For a minute, it seemed like Ted the dump truck driver might be an actor.
Dozens of cyclists laid down in an out-of-the-way stretch of NW Flanders this afternoon and played dead, a symbolic move to let the Oregon Department of Transportation staffers working nearby know the agency’s stewardship of Powell Boulevard isn’t good enough.
There was classical music playing from a bike speaker somewhere, and the occassional melodramatic outburst from an activist mourning the fake death of his friends. And muttering off to the side of it all—in a goddamn Route 66 baseball cap, and with a bushy grey mustache—was Ted. (He didn’t want to give his last name, or have his picture taken, and I was fine with that.)
“How many laws are they breaking?” he asked an ODOT staffer, gesturing to the bike riders covered in fake blood and blocking the roadway. “You’re ODOT, right? Don’t you control these streets?”
ODOT does not control these streets. Not most of them. But it controls Powell, where a cyclist lost his leg in a brutal accident this weekend, and where hundreds of people—car drivers, bicyclists, pedestrians—have been injured in the last decade. The cyclists gathered today at the coaxing of activist group BikeLoudPDX.They wanted to send a message that the agency’s doing a bad job, that—designated US highway or no—human safety should be prioritized above freight and auto movement on Powell.
Ted was incredulous. He’d taken off work just to come down and watch the protest, he said. He’d brought his GoPro camera, and was bearing witness with the TV stations and newspapers.
“I don’t like ’em!” he said, of cyclists in general, and bike lanes, and his notions that the small children who’d come to the protest with their parents would one day grow to want to ride bikes on city streets. “Common sense says bicycles and vehicles do not mix. They never have mixed.
“City hall’s going to hear about it.” he said.
Ted wasn’t the only one watching the protest. ODOT spokesman Don Hamilton was there, too, explaining that, in fact, the state has set aside almost $4 million for improvements on a 14-block stretch of Powell (from SE 20th to SE 34th). Those improvements include new stop lights with left-turn signals, better lighting, and removing foliage to improve visibility, and they probably won’t begin until 2017.
“All of these changes we’re contemplating out there are changes that have been proven to reduce crashes and improve safety,” he said. But they’re also not likely to make Powell the welcoming street all those dead activists would like (the Bicycle Transportation Alliance said as much today). “Highway 26 is a major road over the mountains,” Hamilton said. “It’s a very busy corridor.”
Taking that corridor off ODOT’s hands has been a favorite aspiration of Mayor Charlie Hales, who talks of the city’s “orphan highways” and how it makes little sense that Powell’s controlled by the state. But there aren’t any talks for the city to take over the boulevard, right now. Hales says the city would need more state money to make that happen.
“We’re open to talking to anybody,” Hamilton said.
Also looking on today: Cops, who stopped by to keep order, but were fine with the protest since it barely blocked car traffic. Sgt. Tony Passadore of Central Precinct—a bike commuter, he stressed—was in the group, and stopped to commiserate with Ted.
“They seem to be saying ‘why don’t we make it inconvenient for 80 percent of people?,” Passadore remarked of cyclists pushing for bike-centric road improvements. Like Ted, he noted: “You see a great deal of breaking the rules.” I asked about cars speeding, and Passadore brushed it off, instead explaining that car drivers are easily distracted on busy streets, and that bikes running lights or stop signs is a recipe for disaster.
Passadore said today’s action was “great.” He took umbrage with cyclists “slow-down” of Powell on Monday, saying bike riders were illegally taking up lanes of the road. “That was dangerous.”
Through all these comments, Ted nodded in agreement.
“They don’t obey the laws like cars do,” he said, before admitting to consistently driving 5 mph above the speed limit. He called the gathered activists: “Portland out of control.”
Every single thing the man said was so pat and over the top that, like I say, it seemed for a second like Ted could be an actor making a point about the blind backlash against bicycles in this town (the Route 66 hat didn’t help). I’m 99 percent sure that’s not the case—that, he really is just a guy with a real passion for “the Mother Road.” He’s on the streets everyday seeing the too-many cyclists who think nothing of cruising through red lights and he takes a bizarre leap of logic to assume that ALL cyclists break laws, and that ALL cars follow laws Which isn’t true. He also seemed certain that riding on the roadway was tantamount to a death wish, which certainly isn’t true.
Ted will never be convinced the bicycle is a useful form of transport, or that dumping fake blood on yourself and lying down in the road is potentially a good use of one’s time. He’s wrong on at least one, and maybe both, of those counts. But he’s not the only one of him, either. Building safer roads would be way easier if he were.
By and large, I applaud the protesters here today and how they handled themselves.
Wow, to think I’d see the day when protesters are actually trying to sway public opinion without pissing them off….
If you’re really that surprised by his comments, you need to get our of your Mercury bubble more often.
There is a pretty wide gap between what elderly americans want from roads and what millenials want, but the joke will be on the old’s when they can’t drive anymore and they are stuck with the transportation system they built.
^ From the article: Ted was incredulous. He’d taken off work just to come down and watch the protest, he said.
Those activists certainly had no foregoing interest in going home, kissing people, feeding dogs…good point.
But: I still don’t see why I’m supposed to read something into his ‘Route 66’ hat.
Charlie Hales talks about taking control of the city’s “orphan highways” while simultaneously noting that the city does not have the resources to take care of the streets it does control?? It seems to me that ODOT should be taking control of more of Portland’s streets if the Mayor admits the city lacks the funds to properly maintain them.
HH: You’re missing Hale’s point. Portland’s taking over these Orphan Highways is essentially transferring a liability from ODOT’s books to Portland’s. ODOT hasn’t shown any interest in helping to fix the problem with these roads that it created.
Not sure how I feel about this. Bikes are good. Having safe roadways is good. Activism is good. Still though, I can’t help feeling like road safety (or lack thereof) is something that we as a society living in a modernized world are simply going to be forced to deal with. Automobiles (and their drivers) hurt/maim/ people/kill people, not intentionally but because automobiles are fast, heavy, and not entirely reliable. Individually we all have to take responsibility for our own safety and the safety of others. Much like gun control and being a ‘responsible gun owner’, until we either do away with automobiles entirely, we will have accidents and some people will irresponsibly hurt and abuse the privilege of driving. I’m just not sure pointing fingers at bureaucrats will accomplish the desired results.
ThatOneBrownGuy, there are twice as many fatalities caused in car collisions in the US as in Europe, so it doesn’t have to go hand in hand with modernity. Road design can reduce the incidence and severity of collisions. In the incident this week, for example, two road users were in conflict because there isn’t a protected left when turning from 26th onto Powell; if they weren’t trying to get through the intersection at the same time, it would be a lot less likely that they would collide.
eldepeche, I agree its a poorly designed intersection, but that’s a result of old infrastructure, its not a system designed to hurt anyone. The bureaucrats just didn’t have a magic eight-ball to predict that Portland would become a haven for bike riding liberals 50 years ago or whenever the dang road was designed. Besides, as far as I’ve seen the City and ODOT have been more than willing to gut and re-route roads for the safety of bicycles; a sentiment that the City and State so far have NOT done for issues like say…. Police accountability. I would say these bicycle advocacy activists seem more like a special interest group than any sort of social justice cause and I am continually offended when groups work to phrase themselves that way.
I don’t see it as an either/or proposition. Groups of people that feel that government agencies are indifferent to their lives and safety should demonstrate in front of those agencies.
I think the city has been pretty responsive and forward looking, but ODOT, the target of this protest, hasn’t. Powell and Barbur are among the most-discussed streets in bike transportation circles precisely because ODOT is in charge, and they see these streets as serving one purpose only: moving motor vehicles quickly along. This has been an issue over at least the last decade.
Looking at the statistics though, people on bicycles don’t account for most of the injuries at this intersection, car passengers do. The status quo puts everyone at risk.
I’m not sure you can blame ODOT for car on car accidents, no matter where they occur. I agree ‘personal accountability’ is scapegoated for a lot of fucked up things, like say people who are murdered by Police during an arrest but this is not really one of those type scenarios because a stoplight is not an agent of the state, its a machine that suggests when people should or shouldn’t stop. We all assume the same risk when we get into a car.
Also aren’t there like at least 5 of those blinkey cross-walk-bike lights on Powell between the river and SE 39th? Those things halt all of traffic for as long as a pedestrian or bicyclist would need to cross.
I’m sorry I just don’t see bicyclists as an oppressed class of people.
As it is ODOT is in charge of highways that are also supposed to allow access to large trucks used in interstate shipping…. That’s how we get our food and basic necessities delivered to the grocery and specialty stores we are so dependent on. But also some of that shipping includes goods like $2,000+ Cannon bicycles being delivered to specialty bicycle shops on say…. Clinton Street? Lol. Maybe Cannon CEOs should just ride every bike they make to every shop they deliver them to in SE PDX.
next time someone wants to argue that we should prohibit freight traffic from our city streets, I’ll pass your comment along to them
Why not just get Cannon or Schwinn to lobby the State for better road funding for safer thoroughfares? I’m sure it’d help them sell more expensive bicycles.
And how does Whole Foods get its food? Magic Carpet?
Seriously, there’s like $15,000 worth of bicycle equipment in this one picture. Award for most bourgeois protest in town goes to bikeloudpdx
Hey TOBG, low income people are MUCH more likely to walk or bike to work. Safe bike and Pedestrian routes are critical for helping low income people get to work and school.
http://usa.streetsblog.org/2014/05/08/low-…
Just want to point out that protests can be an effective way to advocate for a cause, especially if well-organized and thoughtfully executed. That’s how the Netherlands dramatically reduced traffic related deaths and injuries:
https://youtu.be/XuBdf9jYj7o