A view through the front windshield of a car, with two bicyclists on the road ahead.

Do Bicycles Slow Down Cars on Low Speed, Low Traffic Roads? Latest Research Says “No”

Jul 21, 2020
Photo by Pav_1007 on iStock
Jaclyn Schaefer, Miguel Figliozzi, and Avinash Unnikrishnan; Portland State University

The new article Evidence from Urban Roads without Bicycle Lanes on the Impact of Bicycle Traffic on Passenger Car Travel Speeds published in Transportation Research Record, the Journal of the Transportation Research Board, demonstrates that bicycles do not significantly reduce passenger car travel speeds on low speed, low volume urban roads without bicycle lanes. Authored by Jaclyn Schaefer, Miguel Figliozzi, and Avinash Unnikrishnan of Portland State University, the research shows that differences in vehicle speeds with and without cyclists were generally on the order of 1 mph or less – negligible from a practical perspective.

A concern raised by...

Read more
Bicyclists ride past retail establishments

Study Finds Bike Lanes Can Provide Positive Economic Impact in Cities

Apr 22, 2020
Photo by Michael Lander
Jenny Liu, Portland State University

Authored by PeopleForBikes

According to a new study released by Portland State University’s Transportation Research and Education...

Read more
An intersection with a bike lane going through it

Biking Safely Through the Intersection: Guidance for Protected Bike Lanes

Dec 17, 2019
Photo by Cait McCusker
Christopher Monsere, Portland State University; Nathan McNeil, Portland State University
Read more
Street icons for bicycle and pedestrian

Quality Counts: Developing Accuracy Checks for Bike and Pedestrian Count Data

Nov 21, 2019
Photo by Cait McCusker
Nathan McNeil, Portland State University; Kristin Tufte, Portland State University

In the past decade bike and pedestrian count programs have sprung up all over the United States, gathering data to evaluate biking and walking infrastructure. However, these modes have not been studied with the quantitative rigor applied to motor vehicle travel. A research project funded by the National Institute for Transportation and Communities (NITC), led by Nathan McNeil of Portland State University (PSU), offers a method for monitoring the quality of this bike-ped count data.

... Read more
A bicycle passes in front of a bus

Buses, Bikes, and Right-Turning Cars: Conflicts and Delays at the Transit Stop

Oct 24, 2019
Photo by Canetti
Miguel Figliozzi, Portland State University

When buses and bikes share space, it's complicated. Not only are there safety risks for cyclists, but also potential delays in bus service and stressful navigation for bus operators. The quest to increase bus speeds—and plausibly...

Read more
Bicyclists cross an intersection with a bike signal, near a red car

If Bikes Could Talk: Would Connected Vehicle Tech Get More People Riding?

Sep 26, 2019
John MacArthur, Portland State University

What if your bicycle could warn you that a car is coming from a side street you can't see? Or let you know that your front tire is getting a little low, or that you're approaching a pothole that wasn't there yesterday? A NITC research project led by John MacArthur of Portland State University explores how connected vehicle (CV) technologies could encourage an increase in bicycling. As CV technology moves forward in the rest of the transportation system—with buses and connected streetcars requesting early green lights from the traffic signals, and cars chatting with each other...

Read more
Automatic bicycle counter showing how many cyclists have passed today, and this year.

NITC Researchers Will Fuse Multiple Data Sources to Count Bikes

Nov 01, 2018
Principal Investigator:  Sirisha Kothuri, Portland State University
Learn more about this research by reading about the Pooled Fund research grant that started it, or the Project Overview page.

BIKE/PED COUNT SURVEY: CALL FOR INPUT

Researchers at Portland State University, University of Texas at Arlington, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Toole Design Group are conducting a scan to identify locations where bicycle counts are taking place around North America, and hope to enlist your help! If you collect bike count data (or oversee counts) in your jurisdiction, please consider taking our quick survey to tell us a little bit about your count locations and data.

The survey can be accessed here: tinyurl.com/BikeCounterScan

THE NEW PROJECT

... Read more
Green bike signal

Translating Bike Traffic Signals: PSU Researchers to Identify Gaps in Driver Comprehension in New NCHRP Study

Nov 01, 2018
Principal Investigator: Chris Monsere, Portland State University
 Learn more about this newly funded research by viewing the Project Overview page. We anticipate findings to be published in 2020.

THE NEW PROJECT

Portland State University is embarking on a collaborative research effort, funded by the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP), to help road users better understand bike-specific traffic signals. Over the next year, Dr. Christopher Monsere and Dr. Sirisha Kothuri of PSU's Transportation Research and Education Center (TREC) will work with researchers from Oregon State University and Toole Design Group to identify gaps in driver comprehension and causes of confusion when both bike signals and motor vehicle signals are present...

Read more
A bicyclists rides down a neighborhood greenway

Bicycle Accessibility Measures: Advancing Equitable Economic Benefits through Urban Greenways

Aug 23, 2018
Principal Investigator: Jenny Liu, Portland State University
Learn more about this research by viewing the Executive Summary and the full Final Report, or watching the January 2018 seminar on the Project Overview page.

Portland, Oregon's 2035 Comprehensive Plan calls for “City Greenways” - a citywide network of park-like streets focused on moving pedestrians and bicycles safely. Such a connected network of safe, welcoming active transportation options could have significant benefits for residents—but which residents?

Benefits of bike and pedestrian infrastructure include environmentally sustainable transportation, livability, and improvements in economic development and public health. While these outcomes are well documented, it is also known that both transportation and...

Read more
Left: Bicycles on a trail; Right: Young woman buying transit pass

2018 RFP for Two Pooled Fund Projects: Exploring Data Fusion Techniques for Bicycle Volumes & Equity in “Cashless” Transit Fares

Aug 22, 2018

The National Institute for Transportation and Communities (NITC) is soliciting proposals for our two 2018 Pooled Fund projects:

RFP now open; proposals due Oct 1, 2018

This project will address the need of cities and municipalities to combine bicycle data from different sources (such as manual counts, automatic counts, and crowd-sourced data from apps such as Strava) to assess an accurate accounting of bicycle traffic on a network. Current work on data fusion techniques is limited and additional research is needed to fully understand the choice of weighting techniques, inclusion of spatial vs. temporal variation in the...

Read more

Pages