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Home » Housing + Cities » Transportation + Transit » Portland Versus the Portland of the Midwest

Portland Versus the Portland of the Midwest

SwatchJunkies

Snow bikes-flickr-richardholdenThere’s a raft of cool stuff in “Analysis of Bicycling Trends and Policies in Large North American Cities,” a new report out by the University Transportation Research Center. It’s authored by John Pucher at Rutgers and Ralph Bueler at Virginia Tech.

I was struck by two things: 1) what a stand-out Portland is, even in North American terms; and 2) how well Minneapolis fares on almost every measure. Portland had better watch out, lest the temperate regions cede bicycling superiority to a place where 20 degrees is, in all seriousness, considered balmy for long stretches of the year.

Apart from that, I don’t feel like I have much to add, so I’ll just highlight a handful of the more intriguing graphics. Our blog platform renders these in a slightly hard-to-read display—I apologize—but they’re worth squinting for.

Top Ten of 100 Largest US Cities by Daily Bike Commuting Levels

pucher and buehler_1

Bike Share of Workers in US and Canadian Cities

pucher and buehler_3

Trend in Bike Paths and Lanes

pucher and buehler_5

Bike Share of Workers and Average Annual Fatality Rate

pucher and buehler_4

Precipitation and temperature data

pucher and buehler_6

If you’re into bike wonkery, go read the whole thing.


Photo credit: Bikes in the snow / Richard Holden / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

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Eric de Place

Eric de Place spearheaded Sightline’s work on energy policy for two decades.

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