Paul J. Berg
2007-07-22 01:02:49 UTC
~
From The (Portland) Oregonian - July 21, 2007
Could you imagine a streetcar line up Northeast Sandy Boulevard?
And how about Hawthorne, Killingsworth and Woodstock, just to name a few
more?
The Portland Streetcar, long considered a downtown transit and
redevelopment tool, could reach disparate parts of the city under a
vision described on Friday by City Commissioner Sam Adams in a speech to
the Portland City Club. The commissioner oversees the Portland Office of
Transportation, which is developing a 30-year rail transit plan for the
city, with implications for the metro area.
"What would Portland look like if we implemented solutions to global
warming and peak oil?" Adams said. "It would look a lot like Portland
circa 1920, a time when the main means of motion were your feet,
streetcars and bikes."
The rail transit vision for the region was just one factor in a
wide-ranging speech on transportation that Adams portrayed as an
overwhelmed, underfunded system with a dire backlog of delayed
maintenance.
"Portland's streets are killing and injuring people despite the fact
that we know how to make them safer," Adams said. "We have lacked
adequate funds to implement safety solutions, to enforce traffic laws
and educate road users."
The speech, titled "From here to there in tomorrow's Portland," provided
Adams' vision for the city's transportation needs decades into the
future. The ballroom of civic activists at The Governor Hotel could have
been forgiven for confusing it with a campaign address. Adams is known
to be considering higher office, and big visions decades in the making
are some of the ingredients that can inspire others to think of a city
official as mayoral or congressional in stature.
The Portland area faces several major transportation challenges, Adams
said, aside from the rush-hour gridlock most people are familiar with.
City streets aren't safe enough. Specifically, nearly 60 miles of the
city's busiest streets don't have sidewalks.
"With such a gap in our transportation system, I don't blame parents for
not wanting their kids to walk or bike to school, which contributes to
the rise in childhood obesity," Adams said. The city's basic road and
bridge system is "crumbling," he said, with at least $422 million in
repairs needed. Another $325 million would be required to fix Multnomah
County's Willamette River bridges, he said.
The potential unraveling of the region's land-use laws -- most
pointedly, the urban growth boundary -- at the hands of voter-approved
Measure 37 could further deepen the problems, he said.
"If the UGB goes, likely so, too, will the remaining capacity of our
road and freeway systems," Adams said. "This is a disaster in the
making."
Along with the challenges, Adams asserted that he's made progress in his
two years supervising the transportation bureau in several ways:
The city, along with other regional governments, persuaded the state
Legislature to approve $250 million for a light-rail extension from
Milwaukie to downtown Portland. Another $20 million was approved for
streetcar projects.
The city's first transportation safety summit led to $11 million in city
money for improvements to Portland's most dangerous intersections. That
has already resulted in new crosswalks on Northwest 23rd Avenue and
Northeast Alberta Street, and 100 new school crossing beacons, among
other recent projects.
Portland's first freight mobility master plan has identified important
corridors for freight movement that could minimize impacts on
residential neighborhoods.
The department also plans an expansion of the network of bicycle
boulevards, streets where residents have ready automobile access but are
dominated by bicycle use.
The more lofty future goals are intended to have a direct impact on
land-use decisions in the city limits. Adams wants to see more dense
residential and mixed-use development along existing transit lines, such
as the yellow Interstate MAX line, and future lines.
"The slow pace of redevelopment along the yellow line in North Portland
concerns me," Adams said.
"Every transit station in the city should be a vibrant micro-community
with its own unique sense of place and identity," he said. "We need to
maximize the return on our multi-billion dollar transit investments with
station area development that makes walking, bicycling and transit the
easiest and best set of travel choices."
~
Poster's Note: Running streetcar lines down Sandy, Killingsworth,
Hawthorne or Woodstock would not reduce traffic congestion. In fact, it
is more than likely will increase the traffic congestion on these
streets. Not to mention costing millions of dollars.
