The Columbia River Crossing’s Independent Review Panel faced harsh testimony Wednesday night at the Expo Center in North Portland from residents, environmental groups, and anti-toll critics.

A few voices expressed support of the $3.6 billion mega-project, but the panel, made up of freeway and bridge engineers from around the country, faced overwhelming discontent with the project from the small crowd of die-hard citizens in attendence.

“Welcome to Oregon,” Ron Buel said to Chairman Thomas Warne and the rest of the panel in perhaps the evenings most biting testimony. “Now please take your rubber stamps and go home!”

Buel’s testimony echoed that of Stop the CRC Coalition member David Osborn, who also labeled the experts as a “rubber stamp panel” while protesting the first meeting of the IRP earlier that day. But Osborn also accused the panel of deliberately keeping a low profile on the public’s opportunity to provide testimony.

“No one in this region knows this meeting is happening,” he testified, pointing out the meeting was announced only 48 hours prior. “How is that increasing public engagement?”

Margaret “Peg” Johnson, president of Jantzen Beach Moorage, Inc., defended the public outreach of the project and urged the planners to continue their work. “We welcome any alternatives that lessen any impact on Hayden Island, but we’ve got to move forward.”

Johnson added that the current air quality from the existing clogged freeway is causing some of the worst in the city to linger in North Portland. She reasons a larger bridge would prevent cars from idling and keep them moving.

 
Protesters picketed the first meeting of the Independent Review Panel of the Columbia River Crossing project (CRC) this morning outside the Expo Center.

About a dozen members of the grassroots organization Stop the CRC Coalition held up signs and banners denouncing what they call a “rubber stamp panel” of experts appointed by the governors of Oregon and Washington to assess the fundamentals of the $3.6 billion project.

“This is a 1950s approach," said David Osborn, holding a sign that read, “Mobility for People Not Cars! No CRC!” Osborn believes the process has been flawed from the beginning, by what he says included limited outreach to the public and a refusal to hear alternative designs.

“12 lanes gives us increased capacity at an incredible cost,” he said. “This moves us away from our sustainability goals and doesn’t strive to create livability.”

Osborn and his coalition denounce the panel of experts, that consist primarily of bridge and freeway engineers, because they are not evaluating the planning process itself.

The latest CRC project update says the panel will “assess the implementation plan for the CRC project, review the financial plan for the project [and] review and evaluate post-construction performance measures.”

Saws screech and jackhammers pound over the sounds of traffic on NE Broadway as workers cut and bash through concrete alongside near-motionless lanes of cars.

This work is the latest phase of the 3.3 mile extension of the Portland Streetcar—a project officials say is on schedule and budget for a 2012 completion.

Street construction always causes a temporary traffic headache. In this case, Portland’s ambitions to increase street car capacity intersects with the existing inconvenience known as the “Broadway- Wiedler Box." The Box is a daily traffic snarl created by the confluence of the Rose Quarter, Llyod Center and I-5 on and off ramps.

“It's not going to get any better,” says a cab driver idling along NE Wielder. Once the construction is complete, the cabbie sees a streetcar as just another snarl to add to congestion. “Streetcars go slower than the MAX.”

The frenzied construction and heavy traffic of recent weeks make clear the city is moving ahead quickly with its major project east of the Willamette. With tracks already in the ground in sections along Grand and MLK, construction teams are now cutting cement and laying more track along NE Broadway toward the bridge.
 

Sarah Stevenson, Executive Director of Innovative Housing addressed the Friends of Cathedral Park Neighborhood Association Tuesday night. She was responding to neighborhood complaints about Innovative Housing's 14-unit facility, with part-time service and care providers by Cascadia Behavioral Healthcare.  The building, located near North Trumbull and Edison streets, was purchased by Innovative in 2005 and renovated and rented the following year.

Tenants are formerly homeless residents who must be single when they apply and go through a screening process.

Portland has big plans for the Memorial Coliseum, but major factors must be addressed before the council selects a design in April. Apart from choosing one of the three top proposals and arranging funding, Coliseum designers say the operating agreement must be finalized.

Currently the Blazers, who developed one of the three successful designs to be recommended by the advisory committee, have an agreement with the city that gives them exclusive control over the Coliseum’s operation. But potential planners of the revamped venue say the current arrangement gives the Blazers’ proposal a distinct advantage.

Bob Melbo, state rail planner for the Oregon Department of Transportation, says $750,000 has been allocated towards two projects in and around North Portland. The rest of Oregon’s $8 million grant from Federal Rail Administration will go to renovate Union Station, he says.

The first project would improve the connection between the Union Pacific line and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway (BNSF) they share near the entrance to Terminal 6 and Marine Drive. The improvement would increase current train speeds of 10-15 miles per hour to 25-30 miles per hour, Melbo says.

“This makes a big difference for an 8,000 foot long train,” he added. “It will occupy less time on the track, so by virtue that helps with delays [of Amtrak service].”

North and Northeast community residents met last night to vent frustrations and discuss the future of Urban Renewal Areas in their neighborhoods. Noting a poor showing of Portland Development Commission staff members, the community expressed an unsettling lack of trust in the process and motives of the development organization.

"Gentrification” was not the only "g" word thrown around at the meeting. More than one resident went as far as to call the process “genocide.”

The town hall was hosted in the Billy Webb Elks Lodge by the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods and other organizations and described as a “Community Truth-Telling.” A panel of local residents and stakeholders discussed the history of the controversial development plans, but they unanimously came down hard on the PDC's history with URAs in the neighborhood.

