Traffic Data Reveals River View Cemetery as a Crucial Corridor for Portland Bicyclers and Vulnerable Road Users
The River View Cemetery (RVC) route has long served as a vital, though precarious, connection for thousands of Portland commuters and recreational users—linking the waterfront, downtown, and Sellwood to Southwest Portland and Lewis & Clark College. For decades, this private property has acted as a de facto public connector, allowing the City of Portland to avoid creating a safe, public, all-weather route for a critical transportation link. The present traffic monitoring study and recurring, unexpected closures have underscored the urgency for the City of Portland to act on a safe, public, and all-weather alternative.
To move the conversation forward from anecdote to evidence, Lewis & Clark College partnered with River View Cemetery to commission a data-driven analysis of the route's usage. My company, Green Dormer Solutions, LLC, provided pro bono traffic monitoring using the open-source TrafficMonitor.ai device. The goal was to provide traffic advocates, city councilors, and transportation planners with objective evidence to justify the creation of a safe, public route.
Data-Driven Insights: Quantifying RVC's Essential Role
Data was collected over a 36-day period, split between Summer (August 15-28, 2025) and Autumn (September 19-October 10, 2025), at the Macadam entrance gate. The analysis revealed significant and consistent use, highlighting the route’s essential role for active transit, especially for those making the challenging ascent to the Southwest Portland neighborhoods. Highlighted are the route’s essential role for active transit, particularly for uphill travel, but also highlights the intrusion of motor vehicle traffic.
User Type | Average Daily Traffic (ADT) , Count | Weekday ADT | Weekend ADT | Exiting Cemetery (Downhill) ADT | Entering Cemetery (Uphill) ADT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Bicycles | 330 | 313 | 344 | 103 | 201 † |
Pedestrians | 90 | 81 | 87 | 76 | 23 † |
Vehicles | 88 | 96 | 53† | 57 | 30 † |
† Indicates statistically significant difference in comparison (p<=0.0.5)
Key Findings from the Analysis: Evidence for Public Investment
The data provides a clear picture of why a public alternative is critically needed, supporting the arguments made by advocates for years.
Bicycle Reliance and Commuting:
High Volume and Consistent Use: Bicycles account for the largest volume of users, with 330 daily average counts. Importantly, the volume showed no statistically significant difference between weekdays (313) and weekends (344), illustrating consistent reliance for both commuting and recreation. This confirms that RVC is a crucial link for transportation, not just a recreational trail.
Directional Travel: Significantly more bicycles were recorded entering (uphill) the cemetery than exiting (201 vs. 103). This strong directional trend suggests the cemetery route is a preferred, safer path for the challenging climb to the Southwest Portland neighborhoods, as alternatives like Taylor's Ferry Road are perceived as dangerous.
Group Rides: An average of 3.2 "group rides" (clusters of at least 5 bicycles) occur per day, with 79% of these groups traveling uphill. This further solidifies the route’s importance for the challenging ascent.
Commuter vs. Cut-Through Traffic: While bicycle volume was evenly distributed after 8 am, with a slight bump from 4-6 pm on weekdays, vehicle volume showed a statistically significant higher volume on weekdays (96 daily average) compared to weekends (53 daily average). Vehicle traffic concentrated near the evening commute, with 34% of vehicles traveling from 4-6 pm on weekdays. This indicates the cemetery is being used as a vehicle cut-through route, increasing conflict points with active transit users and cemetery visitors.
Safety is a Critical Concern:
Extreme Speeding: The speed limit in RVC is 15 mph. The data showed that 66% of vehicles and 15% of bicycles were captured moving over this limit. Vehicles, in particular, showed an average speed of 17 mph downhill, with seasonal analysis showing a statistically significant increase in cars driving 20-30 mph in autumn. The speeding vehicle cut-through traffic creates a high-risk environment on private roads that were never designed for this volume and speed, directly contributing to the cemetery's liability concerns.
Comparison to Alternatives: The primary public alternative, Taylor’s Ferry Road, has an Average Daily Traffic (ADT) of over 5,560 westbound vehicles with an 85th percentile speed of 49 mph (posted 35 mph limit), making it unsafe for bicycles and pedestrians. The data confirms the high volume of bicycle traffic relies on RVC precisely due to the unsafe nature of alternatives.
Direction of Travel: The Crucial Uphill/Downhill Divide
The data highlights the cemetery's critical function as a connection for cyclists traveling uphill toward Lewis & Clark College, the Terwilliger Parkway area, and Southwest neighborhoods as well as potential recreational and training rides.
