Thursday, August 10, 2006

What's green and red and goes 35 miles an hour..?

The St. John's Bridge.

One of the cool things about living in the City of Bridges is...well...bridges. You want drawbridges? We got drawbridges. You want suspension bridges? Got 'em. Dual-purpose road-and-rail bridges. Uh-huh.

One of my favorite ways home is up Interstate 5 to Highway 30 and then out through the funky industrial district. The green hills of Forest Park curl, cool and inviting, on the left, and up ahead is the Industrial Gothic arch of the St. John's Bridge. Up the ramp, over the span, right past the old Town Hall (now our beloved North Portland precinct cop shoppe) and the a spin down Willamette Drive to the Casa del Peeper.

Did I mention that it's a cool bridge...?



One of the coolest things about our bridges is that you can ride your bike - and ONLY ride your bike - across them one day a year. And that's this Sunday. It's always a mob scene, usually hot, and there's always some nimrod walking their bike up the Marquam. BUT...it's a hell of a rush to ride over the I-5 bridges in the middle of 20,000 other people!

It's worth the crush.

Later: a more personal cool thing about Portland.

1 comment:

Millicent said...

You're killin' me ovah heeyah....

Dublin has loads of bridges too because the city is divided by the River Liffey (aka the River Icky)...sort of like another town I know...but these are mostly pedestrian bridges and, generally, relatively non-descript. The exception? The Ha'penny Bridge of Ulysses fame. Check it out some time. But it's no St. Johns!