Houses vs. Cars


A front page story in Friday’s Trib suggests that high-density housing in the central city is a bad idea because it puts concentrations of population near freeways and their pollution.

So what’s the alternative? Push everyone out to the suburbs and leave the city for those too poor to have a choice? That will only drive up VMT and require more freeways. Not the future I want to see for our region!

I have a better idea. Let’s keep cities for people and clean up the emissions from those cars!


72 responses to “Houses vs. Cars”

  1. My son lives within three blocks of Interstate 5, drives a Prius and is upgrading his home with green ideas and projects.

    He and I, along with all other members of our family, definitely agree with the premise of cleaning up the emissions.

    Without a Manhatten Project style effort though, this will not happen. The present administration will never let something like this happen. Massive changes at the top and massive changes in thinking have to be made.

  2. Yes, clean up emissions from cars and trucks, but also start removing freeways that have outlived their usefulness. A good place to start is the Eastbank Freeway, which blocks the eastside of Portland from the Willamette River and sits on some of the most valuable land in the region. For segments that can’t be removed…I-405…cap them or bury them and put scrubbers on their HVAC systems.

  3. I feel this is yet another attempt to push their agenda. This goes along with the NextBus/TransitTracker assertion. Their method of writing can’t even be called journalism because they chose to write strictly from one opinion and fail to analyze from opposing viewpoints. It’s almost like a collection of editorials.

  4. “So what’s the alternative?”

    Meet the demand for roadway capacity by fixing lane reduction bottlenecks and converting restricted HOV lanes to full service lanes thereby making I-5 a standard three lane freeway corridor within Portland; and by constructing additional motor vehicle routes around the City thereby reducing congestion and excessive engine idle times on existing highway infrastructure.

    From a land use standpoint, establish new business parks for businesses that rely on roadway access in less dense areas, and then slowly convert inner city single and limited roadway access commercial and industrial areas to housing. A good opportunity for this type of change is Swan Island that currently has only one roadway access point on and off the island, and relies on an inner city connection to I-5. Transport and other businesses could be relocated near the Airport and Ikea as the land use on the island is converted to housing, green grass parks and other for other recreational uses.

  5. quick, who parks their car in their garage?

    Did you know that you are risking carbon monoxide poisoning on your entire family???

    This is hardly a new conundrum. One fuel legislation tightens up quality for benzene and paritulate matter, it should be less of a problem.

  6. A good chunk of the dirty air problem can be potentially solved by opening the market to other providers of transit services. Such a move would allow the low income people who have to spend a significant part of their income on transportation, but who usually buy older harder to maintain vehicles another alternative. Thus they possibly save money and older dirty vehicles are removed from the roads.

    Of course this cost little or no money.

    It sould not be against the law to own and operate a private transportation business regardless of whether, or not the owner is a major corporation that run buses, or a mom and pop part-timer with a jitney operation.
    MW

  7. Chris: So what’s the alternative? Push everyone out to the suburbs and leave the city for those too poor to have a choice?
    JK: Of course you are intuitively hitting on the root cause of the problem: as we increase density, we are putting more pollution sources in a given area. This increases the intensity of the pollution. Those same sources in a less dense area will be spread out more, resulting in less intensity of pollution.

    Chris: That will only drive up VMT and require more freeways.
    JK: You are forgetting that the city center is irrelevant for most people, so living further out does not mean longer commutes to the city. If I recall the numbers, the driving is only slightly more per person in low density areas.

    Dunphy and Fisher’s data shows NO difference in number of trips over a population density range of 2000 to 6250 people per square mile, then only a moderate decrease at double that density. See chart at the bottom of sierraclub.org/sprawl/articles/modal.asp

    Chris: I have a better idea. Let’s keep cities for people and clean up the emissions from those cars!
    JK: Cares were cleaned up years ago – it is diesels that avoided clean air regulations. Clean up trucks and the pollution problem will mostly go away. A good start would be Trimet – about 10 years ago. (“We’re Trimet, we don’t have to care”)

    Thanks
    JK

  8. Of course you are intuitively hitting on the root cause of the problem: as we increase density, we are putting more pollution sources in a given area. This increases the intensity of the pollution. Those same sources in a less dense area will be spread out more, resulting in less intensity of pollution.

    Density is the solution, not the problem. If we have communities where a variety of uses are located closely together, trips get much shorter, many can be accomplished on non-polluting modes, and emissions go down!

    You are forgetting that the city center is irrelevant for most people, so living further out does not mean longer commutes to the city. If I recall the numbers, the driving is only slightly more per person in low density areas.

