The Big Idea

Up ahead, close to our house in Portland, OR, right smack in front of us in the travel lane on Hawthorne Street (there is no bike lane), is a young fellow on a bike. No helmet, headphones jammed in his ears, Krypto lock in his butt pocket. Glen throws up his right arm in frustration, murmurs a few choice words. A few blocks later, we turn.

Why, does this minimal delay trigger even a whiff of ire? Glen, mind you, rides a utilitarian bike on a daily basis and is a competitive triathlete. Also a very calm human, and a super swell guy. (Good-looking too!)

“Honey,” I ask. “We got stuck behind a bus. We had to wait for pedestrians. We were delayed by a dozen different things. Why does the cyclist piss you off?”

Total time delay on our trip: 20, maybe 30 minutes. Total delay caused by the bike-riding dude: 20 seconds.

“Because he can go someplace else.”

Ah. He means SE Lincoln, the fabulous bicycle boulevard five blocks (a quarter mile) away. This is our street. Why is he using it?

There are some, of course, who couldn’t care less that there’s a fabulous bikeway nearby. Strong and fearless, we call them. Folks who will ride wherever they want, whenever they want, and to hell with you for suggesting that every road isn’t a bikeway.

Or perhaps the young feller just isn’t aware of this excellent option. I often wonder this when I see cyclists on SE César Chavez Blvd (39th), a miserably congested four-lane road. I think, “Poor baby, don’t you know that the “40s Bikeway” is just two blocks away and is much, much better?” I want to hand them each a map or gesture with kindness, “Come with me, and all will be revealed.” A third possibility: the kid needs to get to someplace right on Hawthorne. Going a quarter mile out of his way would make no sense.

That brings us back to Glen’s reaction, which is, in my experience, commonplace. When a person on a bike changes lanes abruptly, or occupies a travel lane, or fails to use a hand signal, or rolls a stop sign or runs a red light, we grumble, we stereotype, we castigate. We note that the person wasn’t wearing a helmet and didn’t have proper blinkie lights. They should have been on the sidewalk not the road! Or… they should have been on the road, not the sidewalk!

Recently, a councilwoman said she wouldn’t support funding Portland’s public bike share program until she “sees bike riders using downtown streets and sidewalks in a safe manner.” (Extend this logic and we’ll halt roadway funding until all motorists stop running red lights and talking on the phone.)

Is it because almost all of us drive, so we simply accept each others’ bad driving (cell phone talking, texting, red light running, speeding) behaviors? Or is it the dehumanizing impacts of the metal box, as Tom Vanderbilt explained in Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (And What it Says About Us)?

Suggestions: Let’s all of us who ride become familiar with the bikeway routes in our towns and use them as much as possible. And let’s all of us who drive be very patient. Let’s not be too quick to judge or scorn those in front of us, no matter how annoying their presence.

Enjoy the ride!

Mia Birk is the award-winning author of Joyride: Pedaling Toward a Healthier Planet; president of Alta Planning + Design; principal, Alta Bicycle Share, Inc.; and co-founder of the Initiative for Bicycle & Pedestrian Innovation at Portland State University. For 20+ years she has been transforming communities and empowering people to bicycle for daily transportation, one pedal stroke at a time. She and her two children live and ride in Portland, OR.