Some Portland, Oregon residents are starting to show a preference for “bikeable” homes, according to a article written by Eric Mortenson in last Thursday’s Oregonian.

I have long wondered if I would live to see the day when such factors actually made it on to people’s short lists of factors in considering which home to buy (or rent). It is really hard to predict, as I certainly did not foresee the ongoing paradigm shift in American’s commuting habits (OK, we are just talking about Portland here). BUT, here we are and people are considering the length of their bicycle commute to work as they choose their home in Portland. Maybe this idea will catch on, or maybe gas prices will go back down and I will be left all alone again on the bike path… you just never know, do you?

Jim Jordan and Pablo Alcala at the Lexington, Kentucky Herald-Leader have teamed up to post a story and accompanying video about Lexington resident Dan Dickinson’s bike ride to work.

Dickinson makes one very important insight: Don’t ride the big roads to work. (The smaller neighborhood streets are much more inviting and interesting anyway

Lexinggton is one city that has paid attention to its amazing level growth in recent years and has made significant strides towards making a compact, livable, sustainable community. Now that gas prices are going through the roof, I guess those dividends are paying off.

Here’s a tip of the old velocommuter chapeau to Dan and the Lexington Planning team!

Photo credit: Pablo Alcala, Herald-Leader.

Portland, Oregon is often considered this country’s bicycle commuter Mecca. As we reported here, the City of Roses has seen it’s number of bicycle commuters quadruple in recent years. However, this has not come with a number of speedbumps as well.

As reported in the Oregonian, this week begins a pilot program to test the effectiveness of bike boxes in Portland. Bike boxes are areas of specially-marked paint at traffic signals so that bicyclists can queue up in their own special place at the front of the right-hand lane of traffic. Automobiles must stop for the signal before the bike box. Also, automobile right-hand turns are not allowed at these intersections during a red light.

A Portland Police Officer prepares to issue a warning to a driver for not stopping before a newly-installed bike box (Source: The Oregonian).

There has been much discussion (here, here, and elsewhere) around the city about the effectiveness of bike boxes. However, as the city hopes to continue down this trajectory of being a great biking city, they are becoming more open to ideas such as these. The ground underneath bike boxes is expensive real estate to be sure, but they may get the city back on track to creating a biker’s paradise.

Portland, Oregon has one of the highest percentage of bicycle commuters in the U.S. (source: The Oregonian)

The City of Portland, Oregon has recently suffered the death of two bicycle commuters. Local residents have begun to engage in a very healthy debate about how to cope with the challenges of rapidly increasing bicycle commuting population. While the numbers of bicyclists have risen exponentially in recent years, the relative attitudes and awareness of drivers has not changed at the same pace.

Kudos to The Oregonian newspaper for their excellent coverage of the tragedy and the ensuing debate. Yesterday, the newspaper launched a website documenting the situation, called Bike versus Car: Sharing the road in Portland.

The website even contains an interactive Google Map mashup showing the locations of bicycle-car crashes in the Portland area.

Note the demographic data on salaries of car drivers vs. bicycle commuters. Interesting…

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In Alan Durning’s new series or articles at the Sightline Institute, he discusses challenges to bicycles as transportation. He introduces the reader to several concepts, such as Car Head and Bicycle Neglect.

While bikers are often marginalized as “too poor to own a car” or “elitist,” Durning attempts to redefine bicycling:

Bicycle Respect gives independence to young teens and affordable mobility to low-income households and retirees. Like such democratizing social guarantees as public schools and unemployment insurance, Social Security and national parks, safe, separate, continuous facilities for cycling and walking put a common foundation under us.

Durning makes a number of valid points. His focus is in laying the groundwork for creating more velocommuters. That is definitely one part of the big puzzle. There are a lot more pieces than just street layout, however.

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According to NPR and others, including bike radar, Paris’ success with their bike rental program, Velib, has inspired other cities to move ahead with bike rental plans of their own.

Barcelona’s bike rental program Bicing has been bankrolled by communications giant Clear Channel, which offers advertising space on the sides of the bike rental stations. With over 100 rental stations spaced throughout the city, this appears to be a win-win for the city.

