This week the Portland Bureau of Transportation published a bunch of new documents (including the official Implementation Plan) and changed the council hearing date to this coming Thursday November 15th at 2:00 pm.
This is not a drill.
With two years of public outreach and planning all tied up in a bow, all that’s left is to make closing arguments, get this thing passed at City Council, and start building.
One of the biggest local consequences of last night’s election is that Jo Ann Hardesty will be sworn-in as a Portland city commissioner in January.
Her presence on the five-member council could have far-reaching implications as we debate and consider major transportation-related issues in the coming years. Hardesty and her new colleagues on Portland City Council will have a say on key issues ranging from mega-projects to micromobility. Since we haven’t sat down with her for an extended conversation yet, I thought I’d share what she’s said on the record thus far. [Read more…]
Quality tools encourage you to do learn about your bike and work on it yourself more often. (Photos: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)
As with many of Silca’s products, their latest tool called Ypsilon Wrench caught my eye and I could not resist. This is a quality tool that looks the part.
SW Canyon Road in Beaverton. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)
A major suburb just a few miles west of downtown Portland wants a dockless bike share system.
The City of Beaverton (population 100,000) has launched an official request for information (RFI) to learn more from companies that, “can provide useful and relevant information on a dockless bike share program.” Bike-share is called out in Beaverton’s 2017 Active Transportation Plan and city planners say it’s a needed weapon in their fight against congestion which is only expected to get worse as the city grows.
“Metro anticipates that the Beaverton Regional Center will increase by 4,500 new jobs and 10,000 new residents over the next 25 years. As the City continues to grow, congestion on local roadways will continue to increase. As one way to help reduce or at least moderate congestion, the City is looking to increase multi-modal opportunities for residents to get to work, to transit, and in the case of walking and biking, as a general form of mobility and recreation.”
Parking reform activist Tony Jordan at a campaign event for Jo Ann Hardesty (center). (Photo: Tony Jordan)
In the first national election since Donald Trump assumed the presidency — and despite gerrymandered districts, voter suppressions efforts, and racist campaigning by some Republicans — America tilted to the left last night. Here in the Portland region, the swing toward Democrats and progressive policies was even more pronounced.
In the race to replace longtime Portland City Commissioner Dan Saltzman, Jo Ann Hardesty cruised to an easy win over Loretta Smith. Hardesty becomes the first black woman to hold a council seat. Hardesty was endorsed by The Street Trust and nearly every transportation reformer in the BikePortland orbit was a major supporter. [Read more…]
On Clinton, and only Clinton, we ride side by side even when cars are near. (Photos: Madi Carlson)
Last week I wrote a “rah rah” post about making a plan to pedal more and beat the winter blahs. That post inspired a few comments about readers’ plans for winter biking; but there was one commenter who felt I, “Missed a huge opportunity to point out that riding at night or even in a light rain increases one’s chances dramatically of death and maiming.”
So this week I figured I should write about safety. Or rather, why I don’t write about safety.[Read more…]
Kiel Johnson (L) and Mark Holzmann. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)
Last Thursday, local advocate Kiel Johnson and I met with Mark Holzmann. Yes, the same Mark Holzmann who madeheadlines a week prior for his role in a sordid tale about road rage and revenge.
In an opinion piece published by The Oregonian, on his Facebook page, and on local TV news, Mark said he was victimized by a man on a bike who yelled at him and pounded on his car after the two were involved in a close-call near the Moda Center on October 22nd. Then a few days later Mark said he woke up and realized all four tires of his car had been slashed and someone had left a spooky and threatening note on his windshield.
Unfortunately that’s the full extent of the story most people heard. As such, it probably only served to perpetuate existing biases people have about each other.
But it’s what happened after the initial news cycle that I think is worth remembering about this story. [Read more…]
Today’s Monday Roundup is sponsored by Greenfield Health who invites you to an Open House at their Lloyd clinic (700 NE Multnomah) this Wednesday November 7th.
Here are the most notable stories we came across in the past week…
Walmart-ville: In a fascinating turn of events, U.S. mega-retailer Walmart now wants to turn its massive parking lots into “town centers” — so they can re-create the vibe that used to exist before Walmart opened in the first place.
