PBOT

In this case, imitation really is the sincerest form of flattery. Calling all Multnomah County creatives, your time to shine is here! Bike to Books, the annual design contest from PBOT and Multnomah County Library, where we ask Multnomah County residents to design artwork for a Portland street, is back! Starting on May 1, Portlanders are invited to design original art to celebrate Bike Month and the hundreds of miles of bike lanes around the city. Participants start with the standard sharrow bike lane marking and put their own flair on it for the chance to add color and whimsy to Portland streets! Submit art in the Pre-Kindergarten to 2nd grade, 3rd through 6th grade, 7th through 12th grade, or adult categories. For the first time ever, we’re hosting a PBOT-led Bike to Books Family Ride on May 9. Join us and bike from one Southeast library to another using low-stress bike routes. After the bike ride, stay at Sellwood-Moreland Library’s Community Room to participate in a Bike to Books contest activity! A space will be set up for kids and adults to draw and color their Bike to Books design sheets. Submit your design right then and there (or email it later) for a chance to get your original artwork installed on Portland city streets! To participate, pick up a copy of the design sheet at your local library branch or visit PBOTs Bike to Books website for a downloadable copy. Once your design has been created you can drop it off at your local Multnomah County Library branch, no later than Sunday, June 1. To find your nearest open branch and for information on hours visit multcolib.org or call 503-988-5123. You can also scan or take a picture of both sides of the form and email it to PBOT at [email protected]. Design sheets are available to pick up or download in English, Spanish, Vietnamese, Chinese, and Russian. Entries must be original artwork. Multiple entries are welcome. Entrants must live in Multnomah County to be eligible to win. Find all the details at biketobooks.com (link in bio, too) Happy creating! We can’t wait to see what you come up with 🎨🖌️

This year’s Portland Sunday Parkways event dates and locations are here! Portland Sunday Parkways Presented by Kaiser Permanente (@kpnorthwest ) is back for the 19th consecutive year. The 2026 season kicks off in Southwest Portland on May 17, continues in East Portland on June 28, introduces a brand-new North Portland event on Aug. 2, and wraps up with a celebration in Downtown Portland on Sept. 13. What’s new this year: • A brand-new North Portland route featuring downtown St. Johns, Portsmouth neighborhood, University Park neighborhood, and N Willamette Boulevard walking and biking improvements. • The East Portland event will feature Verdell Burdine Rutherford Park in partnership with Centennial School District and the City of Gresham. • Check out Darcelle XV Plaza at the Downtown event, celebrating the legacy of Darcelle XV and a new vibrant public space. Volunteer and help make the 19th season the best yet! As a volunteer, you’ll help create joyful streets full of kids on bikes, pets in baskets, people walking, and friends gathering. As a vendor, you have the opportunity to connect with thousands of Portlanders. Lastly, we need your input. Take the pre-event survey to help shape this season. Learn more, sign up, and start planning your summer of now!

Spring cleaning isn’t just for closets! Contractors with PBOT recently kicked off our annual deep clean of PBOT’s 157 bike corrals around town. While the adjacent business who requested the corrals takes the lead on maintaining the corrals, we know that over time businesses change, while the corrals stay in place. To keep the staples in good shape for a long time, our cleaning crew is removing debris from the metal staples and clearing the ground of any overgrowth and stray objects. This work is paid for with the General Transportation Fund. Contractors will be cleaning corrals over the next couple of months. Keep an eye out for cleaner staples coming to a corral near you!

What a way to kick off the 2026 Portland Sunday Parkways season presented by @kpnorthwest ! Southwest Portland showed up yesterday with an estimated 10,500 participants (a 17% increase from last year) spending a beautiful day walking, biking, rolling, playing, shopping, and connecting on car-free streets through SW’s rolling hills. Baby goats, face painting, balloon art, live music, fitness classes, and busy vendor marketplaces kept the energy high all day. We loved seeing so many neighbors, families, and friends enjoying the day together while supporting local businesses and community organizations. Thank you to everyone who attended, volunteered, performed, partnered, and helped make the first event of the season such a success. Mark your calendars for our next event in East Portland on June 28! #sundayparkways #swportland #portland #pdxoregon #bikepdx #thisisportland #pdxevents #MultnomahVillagePDX

