8 • The Southwest Portland Post
NEWS
City seeks to update Bicycle Master Plan;
Open house scheduled for May 18
By Kate Bennett
The Southwest Portland Post
At the SWTrails meeting on Febru-
ary 26, Ellen Vanderslice and Denver
Igarta, both from the Portland Bureau
of Transportation (PDOT), spoke about
Portland’s Bicycle Master Plan update
and its impact upon Southwest Port-
land.
To provide a bit of background, Port-
land’s Bicycle Master Plan was first
adopted in 1996. According to PDOT’s
website, the purpose of the plan was
to provide “a blueprint for mak ing
bicycling and walking an integral part
of daily life in Portland.”
The Bicycle Master Plan proved to be
a success. Since the first implementation
of the plan, Portland’s bikeway network
has more than doubled in miles, thou-
sands of bicycle parking spaces have
been added, and bicycle-related events
and activities have increased ten-fold.
As a result of this success, PDOT
wants to update the Master Plan. The
transportation office wants to prepare
our city for the next ten and twenty
years of cycling.
While the city makes beneficial bicy-
cle-related changes, others are taking
note. For instance, in 2008 Portland was
recognized by the League of American
Bicyclists as a platinum-status bicycle
friendly community.
But Southwest Portlanders, especially
the members of the SWTrails group,
felt as if Southwest Portland had not
reached platinum status as a bicycle
friendly community. The group decided
that something needed to be done in
order to remedy this.
With dedication and a passionate
desire to elevate Southwest Portland’s
bicycling community to platinum sta-
tus, six members of the SWTrails group
worked on and produced the Bicycle Fa-
cilities Strategy to Reach Platinum Status
in Southwest Portland.
The report, a detailed assessment of
Southwest Portland’s bicycle problems
and recommended solutions, was
submitted to the Office of Transporta-
tion on November 3, 2008. Luckily, the
report has been viewed favorably. As
Vanderslice remarked, “[the report] was
an excellent piece of work that has been
a great help to staff.”
The SWTrails group was obviously
excited to hear what Vanderslice and
Igarta had to say about their report at
the February 26th meeting. Overall,
their feedback was positive.
Vanderslice said the SWTrails group
identified a good network of bike
routes and that the Bicycle Master Plan
committee has “incorporated most of
the recommendations from the report
into the draft Bicycle Master Plan net-
work.”
One such recommendation that has
been incorporated into the draft plan
is a stretch from Terwilliger Boulevard
and 6th Avenue to Spring Garden Street
and 17th Avenue.
According to SWTrails, “a low traffic
neighborhood connection is needed
to provide a low traffic alternative to
Taylors Ferry.”
Parker Realty, Inc.
April 2009
According to
the draft network
map, the resolu-
tion to this need is
a proposed bicycle
boulevard route
which would trav-
el along South-
west 6th Avenue,
Hume Street, 12th
Street and Carson
Street.
Another draft-
ed resolution is
to turn Southwest
Mitchell Street,
Westwood Drive,
and Westwood Court into “enhanced
shared roadways.”
According to Vanderslice, an en-
hanced shared roadway is a roadway
that has “shared roadway markings
(bike-and-chevron) and accompanying
signage delineating where bicyclists
and motorists share a travel lane.”
This resolution would address South-
west Portland’s need for a low traffic
link between Hillsdale and Fairmount
that has a gentle gradient.
There are many more proposed bike
routes for Southwest Portland, but the
type of biking facility placed on each
road depends on the road. As Vander-
slice noted, “What [bike facility] is most
suitable definitely varies according to
the street, based on traffic volumes and
speeds, sight lines, and other factors.”
She explained that although South-
west Portland has a hilly topography
and sight lines and connectivity issues,
there is still potential for biking facili-
ties ranging from cycle tracks to regular
bike lanes.
Vanderslice hopes to submit the Port-
West Hills/Hillsdale
$747,500
land Bicycle Master Plan update to City
Council this September. In the mean-
time, she would love to see Southwest
Portland residents at the Open House
on May 18 from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m.
The open house will be held in the
Wilson High School cafeteria and will
give residents the chance to weigh in on
the Bicycle Master Plan update as well
as the Streetcar System Plan.
As Vanderslice explained in an e-
mail to The Post, she needs to first hear
recommendations from the people of
Southwest Portland.
She then said that in order to imple-
ment the recommendations, “We need
to get the plan adopted, amend the
Comprehensive Plan per the plan’s rec-
ommendations, and implement at least
some funding strategies from our plan.
For all three of these steps we will need
the strong support of the community.”
If you wish to see the current draft
of the Bicycle Master Plan update
prior to the open house, visit the City
of Portland’s Office of Transportation’s
website at www.portlandonline.com.
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