Crunch Time for Burnside


City Council will take up Commissioner Adams’ request to fund initial engineering on the West Burnside/Couch couplet tomorrow (3pm Time Certain).

Whether you’re a fan or a foe of the project, this is your best opportunity to influence the outcome. Commissioner Saltzman appears to be skeptical. No word on the other 3 members, but Sam is known as a very good vote counter and it’s hard to believe this would be on the agenda if he didn’t think it was going to move forward.

Patricia Gardner, one of my fellow stakeholder committee members, has a nice op-ed piece in support of the couplet this morning.


29 responses to “Crunch Time for Burnside”

  1. I’m pro-couplet, for selfish, and somewhat mischevious reasons. Plus I absolutely detest Burnside as it exists. But I hope they don’t gentrify it into boredom as they have the Pearl. I’m really curious how the east side circle will change things.

    But oh well.

    Plus, the Streetcar going by my front door beats the hell out of the #77 & other multitudes of trucks that go by. It does a lot less damage to the streets too.

  2. Go for it, Sam! This will help heal the festering wound across downtown that Burnside is today.

    Henry? Sorry. Couch is nice, but Burnside is horrific. This tip and tuck operation will be appreciated by you, too, after you wake from your sleep.

  3. I thought I was all for the couplet. Now that I’ve spent some time toodling around the pearl district section of Couch, tho, i have concerns. It’s mostly boutiques and restaurants, which I have little personal use for. But there seems to be a huge pedestrian presence on that stretch of Couch, and it’s got a great feeling. I think this is where a lot of the residents of the new supercondos are hanging out.

    If couch traffic goes one-way and we get lights on all those corners, i think pedestrians will retreat farther north somewhat. I really suspect that two major oneways (burnside & couch) could become a larger pedestrian/bile barrier than burnside is alone, which would mean creating an even bigger barrier between all these new residents and the downtown businesses that woo them so hard.

    On the other hand, the actual success or failure of this project will probably have more to do with the details of its architecture and implementation than it will the idea itself. There needs to be a comfortable pedestrian and bicycle permeability of that corridor. There isn’t now — that’s the problem that the couplet is intended to solve.

  4. ok, obviously i meant “bike barrier”, not “bile barrier”. (if only we had one of those around every public transit project. =)

  5. Ms Gardner writes as though the Streetcar is a done deal; also she thinks traffic speeds will be in the 15 mph range, lower than some have noted.
    I do look forward to riding the Streetcar across the Burnside Bridge…our bridge with the most potential…but am otherwise wary of this scheme.
    Couch between 9th and 14th will be much less friendly; one hopes that a friendlier Burnside will compensate for that loss.

  6. i’m not really picking sides on this issue, but i spent a good deal of time in that area last week, and i couldn’t help but notice that the area on couch that those who are opposed to the couplet are fighting to preserve is a really small section, only about 3 blocks. in contrast, the rest of couch, at least to the east, is almost totally neglected. burnside on the other hand is horrible, from a pedestrian pov, all the way up and down.

    if the result of the couplet is that burnside is exceptionally improved, while couch is marginally degraded (factoring in the whole street, not just the henry), it seems hard to argue against it.

    the thing i noticed even more than the pedestrian activity on couch, was the pedestrian activity on the south side of burnside around 10th and stark. right now burnside is a gulf separating two vital pockets of pedestrian activity, could the couplet bridge them together? would that result not be totally desirable?

  7. OK — I’m extremely distressed by the couplet plan — it was hatched in 2000 before Burnside and Couch had taken off with the natural business and residential growth that seems to expand daily. The planning process was supposed to include and represent the neighborhoods — yet my neighborhood wasn’t even BUILT in 2000. We have a pedestrian-friendly neighborhood that is recognized worldwide — it favors people over cars and should be duplicated elsewhere in our beautiful city, NOT degraded with five times the car traffic with accompanying pollution, a few more buses, emergency vehicles AND a streetcar that may or may never come — all at a horrendous expense. DEFINITELY make Burnside more safe — streetlights and crosswalks would be a great beginning —

  8. The only people who benefit from the couplet are the big Burnside property owners. Neighborhoods suffer, two schools suffer, a church suffers, locally owned businesses suffer….Can’s Sam figure out a better way to become Mayor?

