| 10/20/2001 | The city of Portland has over 150 miles of bike lanes that can take riders into downtown and into the countryside. This was a contributing factor to Bicycling magazine's award to Portland as being the best city in the nation to ride a bike. In its latest issue, the magazine ranked the city of 530,000 over other high-profile cycling cities such as Seattle, Denver, Tucson and San Francisco.
Commuters, casual riders and serious cyclists are benefiting from the city's generous network of bike paths and bike lanes as well as free route maps and low-cost bike lockers downtown.
"It's a great city to ride in. You've got bike lanes on most of the major streets, and great access across the bridges, across the Willamette as well as the Columbia,'' said Bud Rice, a member of The Portland Wheelmen Touring Club. The group of about 850 bike enthusiasts offers between 25 and 30 different rides each week.
One of Portland's biggest appeals, said Rice, is that it is easy to ride from pretty much anywhere in the city into scenic areas not far away - such as the Columbia River Gorge and rolling farmland of the Willamette Valley.
Bicycling here has grown substantially in the last 10 years, said Roger Geller, bicycle coordinator for the city of Portland's office of transportation. On summer days, the city figures there could be close to 4,000 cyclists riding over Portland bridges - nearly three times more than 10 years ago.
"By providing bike lanes, bike boulevards and paths, we are giving people a safe place to ride. So people have really responded to that,'' he said.
Bicycling magazine said funding to connect neighborhood bikeways and the optimizing of bike routes help make Portland a great place to ride.www.registerguard.com
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