11 Trial Lawyer • Fall 2022 See Pedestrian Experience 12 By Ashton Simpson After three straight days of rain, it is a typical wet spring day in Portland and KemMarks is walking with his fouryear-old on outer Southeast Powell west of 119th Avenue. They suddenly come to an abrupt stop because his daughter, Sasha, has lost her shoe on a muddy trail. “It literally sucked her shoe off!” Marks explains, “There were no sidewalks and it was too dangerous to walk on the edge of the roadway given speeding and reckless driving of motorists in the area.” Marks, an active transportation and disability rights advocate, is no stranger to how the built environment plays a role in not only how pedestrians are able to move but also how it promotes bad driving habits in motorists. Without crosswalks, sidewalks and adequate street lighting, motorists treat arterial streets like Powell as highways, driving at high speeds with little regard for pedestrian and bicycle traffic. To make matters more challenging, Marks has lived his entire life legally blind. He grew up in Peru, Indiana, and, from an early age, learned to navigate a world built for sighted people. Marks decided he wanted to move to Oregon because of our state's progressive values. He attended Willamette University where he earned his Juris Doctorate degree in 1991. While studying for his degree, Marks interned with Oregon Advocacy Center, nowDisability Rights Oregon. At the Oregon Advocacy Center, he learned about the failures of the transportation system. He understood the principle of universal design in the public right of way, meaning pedestrian infrastructure should work for seniors, youth and people living with disabilities first. Prioritizing the most vulnerable people in our society is a serious equity issue that will end up benefiting everyone. Through the years, Marks has fought to ensure equitable outcomes for vulnerable populations in transit. A lack of pedestrian infrastructure and reckless driving are common themes in communities all across east Multnomah County and experiences like Marks’ are often heard and overlooked, causing frustration amongst people who live in outer east county. Drivers turning right on a red light, when the pedestrian crosswalk is active, results in near misses on Marks often. The transportation infrastructure in the community was designed to support auto-centric uses and policies leaving out a key piece to movement — the pedestrian experience. For residents like Marks, who are dependent on public transit, the design of our streets and the availability of buses and trains are about more than convenience, they are a matter of life and death providing access to crucial resources for people living with disabilities, parents of dependent children or caregivers and other vulnerable populations. Room for improvement A complete street is one that has sidewalks, crosswalks, pedestrian lighting, protected bike lanes, street trees, reduced speeds, adequate enforcement and traffic calming devices. This is not the case for a lot of roads in our community with most being built to resemble five-lane highways. That includes Portland’s orphan highways such as Highway 26 (SE Powell Blvd.), US 30E (Sandy Blvd.) and the former Highway 213 (82nd Ave, PBOT took ownership of the corridor in June 2022). Orphan highways are district and regional state highways that are owned by ODOT, but functionally serve as city streets or county roads. These highways cut Ashton Simpson THE PEDESTRIAN EXPERIENCE
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