Henry’s Lament


Last week’s meeting of the Burnside Stakeholder Advisory Committee (SAC) was interesting from a number of points of view.

First, the couplet continues to score best on virtually all the criteria. The ‘new’ news at this meeting was that it wins on travel time and on the urban design criteria.

Last week’s meeting of the Burnside Stakeholder Advisory Committee (SAC) was interesting from a number of points of view.

First, the couplet continues to score best on virtually all the criteria. The ‘new’ news at this meeting was that it wins on travel time and on the urban design criteria.

Second, the possibility of reducing to three lanes west of I-405 is very real. My hope is that Sam will recommend the couplet option east of I-405 and give the neighborhoods an opportunity to flesh out the 3 lane design and see what they think about the trade-offs (reduced to it’s simplest level: a much more humane street on Burnside versus accepting a little bit more traffic on neighborhood collector streets).

But perhaps the most intriguing element was the position of the Henry condo association. You’ll recall that the folks at the Henry (and their developer, Gerding/Edlen), with some support from the Bureau of Planning, were strongly against the couplet, on the basis that it would ruin the the unique pedestrian environment on Couch through the Brewery Blocks.

The Henry, on the strength of a traffic analysis commissioned by Gerding/Edlen, is supporting the “truncated couplet” approach. This is much like the original couplet, except that it would return the westbound traffic to Burnside at 8th, rather than at 15th. This has several impacts:

  • May require shaving the corner off the building at 8th and Couch
  • Requires that at least two elm trees be removed from the North Park Blocks
  • Pretty much drives a stake through the heart of attempts to unify the North and South Park Blocks through the “Park Avenue Vision”

Urban Designer Lloyd Lindley called it a “non-starter from an urban design point of view.”

The Henry’s reaction? “We’re sorry about the elm trees.”

But more to the point, the design advocated by Gerding/Edlen’s traffic engineer still calls for making Couch one-way westbound (as does the couplet design) and still calls for signalizing the intersections at Couch and 10th and 11th. Additionally, compared to the current several hundred cars per hour, the truncated couplet will deliver 800 cars per hour through the brewery blocks during the evening peak (the full couplet will deliver 1200).

In essence the Henry folks are trying to convince us to sacrifice 7 blocks of Burnside and the unification of the Park Blocks to avoid 400 cars going past their building. Hmmm…

By the way, the Bureau of Planning was very quiet at the meeting. Their representative delivered a very neutral assessment of the options. I think the Henry has lost one ally.

It’s also worth noting that all the major land holders other then Gerding have recommended the couplet to Commissioner Adams.

Handicapping this bet, I’d say put your money on the couplet, but still expect the well-connected Henry folks to fight the battle again at the funding stage.

This morning’s Trib has a related article.


29 responses to “Henry’s Lament”

  1. In the Trib article, Sam Adams again noted the unsafe intersections on Burnside. I believe that these are located on the already widened portion…between the bridge and 8th Avenue…and are largely due to right turn lanes, etc.
    Let’s just eliminate the right turn lanes and add parking and/or left turn lanes in this section and be done with it.
    West of I-405, why not three lanes? Burnside has three lanes west of 23rd Place…two westbound up the hill and one eastbound. It works fine, so make that arrangement continue to I-405 and give upper Burnside pedestrians some breathing space.
    Last, make the Burnside Bridge 2 and 2…why does it have 3 lanes outbound?…and use the extra width for very generous bike/walk promenade with benches and coffee/ice cream carts. The view from this bridge is really striking…no superstructure, and unlike any other of our bridges it ends and begins in the grid with buildings, life, activity, etc.

  2. The couplet should have gone all the way to
    NW 19th Avenue, as according to the original
    proposal. I don’t see why some traffic calming
    and other safety measures could not have been
    applied to the area by the church.

  3. I made a very similar argument (to no avail) to the Archdiocese’s property manager.

    But perhaps more compellingly, getting the couplet to 19th doesn’t solve the problem of what to do from 19th to 23rd. I’d rather find a solution that worked for the whole length of the street from 405 to the hill.

  4. There’s no ideal solution for the 19th-23rd section because there’s no comparable parallel street like Couch to utilize. But the couplet should definitely be taken all the way to 19th regardless. Why arbitrarily cut it shorter? West of that, we may have to consider something like Bob R’s suggestion of 10′ lanes at the center and 11′ bus-compatible lanes along the sidewalks. This is only a net gain of 1 or 2 feet for sidewalks, depending on the viability of weaving the lanes, but it’s an improvement from what’s there now.

  5. Oh, and “We’re sorry about the elm trees.”??!!
    They’ve got to be kidding, right? How is chopping down endangered century-old heritage elms even an option? Can you imagine the rage that would ensue from chopping down even one of those trees?

  6. There’s no ideal solution for the 19th-23rd section…

    I’m still pretty optimistic about a three lane scenario. This reduces the pedestrian crossing distance to 33 feet. An eastbound lane can be removed at the expense of accepting a little bit more traffic on the neighborhood collectors (Everett, Lovejoy, Alder, Jefferson).

  7. Chris –

    What are your thoughts regarding bus stops in a 3-lane scenario?

