Don't worry about that cop on p. 22 pulling you over. He's a clipart cop.

Judging by the number of fat asses I see in spandex on my drive home, the health benefits of riding a bike have been vastly overblown.

As professional in traffic safety, I must immediately point out the lack of statistics on vehicle-mile accidents/fatalities. This is the number reported nationally.

Because this is no more than another offensive in the war against cars, it's clear to see why they didn't reference those numbers, because freeways are the safest roads. I would imagine the arterial roads have a lower than average fatality rate as well, which wouldn't be help their aim of reducing lane miles.

The most common accident is the rear-end which of course driver inattention is the main culprit, but another factor is quickly slowing or inconsistent lane speeds typically caused by *congestion*.

Wow, so this is what passes for professional in the city?

I wonder how many work hours were wasted for this copy pasta plate of shhhhh.

No surprise, really. It's been pretty clear for some time now that the city's been hijacked with the intent of turning it into a big bike park, regardless of how many people and businesses it forces out. I think the hope is there'll be enough people from all over the world who'll want to come live in it. It's sort of like a big settlement in an occupied territory. Expect the arrogance to escalate against the non-conforming.

http://www.portlandoregon.gov/transportation/article/386469

At this document for Barbur, here is proof of their bias and insanity:
Page 10-
1383 total reported crashes 2000-2009
19 involving Pedestrians (1.4% of crashes)
23 involving Bicycles (1.7% of crashes)

**97% of crashes involve vehicles**

So what are the top 5 Safety Action plans on page 17? None that involve cars!!

They left out 0 crashes for people just standing still.

The only reason we still have death-trap cars designed with 1930s technology is that highly safe, highly advanced vehicles are still off limits to the wee folks.

And now they want to take those antiques away from us...

Only 23% involved bicycles? I'm surprised.

I live on a 'bicycle path' (complete with the corporal in the bicycle corps markings) and as a pedestrian, standing at the corner of Chavez and Clinton, I see more bicyclist scofflaws than ever. They blow through that intersection against the red light all the time, paying no attention to the fact that on Chavez auto traffic is moving at a fast clip and the northbound lane is visible for only 200 feet. I'm awaiting the inevitable conflict where a bicyclist will ignore the traffic controls and end up a victim of their own stupidity...and the whole bicycling community will vilify the entirely unsuspecting and probably innocent automobile driver.

As for the bicyclists who take to the sidewalks, few to none of them are equipped with the requisite equipment required by the state, nor do they follow the suggested procedures for bicycles on pedestrian thoroughfares.

I think it is way past time to register bicycles and license bicycle riders. And, given the level of possible injury, I'd say that bicycle riders should be required to insure their vehicles as well. That would be a nice way to deter bicycle thefts, provide resistution when they are liable in accidents, and raise public revenues for street maintenance. Requiring plates would also help in reporting miscreants to the police officials.

Should be: Only 23 incidents? I'm surprised.

Still too many Portlanders expressing
concerns with the behavior of some
drivers, walkers and bicyclists (many of
whom are the same people)

Ok, how on earth could they possibly know THAT?

Additional regulation isn't needed for bikes, we should be encouraging exercising, but not at any and all expense.

It's insane that 90+% of taxpayers use cars and the city is waging a war against that! Should I have faith all my millennial peers will grow up one day and stop all this silliness?

I think it is way past time to register bicycles and license bicycle riders. And, given the level of possible injury, I'd say that bicycle riders should be required to insure their vehicles as well.

I've long thought that the proper way to do this would be to get signatures for a ballot measure that would require bike registration, and that would allocate a huge % of the fees (after the costs for running the program are deducted) to bike-related infrastructure.

Portland planning strategy can be summarized as

"I dream of a better world where chickens can cross the road to get to the otherside."

I love watching spell-check at work among our bureaucrats. How else would you know that the "shear width" of Barbur is a problem?

It is my understanding there is now a digital bicycle counter on the Hawthorne Bridge. It looks and works similar to those digital speed signs that tell a driver how fast they are going. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out this will be used for more arrogant self admiration by the bicycle community along with their rant for more bicycle infrastructure that somebody else pays for. What it should be used for is to calculate a license and registration fee for the restricted space they take up and occupy on roads and elsewhere,

I'm sure the bike counter won't be manipulated by the bike community to register more bike trips than reality. Sure, we never did that with car counter strips, did we? They need a video camera on the bike counter to record the bikers going back and forth.

I'll defend this program because some of our streets *were* designed poorly (unsafely), and there is nothing wrong with trying to fix them. This program only applies to a few streets in the city, the most dangerous streets. This isn't a citywide initiative.

The reason the city focused improvements on bicyclists and pedestrians is two-fold:

-Bicyclists and pedestrians are more vulnerable and die easier

-Safety improvements for them improve safety for people driving

As someone said above, 3% of crashes involved pedestrians and bicyclists, but if you look at the fatality chart, half of all fatalities are bicyclists and pedestrians.

If you could fix one thing for $30,000 that could prevent 1 death, or prevent 100 fender-benders, which would you pick?

Trying to prevent the 1 death is important. But you could look at it from the perspective of making improvements that might prevent one or all the causes of the 100 fender-benders that next time could cause a death. Probably better probability.

Sam's claim that NOT repairing streets is for public safety is the most ridiculous statement ever.

They need a video camera on the bike counter to record the bikers going back and forth.

Works for the fish counters at all the dams. But since that's 1950s technology we need a new system that is powered by an iPad, has Wi-Fi connectivity, is solar powered, has an artistic design, introduced with significant community involvement, paid for with new taxes on motorists, and let's start a new city Bureau with a six figure Director and a huge staff.

More pheaux-scientific pontificating.

The latest research says that physical activity level doesn't have any useful impact on obesity until you reach Olympic training type activity levels (which is what trainers have been saying for years). Moderate activity at any size will improve your cardio-vascular health and reduce your risk of insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer's and a number of other maladies, though. However, the best activity choice for most people, and especially the aging, is WALKING and/or SWIMMING, not bicycling. But, the BTA turns people out to phone bank for politicians, and swamps them with letters, cards, phone calls, emails, and visits once they are elected. So, they get first priority. The planner types should just leave alone the idea that making every other street a bike route is a pragmatic technical response to the science. It isn't. We need to practice our chant: "Show me the pools! Show me the sidewalks! Show me the pools! Show me the sidewalks!"

...and another thing. If you care about fatalities, how about cracking down on vehicle and smokestack emissions, giving incentives for EV fleet conversions and smoothing traffic congestion to improve air quality? Those measures would save many more Portland lives than more bike lanes. But, nobody gets to have their picture taken next to it for the next BTA newsletter, so, don't hold your breath,