Image from PBOT website showing new configuration of SW 3rd just south of Burnside.

The demonstration that inspired it happened one year ago, the compromise among stakeholders that confirmed it happened four months ago, and it was first promised to be on the ground one month ago.

Now, at long last, the Bureau of Transportation has made an official announcement that they plan to “reconfigure” 3rd Avenue this weekend.

As we reported back in August, the plan is to re-stripe nine blocks of 3rd from NW Glisan to SW Stark in order to make room for a bicycling-only lane. The new bike lane will be installed in place of the existing standard lane and it will be seven-feet wide with extra “buffered” space on boths sides.

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Earlier this year, bike markings unexpectedly appeared on 3rd Avenue. Now we know why.
(Photo: J.Maus/BikePortland)

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Removable bollards would pedestrianize the road bed on 3rd Avenue outside Voodoo Doughnut.
(Image: Ankeny Alley Association grant application)

One of Portland’s top tourist attractions seems poised to become dramatically less car-oriented by the start of 2016.

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The temporary plaza in front of Ankeny Alley and Voodoo Doughnut was bustling with commerce and enjoyment for most of the weekend.
(Photos: Greg Raisman unless noted)

This weekend in downtown Portland’s slightly seedy north side, a citizen group temporarily converted two lanes of auto parking, a big expanse of empty pavement and two traditional travel lanes into a huge new pedestrian plaza, rows of street seats and ping-pong tables and a protected bike lane.

And it was, more or less, a huge hit.

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Dixie Tavern owner Dan Lenzen, right, with Boris Kaganovich of Better Block PDX.
(Photos: M.Andersen/BikePortland)

Frustrated by city officials’ estimates that it’d take several years to even consider a major redesign of 3rd Avenue through Old Town, a group of neighborhood businesses is teaming up with a team of livable streets advocates to create their own three-day demo of what a better street could look like — two weeks from today.

Inspired in part by the “pop-up” street projects that have helped reshape New York City in the last five years, organizers say Old Town’s three-block project will be one of the country’s largest such projects ever.

It’ll use wooden planters in the street to create more than a thousand square feet of new pedestrianized space between NW Davis an SW Ash, a protected bike lane, a series of new sidewalk cafes, a marked crosswalk and a huge new public plaza in front of Voodoo Doughnut adjoining Old Town’s thriving Ankeny Alley.

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Inspired by the changes on NE Multnomah in the Lloyd District, a new proposal would transform SW 2nd and 3rd avenues.
(Photo by J. Maus/BikePortland)

A coalition of 30 Old Town bars, restaurants and entertainment venues is proposing adding a quarter-mile of planter-protected bike lanes and street cafe seating to 2nd and/or 3rd avenues.

Inspired by nearby projects on SW Ankeny and NE Multnomah, the six-month-old Old Town Hospitality Group sees their experimental road diet concept, which could narrow the streets’ car-oriented area from three travel lanes to one or two and might remove some on-street auto parking, as a way to make the neighborhood safer, more comfortable and better to do business in.

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A rendering of the planned mobile kiosk.
(Image: Know Your City)

Two years after Old Town’s Southwest Ankeny Street closed to cars and became Portland’s first human-only street, it continues to overflow with cool new ideas.

The latest is a tricycle with a built-in kiosk that’d provide a public face for Know Your City, Portland’s independent civic education nonprofit. The trike would be constructed by local frame-maker Oscar Camanera of Simple Bicycle Co and Brennan Conaway of Micro-Structures, with components from Chris King Precision Components.

“Artist-designed and artist-made in Portland OR, the kiosk is an embodiment of all things local,” the organization writes in its Kickstarter pitch. “From here, we’ll sell tickets to tours as well as books on Portland’s history and culture. The kiosk will also provide information about the city, particularly independent businesses in the Old Town area.”

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Carfree SW Ankeny.
(Photo © J. Maus)

On Wednesday, the Portland City Council decided to extend the temporary permit for a carfree SW Ankeny Street between SW 2nd and 3rd Avenues through January 31st of next year.

The project is supported by adjacent businesses, who have agreed to pay the City of Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) for lost parking meter revenue. The initial permit was granted on June 20th and was set to expire on November 1st.[Read more…]

With the entire roadway roped off, foot traffic (and the occasional person on a bike) crowds onto the SW Ankeny sidewalk.
(Photos © J. Maus)

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PBOT has installed a bike corral to deter vehicles from SW Ankeny between 2nd and 3rd Aves.
(Photos © J. Maus)

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