~
From The (Portland) Oregonian - July 21, 2007
Could you imagine a streetcar line up Northeast Sandy Boulevard?
And how about Hawthorne, Killingsworth and Woodstock, just to name a few
more?
The Portland Streetcar, long considered a downtown transit and
redevelopment tool, could reach disparate parts of the city under a
vision described on Friday by City Commissioner Sam Adams in a speech to
the Portland City Club. The commissioner oversees the Portland Office of
Transportation, which is developing a 30-year rail transit plan for the
city, with implications for the metro area.
"What would Portland look like if we implemented solutions to global
warming and peak oil?" Adams said. "It would look a lot like Portland
circa 1920, a time when the main means of motion were your feet,
streetcars and bikes."
The rail transit vision for the region was just one factor in a
wide-ranging speech on transportation that Adams portrayed as an
overwhelmed, underfunded system with a dire backlog of delayed
maintenance.
"Portland's streets are killing and injuring people despite the fact
that we know how to make them safer," Adams said. "We have lacked
adequate funds to implement safety solutions, to enforce traffic laws
and educate road users."
The speech, titled "From here to there in tomorrow's Portland," provided
Adams' vision for the city's transportation needs decades into the
future. The ballroom of civic activists at The Governor Hotel could have
been forgiven for confusing it with a campaign address. Adams is known
to be considering higher office, and big visions decades in the making
are some of the ingredients that can inspire others to think of a city
official as mayoral or congressional in stature.
The Portland area faces several major transportation challenges, Adams
said, aside from the rush-hour gridlock most people are familiar with.
City streets aren't safe enough. Specifically, nearly 60 miles of the
city's busiest streets don't have sidewalks.
"With such a gap in our transportation system, I don't blame parents for
not wanting their kids to walk or bike to school, which contributes to
the rise in childhood obesity," Adams said. The city's basic road and
bridge system is "crumbling," he said, with at least $422 million in
repairs needed. Another $325 million would be required to fix Multnomah
County's Willamette River bridges, he said.
The potential unraveling of the region's land-use laws -- most
pointedly, the urban growth boundary -- at the hands of voter-approved
Measure 37 could further deepen the problems, he said.
"If the UGB goes, likely so, too, will the remaining capacity of our
road and freeway systems," Adams said. "This is a disaster in the
making."
Along with the challenges, Adams asserted that he's made progress in his
two years supervising the transportation bureau in several ways:
The city, along with other regional governments, persuaded the state
Legislature to approve $250 million for a light-rail extension from
Milwaukie to downtown Portland. Another $20 million was approved for
streetcar projects.
The city's first transportation safety summit led to $11 million in city
money for improvements to Portland's most dangerous intersections. That
has already resulted in new crosswalks on Northwest 23rd Avenue and
Northeast Alberta Street, and 100 new school crossing beacons, among
other recent projects.
Portland's first freight mobility master plan has identified important
corridors for freight movement that could minimize impacts on
residential neighborhoods.
The department also plans an expansion of the network of bicycle
boulevards, streets where residents have ready automobile access but are
dominated by bicycle use.
The more lofty future goals are intended to have a direct impact on
land-use decisions in the city limits. Adams wants to see more dense
residential and mixed-use development along existing transit lines, such
as the yellow Interstate MAX line, and future lines.
"The slow pace of redevelopment along the yellow line in North Portland
concerns me," Adams said.
"Every transit station in the city should be a vibrant micro-community
with its own unique sense of place and identity," he said. "We need to
maximize the return on our multi-billion dollar transit investments with
station area development that makes walking, bicycling and transit the
easiest and best set of travel choices."
~
Poster's Note: Running streetcar lines down Sandy, Killingsworth,
Hawthorne or Woodstock would not reduce traffic congestion. In fact, it
is more than likely will increase the traffic congestion on these
streets. Not to mention costing millions of dollars.
~