis said the upcoming ride was born from conversations at the Westside Bike Happy Hour gathering, a event he organizes that has met twice a month since last July at a food cart pod across the street from Beaverton City Hall.
I could hear the frustration in Lewis’ voice in our conversation yesterday. He cited an increase in crashes involving bike riders and walkers in recent years and a feeling of bureaucratic barriers to better bicycling within Washington County government.
“In the west suburbs we don’t have a Springwater [Corridor] trail. We have segments of a Springwater scattered across the whole county, with no connections and separated by five lanes of pavement where the only infrastructure is a piece of paint,” he said. “There’s a ton of big, mean roadways here in the west suburbs that, sure, they have a bike lane; but a piece of paint on a 55 mph road is not enough for a family to feel comfortable enough to want to go on a ride.”
Lewis says his frustrations are shared by fellow members of Ride Westside and he’s heard widespread support for a mass ride from people who show up to Bike Happy Hour.
“I see a Critical Mass and party ride as a fun way to bring the cycling community on the westside together and push for some positive change,” Lewis said. “We’re not here to antagonize the community. We’re here to celebrate cycling and hopefully bring about some effective change in our bureaucratic direction.”
Lewis, in his mid-30s, cut his teeth in cycling activism by participating in large rides in Portland when he moved here from the midwest in 2016. He’s never done a Critical Mass ride, but he understands its history and intent. And while he says he doesn’t want to antagonize anyone, Lewis is also not shying away from the consequences of putting a large group of people on bikes on roads with just a narrow — or nonexistent — bike lane. Lewis clearly wants attention for cycling, but hopes starting the ride on a Saturday morning and hosting a party at the end will balance out any of the unwanted kind.
Since the ride will be on major roadways without a parade or protest permit, the plan is to have volunteers on the ride who will use their bodies and bikes to “cork” vehicular traffic at intersections and make sure the entire mass of riders can get through signals without breaking up into smaller groups.
In the end, Lewis sees the ride as an evolutionary step for the bike scene on the westside. “Clearly, there are cyclists out here. So let’s bring that community together and let’s develop our community out here.”
— The Westside Critical Mass Party Ride is set for Saturday, May 31st at 9:00 am. Follow Ride Westside and see the ride listing on the Shift Calendar for updates.
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This is a great idea, but WHY 9am on a Saturday? At least have it in the afternoon or evening like Pedalpalooza party rides. I would love to attend this but that early in the morning makes me skeptical that the turnout would be sufficient for safety on those stroads.
Most cities in NC do their CM rides on the last Friday evenings of every month, but we’ve heard of other communities who do it on the last Saturday morning. It’s sort of the same thing with the annual Ride of Silence – most cities do it on the traditional 3rd Wednesday in May – but Philadelphia does it the following Saturday morning. It’s “tradition” versus the hard realities of community organizing.
It basically boils down to who you want to impact and who you want to participate. Friday evenings have a lot more drunken revelers and drivers, but also a lot more (fearless) younger adults participating; Saturday mornings will more likely get (Interested but concerned) families participating and the drivers impacted out there will also more likely include families out shopping and recreating.
I have never understood why police would ever have any opinion about CM other than support for it – CM helps everyone to better understand traffic laws and encourages traffic safety by all users – and our local CM has yet to have any negative confrontation with our local police, or other drivers for that matter.
NC is a wet climate all year around, so instead of CM “wet or shine” we instead have a “rain date” for the following (first) Friday, just in case.
As someone who lives on the westside and a local advocate the thought of a Critical Mass ride in the suburbs excites and scares me. We desperately need to show numbers and outrage as Washington County constantly designs and builds bike infrastructure with malicious compliance for federal funding. To ride from Beaverton to Hillsboro you have no good options, and the options that do exist have you sitting at red lights for 30+ minutes of the trip because the lights are all timed for fast cars. I found you hit every single one on a bike, and it is hard for me to get frustrated on a bike but making that trip does that to me. Then there is the danger, where I found on every trip I was guaranteed to have at least one close call even when riding defensively and following all the laws. I have given up trying to make it work, and for my commute from Tigard to Hillsboro I either ride the MAX from Beaverton to Hillsboro or add 5 miles to go through the country side. Through the countryside, while longer and with the same elevation, takes 20 minutes less due to the red lights.
I know these transportation planners are afraid of constitutes that are going to rail against any inconvenience while driving. Please be aware that if you give in and make things more dangerous for everyone else outside of a car for marginal faster speeds or trip times, you are locking us into car dependency. What is really happening? Does everyone drive so we don’t need to really consider walking/biking modes OR everyone drives because we don’t consider walking/biking and it is now dangerous and humiliating to do so?
I’ll be showing up. We might get arrested, but I have a lawyer and this the fight we need to fight.
Why on earth would you get arrested?!?
Because it’s happened before? Critical mass is at its essence a protest that blocks traffic, something that is against the law.
Source. And that is in Portland. If you ride out in the ‘burbs, you’d know that there are plenty of cops out here who think people who ride bicycles are a danger to society and would love to arrest them.
Washington County sheriff will probably show up and try and shut it down. To show they are serious, they may even arrest some corkers.
***comment deleted because it was unnecessarily mean. Please clean your comments up and be nicer if you want to continue taking part. Thanks. -Jonathan***
I said it was a Stupid idea to block traffic in Beaverton and it is.
It is not what the promoters of this ride would like to happen.
I did not call the person stupid.
Its your site but I stand by the statement which you completely mischaracterize.
