Thousands Stroll, Spin at Sunday Parkways

By Shoshanah Oppenheim

As many as 15,000 Portlanders and neighbors to the region said farewell to foul car fumes a route through North Portland streets at Sunday Parkways, an event where six miles of city streets were closed to vehicles. Walkers, cyclists, joggers, and skaters all came out to enjoy the summer sun. Families were out too, free to enjoy some exercise with their little ones without having to worry about traffic.

Dance groups, DJs, food vendors, pick-up games, child health educators, and many more great activities and entertainers were dispersed throughout four local parks from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.. Sponsors and grants covered the cost of increased police supervision and intersection regulation. Many of those enjoying themselves at Sunday Parkways expressed optimism that there will be more events for their communities to get together in the future.

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Oregonian June 23, 2008

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Posted Mon, 06/23/2008 - 12:57pm.

Thousands of dollars could have been raised if fees were charged

Submitted by Terry Parker on Mon, 06/23/2008 - 3:32pm.

Streets blocked off to the motorists who are taxed to pay for them so bicyclists can have a care free day freeloading about. This is yet another demonstration of bicyclists wanting more (exclusive infrastructure and specialized services) as long as someone else pays for it - and why bicyclists need to be directly taxed, pay license and registration fees, instead of poaching the funds for their for all their wants and wishes from motorist paid taxes and other sources. .

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success of parkways

Submitted by nik bresnick on Tue, 06/24/2008 - 7:44am.

Terry,
Seeing as you didn't attend this wonderful event I'll fill you in. This event wasn't just for bicyclists. It was the whole community. It was so much fun. There were thousands of pedestrians, families and people of all ages. It was really special. The road system is our largest expanse of public land in this country thus I don't quite understand why some people feel so threatened when a tiny fraction is made available for non-automobile purposes. Yes, it did cost public money, but public money paid for those very expensive roads. We all pay taxes, even cyclists. I would even guestimate that about 70% of cyclists in portland either own cars or drive sometimes. We pay the same as you to to be licensed and then to improve our quality of lives, as well as reduce traffic and pollution, we ride when we can.

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Bicyclists are not freeloaders

Submitted by Karl Rohde on Tue, 06/24/2008 - 8:18am.

This tired argument that cyclists don’t pay their fare share is just that, tired. More than that though, it is simply not true. Only about 60% of the costs of roads are covered by gas taxes and vehicle fees. The rest is made up of a host of taxes paid for by everyone regardless of their choice of transportation. Meanwhile, less than 2% of transportation expenditures statewide are spent on bicycle infrastructure, which is far less costly to build and maintain. Thus, bicyclists pay a disproportionate share of taxes and are in fact subsidizing motorists. Furthermore, more than 90% of bicyclists also own and operate cars. Many of them would gladly see a proportion of there gas taxes going to create better bicycling infrastructure so they wouldn’t have to be so slavishly tied to motor vehicles for transportation. It’s time to drop the disingenuous “freeloader” argument, because it simply isn’t true.

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