The Mundo longtail cargo bike, sold by Yuba Bicycles, is popular for carrying all types of cargo; especially small children.
(Photos © J. Maus/BikePortland)
(Photos © J. Maus/BikePortland)
Oregon Senate says cab drivers should be exempt from cell phone law
“These are people who are struggling and their livings are made by whether or not they can pick folks up… This is their life.”
— Sen. Larry George, the bill’s sponsor
The Oregon legislature made a strange move on Monday that is very likely to make Portland roads less safe for everyone. By a vote of 19-11, the Senate passed a bill that adds yet another exception to the state’s existing cell phone law. Senate Bill 294, sponsored by Senator Larry George (R-Sherwood), allows a taxicab driver to use a “mobile communication device”, a.k.a. cell phone, while driving.
This is despite widespread evidence that using a cell phone while driving is very dangerous.
SB 294’s sponsor, Sen. Larry George (yes that Senator) got all 14 of his fellow Republicans to join him in supporting the taxicab exemption. The five Democrats who voted in favor of the bill included; Lee Beyer, Chris Edwards, Betsy Johnson, Ernie Roblan, and Chip Shields.
Job of the Week
Just one job on the BikePortland Job Listings this past week, but it looks like a good one…
- Bike Tour Guide/Operator – LifeCycle Adventures
Black Kona Smoke 2009
Year: 2009
Brand: Kona
Model: Smoke
Color:Black
Size:54
Stolen in Portland, OR 97205
Stolen:2013-03-20
Stolen From: 10th ave & SW Morrison outside “the galleria” (where the new Target is being built)
Neighborhood: Downtown
Owner: Ian Conway
OwnerEmail: Ianconway(replace with at sign)hotmail.com
Reward: Good karma & free hugs for life?
Description: Matte black Kona with black fenders and a rear rack. About a 54 (not 100% on the size, it was a little short for me)
Feel free to call me with any information. My numbers 203.219.4041
Police record with: Portland PD
Police reference#: 13-151862
This registrant does not have proof of ownership of this bike
Transportation wonks shine in trivia fundraiser
It was a packed out for the 2nd annual
Transportation Trivia fundraiser last night.
(Photo: Mary Nichols)
Transportation Trivia fundraiser last night.
(Photo: Mary Nichols)
Portland is full of transportation wonks (a.k.a. geeks or nerds) and last night it seemed like nearly every one of them was packed into the Radio Room. The event that brought them all together was Transportation Trivia Night, a fundraiser for the Community Cycling Center.
Dozens of local transportation experts, consultants, researchers, engineers, bureaucrats, students, advocates, citizen activists — and even a few members of the local media (including yours truly) — donated $10 to join the fun. Among the many smiling faces in the crowd were: ODOT Pedestrian and Bicycle Program Manager Sheila Lyons; citizen activist extraordinaire and former City Council candidate Chris Smith; BTA Executive Director Rob Sadowsky; Portland State University Associate Professor Kelly Clifton; Filmed by Bike Founder Ayleen Crotty; and Portland Mayor (and former City Transportation Commissioner) Charlie Hales.
Two local bike shops set to host fashion-focused events
Flyer for Giro New Road launch event in Portland.
Seems like everywhere you turn these days there’s news about bike fashion. Whether it’s featured at the National Bike Summit or making major news headlines, bike brands and major fashion labels are falling over themselves to get a piece of the growing apparel pie.
Portland is an epicenter of stylish cycling so it’s no surprise that we’ve got our share of fashion-focused events. Two of them have come on my radar recently…
This Friday River City Bicycles will host a launch event for Giro’s “New Road” apparel line. Giro, a brand known to most people for their helmets, launched their new clothing line late last month and it’s being called a potential “paradigm shift” by the bike media. A local rep for Giro explained the new line as, “Giro’s take on a changing the traditional road clothing (lycra jerseys and such) to something a bit more understated but still performance based.” New Road features merino jerseys that look more like business-casual t-shirts.
Williams Avenue project gets funded with $1.47 million state grant
Project rendering.
