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Streetfilms: Portland’s Sunday Parkways

11:48 AM EDT on June 25, 2008

In New York, "Summer Streets" is set to debut this August. In Portland, they just held "Sunday Parkways" for the first time. Streetfilms' Clarence Eckerson, in town for the Carfree Cities conference, captured the action and picked up a few pointers for other cities planning to launch car-free events:

It was like a giant community block party with walkers, bikers, joggers, bladers, families, and pets filling the 6 mile course.

There were plenty of fun activities in four northeast parks thatwere linked by the circuit, which was opened to bikes and pedestriantraffic only from 8 AM to 2 PM. For cities planning their ownCiclovias, here are some things I liked about Portland's event:knowledgeable volunteers, lots of fun chalk messages on the ground,easy to follow directions, lots of music & entertainment, and ahuge number of bike stations for bike repair.

Ben Fried
Ben Fried started as a Streetsblog reporter in 2008 and led the site as editor-in-chief from 2010 to 2018. He lives in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn, with his wife.

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