Silverton to Beat Salem to First Bike Corral

Silverton's going to get a permanent bike corral in downtown before Salem!

Bike Corral locations at Water and Main
They'll be tucked in the parking strip, at the yellow zones

Maybe you saw the note in the Appeal-Tribune:

Bike racks will be installed on the east side of Water Street as will solar powered bollards — or light posts — and some fresh paint outlining a bicycle safety zone.

The $3,100 for the project came from the city’s Urban Renewal Fund. No residential property tax money was used.

Jason Gottgetreu with the city of Silverton said the rack will allow up to 12 bikes to park at a time and could possibly be used to display art in the future.

“The city looked at the traffic and parking issues downtown and found that there just aren’t that many places people can lock up their bikes,” he said...

The safety zones will be built between the curb and lanes of traffic but will not take up existing parking spaces. Gottgetreu said the new racks might even free up other parking spaces because more people might leave their car at home.

The 17-by-8-foot safety zone will have reflective markings and solar powered LED lights for illumination without additional wiring.

Interesting, though, that for the pilot "no parking spaces will be removed." The location on the corners in the "no parking" zone is also interesting, and the bollards may be necessary to protect against wide turns. I think the locations, though visible, are non-optimal. At the same time: baby steps. Pilot something, show it's successful, and then iterate with improvements for the next installation.

This will be exciting to watch! Silverton's also got some "Bike friendly businesses" in the Travel Oregon program, and increasingly they look to be making a play for that bike tourism category.

Hey City of Salem, you paying attention???