No helmet for me: A respected cycling writer explains why he no longer wears a helmet; but only after his editor is so worried about it being controversial he feels obligated to post a disclaimer at the top of the post.
Dr. Bill Toepper (L) and Duncan Zevetski of Portland Street Medicine on two of the new bikes. (Photos: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)
Portland has miles of bike paths that are inaccessible to cars. We also have many people who call the land on and around those paths, home. A local nonprofit that provides them with medical care now has powerful new tools that will allow them reach more people, more often: bicycles. [Read more…]
Dr. Adonia Lugo and a small part of last night’s crowd. (Photos: Catie Gould)
“How can bicycle advocacy be more inclusive?” and “How can we make streets safer without causing gentrification?” were central questions that Portlanders asked at a standing room only event on Thursday night.
“Transportation safety [advocacy] is tied up in other ways we decide who’s important and who’s not important.” — Dr. Adonia Lugo
Adonia Lugo, a former bicycle activist with a PhD in anthropology, spoke at a packed event last night. Her recently published book, Bicycle / Race: Transportation, Culture, and Resistance (2018, Microcosm Publishing), follows the trajectory of her cycling experience — from becoming a bike commuter in Portland, to her work establishing the CicLAvia open streets event in Los Angeles, to her struggle to integrate equity during her tenure at the League of American Bicyclists in Washington D.C. [Read more…]
The only thing they should fear on Halloween are monsters. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)
Halloween night gave many Portlanders a chance to understand how street design impacts our ability to enjoy our neighborhoods.
While some parts of the city were deserted, leaving would-be candy suppliers dejected — other places were teeming with kids. We’ve heard that some blocks of the posh Alameda neighborhood had toe-to-toe trick-or-treaters with residents saying they had 400-500 visits. We’ve heard from other people who, sadly, had zero or just a few visits.
My family went out with a few others in the Piedmont neighborhood where costumed traffic was pretty light. One family who joined us said they live in the Cully neighborhood east of 42nd. They drove closer-in because their neighborhood doesn’t have sidewalks and they didn’t feel safe walking around at night. But even in our neighborhood with its full grid of sidewalks, we were always on lookout for drivers and on high-alert whenever a spooky porch beckoned on the other side of the street.
And if you were online at all this week you probably came across an article based on research that shows Halloween night is one of the deadliest of the year for people on foot. [Read more…]
This is what the bike lane on SW Terwilliger Parkway looked like yesterday during the evening commute. Those two white lines on the left are a buffer zone, the actual bike lane is to the right, buried in leaves. (Photo: Steven Mitchell)
“SW Terwilliger bike lanes are terribly dangerous right now,” he wrote, tagging @BikePortland and @PBOTInfo, “Piles of slick leaves and standing water. Be safe!”
Then yesterday he posted video (watch it below) that showed him trying to avoid the slimy accumulation of leaves, only to be the victim of an unsafe pass by a man driving a pickup truck. [Read more…]
Family and supporters of Patrick Kimmons, a 27-year-old black man shot by Portland Police last month, protested outside the Multnomah County Courthouse today. They were responding to a grand jury’s decision to not indict the officers who shot him.
The protest took place on SW 4th Avenue and, according to the Portland Police Bureau, responding officers urged people to get onto the sidewalk. As they addressed the scene, a 55-year-old man purposely drove into them. Here’s the police statement:
“The officers contacted the demonstrators and requested they move off the roadway and onto the sidewalk; however, the group remained on the roadway, blocking vehicle traffic. As officers developed a plan to divert traffic, officers continued to request the protestors move to the sidewalk. While officers continued to communicate with the crowd and direct them to the sidewalk, the driver of a dark blue Chevrolet 2500 pick-up traveled north on Southwest 4th Avenue into the crowd of people and struck a protester. The protester did not require medical treatment.
Officers located and stopped the Chevrolet truck and driver near the intersection of Southwest 3rd Avenue and Southwest Madison Street. The driver was taken into custody without incident.”