    That’s a core concept in the 2040 Regional and Town Centers plan. The ‘complete community’ doesn’t have to exist in downtown Portland, it can exist in any of the region’s centers.

  9. Yeah.

    We all know that since Atlanta, Houston, and Los Angeles built lots of freeways and freeway lanes, that they have no air pollution or traffic congestion.

    High density development works, but only if it is bought into in full. Look at Manhattan. TONS of people there don’t even own cars. But they also have VERY VERY GOOD public transportation infrastructure and very high density.

    We have been able to downsize from two cars to one by moving into a high density close in area. If we could get a little better bus service in the 217 corridor I could cut out 75% of my family’s car use.

    If more people were to cut out their car use there would be less pollution in high density areas. Get people out of their cars. That is the only way to stop the emissions caused by cars.

  10. Reducing numbers of pollution producing vehicles is the obvious answer. Any level of clean burning can be countered by a certain increase in vehicles.

    Better, more effective electric transit seems like the best approach in spite of arguments raised attacking electricity for it’s dependence on coal fired plants and salmon killing damns. Those problems can be addressed as well as we determine to be less wasteful with electricity.

    Increased density does emphasize sources of pollution. The positive benefit of this is that it helps to clearly express to people living in high density areas, the importance of developing, implementing and supporting measures that can minimize such pollution.

    I am not convinced that opening up HOV lanes to full service would do much if anything at all to reduce highway congestion and consequently, pollution. Such a move would be more likely to increase the number of cars on the road.

  11. As I read the article is seems to be specifically about the impact of freeways, not density. There is a lot of development close to freeways that is not dense and a lot of development away from freeways that is very dense.

    One question it raises is whether future high-capacity transit should be run along freeways if we expect it to attract residential development. Interstate Max is mostly within the freeway effects range 1/3 mile range but serves neighborhoods outside the contaminated strip along the freeway. But virtually any residences within a 1/4 mile walk of the new I205 line will also be within the contaminated zone.

    The second old issue is the I5 bridge. What are the health implications of a 50% increase in traffic on I5?

  12. Some number of years ago it was suggested to simply remove I-5 from the I-405 interchange to the I-84 interchange. Then, I-205 would be renamed I-5 and become the primary N-S route. The remaining incomplete bits of old I-5 would then become I-405, the urban alternate N-S route.

    The presently identified I-405 that is now below grade could/should be capped. The resulting “real estate” created out of thin air could then be developed. Much of that airspace is the western boundary to the Pearl, possibly making it very valuable, perhaps valuable enough to pay for the capping.

    I-5 (as it is) is terribly overused and dangerous, especially near I-84 and the Interstate Bridge. It is nearly impossible to grow it in it’s present configuration.

    I-205 still has considerable room for growth, and most importantly, has the already high capacity bridge across the Columbia.

    This would free up the east side properties for parkland and imaginative urban development. The riverside esplanade would realize its greatest potential without the noise and pollution of the adjoining freeway. The horrible Marquam Bridge might be removed, or redesigned and reused for lightrail, maybe even an aerial urban market village.

    Here is a map proposal: http://thumbsnap.com/vf/csX8Sxm5.jpg

  13. Interestingly not one poster has even mentioned housing prices in the central core.

    There will be NO SOLUTION until housing prices are settled. Forcing people to live in smaller homes than they need will not be an answer (this is not Moscow, USSR – we will not tolerate whole families living in cramped one or two bedroom apartments). Nor is Homer William’s assertion in today’s Trib accurate, that people will be able to afford his overpriced condos because “they won’t need cars” – when everything else in the area is likewise jacked up (my personal estimate is that to live downtown closer to work will require at least $1000 more in monthly expensives while only saving $700 in auto expense; and would require extensive travel demands on my wife that would either negate the ability to eliminate the auto, for her to have to take a new job (potentially in a different field of work), or would raise child care expenses even further (due to increased travel times due to a reliance on public transit; a trip for her from SoWa to Beaverton would require at least two, but more likely three busses).

