Oregon state senator Floyd Prozanski, a cyclist and friend of cycling (Share the Road License Plate and laws requiring motorists to drive more carefully around cyclists), had planned to introduce a law would have made HELMETS MANDATORY FOR ADULTS. But there was such a negative response from bicycle advocates that he seems to be backing off. The BTA and other advocates certainly want you to wear a helmet but don’t think it should be a law. It would be too hard to enforce and might cause some people to refrain from riding a bike just because of no helmet. We should encourage people to use helmets but not legislate their use. We also need better education and outreach for all roadway users. Toward this end, the BTA will start an educational campaign to foster a culture of awareness aimed at all road users. Just from personal observation, I notice that non-helmet wearers are more likely to blow through stop signs and traffic signals and otherwise flaunt the laws, giving the rest of cyclists a bad name.
The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) has officially approved the City of Portland Office of Transportation’s (PDOT) “Request to Experiment” with GREEN COLORED BIKE BOXES on one condition; they must test their effectiveness without the green coloring many people credit with their success. They feel the City is testing too many things at once (new color, new signage and new symbols) and they won’t know which is having an effect. Eight bike boxes have already been installed. Three more will be installed by October 1st with striping and signage only but without the green color. They will be evaluated and then the green color added and more data will be studied. The three non-colored bike boxes will be at SW Terwilliger and Taylors Ferry, NW Broadway and Hoyt and SE Clinton and 39th (where the original bike box is).
There always were some bike lanes on NE 162ND AVE. but there was a big gap. It’s a four-lane road which was recently re-paved. Using money from what’s known as the city’s “Missing Links” program (funded at a modest $50,000 per year), PDOT reconfigured the auto traffic lanes and painted a bike lane. It’s still a big, wide road but now it’s much more pleasant to cycle on. One of the other ways the city hopes to improve conditions in EAST PORTLAND is to create more bike boulevard routes through low traffic streets. One route under consideration, the “Market-Mill-Main” bike boulevard, is a pleasant street that almost anyone would feel comfortable riding on. Another future cycling potential in east Portland is the Gateway Green proposal. This parcel of land between the junction of I-84 and I-205 is part of a vision by a local developer to create a bike park and sustainability demonstration area. Its potential as a riding area is very exciting.
Bicycling has become politically mainstream. Earl Blumenauer (Democrat, Oregon) held a press event on the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol to announce that attendees of the upcoming Republican and Democratic national conventions will have ACCESS TO 1,000 FREE BIKES. Along with the bikes — which will be supplied through a partnership with Humana Inc. and the non-profit group Bikes Belong — Blumenauer and several colleagues (from both sides of the aisle) have issued a “bike sharing challenge” to convention goers to take 10,000 trips and ride 25,000 miles on the free bikes.