Hundreds gathered Monday night at the Acadian Ballroom to vent their feelings, frustrations and curious allegories on the increasingly popular Last Thursday event on Alberta Street. A line of attendees snaked around the corner from the ballroom’s entrance, leaving standing room only for many inside.

[illustrative photo by http://www.flickr.com/photos/dmentd/ / CC BY 2.0]

The Kenton Neighborhood Association has won a major victory for cutting down noise from the Portland International Raceway, says Ryan Pittel, the association’s noise subcommittee chair.

At a Jan. 13 public meeting, the Noise Review Board denied PIR a multi-year variance on allowable noise limits in four upcoming racing events. Instead, the board voted to review only 2010’s races.

“My stance was that variances should be applied for on a yearly basis,” Pittel said. “We just wanted a voice.”

“Being my own boss gives me the time to serve on neighborhood committees,” says Woodlawn’s Anjala Ehelebe, financial advisory with Primerica. Ehelebe has been active in the Woodlawn Neighborhood Association as secretary and most recently as the group’s historian. In 2008 she even published a book on Woodlawn’s journey from a streetcar depot to the friendly neighborhood we know today. 

Jenna Forzley, co-owner of the Overlook neighborhood’s Atomic Pizza, only opened her restaurant on North Killingsworth Street last March, but her colleagues already say she is an anchor for the neighborhood. Recently she stepped up as vice president of the Overlook Village Business District Association. 

“Having a restaurant has given us more opportunity to reach out to the community,” she says.

Realtor Paul Maresh was born and raised in North Portland and has lived in the University Park neighborhood for the past 14 years. The hobbyist beekeeper and 1969 Jefferson High School graduate champions many causes for his neighborhood and greater North Portland, but he believes the greatest need is to provide improved transportation infrastructure to the area. 

“The potential for employment [in North Portland] is not realized because of the lack of transportation,” he says. While he understands the importance of industry in the area — having worked over the years for various parts of it — Maresh notes that heavy and fast-moving trucks on the same roadways intimidate a growing number of cyclists.  He’s working on a solution.

Three bicycles rest against poles at the head of a rough but walkable trail. The Waud Bluff trail, more an idea today than anything concrete, is something stakeholders hope will eventually provide a vital connection between the neighborhood above and the Willamette Greenway Project below. 

Just south of the University of Portland from Willamette Boulevard, the overgrown path winds its way down the bluff, across the Union Pacific railroad tracks at the base, and over to the industrial lands of Swan Island. Small oases of trees dot the industrial sites from the south past the university to the north. Nearby the massive dry docks of Swan Island loom as a memory of the era when the workers of the Kaiser Yards built and launched over a thousand liberty and victory ships for the Allies of World War II.

Northeast Portland residents can enjoy low-cost purchase and installation of solar panels, says David Sweet, board member of the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods. Their tried and true ingredient: collective purchasing.

“I’m an evangelist for photovoltaic cells!” says Sweet, who hopes, along with the NECN, that the project called Solarize/Weatherize NE will bring cheap green energy solutions to the neighborhoods of Northeast.

Modeled after the enormously successful Solarize Portland project in Southeast, the idea revolves around reducing the cost of individual home solar energy systems through bulk purchasing by a group of residents.

Representatives of Portland Public Schools met last night at Jefferson High School, attempting to set the record straight on their High School System Redesign. The message: There are more conversations to be had, and there are no preconceived notions about which high schools will be closed as the plan takes effect.

“We want every school to be a place where our kids want to go,” said PPS superintendant Carole Smith at the start of the meeting. Smith acknowledged the Jefferson cluster has had some difficulty with school redesigns in the past, but that PPS was committed to seeing this plan through to the end.

But not all members of the community share her optimism.  Many parents, teachers and students wanted answers. Now.

“There’s tension between being part of creating something and wanting all the answers,” explained Smith. “We’ve made progress, though it doesn’t seem fast enough for some people.”

Portland Public Schools delayed the final decision on the High School System Redesign, but representatives confirm at least two closures of existing schools.

Sarah Singer, senior manager of the redesign, says PPS Superintendent Carole Smith will make a decision on the exact number of schools to close, but the specifics will be postponed until June, after the board works out the details.

“There will be either two or three closures,” she explained. Some schools may be converted to focus schools, some may be closed outright, but Singer says the immediate decision will determine how many remain. “If we have bigger schools, we’ll have to close more.”

Neighborhood concerns about the vacant Clarendon Elementary School building in Portsmouth continue despite an Oct. 6 meeting between Portland Public Schools officials and residents.  The building has been closed for over a year and residents have expressed concern that the building is attracting vandals and illicit activities.

Portsmouth is also home to Rosa Parks Elementary, one of only two new public schools to be built in the city in a decade (the other being Forest Park Elementary). PPS held a recent meeting at Rosa Parks Elementary to discuss plans to close or repurpose some of its high schools. In recent years, PPS has closed North Portland’s John Ball, Kenton, and Applegate elementary schools, as well as Whitaker Middle School in Northeast Portland.  With more closures on the way, where does that leave already closed and vacant properties like Clarendon?

Portland Public Schools held their second public outreach meeting on Saturday, outlining their plans, assumptions and reasoning on the high school system redesign. Discussing school size, flexibility and the effects these two factors have on elective offerings to students, the main issue PPS identified was balance.

Addressing a full room of parents and a few students in the Rosa Parks Elementary School cafeteria, PPS representatives presented data on a number of education scenarios for community schools. Ranging from five community schools of 1,640 students down to nine community schools of 911 students, PPS's conclusion was that bigger schools mean more options for students.