This coming Tuesday, Salem lawmakers are holding a public hearing on Senate Bill 729. SB 729 is the “fixie bill” that is being proposed to clarify the legal language and shore up confusion around how the bicycle equipment requirement (ORS 815.280) should pertain to fixed-gear bicycles. Since Ayla Holland’s seminal case last July there has … Read more
Wednesday was the inaugural session of the new Share the Road Safety Class. This new class can be completed in lieu of paying fines for certain bicycle, pedestrian and motor vehicle infractions. BikePortland reader Lev Tsypin, who runs Level Online Strategy, was in that first class and wrote up an account of his experiences (edited … Read more
The City of Portland is holding a media event today (right now actually) for their “innovative” Share the Road Safety Class, the new diversion program you have already heard of. Today’s event marks the inaugural class session which happens tonight from 7-9 pm at Legacy Emanuel Hospital in north Portland.
Proposed development area.Click to enlarge graphic SK Northwest, a Portland-based retailer of jet-skis and personal watercraft, has submitted another proposal to develop a key parcel of Willamette riverfront land. The proposal was submitted to the Bureau of Development Services (BDS) on March 1st and once again, it does not include plans for a trail. You … Read more
What red light? Just a word of caution… this Wednesday (3/14) is the inaugural “Share the Road Safety Class.” This is the diversion class hosted by Trauma Nurses Talk Tough, that was recently made official and has been in the works since last June. It was set up to educate cyclists (and others) about traffic … Read more
A bill that would allocate $3.5 million in state lottery funds to the construction of two new velodromes in Oregon is kicking into high gear. Republican Senator Jason Atkinson is holding a round table strategy discussion today at the capitol building in Salem. Invited to the table are a diverse list of movers and shakers … Read more
The front page of today’s Metro section of the Oregonian has perhaps one of my favorite headlines ever; “In Oregon, bike culture isn’t partisan.” The story, by the O’s Salem staffer Harry Esteve, is about how Republican Senator Jason Atkinson is behind a bill that would re-word existing bicycle equipment requirements to exclude fixed-gear bicycles … Read more
[A new bill proposed by Oregon Sen. Jason Atkinson could bring a new velodrome to Portland. The Alpenrose Velodrome (shown above) is in need of expensive repairs and is not a year-round facility.]
The last, and most innovative of the BTA’s three legislative proposals is just one minor step from being an official bill. Their “vulnerable users” proposal will be turned into the House Judiciary Committee in Salem today. Here’s the official wording of the bill summary:
[via Amanda Fritz’s Blog] The Oregonian penned an editorial yesterday that says currently proposed cell phone bans are nothing but “trendy” and “frivolous” pieces of legislation.
[Without a new law, this is what some people must resort to.]
[Stop sign with in NE Portland.]Photo: zervas/Flickr This is the second of two posts offering different perspectives on whether or not we should work to change existing stop sign laws. In the first post in this series the author claimed that allowing bicycles to treat some stop signs as yields is a much safer and … Read more