Long championed as the cycling capital of North America, Portland (the Oregon one), has guided other cities striving to cultivate an active and educated populace yearning for two-wheeled mobility.
So many words have been written about Portland’s bike culture that a mass influx of new residents has spurred soaring housing costs. This new generation shunning the suburbs is now finding out the harsh realities of a real estate market willing to use bikes as a wedge marketing tool.
On top of this, there’s been a bitter ‘bike-lash’ to all those sleek cyclists darting past backed up automobiles on the road: Portland’s driving class seems hostile to the point of calling for violence against those wise enough to ride.
Take a look at some of the comments under a local news station’s Facebook post in response to a young Portland bicyclist who tragically lost his leg after a truck driver ran him over, and a subsequent protest at the unsafe site of the collision:
