No more ugly plastic bike lane poles
Concrete curbs will replace them on NW 16th Avenue
The plastic poles separating the Northwest 16th Avenue bike lane from auto traffic have to go. They are not aesthetically pleasing.
More specifically, they are getting battered and knocked completely off their bases so often that a row of them resembles the smile of a brawler who has been punched in the mouth too often.
Roger Gellar, the city’s bicycle coordinator, told the Northwest District Association this week that the Portland Bureau of Transportation intends to replace the flimsy plastic poles, which are made to snap back after being run over, with permanent concrete platforms.
The concrete pillars cost four times as much as the plastic variety, but Gellar said they will cost less in the long run because maintenance crews will not be constantly replacing them. Crews are coming out weekly to replace missing poles, he said.
In that the poles are built to withstand being flattened more than 100 times, he suspects some are being removed by vandals.
NWDA representatives questioned whether this and some other bike lanes in the district are being used by enough riders to justify their continued existence. That topic was not on the agenda, however.
In that Portland bicycle ridership has been declining for a decade, NWDA Planning Committee member Roger Vrilakas asked, why do we persist with approaches that “aren’t working all that well?”
I lived for 12 years on NW 16th, and saw those lane separators installed about 3 years ago. EVEN WITH the posts in place, I saw cars go INTO the bike lane, on the OTHER side of those separators. I have a bike, and I don't ride it that often, but I don't share the outrage about their simple existence. A concrete curb would be harder for cars to "jump over", and obviously would not break the bank for the city (or county). Originally I thought it was a waste of resources to install them, but I've seen a steady increase in the use of these bicycle lanes by actual bicycles. They may not be perfect, but over time, as we get used to them, they help prevent car drivers assume they are omnipotent who don't need to share the road with non-car users.
NWDA Planning Committee member Roger Vrilakas asked, why do we persist with approaches that “aren’t working all that well?”
Well the new Portland excels at continuing the failed status quo (homelessness, lack of police, a dysfunctional 911 system, wasteful nonprofit spending). Why? We elect leaders that don’t want change but want to double down on failed policies (JVP, Kanal, Green, Morillo, Novick, Avalos, Koyama-Lame, etc)