    With only one travel lane between 15th and 23rd, I would propose that bus stops be minimized in that section. We’ve had debates here about curb extensions, etc., before, but frequent bus stops on that section of Burnside would be guaranteed to hold up a lot of traffic at peak hour.

    In a single eastbound lane scenario, the bus could stop once just _west_ of 23rd, and could stop _east_ of 15th without blocking traffic in the 15th-23rd stretch. Is 8 blocks too far? It would be a downhill walk for most people. But, if it is too far and ridership justifies blocking traffic, perhaps a stop at 18th or 19th would split the difference.

    Thoughts?

    (Please note I prefaced my statement with an “-if-” – I’m still in favor of my 4-lane, 10’/11′ proposal.)

    – Bob R.

  8. Bob, that’s clearly something that needs to be worked out. It depends somewhat on how you ‘reuse’ the space gained. If you deploy some of it as parking (on the theory it will incent some of the redevelopment the neighborhood wants along Burnside and it creates a shield between traffic and peds on the sidewalk), then you could have pullouts in the parking strip.

    A more promising approach might be to use the wierd triangular intersections to create pullout areas in these intersections.

  9. Having people parallel parking on eastbound Burnside (if it’s reduced to a single lane) would be a disaster. Bus pullouts, possibly yes, but have you seen how long it takes some people to parallel park?

  10. Chris,
    Has it been determined yet if the Feds will accept Bob R’s hybrid of 10′ and 11′ lanes? Seems like if we’re still providing an 11′ lane in each direction, it would satisfy their criteria for fed funding.

  11. Then maybe you put the parking on the west side. All of the urban design issues need to be looked at. The analysis so far just says it’s possible to make the traffic work in 3 lanes.

  12. Personally, I think West Burnside should be left as is, especially with construction costs increasing. I see no viable reason to divert traffic through Old Town on sleepy Couch Street or lower the vehicle capacity on Burnside west of I-405. Most businesses that front Burnside or Couch Street located there with knowledge of the existing traffic patterns and sidewalk widths. Burnside is a through motor vehicle arterial street. Why develop another parallel one effectively making the blocks in between an island? Transportation dollars can be better utilized elsewhere. After all, I doubt Powell’s will be allowed to put up another nonconforming commercial sign facing Couch similar to the one facing Burnside.

  13. Has it been determined yet if the Feds will accept Bob R’s hybrid of 10′ and 11′ lanes? Seems like if we’re still providing an 11′ lane in each direction, it would satisfy their criteria for fed funding.

    Nobody has asked the feds. The SAC position is still for four 10 foot lanes.

  14. I agree that there now are a lot of bus stops
    on West Burnside; a stop every three blocks
    would be the optimum (like they did in NYC–
    the standard distance between stops on the
    short-block avenues was changed to three blocks years ago).

  15. As long as you’re fine with 5 of the 10 most dangerous intersections in the City sticking around.

    Presumably the ten most dangerous intersections in the City will still be around regardless of what you do. The question is whether changing the intersections will make them substantially safer for the money spent than if it was spent elsewhere.

  16. Wait, let me get this straight — the option for 3 lanes west of 405 doesn’t take the real estate from the eliminated 4th lane and translate it into much wider widewalks plus left turn lanes at intersections? Why would street parking even be considered? I mean, yes, street parking can be a nice buffer, but a wider sidewalk with street trees would be just as nice!

    I understand that bike lanes are not being considered because bicyclists are supposedly fine with using other “parallel” streets that are 4+ blocks away to get to destinations on Burnside…

    My ideal scenario? Burnside west of 405 goes to 1 lane in each direction, plus left turn lanes, plus bike lanes, plus wider sidewalks (with street trees!), plus bus pull-outs so that stopped buses don’t impede traffic. Was this option ever studied?

  17. So… with all this… is Burnside going to get paved too? or is it just the couplet area.

    Cuz even more than anything, that street is hurting.

    I tend to avoid it when I drive… and just won’t even cross it unless on bus or streetcar.

  18. Wait, let me get this straight — the option for 3 lanes west of 405 doesn’t take the real estate from the eliminated 4th lane and translate it into much wider widewalks plus left turn lanes at intersections?

    It certainly could all be sidewalk. But the neighborhood’s goals go beyond just the pedestrian environment to include redeveloping some of the properties into more vibrant uses. On-street parking goes a long way to making retail more viable (and I say that as a confirmed alternative transportation advocate).

    All this stuff has to get talked through. The breakthrough that has happened is to get the traffic guys to admit that the world doesn’t end if we take away an eastbound lane – that’s a real breakthrough. Now we need to figure out how to take best advantage of it.

    And no, there’s not room for left turn pockets unless we turn over pretty much all of the lane we’d be removing.

    My ideal scenario? Burnside west of 405 goes to 1 lane in each direction, plus left turn lanes…

    That is in fact the three lane scenario that was originally studied and it’s a disaster, gridlocking the whole west side of downtown. There’s just too much westbound traffic from 405 to 24th. Again, the breakthrough was to make the traffic folks do the analysis of the 2/1 configuration.