Paving season continues as a PBOT contractor begins paving on SE 82nd Avenue today and PBOT crews begin paving on SE 41st Avenue on Wednesday! First up, PBOT's safety and maintenance upgrade of 82nd Avenue continues, with months of work to provide new, smooth pavement and replace failing sections of roadway starting on today, May 18, and continuing on weekdays through the end of July. The first section of paving will take place on SE 82nd Avenue between SE Clinton and Brooklyn streets. Contractors will then pave additional segments of the corridor between SE Brooklyn and Bush streets; NE Thomson to Hancock; and lastly SE Schiller Street and SE Foster Road. The existing pavement on NE/SE 82nd Avenue is severely deteriorated in these sections, with cracking and water infiltration that extends below the surface of the roadway. After wrapping up paving days ahead of schedule on NW 23rd Avenue (see third and fourth photos), PBOT crews are moving to SE 41st Avenue, between Woodward Street and Grant Court, thanks to Fixing Our Streets. This neighborhood greenway is popular for people on bikes and other non-motor vehicles. The corridor connects travelers to Richmond Elementary School as well as businesses and housing on the busy SE Division Street area. Later this summer, a PBOT contractor will be repaving SE Division Street from SE Cesar Chavez Blvd to SE 50th Avenue in the Summer of 2026 for the SE Division Street Repaving Project. Expect delays, travel cautiously, observe all closures and directions by flaggers, and use alternate routes if possible. You'll find more details about these projects and PBOT's road maintenance work at the link in our bio.

Excuse me, I think there’s something in my eye 🥹 It’s only May 15 and we’ve already gotten so many good Bike to Books designs submitted! Earlier today, we saw mom and daughter duo submission that may or may not have made our eyes water a little. On the design sheet, we ask what inspired the design. “I just thought about a mushroom guy. And it made me think of Earth Day, which I think is a really special day to me,” Hilde said about her design. Megan, Hilde’s mom wrote, “Drawing with my daughter, thinking about what would make her smile and thinking of early morning commutes - wondering where this crew is coming from and going to.” Bike to Books is the program where PBOT and Multnomah County Library partner to encourage Portlanders to ride bikes and read books. There’s still plenty of time to head to your local library branch to pick up a design sheet (or two or three or four) or download it from biketobooks.com. We love thinking about families or groups of friends working on their designs together. Next spring, the four winning designs will be installed on a Portland street! Learn more about the Bike to Books design contest at the link in our bio. Okay, BRB, gotta go hug our moms 🧡

Come see us at the Centennial Neighborhood Bike Fair on Friday, May 29 from 2:45 p.m. to 5:45 p.m. at Parklane Elementary School and get a free helmet fitting! We’ll also have learn-to-ride lessons, helmet giveaway, quick-fix bike repair, and a fun bike safety passport activity to earn a prize. Plus community rides to get comfortable riding on city streets. We hope to see you there! May is Bike Month and we’re excited to help y’all get or stay rolling! For more information, see the link in our bio!

Portland Sunday Parkways Presented by @kpnorthwest  kicks off the 2026 season this Sunday, May 17, in Southwest Portland from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.   Celebrate car-free streets with your community by walking, biking, rolling, shopping, and exploring five activation areas featuring vendor marketplaces, community booths, free family-friendly activities, and live entertainment.   Streets along the route will be closed to motorized traffic from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Local access will remain available to homes or businesses along the event route. Volunteers, traffic flaggers, and temporary barricades will be stationed at intersections to help guide drivers. If possible, plan ahead and avoid driving in the area.   Parking on streets along the Southwest Sunday Parkways route is not allowed on the day of the event, starting at 6 a.m., for vendor marketplaces, community booths, and activities in the streets. “No Parking” signs have been posted in advance. Vehicles left on the route in areas posted for “no parking” will receive an $85 citation for violating the temporary no parking zone plus towing and storage fees. Vehicles will be towed beginning at 6 a.m. on Sunday.   Driving in the area? For east-west access, you can cross at SW 35th Avenue and SW Multnomah Boulevard or SW Falcon Street. You can also cross SW 35th Avenue at SW Vermont Street or SW Capitol Highway for north-south access.     Taking the bus? As part of Sunday Parkways partnership with @trimet , special bus detours will run from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. TriMet Bus Line 44 – Capitol Hwy/Mocks Crest will detour both directions between Capitol Hwy & Taylors Ferry and Capitol Hwy & 31st,. TriMet Bus Line 45 – Garden Home will detour northbound starting at Garden Home & 45th.   For full information, visit the Southwest event webpage by clicking the link in our bio.