What an excellent idea. Bike rentals seem to address multiple concerns in regards to bicycle commuting:

Bikes can be stored in secure locations when not in use;
Novices have a very low entry cost to at least try out the concept; and
Cities win because, by outsourcing the whole affair, there is almost no investment or overhead to deal with

Let’s hope that these systems really do come to a city near you!

Photo courtesy of Getty Images via Bike Radar.

Read more from our sources: NPR and Bike Radar.

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A separated bike lane in Copenhagen Demark (Photo source: The Age)

It seems like every day something comes over the wire about how cities are giving bicycle commuters a high five.

In yesterday’s USA Today, writer Charisse Jones writes that “Cities are accelerating their efforts to encourage commuting on two wheels, putting bike racks where cars once parked, adding bike lanes and considering European-style bike-share programs to get residents out of their cars.”

Four cities are cited for their efforts to encourage bicycle commuting (no, Portland was not one of them): Boston, New York, San Francisco, and Chicago.

New York for the first time is creating a special lane, modeled on those used in European cities such as Copenhagen, Denmark, that will separate bicyclists from motorists. The Ninth Avenue bike lane in Manhattan is being built between a sidewalk and a lane for parked cars.

What an excellent idea! Putting bikes on the right side of parked cars truly gives the safety bikers need to travel on roads where autos reach high speeds. Hopefully this idea will catch on in your city soon…

Read more about it at our source: USA Today

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This week marks the fifteen anniversary of San Francisco’s first Critical Mass. “Critical Mass” is a term used to describe an event where multitudes of bikers take to the streets at one time to celebrate biking and to show the potent force that many bikers can have, if joined together en mass.

The original organizers of these events in San Francisco wanted to bring attention to biking. Many bikers die every year in accidents with automobiles. Since automobiles most often are the ones that dominate roadways, the event could be considered the equivalent of thumbing your nose at cars.

Now, fifteen years later, questions remain as to the true power of the Critical Mass.

There are many benefits to a Critical Mass, but there are also a number of serious drawbacks. Let’s start with the benefits:

Brings awareness to the issue;
Creates an important social opportunity for bikers, who are often marginalized and heckled by motorists; and
An opportunity of empowerment through sheer numbers.

Now the drawbacks:

Creates a sense of animosity from drivers towards bikers (bad idea: cars usually win encounters);
It’s a very passive-aggressive statement;
A few bad apples can spoil it for everyone; and
It is more of an inward expression of bonding than an invitation to join in.

Number four might offend folks who support critical mass, and it really depends on how the event is held. In San Francisco, for example, the events have become controversial because some bikers have taken Critical Mass as an opportunity to express raw anger at others. Conversely, drivers have taken to yelling obscenities at the bikers.

Nether side is blameless and this leads us to our main point: Critical Mass brings a lot of attention to biking in a community. If the biking community is ready for the criticism and has a good handle on how the spin goes, such events will be successful and biking organizations will benefit from increased support and membership as a result. On the other hand, if you are content just ’sticking it to the man’, well, then, so be it..

For more on this issue, read up over at the San Francisco Chronicle.

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Kudos to Streetsblog for their excellent coverage of Portland, Oregon’s pedestrian-and biker-friendly streets.

I recommend going over and reading the post yourself, but it essentially discusses a preliminary bicycle count report for 2006. Even though new bike lane construction has essentially been flat, bike use has increased over 21% from 2005!

Image credit: Portland Bicycle Count Study via Streetsblog

The Pedestrian and Pedaling Network (PedNet.org) of Columbia, Missouri has issued a challenge to local residents for the month of September:The Low-Car Diet Challenge, 2007. Among the options for competition include the bicycle, so you are sure to see more velocommuters out there on the streets this month!

This year, according to the Columbia Missourian, the judges made the program more flexible than last year’s event. New categories include “weekly shopper,” which allows four round-trip car journeys during the month; “business traveler,” which permits one out-of-town trip by car and airplane during the month; and “elite,” the most restrictive category, which prohibits all motorized forms of transportation.

Keep it up, Columbia - Adkins ain’t got nothing on you!

Photo credit: PedNet

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