Overall, there were significantly more bicycles entering the cemetery (going uphill) versus exiting (going downhill) at a ratio of 201 to 103 bicycles ADT. This is a powerful finding, as the most challenging and dangerous alternative, S Taylors Ferry Rd, is primarily an uphill/eastbound slog with an 85th percentile speed of 44 mph (in a 35 mph zone) and high Average Daily Traffic (ADT) counts of over 6,000.1
The opposite trend was observed for vehicles and pedestrians, with more exiting (downhill) than entering, indicating that drivers see the cemetery as a viable link for downhill travel as high-speed cut-through to avoid potential congestion on Taylor’s Ferry or Macadam. This also creates more potential conflict, as daily pedestrian count is slightly higher than vehicles, at 90 vs 88 ADT, and all user activity increases during the evening commute time.
Vehicle Speed is the Primary Safety Threat
The most alarming discovery relates to speed. The speed limit within River View Cemetery is 15 mph. The data clearly shows that vehicles are routinely exceeding this limit, posing a direct threat to all other users.
66% of vehicles were captured moving over 15 mph (the speed limit), compared to just 15% of bicycles.
This speed differential is magnified when traveling downhill: 74% of vehicles vs. 39% of bicycles were over 15 mph.
Vehicles maintained a high average speed regardless of direction: 15 mph uphill vs. 17 mph downhill.
Bicycles, by contrast, had a major directional speed difference: 7 mph uphill vs. 14 mph downhill.
This confirms that the cemetery's roads are being treated as a high-speed, non-residential street by most drivers, directly contrasting with the intended quiet nature of a cemetery and the safety needs of active transportation users. The risks are compounded by the presence of vulnerable road users and the narrow, winding nature of the roads.
Seasonal and Time-of-Day Analysis
The analysis also looked at seasonal and hourly variations, offering a more nuanced view of usage.
Seasonality
User Type | Summer Daily Average | Autumn Daily Average | Difference (Summer vs. Autumn) |
|---|---|---|---|
Bicycles | 386 | 294† | † 24% reduction (Significant) |
Vehicles | 91 | 83 | No significant difference |
Pedestrian | 83 | 91 | No significant difference |
While overall bicycle counts saw a significant 24% reduction in autumn compared to summer—a common trend potentially due to weather—vehicle counts remained essentially the same. This suggests that the volume of cut-through motor traffic is consistent regardless of the season, further highlighting the urgency of finding a safe public alternative. It is worth noting that weekend bicycle counts remained consistent between summer and autumn with 367 vs 370 ADT, respectively.
Furthermore, the data showed that vehicles were significantly faster in autumn than in summer, with more cars driving 20-30 mph. This increase in speed, despite lower overall bicycle volume, is a dangerous trend that increases risk for all users as the days get shorter and weather worsens.
Hourly Breakdown
The hourly breakdown points directly to the cemetery's function as a bicycle commuter route:
Bicycle volume was evenly distributed throughout the day after 8 am, with a notable weekday bump of 21% of total volume occurring during the crucial 4-6 pm evening window.
Vehicle volume was highly concentrated during the afternoon rush hour, with 34% of vehicles traveling through the cemetery from 4-6 pm on weekdays.
This convergence of high-speed motor vehicle traffic with peak bicycle and pedestrian commuter traffic creates a predictable and unacceptable safety hazard precisely when vulnerable users need the route most.
Group Riding
The analysis also shed light on group cycling, which has been a point of contention with the cemetery users. Group rides were defined as at least five bicycles clustered within 10 seconds and had no way of differentiating recreational or commuter rides.
There is an average of 3.2 "group rides" per day, nearly even on weekdays and weekends.
Group rides make up an average of 8% of total daily bicycle volume, averaging 10 bicycles per group.
79% of group rides go uphill, further cementing the cemetery's role as the only feasible route for ascending the hill.
Weekday group rides skew towards evening (5-7pm) and weekend group rides skew toward morning (9-10 am)
Specifically, weekday morning commuter group rides, largely uphill, are likely a result of a "platoon" effect caused by the traffic light at Mcadam's grouping cyclists as they commence the ascent toward the cemetery.
The Alternative Route Crisis
The precarious nature of the cemetery access was recently thrust into the spotlight with temporary closures due to construction, prompting a familiar outcry from the community. A recent BikePortland article, "Yes, River View Cemetery is closed to cycling. Here's why," reported temporary, safety-related restrictions and the inability of the cemetery to provide prior warnings due to outside contractors and weather concerns.