Flower potholes: How has this not caught on in Portland?

If ever there was a protest suited for a bumpy-streeted Northwest city obsessed with public art, gardening, good manners bordering on the passive aggressive and alternative transportation, "pothole gardening" is it.

Across North America and parts of Europe, people fed up with local municipalities ignoring their complaints are filling street potholes with potting soil and flowers.

The passive aggressive way of getting your town to deal with potholes. Posted by Life of Dad on Saturday, May 23, 2015

In Hamtramck, Mich., Paige Breithart said the city has been blooming lazy about fixing its damaged blacktop.

"There are a huge amount of potholes around the area, and I know a lot of people have been annoyed after bursting tires and avoiding them," Breithart told WXYZ last month.

She and a friend planted about 40 or 50 flowers across the city, the TV station reported.

"We used my friend's pickup truck, put two flats of flowers and bags of soil in the back, and just drove around, filled it, and drove away," Breithart added.

From small towns such Schenectady, Moose Jaw and Bangor to major metropolises such as Montreal and Chicago, the movement is gaining momentum.

In fact, a frustrated bicyclist in Edinburgh, Scotland, live-tweeted her recent adventure in creative street gardening.

Talk about a gauntlet thrown down. There is nothing like telling Portlanders that they have been out-Portlandiaed.

However, Portland Bureau of Transportation officials say they have yet to receive reports of someone making flowerbeds out of potholes in Stumptown. It's not as if there aren't streets in desperate need of attention.

Maybe pothole plantings haven't sprouted up in Portland because the city is so darn quick in responding to complaints, said Diane Dulken, a PBOT spokeswoman.

"While we are in need of funding to adequately maintain our streets in good condition and repair streets in poor condition, PBOT is highly responsive to reports of potholes," she wrote in an email. "Our pledge is to fix a pothole within 21 days of receiving a report."

Currently, however, the city's average repair time is five to seven business days, she said.

"So the growing season for a flower planted in a Portland pothole would be very short and flowers planted in a Portland garden would have a much better chance of thriving than one planted in a Portland pothole," she said.

Hey, hey. Looks like PBOT has developed some swagger. Anyone willing to test Dulken's theory?

Stretches of Northeast Weidler Street north of the Moda Center look like a half-detonated minefield.

Of course, in Welland, Canada, authorities worry the pothole flowers - while cute - are a potentially dangerous way to make a point.

"Pedestrians, cyclists, motorists -- they're all at risk should a driver feel compelled to swerve and avoid potted petunias," reports the Welland Tribune.

Still, I'm thinking it's better than the, ahem, NSFW methods other people have used to bring attention to potholes. Also, no one actually thinks using a pothole as a beer cooler is safe, do they?

Here's a look at what else is "out there" about traffic, transit and transportation in Oregon and around the globe (no matter what the clock says, it's always the morning commute somewhere):

Soon,

Uber has launched UberPedal, "an on-demand bike rack option in Portland,"

Speaking of Uber: The San Francisco-based startup has gutted Carnegie Mellon University's robotics department in its quest to create driverless ride-hailing in the future,

The Oregonian/OregonLive's Amy Wang reports

As a lane-splitting bill moves close to a final vote in the Oregon Legislature,

-- Joseph Rose

503-221-8029

jrose@oregonian.com

@josephjrose