4/25: Hello readers and friends. I'm still recovering from a surgery I had on 4/11, so I'm unable to attend events and do typical coverage. See this post for the latest update. I'll work as I can and I'm improving every day! Thanks for all your support 🙏. - Jonathan Maus, BikePortland Publisher and Editor
This weekend the 50 acres of land around Alpenrose Dairy in Portland’s southwest hills will be teeming with cyclocross racers and fans. The hills, kitschy village, and velodrome have provided a route for the kickoff event of the River City Bicycles Cyclocross Crusade for many years. This year a dark cloud has hung over Alpenrose as race organizers worried that a sale of the dairy would result in them being kicked out for good.
We’ve been on the car-housing beat for many years now, so when housing expert and Sightline reporter Michael Andersen says he’s never seen a more clear-cut example of how Portland can choose housing for people or housing for cars, I think it’s worth your attention.
Andersen just published a story about a policy in front of Portland City Council today that would reform “mid-density zones”. Among the details of the Bureau of Planning & Sustainability’s Better Homes By Design proposal is one that Andersen finds “almost shocking its clarity.”
I’ll let Andersen explain (emphasis mine):
Portland mayoral candidate Sarah Iannarone is no stranger to bold ideas. She spent years working at Portland State University leading educational tours for visiting leaders that focused on our city’s legacy of transformative urban planning decisions.
Now, as Iannarone campaigns to unseat Mayor Ted Wheeler, she’s unveiled a “Climate Justice” policy plan that would be transformative in its own right. Iannarone’s “Green New Deal” plan (PDF) comes out just two weeks after a City of Portland report found that carbon emissions from the transportation sector are “increasing dramatically.”
The City of Portland says they’re all set to start building a set of safety updates at a tricky, off-set intersection on the Tillamook Neighborhood Greenway.
Comments about transportation safety made on Twitter last week by Portlander Tiana Tozer have raised eyebrows. While her Twitter account is not an official ODOT communications channel (her profile says, “Opinions are my own”), Tozer is ODOT’s Region 1 transportation safety coordinator and she sits on the Portland Bureau of Transportation Vision Zero Task Force.
Here’s what happened:
Tiana Tozer attended a City of Portland event at Ventura Park Thursday morning. Later that day she replied to a tweet of a video we posted from the event. When someone questioned the effectiveness of holding signs and asking drivers to slow down, Tozer replied: “Ho hum another entitled American sitting back watching people die, but he himself has no solution. How easy it is to criticize. God forbid you should be part of the solution. Don’t strain yourself.”
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Kids are back in school, the sun isn’t quite as sunny, and there’s a fall vibe in the air.
While summer has dropped off the back of the peloton, it’s still a beautiful time to ride bikes in Portland! If you’re looking for something to do, have a look at our ride and event selections below…
