The Burnside Blog
This Week in Portland Design
It’s not a busy week in the City of Portland as the city celebrates MLK’s birthday on Monday, and the Historic Landmarks Commission and Design Commission both met last week. Even in Portland, some weeks are lighter on the wonk than others.
Monday Let us fondly remember Dr. King. Unfortunately, most of us will be remembering him during our lunch and coffee breaks. Unless you work for the government or in the academic sector, you’re probably working today.
Tuesday If you work for the government, today is really your Monday. Like many Mondays, there’s not much going on today. I was told a few weeks ago that the Cyan Condominiums would debut its sales office this week, but I’ve yet to confirm. Once it’s up and running, I’ll post photos. The Cyan is said to be the city’s first true work force housing condominium, and many of the units are said to be around 550 square feet. It’s said to be the prototype for many future Portland buildings, and we’ll be talking to project developer Gerding Edlen about their take on the future of Portland housing in the coming weeks.
Wednesday The PDC (222 NW 5th Ave., 8:00 am to noon) meets today for more of the usual: $750,000 for a park here (Patton Park on Interstate), and a few million in urban renewal bonds to the Downtown Waterfront there. The Downtown Waterfront’s status as an urban renewal area expires April, so time is running out. Other than that, PDC’s monthly agenda for January includes a laundry list of milestone development Projects. The PDC will likely adopt a final resolution that will bring the long-proposed Killingsworth Station Project back to life. Some background: PDC owns a 30,000 square foot parcel on the Northeast corner of Interstate and Killingworth, just paces from the MAX stop. PDC has hoped to develop it for several years. An initial agreement between PDC and Developer Tom Kemper fell apart in 2006 as Kemper cited that rising construction costs prevented his 91-unit condominium and apartment project from penciling out. Killingsworth Station 2.0 contains 54 units of rental housing proposed by Killingsworth Station LLC, aka Jim WInkler. While high construction costs, largely tied to a worldwide building boom that has spiked the price of materials plus pesky rising fuel costs, have hardly abated, high-density, mixed-used housing along the Interstate Corridor is an easier sell these days as several market-rate projects took wings in 2007.
The PDC board will also hear briefings on the Transit Mall Revitalization and a proposed Resource Access Center for the homeless population in Old Town. Stay tuned because I plan to cover the latter project extensively in the coming months.
Also on Wednesday at the City Council Chamber, (1221 SW 4th Ave., 9:30 am) Commissioner Sam Adams will propose to City Counci a series of resolutions aimed at upgrading and maintaining transportation infrastructure in Portland, improving bicycle transit options and securing funding for the dilapidated Sellwood Bridge, whose structural problems have prevented access by public transport and the freight community for nearly four years. As reported in another excellent article by Corey Pein at Willamette Week, the $464 million in proposed upgrades, which will be paid for by tax increases, is a gutsy move for Adams, who also happens to be the front-runner in the mayoral race. Then again, by the Minneapolis bridge collapse last summer, we learned that passivity can be more expensive.
Thursday and Friday Quiet Time