    On the other hand, the comment “leave the city for those too poor for a choice” negates the fact that THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT IS HAPPENING – The City of Portland is actively pushing out the middle class by catering to the rich, and then a token subsidy to the poor. The middle class is therefore forced to live in the suburbs. (And then the City is complaining about traffic and its diminishing school system, all in the same breath. Maybe if the City took a proactive effort to ensure that people of all income levels were welcome in the City and could find appropriate housing, that more people would want to live in Portland, and patronize Portland’s school system, and pay Portland city taxes, and drive less…)

    As for whether the so-called “east bank freeway” (it’s called Interstate 5, also known as the Pacific Highway, but not the “east bank freeway”) – if it’s outlived its usefulness, then where are the 75,400 vehicles (ADT) that use I-5 underneath the Burnside Bridge going to go? The capacity doesn’t exist on I-405 (currently there is anywhere from 80,000 to 120,000 ADT on I-405 at various points), and many of these vehicles can’t realistically use I-205 (as it is seven miles to the east). Surely we don’t want to use this debate to argue for the construction of a new freeway in the city core, do we?

  14. Many of these issues will be considered differently as the price of fuel escalates. At some cost point usage will terminally decline.

  15. Interestingly not one poster has even mentioned housing prices in the central core.

    According to CNN/Money housing prices in Portland are supposed to decline this year. So maybe that will make everyone feel better?

    where are the 75,400 vehicles (ADT) that use I-5 underneath the Burnside Bridge going to go? The capacity doesn’t exist on I-405 (currently there is anywhere from 80,000 to 120,000 ADT on I-405 at various points)

    Where are they going? I think a part of them will use I-405, especially if the number of access points along it are reduces. Those that are continuing north on I5 and some of the banfield traffic would likely do that. Many of the trips are into the near northeast and southeast. These trips will go into the local street grid including whatever streets replace the freeway in the central eastside. The impact of that need to be evaluated. Some trips will never get on the freeway in the first place. I think the assumption that those lanes are needed is just that.

  16. Michael Says: Many of these issues will be considered differently as the price of fuel escalates. At some cost point usage will terminally decline.
    JK: Don’t hold your breath. Even Europeans, with their $5&up/gal. gas abandoned transit years ago. Now 78% of trips are by car (up from 76% twenty rears ago). see DebunkingPortland.com/Transit/EuroTranistShareLoss.htm

    Thanks
    JK

  17. http://portlandtransport.com/archives/2007/04/mixing_housing.html
    Chris Smith Says: Density is the solution, not the problem. If we have communities where a variety of uses are located closely together, trips get much shorter, many can be accomplished on non-polluting modes, and emissions go down!
    JK: We have finally gotten to one key data point that underlies much of our disagreements:
    I claim that when density increases, total driving increases.

    You appear to claim that as density increases, total driving decreases – is that correct?

    Thanks
    JK

  18. Jim, I do indeed hold that increasing density decreases driving. I give as evidence three trends in our region from 1990-2000:

    – Density increased (population grew much faster than acres inside the UGB)
    – Average commute distance dropped
    – VMT per capita dropped slightly

  19. Erik Halstead said: “The City of Portland is actively pushing out the middle class by catering to the rich, and then a token subsidy to the poor. The middle class is therefore forced to live in the suburbs.”

    Eric, you hit the nail directly on the head. This is exactly what the City of Portland is doing.

    Chris said: “Density is the solution, not the problem.”

    Actually it is both. An AP article in the April 20, 07 Oregonian stated “For last year, Oregonians bought about 142,000 gallons more each day on average than the year before, federal Energy Information Administration statistics show” and “Oregonians are burning more gasoline, for example, but driving fewer miles on state highways”. The article implies this scenario is due to people driving larger vehicles that get poor fuel mileage; however other media articles have aspired to Oregonians purchasing more fuel efficient cars.

    The theory can be viewed differently. First additional fuel is consumed due to the fact fuel miles per gallon are reduced by up to 15% for most vehicles with an ethanol gasoline mix as compared to straight gasoline. And second, as density has taken place, roadway capacity has not kept up with demand, increasing congestion in the denser parts of the city and thereby increasing the engine idle time that wastes fuel and creates the negative impact on air quality..Furthermore, transit busses and streetcars stopping in motor vehicle travel lanes on arterials and blocking other traffic while loading and unloading passengers only compounds the problem. The latter problem can for the most part be resolved by constructing more roadway and freeway capacity when and in the same areas density is increased, accommodate transit stops with bulb-in bus pockets instead of bulb-out curb extensions, and by placing streetcar routes on low volume motor vehicle streets rather than high volume arterials where they disrupt traffic flow.

  20. Don’t real estate prices depend on what people will pay for the real estate?

    Are you suggesting that the government should regulate real estate prices?

    I think the houses in the urban areas are getting more expensive because they are attractive and people want to live there…

    Why is real estate so expensive in New York? London? Other dense areas? Certainly not because they suck…

    The market will charge what the market will bear. That is why real estate in Amarillo Texas is cheap by comparison – no one wants to live there.

