Riverfront Park Bike Repair Station is Open! Other Good News and Bad News

Getting ready to pump up a tire

There's a workstand with tools and a tire pump.

It's located right by the spash pad and dock, hopefully with enough visibility that vandalism won't be a problem - though it's also a little off the way for more serious recreational riders who might not find it from the Willamette Valley Scenic Bikeway. 

Earlier in the summer:
Fresh concrete for bike repair station at Riverfront Park

If it's successful, maybe more can be installed around town.

In any case it will serve those in Riverfront and Wallace Parks well.

More Good News

(This has nothing to do with bikes!)

Ok, so the burst water pipe and subsequent flooding is not good news. But the recovery appears to offer Wild Pear an opportunity to enhance the restoration of the 1880 Adolph Bock.

They talk about taking out the tin ceiling, numbering each panel, and then restoring it in order and say

We are committed to doing everything it takes to restore it to its historic standards, and make it as good, if not better, than it was before

I mean, they're embracing the preservation role with relish!

That's a cheery thought.

Chemeketa Bikeway's Future? Also, new Firehouse Crossing Shopping Center and its Sidewalk

The crash a couple of days ago between a car and moped at Chemeketa and High brought to mind the proposed development for the old City Hall site.

Revived concept for Old City Hall site: High & Chemeketa,
which would have included the Belluschi Bank lot (far right)
via Skyscraperpage.com

This is an old rendering, and it may have been - or may will be - superseded. Still, it's a pretty big midrise project by Salem standards.

It also went through approvals and traffic analysis before Bike and Walk Salem was adopted into the Transportation System Plan. So it does not necessarily accommodate the fact that Chemeketa is a designated bikeway. Similarly, it precedes the the Downtown Mobility Study and was conceptualized before there were plans to reconfigure High Street.

So what happens to the streets when this thing gets built?

(See here for the extension on the demolition permit and the site plan approval.)

CB|Two Continues to Experiment with More Walkable Designs

Remember the auto dealership that was demolished earlier this year just north of Winco and across the street from Trader Joe's?

Now Demolished Dealership at 4403 Commercial Street SE
(look at all the blacktop and parking!)

CB|Two is designing a new shopping center for the site at 4403 Commercial Street SE.

Crash on Chemeketa Shows Need for Improvements; Beavers Show the Way: Newsbits

Some scattered notes from the paper...

Two Crashes; Chemeketa Still not First-Class Bikeway

Since we started counting in September 2012, drivers have crashed over twenty times into large stationary objects off the road.

Tracking multiple moving objects in space is difficult enough, but if drivers cannot avoid large stationary objects like houses, maybe the underlying conclusion should be that cars are inherently dangerous?

Two crashes

There was a crash also on a primary bikeway into downtown. The details are slightly alarming because the driver of the car admitted to police she "sped up to catch a green light" on Chemeketa and a moped driver, not expecting the speed-up, apparently was making a turn on to High Street and hit the car.

In order to make Chemeketa a first-class bikeway, it needs additional traffic calming and actions to shunt through-traffic over to Center street or the State/Court couplet.

Drivers should never see "speeding up" for a light as an option on a first-class bikeway.

Update on Parkway Car Dealerships

You might recall the announcement that Lithia Motors would be leaving downtown to move the the Parkway.

Talk about Walking, Biking, Land Use, and Transportation Tomorrow

Don't forget, tomorrow on Wednesday, October 8th, James F. Sallis, Distinguished Professor of Family & Preventive Medicine at University of California, San Diego, will give a Healthy Communities talk, "Rx for Better Health: Walking, Biking, and Moving."

(click to enlarge)

A recent add to the program looks terrific!

Sallis' presentation will be followed by an interactive exchange with local officials on specific steps that local governments and citizens can take to improve conditions for pedestrians, bicyclists, and other “active travelers.” The local panel: Linda Norris, Salem City Manager; David Fox, Salem Planning Commissioner; Janice Naimy, Senior Director of Health Innovation, Family YMCA of Marion & Polk Counties; and Garth Brandaw, AIA, Senior Principal, CB Two Architects.

Previous talks along the same lines from Gil Penalosa and Jeffrey Tumlin have not had any formal public engagement with City Staff, and this looks like a solid move in the right direction. Hopefully discussion will be substantive rather than the same old bromides.