  9. All seven neighborhoods along the couplet support it. It opens up access and vastly improves pedestrian safety. The only people who DON’T benefit are immediate residents on Couch, and I think even they get a lot of benefits, albeit with some sacrifices.

  10. don’t be fooled. the couplet is about politics and large developers. it goes against everything that portland stands for–sustainability and community. it is motiavted by cars instead of people. it will homogenize our streets and turn them into a generic mall.

    the ENHANCED BURNSIDE plan accomplishes everything–increased safety, better north/south access, calming traffic and beautification. and all for a LOWER COST and without detroying an interntaionally lauded pedestrian neighborhood. the couplet is NOT THE PORTLAND WAY.

  11. The headline on “Portland Tribune” today said EXHAUSTED BY EXHAUST and talks about air pollution and health problems in North Portland just one block from I-5. How many health problems will be experienced by the children in Emerson and Cathedral schools when 5 times the traffic goes RIGHT by their windows every day? This isn’t just about condos — it’s also about kids — I doubt they will be inhaling the “benefits, albeit with some sacrifices”.

  12. As a north/south bike commuter who frequently crosses inner east Burnside, I’m very much in support of the eastside couplet because of the new bike and signal infrastructure, as well as the re-configuration of the area around Bside/Sandy/12th (I’d also like to see that 7th Ave ped/bike bridge over 84 get funded). I’m undecided on the westside portion, however.

    I have a few technical questions that I haven’t seen much discussion about:

    The Burnside Streetcar is really a post-couplet project, right? Does the streetcar piece have any immediate bearing (other than sweetening the pot for the skeptics) on the discussion at hand? For example, does the future streetcar alignment have an impact on the engineering right now?

    Also, is the eastside portion of the couplet still disconnected from the westside portion? If so, what are the prospects for the two sides to be reunited again into one project? Could the eastside move forward by itself, in the event that the westside is blocked? And what is the projected construction schedule — is the eastside still in hurry-up mode so that the Bridgehead development can go forward?

    Lastly, will a ped/bike bridge over 405 at Flanders be included in the westside funding?

  13. A big NO on the couplet. Please preserve a pedestrian rich/friendly area that promotes a genuine sense of neighborhood.

  14. How many health problems will be experienced by the children in Emerson and Cathedral schools when 5 times the traffic goes RIGHT by their windows every day?

    The couplet creates no new traffic or emissions, it does move 50% of the traffic (and presumably emissions) 200 ft. north. For the Cathedral School, I think the dominate air quality issues is the freeway (90,000 cars/day) rather than Burnside (20,000 per day).

  15. The Burnside Streetcar is really a post-couplet project, right? Does the streetcar piece have any immediate bearing (other than sweetening the pot for the skeptics) on the discussion at hand? For example, does the future streetcar alignment have an impact on the engineering right now?

    The linkage is that it may make more sense to put in the rails at the same time you rebuild the street. At this point Sam is asking for money to do enough engineering to get costs on both the couplet and the Streetcar. This is not a green light for the whole project, just preliminary engineering.

    Also, is the eastside portion of the couplet still disconnected from the westside portion? If so, what are the prospects for the two sides to be reunited again into one project? Could the eastside move forward by itself, in the event that the westside is blocked?

    East side is already moving forward independent of tomorrow’s decision.

  16. Hopefully Mayor Potter and our Commissioners will take a moment to read “The Oregonian” editorial page today before they cast a disastrous vote on the couplet project. LET’S CALL THE WHOLE THING OFF pretty well says it — once the bell is rung on this fiasco, there’s no going back. “Don’t go there” — wise words!!