(Fat Pencil Studio for PBOT)
(Fat Pencil Studio for PBOT)
Changes are finally coming to North Williams Avenue.
After a long and arduous public process that began in January 2011, we can finally look forward to a host of much-needed traffic safety improvements on this busy bikeway corridor.
Yesterday in Salem the Oregon Transportation Commission approved a list of eleven projects that will improve biking and walking conditions across the state and among them is $1.47 million for the North Williams Avenue Traffic Operations and Safety project.
Tourism org uses bikes to sell Portland
Travel Portland, our city’s official tourism and marketing arm, has debuted a new video that highlights bicycling. The goal of the video (watch it below) is to entice tourists to come here by showing them how bicycling is such a large part of our local culture.
The video features copywriter and illustrator Alexander Barrett, who opens the 41 second ad with, “As one of the country’s most bikeable cities, Portland has a ridiculous amount of bikes.” He then goes through a bunch of different bike types including a tall bike, a cargo bike, and even the “Pedal Powered Talk Show” bike built by Portland-based Metrofiets and piloted by show host Boaz Frankel. Check it out:
A Portland road rage roundup
Keep calm and carry on.
(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)
(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)
I hate to do this.
I get a lot of emails, Tweets, and sometimes even phone calls about collisions, close-calls, and other scary incidents involving people on bicycles. The vast majority of the time I just take in the information in and do nothing about it. After all, there’s a lot of traffic out there and I don’t think every time a person on a bike has an unfortunate experience it merits a blog post.
Not only that, but I constantly debate with myself whether posting about these things will only create more fear among readers, when overall, riding a bike is not dangerous.
However, earlier this month I received three emails in less than one week that shared three different and equally troubling road rage incidents. Given that, I felt that the community should know. I’m sharing the emails verbatim below in hopes of raising awareness that intimidation and harassment remains a part of Portland’s transportation culture:
The Oregonian’s unfortunate letters about Hawthorne bike counter – UPDATED
Public opinion not based on facts.
The Oregonian published two letters in today’s paper that allow a falsehood to go unchecked and that further perpetuate the incorrect notion harbored by many readers of that publication that bike-related spending by the City of Portland is both bad policy and out of control (neither of which are true of course).
The letters came in response to a story about the Hawthorne Bike bike counter that ran online on Sunday (3/17) and also ran in Monday’s print edition (page A6).
The online version of the story, Portland bike counter: Nudging 1 million trips over the Hawthorne Bridge, mentioned “the city’s $20,000 bike counter,” in the opening lines. Much lower down, in a “quick facts” section of the story, the reporter noted (correctly) that the counter was “donated to the city by Cycle Oregon.”
Large Surly Long Haul Trucker 2012
Year: 2012
Brand: Surly
Model: Long Haul Trucker
Color:Large
Size:Dark Green
Stolen in Portland, OR 97266
Stolen:2013-03-20
Stolen From: SE 83rd and Duke
Neighborhood: Lents
Owner: J Justus
OwnerEmail: justus.jennifer(AT)yahoo.com
Description: Brown handlebar wrap was starting to come off.
This registrant has documented proof of ownership of this bike
New Portland-based crowdsourcing startup has local bike industry roots
Screenshot of CrowdSupply.com.
A Portland-based crowdfunding startup that launched this morning has strong cycling roots. Crowd Supply, a twist on the Kickstarter concept, was co-founded by noted web entrepreneur Lou Doctor and Scott Torborg. Doctor is also co-founder and Chairman of the Board at Velotech, which is the parent company of Western Bike Works, BikeTiresDirect.com and other e-commerce properties. Torborg is an MIT-trained hardware engineer and son of Jay Torborg, the co-founder and CEO of Velotech.
With these two and other “bike geeks” (as described by Crowd Supply Project Manager Patrick Croasdaile) on the Crowd Supply team, it should come as no surprise that two of the 10 initial projects launched by the company are bike-related. But before I get into those, it’s worth noting how Crowd Supply works.