    But density without alternative methods of transportation will not work either as people will still have to drive to get to what they need.

    I wish prices in the central core were a little better too. I would love about a 1200 square foot condo. But we can’t all always get exactly what we want…

    :)

  21. The article implies this scenario is due to people driving larger vehicles that get poor fuel mileage; however other media articles have aspired to Oregonians purchasing more fuel efficient cars.

    Which reports are those? From that same report you site for increasing gas consumption:

    ‘”The only obvious explanation is that despite the fuel prices, people are still buying the big SUVs,” said John Merriss, policy unit manager at the Department of Transportation.

    The gross weight of new Oregon vehicles rose almost 25 percent between the early 1980s and the early 2000s, Merriss found.’

  22. While I’m not a fan of government overregulation (to lower prices), there is clear evidence that Metro/Portland/Oregon land use regulations have helped to increase real estate prices; at the same time that Metro/Portland have subsidized select developments, and limited development in certain areas – thus benefitting a few developers, raising overall housing prices, and squeezing lower income homeowners and renters out.

    Had Portland not given insane subsidies to many of these developments, the development would have occurred but slowly and over time – thus reducing the impact on rising housing prices. Further, Metro’s insistence on certain sized lots which have caused huge homes on tiny lots, and the general developers’ concept that every home has to be a “luxury home” have also jacked up prices.

    In the Portland metro area, nearly 50% of housing occupants do not own their own home; this is one of the highest percentages of any major metropolitan area in the U.S. In some cities like Beaverton, the percentage is higher.

  23. Erik,

    You are confusing me. You complain about Portland and subsidized developments, but you also state that Beaverton has higher percentages of people not owning their own home… So is Beaverton worse than Portland – yet it has less density?

    And you also state that developers concept that every home has to be a “luxury home”? How is that the governments fault? Isn’t that also driven by market demand?

    Do developers HAVE to build huge houses on small lots? Is that a requirement somewhere? I guess you are saying that we should have huge houses on large lots?

    What if I don’t want a large lot?

    How do you contend that development occurring slowly and over time would lower housing prices? Doesn’t more housing on the market increase competition and lower prices? Wouldn’t fewer homes being developed raise prices due to less supply and higher demand?

    I would say, considering the massive amounts of development that has occured, that Portland’s subsidies have worked. Early on using subsidies to encourage development in say, the Pearl, has influenced so much other new development there that the increased tax income from all the new development is probably much higher than the few subsidies they gave to kick off the development in the first place. The same holds true for SoWa, and other places. A couple highly attractive developments encourage other developers to build as it increases the potential market. And as there are more residences, more business move in. More businesses make it attractive for more residences, and so on and so forth.

    Again, I am not sure that the market is artificially inflated by government policy. People are moving into the city because they WANT to. You think people who can afford $500,000 for a condo in the city can’t afford a house in the suburbs and a commute to match? No, they can – instead they are choosing a condo in the city because that is what they want.

    I think the only thing recently that really thrust the prices up is the extremely low interest rates enabling people to look at higher priced units. And all of the “trick” loans that we had, like 30 due in 15, or interest only, that sort of thing (which are now causing lots of foreclosures as people can’t pay once the gimmick terms expire). Without all that I think prices would not have gone up so quickly.

    Density is not evil. Apparently people like it or they would not pay the premium to live there.

  24. Just make everyone’s minds spin, Beaverton Mayor Rob Drake likes to point out that Beaverton, on average, is denser than Portland (this is due in part to the low densities in outer eastside Portland).

  25. Chris –

    Rob Drake is talking about population density. I think it is largely because Beaverton has very little green space and very few large industrial areas. When you start considering Forest Park, the industrial areas and open space along the Columbia including Bybee Lakes and the airport, Swan Island, the Central Eastside and Brooklyn Yards you are talking about large parts of Portland that have few if any residents. If you include Forest Park and the Industrial areas Northwest Portland is low density.

    “Density” is a lousy term to use because it has a very specific meaning that is only partially related to how people use it. You can have compact development surrounded by greenspace that will pencil out as “low density”.

  26. VR:

    Actually, housing prices are solely dependent upon Homer Williams, Vera Katz, and the critical mass bicycle escapade downtown.

    The more the evil three work together, it causes housing prices to increase, because of all the “filthy liberals” who realize their diabolical plan to…uh.. hmm, do something.. is succeeding!

