The Southwest Portland Post., July 01, 2015, Page 2, Image 2

2 • The Southwest Portland Post
The Southwest Portland Post
4207 SE Woodstock Blvd #509
Portland, OR 97206
Fax: (866) 727-5336
email: editor@multnomahpost.com
It’s time to treat bicycles just
like any other vehicle
It should now start to be abundantly
clear that the Bicycle [Transportation]
Alliance has pushed their agenda in the
city of Portland.
Celebrating
22
Years in
Business!
EDITORIAL
It is also abundantly clear that all the
rule and law changes are getting bike
riders killed or maimed.
It is totally unfair to give bike riders
free reign leaving vehicle drivers to
monitor pedestrians crossing wherever
they choose and bike riders who cut to
the front of any line, fail to obey traffic
signs and rules of the road.
It is hard enough for locals who
struggle to keep from killing pedestrians
and bike riders who do not obey safety
and traffic laws.
Imagine the confusion when out
of town, out of state vehicle drivers
attempt to navigate the city with green
boxes and bike riders who go wherever
they want and however they decide
to go.
It is time to make bicycles just like
any other vehicle using our streets and
highways.
If everyone followed the same rules of
July 2015
the road, drivers would not be confused
about what bike riders are doing in any
situation.
Same rules for all would certainly
help to reduce accidents involving bike
riders and vehicles.
Patti Waitman-Ingebretsen
Multnomah Village
Proposed city trails policy
cuts out neighborhood
participation
T h e C i t y Wi d e Tr a i l s P o l i c y
[Community-Initiated Neighborhood Trails
Process] set to go before the Portland
City Council [sometime in July or August]
has eliminated neighborhoods from the
approval process.
While it has added many
responsibilities for a nonprofit to
accomplish before a trail can be
maintained or a new trail built, it does
not require essential duties of the city
of Portland.
The proposed trail policy will
essentially eliminate citizen led efforts
to build and maintain our trail system.
Few if any will be willing to go
through the difficult, five-page
process to accomplish even one short
connection.
Most of us in Southwest recognize
we have wonderful places to walk on
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Don Baack
Hillsdale
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4207 SE Woodstock Blvd #509, Portland, OR 97206
Editor & Publisher .........Don Snedecor
Reporters/Writers ...........KC Cowan, Erik Vidstrand
Editorial Cartoonist ........Jesse Springer
Copy Editor ......................Rich Riegel
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Don Snedecor
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existing rights of way. The urban trails
and the local connections need to be
maintained.
We have skilled volunteers ready and
able to do that maintenance. We need
cooperation and funding from the city
of Portland to do that maintenance.
[If] the policy calls for a huge amount
of work to just maintain a trail or
build a new trail, it is very unlikely
that SWTrails or other nonprofits will
undertake these tasks.
That will leave our Southwest urban
trail system unmaintained, and it will
leave the short connections in all of
our neighborhoods unimproved and
unmaintained.
It will make it very difficult for other
parts of the city to develop an urban
trail system without the city doing it.
What we need is for the [Portland
Bureau of Transportation] to develop a
partnership agreement with nonprofit
organizations to provide a low cost
way to maintain and expand our very
important trail system without as much
bureaucracy and red tape as the trails
policy [currently] requires.
SWTrails requested $15,000 for the
upcoming fiscal year to do just that.
[Portland City] Commissioner Steve
Novick apparently did not see any
value in that proposal.
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