🚨 Please note: BikePortland is currently on hiatus and only publishing guest articles. Learn more here. Thank you. - Jonathan 🙏
The Portland Police Bureau sent three motorcycle cops to SE Clinton Street this morning to observe and enforce stop sign compliance at 34th and 21st Avenues.
According to Traffic Division Lieutenant Bryan Parman, the “enforcement mission” (a.k.a. sting) came after his office received a complaint via email last week from a nearby resident. Parman said,
“If I would have been a pedestrian or on a regular bike, I would have been dead…I feel like an attempt was made on my life. I told the cop I was assaulted but for some reason this was put on the backburner. They told me my case was placed at a low priority.”
— pedicab operator
Last Saturday night at about 2:30 a.m., a pedicab operator was allegedly run down by a man driving a late-model Mercedes while riding east on NW Davis Street in downtown Portland.
The woman, who has requested anonymity because she fears her safety and her job, says the impact from the collision caused her to “fly about twelve feet backwards through the air and land on the ground.”
A witness says the car was traveling at about 40 miles per hour. The impact left the pedicab smashed, but the woman was miraculously unhurt.
I spoke with the victim this morning and she is still in shock and disbelief — not just because of the crash and its aftermath, but because she feels the Police Bureau has not responded adequately to a situation she says could have easily ended in a fatality.
Lots of stop sign news at BikePortland headquarters today.
I spent my morning out at SE Water and Caruthers where city crews recently removed two stop signs that were deemed unnecessary, I just got off the phone with Traffic Division Lieutenant Bryan Parman about an “enforcement mission” (a.k.a. sting) at a stop sign on SE Clinton this morning, and I have been planning an update on the BTA’s Idaho Stop legislation.
The Portland Police Bureau Traffic Division has chosen a new captain. Officer Eric Hendricks, who has been in the bureau for 23 years and was most recently in charge of its Training Division, will now lead the Traffic Division.
Assistant Chief and former Traffic Division Captain Larry O’Dea shared the news with me yesterday and O’Dea said he’ll personally introduce Hendricks at a tonight’s meeting of the City of Portland Bicycle Advisory Committee.
An Open House is scheduled for the unveiling of the latest document — the Gateway Green Bicycle Concept Plan. We hope you will join us at that event:
Gateway Green Open House
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
7:00 pm to 8:30 pm
Gateway Elks Lodge
711 NE 100th Ave
Portland, OR
[Located two blocks south of the Gateway MAX station]
Soon these pages will have information about the proposed project and the Friends group. We’ll include maps, photos, volunteer opportunities — and copies of documents like the Vision Plan, and the recently completed Bicycle Concept Plan.
Filmed by Bike Opening Night
April 17 from 6pm – 1am
Clinton Street Theater, SE 26th and Clinton
7:00, 9:00, 11:00 screenings
The Ruckus in the Street program shows at all Friday screenings
21+ for all shows on Friday.
New Belgium Street Party outside the festival is open to all ages.
$8-15 sliding scale for the movies, street party is free
$15 gets you two complimentary raffle tickets and the signature Filmed by Bike sticker.
Doors open 30 minutes before the show. Line forms one hour before the show. You may only buy one ticket at a time and you must have your ID. CASH ONLY.
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We’re getting our week-long festival started right with the Opening Night Throwdown. Come inside to watch the movies (21+) and stay outside for the New Belgium Street Party, all ages and FREE! Though it’s all ages, the street party is a decidedly adult atmosphere.
NEW BELGIUM STREET PARTY
Come party in the street with us for the New Belgium Street Party. We’re opening up Clinton Street between 25th and 26th for our very own party with a beer garden, entertainers, music and more.
EMBRACE THE LINE- COME EARLY
Every year the Opening Night Throwdown screenings have sold out, so this year we added in an additional screening at 11pm. We suggest you come an hour early to get in and to have time to hang out at the New Belgium Street Party. Embrace the line; meet a new friend. Tickets go on sale a 1/2 hour before the screening time, so you can buy your ticket and hang out.
Shows are 21+ so you must have your ID and you can only buy a ticket for yourself. CASH only.
If you’re concerned about getting in, you should really consider buying one of our VIP Access Packs and come in style.
EMBRACE THE LINE
So, yeah, there is a line to get in. A line of awesomeness. Embrace the line. Make a friend. Meet the people you’re standing next to. Drink a beer – yes, you can do that in the line.
MORE INFO
Filmed by Bike: April 17-23
Clinton Street Theater
[Editor’s note: This story was written by BikePortland News Intern Dan Liu. Stay tuned for more photos and stories from Dan!]
Last fall, North Portland bike repair and tool co-op Bike Farm celebrated its one-year anniversary by moving into a new space — one where the young non-profit now must make rent.
In other words, “We’re excited for the summer,” says Bike Farm’s volunteer analyst Momoko Saunders. “We really hope that the bike community will come out and support us as the weather gets better.”
At their new location in a former hair salon on 305 NE Wygant St., (their old location had been a donated residential garage off Alberta), Bike Farm has officially survived the winter slow-season thanks to individual memberships, donations, and volunteers’ sweat.
Opening a new retail business in the midst of an historic economic downturn isn’t exactly a safe bet, especially when there’s not a very big existing market for your product. But that didn’t stop Wake Gregg from opening Portland’s first all-electric bicycle store, The eBike Store (201 N. Alberta), last week.
BikePortland Neighborhood Get Together: Powellhurst
When: Monday, April 20th, 5pm – 7:30pm
Where: The Rumpus Room, 10555 SE Division
Details:
Anyone who lives, works, commutes, or otherwise spends time in outer Southeast Portland is invited to join us.
This is an informal social event for people invested in biking to meet each other, talk shop, compare notes, and generally have a fun evening. Come discuss bike routes, connections, and pavement maintenance, the new MAX light rail line under construction in the neighborhood, and more.
These monthly get togethers are in a different neighborhood each month. So far we’ve visited St. Johns in February and Multnomah Village (with 50 attendees!) in March. Both were great chances to meet people we generally only interact with online, and to learn firsthand about issues in parts of Portland we don’t regularly visit.
You’re invited to our next BikePortland Neighborhood Get Together in the Powellhurst neighborhood of outer Southeast Portland — that’s right, we’re going east of I-205.
Anyone who lives, works, commutes, or otherwise spends time in outer Southeast Portland is invited to join us.
This is an informal social event to meet each other, talk shop, compare notes, and generally have a fun evening. Come discuss bike routes, connections, and pavement maintenance, the new MAX light rail line under construction in the neighborhood, and more.
Last week, we published an interview with Portland Cascadia Pedicabs owner Ryan Hashagen. In it, Hashagen shared serious concerns about new policies being crafted by the City of Portland’s Revenue Bureau that would bring pedicabs under regulation for the first time.
Hashagen told BikePortland, and many other local media outlets, that if the regulations went forward as currently proposed he (and other pedicab company owners and pedicab operators) would “cease to operate”*. Hashagen feels that they have not had enough time to digest proposed changes and influence the policy-making process.
As part of our ongoing look at the City of Portland’s Bicycle Master Plan update process, I thought it might be fun to take a look at some of the new bicycle infrastructure ideas being considered for use in Portland.
The City has published a draft of their “Suggested/recommended Bikeway Facility Types”. Many of them won’t be news to most of you — stuff like bike boulevards, sharrows, and bike lanes are old hat. But what’s neat about the Bike Master Plan Update project is that it’s an opportunity to get some new types of facilities into the city’s toolbox.