OTREC was pleased to brief members of the Joint Policy Advisory Committee on Transportation on August 3, 2009. Staff provided an members with an overview of the OTREC’s research, education, and technology transfer programs. Students Nikki Wheeler and Nathan McNeil summarized their involvement in two projecs: “Investigation of Intersection Safety for Cyclists by Age and Gender” a “Evaluation of Bike Boxes at Signalized Intersections”. Additional faculty participated by providing a summary of their research focus.
May 21, 2009
Northeastern Universityís Peter Furth is known equally for his research in public transportation, bike planning and traffic signals. Furth brings his diverse interests to Portland for the holiday-shortened week of May 25th. On Tuesday, 5/26, there will be a seminar on his traffic signal priority work and on Wednesday, 5/27, there will be another seminar on his work regarding cycle tracks. In addition, Furth will have a variety of meetings with local transportation practitioners, including a bike tour by staff from the Portland Bureau of Transportation. The visit is co-sponsored by OTREC and IBPI. For more information about the seminars, visit PSU's Center for Transportation Studies.
Nov 17, 2008
Portland State University is committed to supporting research that is both regionally focused and globally relevant. This fall PSU has published a brochure featuring some of its exemplary research including OTREC sponsored projects by researchers Madeleine Pullman and Jennifer Dill. Dr. Pullman's research addresses the logistical issues raised by the rising demand for locally produced foods. She has studied supply chain success stories like that of Country Natural Beef, a cooperative family business committed to environmental responsibility, as well as other enterprises that have been slower to adopt such values, in order to better understand the impediments to change. Dr. Dill's research team has given GPS devices to bicycle commuters and collected rider surveys in order to collect data about the routes cyclists take, gender differences in riding and other information that can help cities better understand cyclistsí infrastructure needs. This regionally aimed research creates universal models of environmental responsibility and sustainability from which other cities can benefit.
May 15, 2008
On May 15, 2008, Jennifer Dill, Associate Professor in the Nohad A. Toulan School of Urban Studies and Planning and Director of the Center for Transportation Studies at Portland State University, participated in a congressional briefing in Washington, D.C. The briefing was sponsored by the Congressional Bike Caucus and the Active Living Research program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation on Biking Your Way to a Healthier Community. The Congressional Bike Caucus is chaired by Congressman Earl Blumenauer (OR) and Congressman Tom Petri (WI). Dr. Dill described her ongoing research of regional bike trips, tracked by GPS-equipped bicyclists. She notes that preliminary analysis shows that half of the bicycle riding happened on roads with bike lanes, off-street paths, or bicycle boulevards. She also briefly discussed policy implications and further research needs. Read Dr. Dill’s briefing here: Briefing.
Sep 28, 2007
Professor John Pucher, a car-less commuter from the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University, was the first fall OTREC Visiting Scholar and CTS Seminar guest on September 28, 2007. His presentation, "Promoting Safe Walking and Cycling to Improve Public Health: Lessons from Europe," was standing room only, and the audience enjoyed his photos of bike-friendly features in cities across Europe. Pucher examined a range of public health impacts of our urban transport systems and argued that the current car dependence of American cities is responsible for enormous environmental harm, social isolation, lack of physical activity, and traffic dangers. He described how improving the convenience, safety, and attractiveness of walking and cycling in crucial to overcoming these negative impacts. Pucher discussed specific policies and programs used in Europe, and advocates their widespread adoption in American cities. A lively discussion with faculty, students and members of the Portland Bicycle Master Plan Committee followed the seminar.
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The City of Portland and the Metropolitan Region have strong policies in place to encourage transportation through means other than the single-occupancy vehicle. Both governments have numeric goals for the proportion of trips to be made by walking, bicycling, transit, shared vehicles, working at home and driving alone. Indeed, the City of Portland desires that by 2035 no more than thirty percent of commute trips be made by people driving alone. Similar policies have driven transportation planning in the city and region for decades.
To understand if these policies will be effective it's necessary to understand whether their antecedents have been effective. The Portland region has been investing in transit, bicycling and walking for more than two decades? Are we moving the needle? Have we been effective?
Roger's presentation will take a look at regional data for the period 2000-2014 to assess the effectiveness of our efforts and use that information to suggest pathways forward.
Roger Geller has been Portland, Oregon’s bicycle coordinator since 2000...
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Summary: Urban bicyclists’ uptake of traffic-related air pollution is still not well quantified, due to a lack of direct measurements of uptake and a lack of analysis of the variation in uptake. This paper describes and establishes the feasibility of a novel method for measuring bicyclists’ uptake of volatile organic compounds (VOC) by sampling breath concentrations. Early results from the data set demonstrate the ability of the proposed method to generate findings for transportation analysis, with statistically significant exposure and uptake differences from bicycling on arterial versus bikeway facilities for several traffic-related VOC. These results provide the first empirical evidence that the usage of bikeways (or greenways) by bicyclists within an urban environment can significantly reduce uptake of dangerous traffic-related gas pollutants. Dynamic concentration and respiration data reveal unfavorable correlations from a health impacts perspective, where bicyclists’ respiration and travel time are greater at higher-concentration locations on already high-concentration roadways (arterials).
Bio: Alex Bigazzi is a Ph.D. candidate in Transportation Engineering at PSU, where he is also teaching a class on transportation emissions modeling....
The video begins at 5:27.
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Abstract: Today, most streets are designed and managed to meet mobility standards that focus on the movement of motor vehicles, failing to adequately accommodate and prioritize transit, walking, and biking. A new culture of innovation is needed in transportation as traditional solutions alone will not suffice. By 2035, the Portland Plan envisions transportation facilities that are designed and managed to prioritize travel investments that improve walking, biking, and universal accessibility as the first priority.
In support of this vision, Peter Koonce, Manager of the City's Signals, Street Lighting, & ITS Division will discuss how he's looking to make the City's traffic signals consistent with these goals resulting in more effective integration of land use, transit, cycling, and walking. The discussion will be centered around research that is needed to improve our understanding of best practices from the U.S. and Europe for application in Portland.
Room 315 Engineering Building (ITS Lab)
If American cities are to serve the mainstream population of traffic-intolerant bicyclists, we need a broad range of low-stress facility types that can be applied depending on traffic and space constraints. This seminar will focus on two kinds of bicycle accommodations. A “Bicycle Priority Lane” is a shared lane treatment, like the shared lane arrow or “sharrow” that is becoming popular, intended for streets lacking the space to provide a dedicated bike lane. It enhances the sharrow by providing longitudinal markings that define a “lane within a lane,” drawing from “advisory lanes” (UK) and “suggestion lanes” (NL). We show how defining the bicyclist’s space objectively with road marking frees bicyclists from the stress of negotiating for operating space with motorists.
Separated paths or cycle tracks are bike paths along a road that are physically separated from moving traffic by a curb, median, or parking lane. For decades, they have been the mainstay of bicycle networks in the Netherlands and in Montreal, but have been shunned by US planners due to misplaced safety concerns. We will expose the flaws of the studies used to discredit separated paths, and discuss their safety record in the Netherlands and in Montreal. Practical issues in cycle track design will be discussed based on Montreal’s experience of the last two decades.