I beg your garden!? NW/SW Broadway is looking so fresh and so green (green)! PBOT and Portland Parks and Recreation partnered to put out over 50 planters, protecting the bike lane, along NW and SW Broadway through downtown Portland. Portland Parks and Recreation horticulturist picked resilient plants, low maintenance plants adaptable for full sun through shade and suitable for challenging environments. Heights will be varied to create visual interest, using low growing plants at crossings for better visibility. A mix of evergreen and seasonal blooms are used for year-round appeal. The planters will be watered once a week, sometimes through September, depending on the weather. Here’s a full planting list for all you plant nerds: • Cryptomeria japonica ‘Black Dragon • Nandina domestica ‘Purple’ • Osmanthus heterophyllus ‘Goshiki’ • Viburnum davidii • Mahonia nervosa • Guara ‘Belleza Light Pink Compact’ • Hellebore • Rudbeckia – Black Eyed Susan • Carex testacea • Sedum spectabile • Hakonechloa macra • Geranium ‘Rozanne’ • Rubus calycinoides – Creeping Raspberry May is Bike Month and this is just one example of how PBOT is making biking safer and more enjoyable in Portland. Learn more about the NW/SW Broadway Streetscape Project at the link in our bio.

Sharpen your pencils, locate a lawn chair, and dust off your clipboard... PBOT's annual bike count is back! Each summer, over 100 Portlanders come together to count people biking at more than 350 locations across the city. This annual data collection is only possible thanks to our volunteers. The volunteer sign up form is now open, claim your spot today! Counting will take place June 2 - Sept. 30. Counting locations are available on a first come first serve basis. Learn more about PBOT's annual bike count and fill out the volunteer sign up form on our website at portland.gov/bicycle-counts.

Last summer, crews repaved Pride Plaza on SW Harvey Milk Street between 12th and 13th Avenues. We’re happy to announce that a colorful street mural, furniture, greenery, and whimsy are coming back to the plaza this summer! Thank you for your patience while we repaved Pride Plaza in preparation for the upcoming plaza construction. Upgrades to the plaza will feature durable, high-quality materials and will represent PBOT’s first example of a “permanent street plaza”. Permanent street plazas are intended to serve as longer-term public spaces that support local businesses and community use for the foreseeable future. In tandem with Pride Plaza, PBOT will also be constructing a second street plaza (or promenade), just down the street. Darcelle XV Promenade on SW 9th Avenue will be next to the Darcelle XV Plaza under construction now by @portlandparks . This street plaza includes a portion of the future Green Loop, a linear park and multiuse path that will connect the Central City. The design will also feature custom artwork, planters and greenery, and overhead lighting. Find more detailed information about these upcoming plaza projects on our website, linked in bio. We’re so excited to welcome you back to Pride Plaza and welcome you to the new Darcelle XV Promenade later this summer!

🚧 Along with 8 other elementary schools in Portland, our bike bus has been collaborating with @pbotinfo 's Safe Routes to School program on the Bike Bus Wayfinding Pilot Project. Bike Bus signage and pavement markings were installed to help educate communities about bike buses, how to travel on neighborhood greenways, and to encourage safer driving. This project was made possible through an @oregonmetro Regional Travel Options (RTO) grant 💕 📋 Now we want to hear your experience with the project, which you can share by taking a short 5-minute survey, available in both English and Spanish: /g/Ff6D3EakWM . Survey link is also in the bio ⬆️ **Survey is open through May 31st** Please share with other school families; this is not limited to bike bus riders! 🦓 The Safe Routes to School crew will also be at Abernethy tomorrow morning to survey families in person, in zebra costumes nonetheless!!