    /sarcasm

    you know, I wouldn’t exactly come to a transportation blog full of libertarian trolls to find out how the real estate market works… ;-P

  27. Environmental impacts of high emission levels in the core of Portland are a direct result of inadequate number of highway options, forcing an ever increasing population on a limited number of roads/highways.

    We cannot build our selves out of the I-5/I-405/I-84 corridors that come together with some balance.

    The solutions that I agree with is making I-205 the primary north/south interstate and freight corridor through our region. It can be expanded and it is safe and affordable and we cannot say that about the I-5 corridor.

    We cannot allow this CRC Bridge expansion that will flood more cars into the I-5/I-405/I-84 corridors and make congestion and emissions worse.

    I have proposed a North Portland Street bi-state multi-mode arterial corridor along side the BNSF RR tracks. We need options that get trucks and cars out of the I-5 corridor something completely different then building a wide new CRC bridge.

    Without money ($20B) to widen and pave all of the I-5/I-405/I-84 interconnecting freeway network, why not take the $6-Billion and create/build something that will provide alternatives.

    Our comprehensive plan has these work centers, lets start building alternative roads and transit that connects families to their work centers, something that we are not doing at this time.

  28. Jim Karlock claims that “cars were cleaned up years ago.”

    [personally directed comment removed]

  29. I decided to stay in this so-called Portland utopia until my lease is up in November. I couldn’t find any takers for my place so I guess it’s not really that sought after as they try to force us to believe. Plus it was just way too complicated and I don’t want to forfeit a boatload of money in a lease break. So I took my car out to my parents house near Salem so now I don’t have to pay $85 a month in parking. I brought my bicycle up and now I can tear around the streets and not have to follow any traffic laws. Isn’t life wonderful? With all this hulabaloo about the density near the exhaust fumes, why doesn’t the government spend some of its seemingly limitless budgets it uses for toy trains and subsidize people to instead buy electric cars? Wouldn’t that make more sense – it would still give people the freedoms they come to expect AND be environmentally safe, too! I don’t mean hybrids, I mean full on electric vehicles that are plugged in to recharge. People could use them for short hall trips and then rent if they need to haul a bunch of people in an SUV to the beach or something of that nature. I am tired of being forced fed this concept that riding in a cattle car with drug dealers and vagrants is “fun” or “livable”.

  30. Interesting how this topic is being denigrated back to the name calling (i.e. “libertarian trolls”).

    But let’s just assume that I am nothing more than a Libertarian troll. Then what the solution to ensuring that those who need to work in Portland’s central area – who all don’t make $100K a year or more – have access to housing? Since the solution isn’t to balance housing needs, then the solution must be to find a way to transport these people from where they can find affordable housing to the central core.

    Since everyone is bent on demanding mass transit or bikes as the solution, are we also going to force employers to conform to TriMet’s business day? If not, then how will employees commute to/from work when TriMet stops running busses to many parts of the region outside the rush hour; or in the early mornings/late evenings?

    The opposite of Libertarian is having goverment dictate (and fund) the decisions of people. I can only surmise that some simply want to force their transportation values (i.e. more MAX and more bike lanes) on others; but at the same time force those who are dependent on low-cost transportation further away from employment centers, creating another San Francisco – a city where tens of thousands of people must commute through just a few transit options from across San Francisco Bay.

    I’ve offered my solution (equalizing housing availablity) and I’ve been pooh-poohed. What’s your solution? More high-priced housing? Fewer transportation options? That can only add up to a shortage of workers – and thus more jobs moving out of Portland, and ultimately even out of the metro area, when the people that we all depend on for everything from government services, utility work, and nearly every retail, food and service sector job, can’t afford to live in the area nor have the ability to commute to their jobs.

  31. Chris Smith Says: Jim, I do indeed hold that increasing density decreases driving. I give as evidence three trends in our region from 1990-2000:

    – Density increased (population grew much faster than acres inside the UGB)
    – Average commute distance dropped
    – VMT per capita dropped slightly
    JK: Can you point me to data sources that you find credible, for these, I’d like to do some math on them?

    Thanks
    JK

  32. Let us get way from some of the BS that always seems to be come part of the opinions that are posted on this blog.

    Lets call for significantly greater orgination and distination studies of work level commuters and how they commute to and from their employment.

    Lets do the same thing on most all commercial truck traffic in our region to where we analyse their orgination and distinations to accurately identify routes and times so that we can identify options and opportunities to better manage the transportation resources we have.

    Just take $1-Billion from the stupid CRC Project and start making smart decisions.

