Local traffic victims’ families will band together to form new voice for safety

kristi finney families for safe streets

Kristi Finney talks to fellow safety advocates Monday to plan the launch of Oregon and Southwest Washington Families for Safe Streets.
(Photo: M.Andersen/BikePortland)

A group of people who’ve lost family members on Portland-area streets has seen the success of their peers in New York City and is preparing to launch a similar organization here.

“I really am interested in behavior change, cultural change.”
— Kristi Finney

If you know anyone who has lost loved ones to traffic — whether the victim was walking, biking or driving — Oregon and SW Washington Families for Safe Streets is building its network in advance of a planned Nov. 15 launch.

Families for Safe Streets has been a key force behind New York’s rapid adoption of a Vision Zero policy that prioritizes traffic safety over traffic speed. This spring, NYC transportation advocate Paul Steely White told us he’d “never seen a campaign have so much influence over elected officials in such a sort time.”

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Photos and memories from our 10th birthday celebration

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A slice of the crowd at Velo Cult Friday.
(Photos: Margi Bradway unless noted)

Any room becomes a special place when it’s full of people you love and respect, and BikePortland’s 10th birthday party on Friday was one of the most special rooms we’ve had the honor of bringing together.

Nearly 300 people turned out. True to the spirit of the site, we welcomed citizen gadflies and academic brainiacs, bike-club party kids, family members of traffic-violence victims, indie framebuilders and a U.S. congressman.

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Advocate: October PBOT Bicycle Advisory Committee meeting agenda

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The PBOT Bicycle Advisory Committee monthly meeting is on October 13th at 6:00 in City Hall.

Check the agenda below:

Transportation System Plan Update: Stage 2
Stage 2 of the TSP update focuses on implementing the city’s Comprehensive Plan. This stage will focus on maps and classifications, performance measures (to identify how well the city’s proposals address comprehensive plan goals), looking to Transportation Demand Management and other measures to reduce traffic and parking impacts and consideration of how to manage automobile parking. Peter Hurley and Grant Morehead will discuss this stage 2 work.

TriMet’s track crossing proposals
Jennifer Koozer from TriMet will return to the BAC with Teresa Boyle and Jean Senechal- Biggs from PBOT to provide an update to their proposals for managing bicycle and pedestrian crossings of light rail and heavy rail tracks near Clinton Street.

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Industry Ticker: Bike N Hike stores up for sale as owner preps to retire

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Bike N Hike owner Kevin Chudy
(Photo: Linkedin)

According to a story last week in Bicycle Retailer & Industry Magazine (BRAIN), three bike shops in our region could close if a seller doesn’t step up.

Kevin Chudy, the owner of three Portland-area Bike N Hike stores, plans to retire at the end of this year after 31 years in the business. As part of that transition he’s looking to sell his stories in Milwaukie, Beaverton and Hillsboro.

Chudy, who won an Alice Award from the Bicycle Transportation Alliance in 2007, closed his 7,500 square-foot Portland location back in July 2014 because of declining sales.

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Future Topics-Community Benefits of Active Transportation

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I would like to see continued development in the link between transportation planning and improved health outcomes in our community. I don’t think the general public understands that investments in active transportation will save tax dollars–not just in transportation spending, but also in health spending, education spending (kids who exercise focus better), and more.

Bike Portland has certainly made me a better advocate on these issues over the years, and inspired me to follow the data in other forums as well.

For example, I attended a conference last week sponsored by We Can Do Better that included this address: “Transportation, Community Planning and Health Outcomes – Lawrence Frank, Ph.D. AICP, CIP, ASLA, Professor in Sustainable Transportation and Public Health at the University of British Columbia and President of Urban Design for Health, Inc.” Dr. Frank reported a study currently underway that will use ridership data from Trimet and a large healthcare system to look specifically at the health impact of the new Orange Line for people who live along that line (previous studies have shown that transit users exercise more). While it will be a couple of years (at least) before we see those results, it would be great to inform the biking community of these types of benefits.

Highlighting support from BTA, Novick will put local gas tax on May 2016 ballot

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Novick hopes second time’s a charm.
(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)

After dismissing it as too unpopular to even merit discussion prior to his last (failed) attempt to raise new revenue for transportation infrastructure, Commissioner Steve Novick now plans to put a 10-cent gas tax on the May 2016 ballot.

