BikePortland

Oregon is 8th state to officially endorse progressive street design guide

Key concepts in the NACTO guide.
(Photos: NACTO)

After a year and a half of lobbying, the Oregon Department of Transportation has formally recommended that its street designers look for ideas in one of the country’s most progressive bikeway design books.

The Urban Bikeway Design Guide by the National Association of City Transportation Officials was one of the country’s first official documents to include design elements like protected bike lanes, bike boulevards, floating bus stops and bike-specific traffic signals. Some of its concepts are already in Oregon’s in-house bikeway design guide, but NACTO has asked allied states and cities to endorse its guide in order to lend legitimacy to the designs in less progressive states.

Metro volunteer Randi Wexler passes out a survey card at the west end of the Tilikum Bridge.
(Photo by M. Andersen/BikePortland)

Have you been wondering why someone shouted questions to you as you rode across the Tilikum Bridge today?

Buffered Bike Lane with a bike symbol and arrow pointing forward

Freshly paved path from bridge to what will eventually be an off-highway connection to Willamette Park.
(Photo: Multnomah County)

Multnomah County has made major progress on the Sellwood Bridge project and at the start of next month they’ll flip the switch on a traffic change that will impact your bike ride.

The Portland Progress Dashboard.

Last week at the Ann Niles Transportation Lecture, Los Angeles Transportation Director Seleta Reynolds said the overwhelming majority of her job is good management, not the clever policymaking that everybody usually wants to talk about.

Here at BikePortland, we’re guilty of talking a lot about clever (or not so clever) policymaking. But this year, the Portland Bureau of Transportation is also going through some operational changes that are worth knowing about.

Under Director Leah Treat, PBOT is working to be more precise and public about the status of its many projects. And a new tool on its website looks a lot like a gimmick but is actually a pretty good new way to keep track of everything the city is up to.

Bike theft is a topic that gets lots of air play these days. We probably know the basic facts, but, curiously no one has so far produced a statistic that would help us understand the probability of having a properly U-locked bike stolen (here in town, or anywhere). Gerald Fittipaldi recently ventured that upwards of 95% of bikes stolen on the PSU campus were *not* locked with a U-lock, but beyond that all we hear are anecdotes. One would think that the Bike Theft Task Force would have some figures.

Vancouver is one of the busiest bike corridors in the city and the signal came as part of the N Williams Traffic Safety Project.

City press release below. More coverage to come…

PBOT, local organizations and community representatives to switch on new traffic signal at North Vancouver and Cook on October 14

(Oct. 12, 2015) On Wednesday, October 14, Portland Bureau of Transportation Director Leah Treat will join local businesses and community members to activate the new traffic signal at North Vancouver and Cook and highlight the positive impact of the North Vancouver Avenue and Cook Street Local Improvement District.

Read more

In their own words, here’s what Portlanders are saying about Clinton traffic diverters

Portland is at a crossroads..
(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)

In their open-ended comments about traffic diverters and speed bumps proposed for Southeast Clinton Street, one Portlander after another has chimed in to support the concept of making Portland’s most important bikeways more comfortable to bike on.

“Please fix things before my girlfriend moves to Detroit,” one frustrated Clinton Street user wrote.

As we reported last month, people who’ve participated in the city’s very public open house and its online survey have been overwhelmingly in favor of the diverters. But as fans and critics of the city’s plan both organize politically, the city has received memorable comments on both sides of the issue. Here’s a selection of what they said, lifted from results of the open house and online survey that we requested under the state’s open records law.

Starr Walker raced her bike yesterday,
and it was stolen just a few hours ago.
(Photo: PolerCX/Instagram)

Three seemingly unrelated bike thefts in the past four days have Portland’s close-knit racing community feeling frustrated and fed up.

It started Thursday night and we just got word of another bike stolen a few hours ago. In that period five high-end racing bikes have been nabbed by thieves. The incidents don’t appear to be connected, but it’s rare that so many expensive bikes used for racing would be stolen in such a short period of time.

Please be on the lookout for these bikes:

— Shawn Small, founder of Ruckus Composites, got his custom mountain bike stolen last Thursday night. The bike is a one-off that he made and custom-painted himself. He has ridden it on the Oregon Outback and raced it at a 24-hour event. The bike was stolen from Southeast Portland. See details and photos below…

Grilling by bike in Paste Magazine.

If you’ve followed this site for a while you know that here in Portland, people do a lot of amazing things by bike: raising a family, getting married, moving, and responding to disasters are just a few of them.

I like to share those types of stories here on BikePortland because they challenge people’s assumptions about what bicycles make possible. That’s why I get excited when larger media outlets give them attention because their I know their audiences will be even more amazed and inspired.

Case in point are two recent bits of media attention worth noting: Portland’s “Grill by bike” trend highlighted in Paste Magazine and the Pedal Powered Talk Show earning a spot on Oregon Public Broadcasting’s Oregon Art Beat program.

Safer infrastructure would shift this traffic equation.
(Photo @ J. Maus/BikePortland)

By a scan of headlines and social media feeds, last week’s International Walk and Bike to School Day was a big success. But the full picture reveals a more sobering truth: The vast majority of kids didn’t walk or bike to school.

[This post was submitted by BikePortland subscriber Colin Reis. See more BikePortlander Posts here.]

If you live in North Portland anywhere west of Denver Avenue, then you’re probably familiar with Greeley Avenue. It cuts diagonally from Arbor Lodge neighborhood through Overlook and towards the Fremont Bridge, where it meets up with Interstate Avenue. This means that if you biked south on Greeley from St. Johns or The University of Portland, the 12 blocks that you’d have to travel to get from Greeley to Interstate @ Killingsworth Avenue would be avoided entirely because of Greeley’s diagonal tilt. If you prefer direct and efficient routes, hopefully you’ve signed on by now, especially if you’re a North Portland resident. A nice bonus is that Greeley goes right through the Adidas Factory with all of its flair.

Oregon is 8th state to officially endorse progressive street design guide

Metro is doing a 12-hour bicycling survey on the Tilikum Bridge today

Checking in on the Sellwood Bridge project

Full speed ahead: City’s new transportation dashboard tracks progress

How Much (Statistical) Protection Do U-Locks Offer?

New traffic signal at N Vancouver and Cook will be turned on Wednesday

In their own words, here’s what Portlanders are saying about Clinton traffic diverters

Theft of several high-end race bikes has Portlanders on edge

Portland’s bike-powered BBQs and talk show get their due

Safe routes coalition: Too many kids unable to join Walk and Bike to School Day

A Profile of N Greeley Avenue

Latest Headlines

Reminder: No riding through River View Cemetery during Memorial Day Weekend

Guest Article: Demand a pause on PBOT’s SW Alder decision

Guest Opinion: The bike beat lives on in all of us

Our 20th Anniversary Party is this Wednesday

From the Archives

The 10 busiest bicycling spots in Portland