Credit: Michael Andersen
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I have no idea why I subscribe to Bicycling magazine. It’s obsessed with a road-cycling culture I could not be less interested in, it’s endlessly repetitive, and it’s stodgy. But I hesitate every time I consider canceling, and I flip through every single issue.

They sent a new one today, and it’s got some unwelcome news. After years of being in the top one or two, Portland’s no longer even in the top three American bike cities, according to the magazine. We’re number four.

“The lack of a large bike-share system and protected bike lanes put Portland off the pace of the most innovative cycling cities and drop it to its lowest ranking in our survey since 2010,” the magazine writes.

Who’s beating us? New York, Chicago, and, maybe worst of all, long-time bike-city rival Minneapolis.

This comes at a bad time. It’s not that Bicycling is some sort of final arbiter on bike worth—they’re trying to sell magazines, and it’s boring if Portland is at the top of the pack every year. Still, the magazine’s rankings have undeniably been a source of pride. And its critiques on protected bike lanes and bike share are at the forefront of why even the city’s biggest bike boosters are questioning whether the Rose City has lost its vaunted bike mojo.

Here, I wrote a long story about that doubt earlier this year. Read it!

While we’ve stalled out, New York, Chicago, and Minneapolis all have bike share systems (ours is supposedly coming) and the political will for innovative bike infrastructure Portland seems to have completely misplaced. Actually, by Bicycling’s apparent metrics, Washington, DC, is another good candidate to beat out Portland (it’s number 5). Rahm Emanuel has actually gloated about making Chicago one of the country’s top bike cities. It ranked a lowly fifth in 2012—the last time Bicycling did this—and now Rahm’s got room to gloat. That’s the worst part, really.

Pretty sure Bicycling hasn’t posted this to its site yet.

Here’s the top 10.

1. New York
2. Chicago
3. Minneapolis
4. Portland
5. Washington, DC
6. Boulder
7. San Francisco
8. Seattle
9. Fort Collins
10. Cambridge

I'm a news reporter for the Mercury. I've spent a lot of the last decade in journalism — covering tragedy and chicanery in the hills of southwest Missouri, politics in Washington, D.C., and other matters...

9 replies on “Burn! <i>Bicycling</i> Kicks Portland Down to Its Fourth-Best Bike City”

  3. Hopefully at some point Amanda Fritz will realize that she is dead wrong in her stance of blocking the bike share for “safety reasons”. Bike shares in the US have served up 23 million rides without a single death and very few injuries. The data says she should be supporting bike share for safety reasons, not opposing it because she once saw someone do something dangerous on a bike.

  5. Well us bike NYC people are happy for a brief moment and then quickly we return to our never ending bike advocacy work at hand. Lots to improve, even if we win this somewhat symbolic accolade: better bridge access, expansion of bike share, expansion of NYPD bike patrols, bike parking, upgrading painted lanes to physically protected lanes, improving connectivity of the bike network, wayfaring signs, getting more kids and teens on bikes, and on and on.
    Candidate Bill de Blasio, now Mayor, stated a goal of 5% mode share of commuter trips. That is, by some estimates, between two and four times the current bicycling levels. To reach that lofty goal NYC would have to redouble its efforts in all the areas listed above, with the support/pressure from the bicycle advocacy community.
    Kudos to Transportation Alternatives and its thousands of dedicated volunteers who have supported its bold and dynamic work.
    I don’t doubt that Portland will continue to do great things in their own bicycling world, inspiring us from across the country. In the meantime, perhaps the top ranking given to the Big Apple might inspire a re-energized Portland cycling community to get going again.
    Sincerely,
    Cantor Ben Kintisch
    Of the Brooklyn Activist Committee
    Transportation Alternatives, NYC

  6. I am tired of Portland’s narcissism. Unattractive & troubling. BTW- if you are from out of town, please understand that most of Portland has crap bike infrastructure because the central city sucks up all the resources while enjoying tax breaks. And, we have a somewhat douchey cycling culture. The BTA is to biking what marriage is to satisfying sex.

  8. May we please please please get a bike rental program? I would sooo love that. Anyone know a way to make that happen?

    No, we cannot have bike share. Bike share is just one more gift to big property owners downtown and scofflaws like AirBnB. Let AirBnB give us 10 million for a bike share sponsorship. Anais, please go to Outer SE Portland-
    a planning disaster on a massive scale. Go see the empty storefronts in Lents- that’s why you can’t have bike share. Publically funded Bike Share is unfair to the majority of Portlanders. There’s way too much “ooh I love that” in City Hall, and very little in the way of fairness and practicality.

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