    And by the way — the streetcar WAS tossed in at the last minute — particularly the piece that makes the Cathedral School children cough and runs a streecar by during church services. In an attempt to make this look like “good transportation”and further disguise the fact that it’s all about making big property owners happy, all that’s been done is to emphasize what a patchwork job of “planning” and a bad idea this whole boondoggle really is.

  17. Without Streetcar I’m not sure the westside project pencils. Eastside Burnside is already thriving with cheap rents attracting edgy businesses, etc. That will dry up when it all gets nice and pretty. Do we have to clean up every street in town?
    But Streetcar pushes me from strongly con to mildly pro…I guess I just love the little guys. But to be clear…no Streetcar, no couplet.

  18. What really scares me about the westside proposal is that the streetcar, popular as it is, was thrown in to limit criticism of the proposal on the whole. I fully expect this to go through, then for streetcar to be deferred indefinitely into the future. Then people like Lenny and myself, who were against the proposal without the streetcar, will be made to look like fools. We’ll get all of the bad (more traffic on Couch), without the good (streetcar), at least for the immediate future. Classic bait-and-switch.

  19. They have all of downtown all tore up for building more toy trains, they have the tram, another over budget fiasco. I cannot believe they also haven’t tried to mimic Boston’s Big Dig project! When will these clowns ever learn? I am moving out of this overpriced ghetto. It used to be that ultracramped developments were known as “the projects” in this crazy town we’re brainwashed that living in a shoebox-sized apartment for $1200 a month in rent and riding the streetcars is “livable”. What a joke. If I wanted to live in L.A., I would move to L.A.

  20. Grant, I have the same q.

    Greg, how many times have you threatened to move? We’ll all be curious to know where you end up. I hear Boise is nice. Take some of the other folks with you, please. You know who I mean.

  21. From The Oregonian breaking news blog:

    Portland City Council OK’s making West Burnside one-way

    Posted by The Oregonian April 11, 2007 21:51PM

    In a move that could radically reshape downtown if the price is right the Portland City Council gave the go-ahead Wednesday to turn bustling West Burnside into a one-way street.

    City Council members voted unanimously to begin early engineering work to convert Burnside and neighboring Northwest Couch streets into one-way streets from Second Avenue to 15th Avenue.

    Click the link to read the whole post…

    – Bob R.

  22. Thanks Bob R. So the Catholic School carried the day and got the couplet moved away from their backdoor. Interesting. Also interesting that it was a unanimous vote to go ahead with at least this stage.

    But it also sounds like we won’t know what Burnside is really going to be for a few more years…

  23. I am somewhat for the couplet as Burnside is definitely a Barrier (as I call it). However, I’m not for the streetcar. I just don’t see why there should be such a concentration of projects (original MAX on 1st, streetcar on 10th/11th and now the new mall on 5th/6th) or where the operating funds would come from.

    On the other hand, the half-hourly Sunday service provided by Line 20 isn’t that great.

  24. “Greg, how many times have you threatened to move? We’ll all be curious to know where you end up. I hear Boise is nice. Take some of the other folks with you, please. You know who I mean.”

    Boise *IS* very nice but I can move to any number of beautiful Measure 37 developments here in Oregon for way cheaper and much more livable than this concrete jungle.

  25. Chris,

    “the neighborhoods” or the neighborhood associations? Have the neighborhood members been polled or are we relying on the most active and best funded members?

    i realize this is the method we have for neighborhood input but I’m very skeptical of using a volunteer organization like the neighborhood associations as our only measure of public support or opposition.

    my own neighborhood assn is dominated by a small number of wealthy property owners, and they seem to have little interest in representing the whole neighborhood.

  26. Neighborhood associations. My experience is that neighborhood associations consist of those motivated enough to show up. I recognize that selective involvement is not ideal, but in my experience leaders of neighborhood associations do give considerable thought to the needs of their neighbors.

  27. Most neighborhood associations I’m aware of have board vacancies and are practically begging for new regular board members as well as general members. I was on the board of my own neighborhood association for awhile (Rose City Park) and am now the webmaster — they would be delighted if more people showed an interest in joining the board.

    – Bob R.

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