After a discussion about the proposal with community leaders today, Novick’s office sent out a press release exclaiming that, “Momentum builds for Portland gas tax to fund street repair and traffic safety.”

And in a marked departure from he and Mayor Charlie Hales’ previous strategy, Novick is not shying away from the “b” word (bikes).

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Mayor courts businesses as part of climate change push

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Screengrab of City website.

Portland Mayor Charlie Hales is appealing to local businesses in an effort to address climate change. As part of “Climate Week” which ran from September 21-25, he launched an effort to get at least 50 companies to “join the city in committing to reduce carbon emissions.”

This is an important initiative to watch for a few reasons. First, if Hales (and the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability) succeeds at creating a new coalition of businesses who care about climate change, it could morph into something that gives city council a counterbalance to the Portland Business Alliance — an organization that has tended to fight for the status quo of auto-dependence when it comes to transportation issues.

“There’s this notion that the City of Portland is green, but that the business community is opposed,” Hales said in an official statement. “That might have been true once, but not today. Today, members of our business community share our city’s values of equity and livability.”

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Suggestions for bikeportland

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As a huge fan of this website and everything you do, and with an eye to the changes that the new subcriber model might permit us to pursue, here’s a short list of things that would be fun to see:

(1) a better search function. The button has drifted a bit lately, I’d like to see it in the upper right corner which seems like a typical location. When you do search, the results are not organized by date, or much of anything else as far as I can tell. Would it be possible to crib a more sophisticated search algorithm, perhaps even with ‘advanced’ features from somewhere? This would make mining the archives so much more rewarding.

(2) an edit button for the comments. Perhaps this is expensive (I don’t know) but I do know that many, many commenters have expressed a desire for this.

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The Monday Roundup: Bike-oriented office building, India’s ‘village of widows’ & more

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bike office building

Would the hallway be one big ramp?
(Image: Steven Fleming via Treehugger)

Here are the bike-related links from around the world that caught our eyes this week:

All-bike office: What would an office building look like if it were designed around the assumption that everyone biked there?

Social distance: An excellent roundup of scientific studies into how your commute affects your life includes a haunting detail: “car commuting was associated with lower levels of social participation and general trust.”

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Job: Bicycle sales/mechanic – First City Cycles

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Job Title *
Bicycle sales/mechanic

Company/Organization *
First City Cycles

Job Description *
Are you obsessed with bikes and feel like you’re part of the bicycling community? If so, have we got the job for you! First City Cycles, located in downtown Oregon City, has an immediate opportunity for an experienced service technician and sales consultant. We’re looking for a team player with at least 3 years of in shop, and hands-on bike maintenance experience, who also enjoys bicycling, and talking bikes with customers. Our expanding shop is part of the community and the home base of the Oregon City Trail Alliance (OCTA), helping to build local bike parks, and trail systems to expand the joy of cycling in Oregon City, and Clackamas County. If you feel you want to be part of our team, please send your resume, and brief cover letter to: mark@fccycles.net. Preference will be given to applicants with experience of Specialized, Norco, or Kona brand products. Only qualified applicants will be contacted for interview. No phone calls please.

How to Apply *
Email resume and cover letter to: mark@fccycles.net

Tilikum Crossing may have boosted bike traffic already (corrected)

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Tilikum Crossing during Sunday Parkways last weekend.
(Photos: J.Maus/BikePortland)

Correction 10/5: Unfortunately, an earlier version of this post was based on inaccurate data. As explained in the comments by Portland Bicycle Planning Coordinator Roger Geller (and first noticed by reader Psyfalcon), the Hawthorne counter failed to capture eastbound bike data from Sept. 9 through the end of the month. This problem wasn’t noted on the city’s website but we should have noticed the east/west discrepancy and checked with the city before running this story.

This means it’s likely that the Tilikum has boosted total bike traffic across the Willamette, but that Hawthorne bike traffic hasn’t dropped by anywhere close to one-third. It’ll take several weeks to learn the truth. In the meantime, we regret the error. The original (incorrect) version of the post follows.

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With six kids and no car, this mom does it all by bike