Former Portland Mayor Charlie Hales and a PBOT staffer stand with former PPB Traffic Division Captain David Hendrie at a crosswalk enforcement mission in 2013.
(Photo: J. Maus/BikePortland)

The Portland Bureau of Transportation has ended a 15-year partnership with the Portland Police Bureau that centered around the enforcement of Oregon’s crosswalk law.

Since 2005 PBOT has conducted “pedestrian crosswalk education and enforcement actions” with the PPB. But in recent years conversations around the enforcement of traffic laws and concerns about racial profiling by police officers have intensified.

At a meeting of the City of Portland Pedestrian Advisory Committee last night, PBOT Traffic Safety Section Manager Dana Dickman said City Commissioner Chloe Eudaly asked the bureau to stop working with police.

“There had been concerns about secondary violations,” Dickman told the committee. “People were being pulled over for failure-to-yield, but during the stop they are cited for lack of insurance or a suspended license. And then the citations rack up… There was a concern we are potentially bringing people into a much more serious situation, impacting them financially, and bringing them into a legal situation in a way we didn’t intend… Our commissioner and community members felt that was potentially punitive.”[Read more…]

“Commissioner Eudaly and PBOT want to show support for Black Portlanders, for the Black Lives Matter movement, and for the protestors calling for justice.”
— Margaux Weeke, Communications Director for Commissioner Eudaly

[Read more…]

“Plans… are in full swing. We are designing a permit process that will allow not just restaurants but bars, retail, and personal service businesses to access the right-of-way.”
— Margaux Weeke, Commissioner Chloe Eudaly’s office

We’ll be seeing more of this soon.
(Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)

[Read more…]

Left to right: Mingus Mapps, Chloe Eudaly, Seth Woolley, Sam Adams, Keith Wilson.
(Photos: Respective campaigns)

It’s been a tough pill for me to swallow, but the truth is cycling just doesn’t command the same attention in local political circles that it used to. With so many people struggling to put a roof over their head and all the systemic injustice and inequality that has become even more glaring in recent years, it’s understandable that personal mobility doesn’t merit as much attention as it did a decade ago.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t ask candidates for local office what they think about it! [Read more…]

“I’m a little disappointed [advocates are] so singularly focused on this issue that they can’t really take into consideration the full breadth of what I’m dealing with as transportation commissioner.”
— Chloe Eudaly, City Commissioner

(Photo: J. Maus/BikePortland)

[Read more…]

“I understand people see this as an amazing opportunity… but I’m nervous about the consequences and I’m questioning whether this is the right time to re-allocate resources.”

City Commissioner Chloe Eudaly.
(Photo: J. Maus/BikePortland)

[Read more…]

Publisher’s note: While we’ve made a lot of noise in the past month about the need for immediate street changes to reflect new behaviors, another big part of this conversation is how best to transition our streets when quarantine is lifted. Kiel Johnson, a BikePortland contributor and owner of Go By Bike Shop & Valet under the Aerial Tram, reflects on that issue in his letter below.

Dear Commissioner Eudaly,[Read more…]