Portland Marathon has a New Route. Here’s How It’ll Affect Yours.

Oct 2, 2019

Ready, set… reroute?

This Sunday, October 6, the Portland Marathon returns with a totally new route through Portland. The new 26.2 mile course will take runners on a tour of the city, hitting many of our most scenic — and busiest — neighborhoods. As a result, all MAX lines and 15 bus lines will be affected Sunday morning.

If you’re riding with us on Sunday morning, check for reroutes and plan an extra 30 minutes (or more) for your trip, as the race will run through many bus routes and MAX tracks. And make sure to check out trimet.org/alerts or @trimetalerts on Twitter to stay up-to-date on route changes.

Here’s more on what you can expect

MAX delays

MAX trains may stop for a time during the race to let runners pass by. Plan for up to 30-minute delays on all MAX lines between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. and up to 15-minute delays through about 4 p.m. (though we expect most of the disruptions to end by 10:30 a.m.).

Even if you’re not taking MAX in Downtown Portland, keep an eye on alerts. Trains stopped downtown can lead to delays in the rest of the system.

Bus detours and delays

We’ll detour 14 bus lines Sunday morning to avoid the marathon route:

4 – Fessenden

8 – Jackson Park/NE 15th

9 – Powell Blvd

12 – Barbur/Sandy Blvd

15 – Belmont/NW 23rd

17 – Holgate/Broadway

19 – Woodstock/Glisan

20 – Burnside/Stark

24 – Fremont/NW 18th

35 – Macadam/Greeley

44 – Capitol Hwy/Mocks Crest

54 – Beaverton-Hillsdale Hwy

56 – Scholls Ferry Rd

77 – Broadway/Halsey

We’ll start detouring buses at 6 a.m., just over an hour before the marathon’s 7:10 a.m. start time. There will be signs to direct you to temporary stop locations. By about 10:30 a.m., buses will start returning to their regular routes.

There’ll be some delays on bus lines we don’t reroute, too. Lines 2, 6 and 14 will be on their normal routes, but they’ll be delayed at the beginning of the marathon. On the east side, buses on Line 70 might also run a bit late, too.

Getting there

Save yourself a car trip, or your stamina, by using transit to get to and from the race. Even though staging for the event starts at the very early hour of 4:30 a.m., MAX and buses also start their days before dawn.

Plan your trip using our Trip Planner (and remember to put in Sunday, October 6, for your ride date, as Sunday service is a bit different than weekday service, especially on buses).

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