  19. So… with all this… is Burnside going to get paved too? or is it just the couplet area. Cuz even more than anything, that street is hurting.

    That in fact was the genesis of this whole effort. The street needs major work. The PDOT folks were smart enough to post the question: we need to rebuild this street, do we really want to rebuild it in this configuration?

    Actually, it’s the I-405 to 23rd piece that is in the worst shape. But that’s also the stretch with the least set of identified funding sources.

    If this was easy, the last transportation commissioner would have gotten it done. I applaud Sam for wading in.

  20. That is in fact the three lane scenario that was originally studied and it’s a disaster

    Chris – I have reposted your comment to make a point… sad that it needs illustrating… transit advocates _do_ admit that too much limitation on the automobile right-of-way can be a bad thing. We are constantly accused of being “car haters”, but if this were the case, the 1+1+left turn scenario would be the top priority of every transit and bike advocate, and clearly, that is not the case…

    – Bob R.

  21. I rode my bike in on NE Broadway this AM…a urban race track if there ever was one. Couplets are for cars, and as noted, the Burnside/Couch couplet will speed travel in that corridor.
    PDOT designs against peak hour loads, so you know that for most of the day, this new “solution” will be a race track just like Broadway/Weidler, I don’t care how the signals are set.
    Moving more motor vehicles faster does not make for a better ped environment, no matter how many benches you waste on wide empty sidewalks.
    Hopefully with the cost of roads going up this will never get built; unfortunately the mere existance of the approved plan will hang over the area as a major disincentive to investment, undermining the Brewey Blocks notable success.
    Sorry Chris, this dog needs to be killed now.

  22. Lenny –

    Broadway/Weidler acts like a “racetrack” because of two factors: Many lanes and wide spacing between traffic lights, which is the exact same problem Burnside has in places now.

    A Burnside/Couch couplet will resemble Washington/Alder or Market/Clay far more than it would resemble Broadway. There will be signals at every intersection, curb extensions at every crosswalk, and 2 or 3 lanes of width at pedestrian crossings.

    – Bob R.

  23. “The street needs major work. The PDOT folks were smart enough to post the question: we need to rebuild this street, do we really want to rebuild it in this configuration?”

    The essence of their question is how can we make it as expensive as possible.

    Folks here jumped at the chance to make it cost as much as possible.
    We couldn’t possibly just upgrade the street and save money to upgrade others. NOOOOOO!

    A huge, costly plan must be dreamed up then justified with exaggeration and fabrication.
    Gosh wouldn’t it be great if Burnside had fewer traffic lanes and added bike lanes?
    It could be promoted as for children and traffic, right?
    Absolutely crazy.

  24. ^^ So you don’t want to improve any of our streets? I’m glad you’re not in charge. I also think PDOT is smart to think about improving a street that needs to have major repairs anyway. Why invest all of that money on repaving a poorly designed street? Wouldn’t that be the “real” waste of money?

  25. Burnside is a racetrack now because all of the lights turn green at the same time, and drivers “race” to get through as many lights as they can before they all turn red. Bob R. is exactly right, Burnside/Couch will function the same as all of our other downtown couplets, not Broadway/Weidler.

    Personally, I dont see why the Henry is so opposed to this. Currently, Couch between 10th and 13th is a madhouse. I’ve seen more pedestrians almost run over at those crosswalks because drivers aren’t sure which way to look before going through the intersection. And pedestrians will walk right into the intersection without stopping or looking at all. Traffic lights and the couplet will definitely untangle that knot.

  26. Burnside definitely need pedestrian improvements;
    for example, look at the environment around 18th
    and Burnside–it is terrible for pedestrians, and
    with the Civic condos and public housing next
    door opening next year, there will be even more
    pedestrians.

    BTW, I saw on some real estate broker’s site that
    30% of NW District and 34% of Pearl District
    households do not have cars. Chris, are these
    figures in the ballpark?

  27. Ironically, the Couch 10th-13th intersection – with pedestrians wandering through the streets (gasp!) more closely resembles Europe’s streets than anything else in Oregon.

    Call it dangerous, call it controlled chaos… but how many people have died there since the Brewery blocks were finished?

    If you want vibrant streets and an active city, you have to realize urban places are messy… you cannot always control them to force everyone to stay on their own little space marked by little white lines. While turning Couch/Burnside into a couplet (of which I also support) may help sanitize this ‘mess,’ I think it will – ironically – help the pedestrian (human) connection between the Pearl district and the rest of downtown… which has been stated before.

  28. I agree, the couplet will definitely improve the N-S connections for pedestrians, but it will also improve automobile and streetcar flow. And I think the additional traffic on Couch will be a positive for those businesses. Not to mention safer for everyone.
    And you’re right, if urban environments aren’t a little bit messy, then they’re lacking vitality. However, I think Couch is just messy enough to be detrimental for everyone concerned.
    We always hear about the Henry residents, but what do the businesses along Couch think? We know Powell’s is in favor of this, but what about PFChang’s, Diesel, West Elm, Anthopologie, Adidas, etc.? Have they voiced any opinions, or are they too beholden to Gerding, their landlord, to say anything?

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