More details from the initial announcement after the jump...

Zena's 1853 Phillips House Languishes, Wallace Road Betrays Robert Wallace's Generosity

Did you get out this weekend??? It was glorious early fall!

Sagging barn on Zena Road, early 1900s - it will be gone soon

Don't forget about today's Preservation Pub on our earliest places:

The collection of handmade structures built in the Willamette Valley between 1841 and 1865 embody the culmination the Oregon Trail experience. While their significance to our state’s history is paramount, these buildings are being lost at an alarming rate.

1853 Phillips House Shows Neglect

A ride out to Zena showed lots of old buildings, and one in particular.

Phillips House of 1853 - Vacant since 2002 and in danger

The Phillips House of 1853 is in the same classical revival style of the Conser House in Jefferson. 

By Salem standards, it's really freakin' old! Statehood came in 1859, remember.

Highway Capacity Expansion Sucks up Safety Resources; Third Bridge Would do Same

News this morning is that a second person has died in the crash the other day that first killed Oregon State Hospital psychiatrist Steven Fritz.

Cary Marie Fairchild died as a result of injuries sustained in the crash.

The crash appears to have been preventable. A cable barrier has been set to be installed at the crash site, and the barriers appear to have a significant affect on cross-overs.

But according to a recent article in The Oregonian, the Newberg-Dundee bypass and Woodburn I-5 interchange expansion sucked up resources that would have been used for the installation:

In 2011, a small pot of money became available [for the cable barriers on I-5] when a Corvallis safety project was canceled. [Tim] Potter, the ODOT manager wrote on Jan. 12, 2012, that construction on the I-5 cable barrier project should begin in the summer, bringing the section into "compliance with current ODOT standards."

But in June 2012, ODOT officials postponed the project because there were not enough resources, Potter said. The reason: The Jobs and Transportation Act of 2009, a massive $800-million spending bill adopted by the Legislature to raise the state gas tax and DMV fees in the name of creating 40,000 jobs.

The headline-making law promised that specific projects coveted by lawmakers would be completed on tight timelines. Specifically, the Newberg-Dundee bypass and Woodburn's I-5 interchange took up money and staff that otherwise would have gone to the I-5 safety project, Potter said.

"The Legislature provided the money for those but there was also a time commitment," he said. "Those two big projects just dominated the resources. In fact, on Newberg I still have resources tied up."

When we consider projects like the Third Bridge/Salem Alternative, we should consider the opportunity costs: Money and time we spend on capacity increases are money and time not available for safety improvements.

New capacity hinders our ability to preserve and maintain existing capacity, and it also hinders our ability to protect road users.

Three drivers hit people on foot

Friday night in the seven o'clock hour, right in the gloaming it seems, three reports of drivers crashing into people on foot came in.

Preservation and Jumble Means Jobs (and beer)!

The weather looks great for wheeling this weekend! It's a great time to think about history as you're out and about.

R.C. Geer homestead from 1878 Marion County Atlas

Back in the spring, you might remember from Salem Weekly the piece about the transformation in process at Geercrest Farm.

Next week on Monday the 6th at Mission Mill, folks from Restore Oregon will be holding a "preservation pub," talking about places like the Geer farm - pioneer-era farms, houses, and homesteads.

The talk arises out of the work for their annual list of "Oregon's Most Endangered Places," and this past year the remaining pioneer homesteads in the Willamette Valley were included as especially at risk.

Historic Preservation League:  Most Endangered Places
Phillips House in middle photo

These buildings from between 1840 - 1865 are often deteriorating, are generally out of the way, and ultimately are irreplaceable.  Once they're gone, they're gone, absolutely gone.

The Geer farm from 1848 is lucky to have a non-profit and education project behind it. A few other homes have been relocated to Mission Mill or other places in town. The McCulley House is fine example of one that's been moved and restored. Other houses have been modified and are a little camouflaged, so to speak.

Smith-Fry House of 1859

You might not immediately recognize the "Edes" house. Today we call it the Smith Fry House, and it's at the top of Gaiety Hill, right by the Library.

A while back the folks at Mission Mill put together a map of buildings and places in Salem that date to this period - and there's more than one or two.