A key part of the Naito Parkway bike lanes will lastly be re-hardened after a protracted row of ornate, metal bollards went lacking in 2023. As we’ve reported, the bike lanes adjoining to Portland Saturday Market between Ankeny and Burnside had been left unprotected after the bollards vanished someday in spring of 2023. It’s nonetheless unknown what precisely occurred to dozens of bollards — some say they had been stolen for scrap, others say they had been merely broken after which discarded by drivers and/or vandals.
After our story in 2023, the Portland Bureau of Transportation put in momentary orange site visitors cones to assist present safety for the favored, two-way bike lanes. On Tuesday, PBOT introduced {that a} crew of contractors will start a venture this week to put in concrete curb separators to guard the bike lane. “They’re anticipated to put in about 210 toes of concrete separators alongside the outer fringe of the two-way multi-use path, from SW Ankeny to the Burnside Bridge,” reads the PBOT assertion. “The separators are supposed to supply safety for folks biking and strolling, whereas requiring much less upkeep than movable bollards that had been beforehand used on this part of the trail.”
The bollards (at proper) had been detachable in order that distributors of the Saturday Market might park within the bike lanes to load and unload their stalls. It’s an annoying compromise (because it results in folks parking within the bike lane), but it surely allowed the Saturday Market to assist the Higher Naito venture and be a keen accomplice with PBOT going ahead. With the brand new curbs on the way in which, I requested PBOT if something had modified of their settlement with the Market.
“Our settlement with them, and the loading operations can be unchanged,” stated PBOT Public Info Officer Dylan Rivera. “Distributors will be capable to enter Higher Naito on the intersection of Ankeny or drive over the site visitors separators at sluggish speeds to load and unload. The overwhelming majority of the time (when distributors aren’t actively loading or unloading for the Market) folks biking and strolling on this section of Higher Naito will profit from new concrete safety separating the ability from the northbound journey lane.”
PBOT expects the brand new concrete therapy to be way more sturdy than the bollard design they initially put in.
For those who trip this part of Naito, count on a detour across the development work and into the Waterfront Park path for a couple of week from yesterday.