Hi J1mbO,
I disagree a bit. I think the reason the police in Portland were so excited to crack down on Portland Critical Mass is because they had been convinced it was some sort of anarchistic plot and they refused to see it as merely a bike ride protest. And in my observations, when there’s more of an extreme political view it is met with a more extreme police reaction — therefore in Portland we can expect police to be more forceful because of the local political dynamics and in the ‘burbs we could expect police to be less forceful because of the local political dynamics.
Thank you Jonathan. That is a a reassuring bit of history. I mostly took part in CM in the SF Bay Area, and by my time the events were escorted by the police and there were thousands of riders. The history of CM there is long, storied, and full of conflict. Pedalpalooza is way more better imo, but we don’t have anything like that in the ‘burbs.
I generally have no issues with police in Tigard and we even have a few bike police out here. However, I have had some interactions with local police that are of a similar vein to those of [Shannon’s out in Hillsboro](https://bikeportland.org/2023/08/03/family-biking-a-cop-admonished-me-for-taking-the-lane-377754). These interactions have colored my vision of them somewhat, and I do view them as an active deterrent towards new cyclists in these areas. I have not had those first hand interactions with police in Portland, although I have heard rumors.
Since the event may land on a Saturday, I am not sure how critical mass it would be which typically were required to be done during rush hour, but am looking forward to it nevertheless.
Who makes the rules for a supposedly leaderless semi-spontaneous ride?
I was on several of the most eventful CM rides in Portland. The stated intent of the ride was to ride lawfully and plentifully (and without a parade permit) to assert our right to be on the street, and to show that “we are traffic”.
Things tended to get out of hand when riders made a big show of deviating from that plan, for example riding in oncoming traffic, standing in the street after being told to get on the sidewalk, etc. The lack of a parade permit also became an issue at some point (though I never really understood why that rankled City Hall so much.)
If the folks riding in the planned CM ride are riding at least approximately legally without making a big production of flaunting traffic rules, I expect a very chill (but not chilly) reaction all around. I’m not sure which side of the line corking falls onto, but I suspect it’s context specific. If the cops do show up and people are riding illegally, I’d expect a ticket, not an arrest, unless they’re doing something that goes well beyond a traffic violation.
Biking just isn’t the flashpoint it was in the past.
You know what, I agree with you. I think I overreacted a bit.
What goals does this aim to accomplish? He claims it is to bring people together and won’t antagonize the community but “the community” of normal people will not receive this positively. Beaverton police and Washington County sheriff don’t play.
Why not? Unless the riders are deliberately antagonistic, I think folks will just get on with their day. Most likely, they won’t “receive” it at all.
If 100 people show up, invite some politicians to show them the level of support for bicycling in the community.
You are correct, in most communities the local police simply won’t care, they’ve got bigger fish to deal with. It’s only in a few very selective cities nationwide where riders and police antagonize each other (such as in Portland). Most people in your community won’t even hear about the ride, let alone see it, and of those who do, they’ll likely think it’s some sort of harmless charity ride.
I’ve seen many holier-than-thou “cycling clubs” publicly ridicule any local CM efforts, yet when the clubs do group rides they also cork, ride through inconvenient red lights, block car traffic, and so on – they simply are opposed to the term “Critical Mass” which they see as a liberal bicycle conspiracy.
I am not one of the organizers, but I assume the goal is to bring more cyclists into the advocacy loop in a fun and engaging way. Most of us need to be invited into the advocacy community before we start to take further steps. I’m a “normal person” in Beaverton and I am receiving this positively.
At least I can report that there has been slow, but discernible progress on the 6-mile Council Creek Regional Trail to connect Forest Grove and the MAX Blueline in Hillsboro. The old rails and sleepers are gone and the road crossings have been crudely paved. This East-West segment is due to be completed in 2028. Eventually it will connect to the Banks-Vernonia Trail for a total length of 15 miles (who knows when?)
https://ccrtdesign.washcoopenhouses.org/
and
https://www.hillsboro-oregon.gov/home/showpublisheddocument?id=7217
This looks like an awesome trail, but does it mean that extending the Blue Line to Forest Grove is permanently off the table?
If it’s like what’s shown in the photo, I predict a pleasant and unremarkable ride.
Please report back!
‘Latest sign of life’ – why does Jonathan always sound so disconnected from reality when he writes about or discusses cycling west of I405? There’s plenty of life. Broaden your world view.
haha no harm meant by that but I can see why you’d take offense. I’ll reconsider that and going forward will be more careful.
It is Bikeportland and not bikewashingtoncounty but it does seem a big miss since the largest and best Group road rides in the area are in Washington county.
I had no idea the West Side was so punk. I might need to cross the river to check out the conversations at their happy hours. Good for them!
Maybe this is Portland/Oregon exceptionalism, but I’ve always thought that one of the great strengths of our area is that the suburbs are actually pretty good. There’s lots of really nice walkable downtowns and relatively well-connected street grids. Towns like Milwaukie, Gresham, Tigard, or Hillsboro are nice places to visit in their own right. The new suburbia that’s going up – while definitely far from perfect – is much more pleasant than a lot of the new neighborhoods going up in places like Arizona or Idaho.
I used to have a job that had me commuting from the Tabor area all the way out to Troutdale. I did it most of the time with a bike + bus combo. For the 3ish miles I’d ride through Troutdale, I found it very pleasant. Although there isn’t much in the way of formal bike infrastructure, I created my own routes through neighborhood streets. Drivers here are also, by and large, much more respectful of people on bikes than a lot of other places in the country. I think that a little bit of investment in traffic calming and better stroad crossings in the suburbs could go a long way. The west side is unique, too, with the scattered trail system that has the potential to be connected to a region-spanning, low-stress bike network.
Anyway, good on these folks! Looks like a cool and fun ride. Hope they get a good turnout!!