Nine days apart: Same intersection, same trucking company, same type of collision, same result, same problem we’ve known about for over a decade.
(Photos via @SmplicityCycles via Twitter)

It’s disheartening to start writing a post about the need for changes at a dangerous intersection only to recall that I already wrote the story. Nearly five years ago.

“Another right-hook at Broadway and Hoyt: What can we do about this intersection?,” screamed the headline in our October 2013 post.

And here we are today with the same concerns, the same problems and the same intersection.
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On a ride into downtown this morning I came across a common sight: People on bikes waiting for a red light in a single-file line at an intersection that has a bike box. The bulk of the bike box — a large green space at the front of the intersection intended to make auto users to stop further back — was empty.

This has always puzzled me for several reasons. Whenever I come upon a bike box at a red light I’ve always thought it best to fill the box. That’s why it’s there right? So, in an effort to spread the word, I posted a photo and message about it to Twitter.
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As Portland wraps up its first major study of its unusual “yield to bikes” LED sign on Northeast Couch Street at Grand Avenue, a TriMet bus video of a recent collision at the intersection shows that the longstanding right-hook problem at the corner isn’t solved yet.

Lane Werner, a nursing student at Linfield College’s Northwest Portland campus who said he’s chosen not to own a car, has been kept off his bike for three months after the work van in the video above turned in front of him at the light as he was overtaking it. The slow-motion collision was captured by a bus that was immediately behind.

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View of NW Everett at 16th (looking east).

Concerned about a very high rate of right-hook collisions and general traffic “chaos” at the intersection of NW 16th and Everett (map), the bureau of transportation is drawing up plans they hope will make it safer.
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Collisions are up at SW 3rd and Madison.
(Photo © J. Maus/BikePortland)

New data released by the Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) yesterday shows that collisions have gone up significantly at four of 11 intersections where bike boxes were installed in 2008. While longer-term policy and infrastructure changes are in the works for next year, PBOT has announced interim measures aimed at improving safety at those four intersections — one of which is SW 3rd and Madison where Kathryn Rickson was killed back in May.

After Rickson’s death, PBOT was (once again) forced to address critics and rising concerns that they have not done enough to reduce the number of right-hook collisions throughout the city — an issue that has plagued PBOT for years. The announcement of new safety measures and the increase in right-hook collisions came in a letter from City Traffic Engineer Rob Burchfield to the Federal Highway Administration’s Transportation Operations Director Mark Kehrli. The letter is a progress report related to the City’s ongoing FHWA experiment with bike boxes and colored bike lanes. [Read more…]

On NE Lloyd, a man on a bike waits behind a car, despite the new colored bike box and bike lane.

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PBOT plan drawing for SE Madison between 6th and Grand.
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PBOT will install a new bike box and colored lane markings on SE Madison just east of SE Grand today. Back in September, the City unveiled a list of 11 bike box locations, saying, “Our observation is that they’ve contributed to a safer, more comfortable travel environment.” This is the second bike box to be installed from that list.[Read more…]

A year-long evaluation by researchers at Portland State University’s Institute for Bicycle and Pedestrian Innovation has found that Portland’s bike boxes improve the safety of roads users on a number of levels. The research — funded through the Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium — complements another study from the University of Texas published last month that also found bike boxes to have a positive impact on traffic safety. City of Portland Bureau of Transportation officials say these studies confirm their own observations about the bike boxes and they are in the process of identifying new locations to add more of them. [Read more…]

Portland has been at the cutting edge of traffic design for many years. In America, with our stringent, car-centric traffic design guidelines, that means having engineers who are not afraid to push the boundaries of the status quo.

The most recent example of this are Portland’s colored bike boxes. We weren’t the first city to do them, but we were the first to launch several of them at once on busy intersections in the urban core.

Before laying them down, PDOT sent an official “Request to Experiment” to the Federal Highway Administration. It’s not a required step, but an official nod from the FHWA would help PDOT breathe a little easier, and more importantly, would open the door to make colored bike boxes a standard treatment that could then be adopted more easily in other cities.[Read more…]

The old-school bike box at SE 39th and Clinton.

The colored version at SE Hawthorne and 7th.

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