In the midst of so many issues affecting our city –homelessness, housing affordability, trees, natural gas appliances and electrification, city expansion or densification, dark skies, and wildfire protection and evacuation–one issue has been constant: transportation. How our transportation system grows and changes affects our daily lives and influences almost every other issue the city is facing.
Our city council can choose to build a transportation system similar to how it has been built over the last 100 years, emphasizing the convenience of driving and making it dangerous to walk and bike in many parts of the city, apart from where recent, disconnected improvements are made. Or it could recognize that there is not enough space in our growing city for all the cars coming with our projected growth and start planning for an effective bus system; for connected, convenient and safe bike routes; and for sidewalks that include safe ways to cross busy streets.
Bend Bikes wants to continue to be proactive about our vision for the city and will be proposing concrete and measurable actions the city should take to improve the safety of biking and walking. As council moves toward their 2027 goal setting process, we will be advocating for the following measures:
- Reduce speed limits citywide starting with residential streets
Slowing speeds is the single most important action we can take to make all people safer. People driving slowly can see people out of cars more easily and are more likely to stop for people crossing the street. Collisions at slower speeds result in less severe injuries and property damage. Street design is paramount, but reducing speed limits is a low cost, quick to implement solution that could have widespread impacts on street safety in our city. We are asking the city to:
- Reduce speed limits on all residential streets and low volume collectors to 20mph within three years. The recent passage of two Oregon bills allow cities to change speed limits on these streets to 20mph overnight without an ODOT review.
- Reduce speed limits on most higher volume collectors and arterials within five years. Changing speeds on these streets requires ODOT review but will likely have the most impact in terms of street safety
- Connect the network, quickly, safely and cost-effectively
While portions of our neighborhood greenways and bikeways have seen some major upgrades in recent years, the network remains fragmented with dangerous intersections and inconsistent bike lane protection still occurring along most routes. We are proposing a number of low cost solutions to connect our network:
- Add flexposts to all buffered bike lanes. Flexposts are visual and tactile reminders to drivers to stay out of bike lanes and make very exposed bike lanes much safer for all people riding or rolling in bike lanes. We want the city to commit to installing a significant number of miles per year.
- Construct additional street calming measures along neighborhood greenways and safe routes to school. Speed humps, chicanes, modal filters, quick-build curb bump-outs, raised crosswalks—there are a number of low-cost, quick-to-implement features that can help reduce and slow traffic to the targeted 20mph on our neighborhood greenways. Currently many of our greenways are designed for higher speeds and serve to divert higher-speed vehicle traffic. We want the city to commit to treating a significant number of miles of greenway per year.
- Build more safe crossings. Safe crossings that include raised platforms, flashing beacons, signals and median islands are critical to safely connect bikeways, safe routes to school, pedestrian routes and traffic-calmed streets. We want the city to commit to installing a significant number of these per year.
- Policy recommendation: No new multi-lane roundabouts
Bend has embraced roundabouts for good reason—they keep traffic flowing smoothly, there are fewer collisions, and those collisions are less severe. But that applies to single-lane roundabouts, the most common roundabouts in Bend. When those roundabouts become multi-lane, that’s all out the window.
Multi-lane roundabouts have many more points of conflict where cars can collide. They are confusing for drivers, resulting in use of the wrong lane and less predictable traffic patterns. People crossing roundabouts on foot or bike must cross two lanes of traffic, making them less visible and more exposed to traffic. And people often drive faster because the roundabouts are wider and the corners not as tight. It all adds up to more danger for people in cars and out of cars.
We need your support!
On October 21, the city council will discuss the future of our transportation system. They need to hear what you want. Please send an email to [email protected] (and bcc info@bendbikes) or come to the city council meeting and sign up to give public input. We often hear from councilors that the single most important thing we can do to influence how our transportation system is built is for many people to send emails to the council or make a comment at a council meeting.
Here are some ideas. But don’t stop here–the best comments, either in e-mail or in-person, have two parts. First: tell your story. Second: tell them what you’d like to see change.
Your Story:
- Why don’t you take the bus, bike, or walk more?
- How hard is it to get your kids to school?
- How hard is it to cross 3rd St? Or Wilson? Or Reed Market?
- What intersections scare you to ride through?
- Do you ride or walk where the sidewalk or bike lane ends and you’re thrust into traffic?
- And there are so many more stories…
Your Request:
- A better bus route to work, the store, or to your doctor’s office.
- Slow down traffic in your neighborhood or along a specific street.
- Complete a safe bike route to the Larkspur Center, or a school, or a park, or downtown.
- Put in a safe crossing near a school, or a park, or a business.
- Make an intersection you go through safer and slow cars through it.
- Or more generally, slow traffic and build connected bike lanes across town or to downtown.
You don’t need to have a solution. That’s their job. But history shows that if people don’t let the council know that they are experiencing problems, your problem is not going to be solved. Let’s not give them the excuse that they thought everything was going well and there’s nothing to fix!
Please send your thoughts to our city council before October 21st ([email protected]) or make a comment at the October 21st meeting. Please bcc [email protected] we can track what our community is asking forand what the council is hearing.