The Monday Roundup: Plungers, tolls, chop shops, KISS on bikes, and more

This week’s Monday Roundup is sponsored by Nutcase, the Portland-based company that offers cool bike helmets for everyday riding.

Rolling with KISS: The legendary band has licensed their logo on a line of aero bicycle wheels.

Imagine that: This Daily Mail (UK) reporter has no clue that fines and tickets to bicycle riders are down — not because police are looking the other way — but because more people are riding, thus improving the overall behavioral pool as expected.

Sobering impact of Uber and Lyft: NYC streets are flooded with Uber and Lyft vehicles, eroding transit ridership and clogging streets even more. What a mess. Yet another reason to be skeptical of any “new technology” that puts cars at its center.

Car use = OK. Car abuse = Not OK: Portland economist Joe Cortright strikes an important tone with his latest from CityLab, where he argues that the only thing wrong with our use of cars is that we don’t pay enough for the privilege.

Housing for people, not cars: A promising update to an issue we’ve been covering longer than anyone else: Thanks to Portland’s new Inclusionary Housing rules, a developer of two residential buildings in southeast Portland may leave auto parking out of its plans and opt for affordable housing instead. All to save money.

Car parking is so over: Another fun one from The Connecticut Postt: “City planners need to remember human beings come with two legs, not just four tires.”

Plungers FTW: The latest weapon of choice for tactical urbanists in Wichita, Kansas are toilet plungers. Seriously.

Don’t call it the Westside Bypass: The Vice-Chair of the Oregon House Transportation Committee is dreaming of a new freeway on the westside that he’s dubbed the “Northwest Passage.” Good luck Rep. Vial.

War on speeding: Portland isn’t the only place that wants us to slow down in our cars. It’s a nationwide phenomenon.

Open-air chop shop ban: San Francisco is tired of stolen bicycles being parted out, out in the open. They want to ban chop shops (and some people think we should do the same here).

It won’t be automatic: A good article summarizing the hurdles faced by autonomous vehicles in urban areas — and how they will lead to radical shifts in urban planning. (The part about curb space — for loading/unloading — becoming the most valuable part of the street is especially interesting.)

Oregon distractions: Get up to speed on how — and why — the Oregon Legislature is trying to revamp their cell phone use/distracted driving laws.

Intersection of justice: A great example of how environmental and social justice issues intersect with transportation in Milwaukee where three groups are suing the state over a planned highway expansion mega-project.

Idaho stop in California: The sensible change to the law that would allow bicycle operators to roll through stop signs after yielding (when it’s safe), has been proposed in California. I hope Oregon tries this again in the 2019 session.

VW sucks: Volkswagen willfully cheated on emissions tests, and now scientists have calculated the significant public health impacts.

Managing traffic: We don’t have a congestion problem, we have a congestion management problem. As more cities figure this out, you’ll be hearing a lot more about tolls.

NOLA rising: New Orleans has a secret weapon that could see its already sharp rise in cycling take off even more: Tens of thousands of workers who ride (or would ride) to their jobs in the city’s legendary hospitality industry. Oh, and the city is about to make it even easier and safer for them to do so.

— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org

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