  33. Erik,

    Just so you know I don’t consider you a libertarian troll ;-)

    I do note, after reading your posts, that you appear to have a lot of issues with housing costs here in Portland, with an assumption that only rich people can afford it. While I do see cause for concern if trends continue, I don’t think that this is a necessarily true statement today.

    My partner and I make far, far less that 100K a year and we purchased a home in inner North Portland last October. It’s on a nice size lot (5,000 sq feet) and is a well kept three bedroom house. How did we do it? We took advantage of two great programs that are specifically designed for people like me and perhaps you.

    One is the Portland Housing Center. They offer great programs designed to increase potential homeowners knowledge and options for purchasing their own homes. When purchasing a home, knowledge is power, and I cannot recommend this program enough. My partner and I were far more confident about purchasing a home after taking this class. http://www.portlandhousingcenter.org

    The other is a state of Oregon bond program that offers mortgage loans at below market interest rates for first time home-owners. Again, this is an incredible program that ultimately increases your purchasing power while keeping your mortgage payments lower than they would be in the marketplace. http://www.oregonbond.us/

    I know I sound like an advertisement, but I honestly believe these two programs, along with sound financial planning and responsibility, are invaluable resources for individuals who would like to purchase a home but are concerned about property values in Portland. Maybe you would be interested in checking them out?!?!

    regards,
    dan

  34. Paul Edgar said: “Environmental impacts of high emission levels in the core of Portland are a direct result of inadequate number of highway options, forcing an ever increasing population on a limited number of roads/highways.”

    Another nail hit directly on the head. Paul is absolutely correct!!!

    It is sort of like the arrow on the side of every FedEx truck. Until someone points it out, most people don’t see it. Paul could not have said it better. Now if only PDOT, Metro and the advocates for alternative forms of transport can truly understand and comprehend what the experts are trying to them as documented in the contents of the Cost of Congestion Reports.

  35. Terry –

    Do you mean to imply that if people don’t agree with your take on the matter then they don’t “truly understand and comprehend” what the “experts” are saying?

    – Bob R.

  36. Lets call for significantly greater orgination and distination studies of work level commuters and how they commute to and from their employment.

    Lets do the same thing on most all commercial truck traffic in our region to where we analyse their orgination and distinations to accurately identify routes and times so that we can identify options and opportunities to better manage the transportation resources we have.

    Amen, brother!

  37. Environmental impacts of high emission levels in the core of Portland are a direct result of inadequate number of highway options, forcing an ever increasing population on a limited number of roads/highways.

    No one is “forcing” anyone to drive. But I think you are missing a central issue this raises with your proposed highway. You are creating a 2/3 mile wide swath through North Portland in which people really shouldn’t be living. And it will not relieve the impact on people who live near I5, it will just increase the number of people (and trucks) driving through neighborhoods, albeit on freeways, in north and northeast Portland.

  38. Ross, we should not be trying to put more trucks and car into the I-5 corridor, it is just not smart. We must look at all options that can re-direct all of the activity to alternate arterials, freeway and modes.

    Common sense tells us that the I-5 corridor is close to saturation and the level of emissions will stay high and kill people until the leaders wake up and start building alternatives.

    This maybe a concurrency situation where we can no longer allow any new trips in the I-5 corridor.

    We may have to limit all new construction and business activity in the I-5/I-405/I-84 corridors in core downtown Portland until PDOT/METRO/ODOT address this lack of capacity, options and alternatives.

    We may have to a 3rd party analysis determine when we can open up the city again. Concurency is a big issue and we are not meetign basics.

  39. I figure, at the minimum, that Portland area road are completely uncongested about 2/3 of the day. Do we have a capacity problem?

    Some areas of Portland are very dense and the people who live are more likely to take transit/bike/walk. Some are are very undense and people drive. Overall it seems to be really be working OK. I still think it’s possible to buy plenty of places under 200K. I don’t think those homes are in great areas of town, but that’s what N PDX was like about 2 years ago (and still is a bit rough in some spots). Is housing then too expensive?

    I love how both sides here accuse the other side about “subsidies” – when everything is a subsidy is you want to look at it that way.

    Build more roads? Please let me know where that has solved anything?

    And since when does transit (except in a few special places) really reduce auto travel demand significantly? (It doesn’t)

    You don’t like pollution? Well save a bit more $$$ and live somewhere w/o it…

    If cars were 100% non-polluting would they be OK then? (not necessarily)

    What really is the point of these discussions anyway? I find them really entertaining but not all that useful in terms of a policy making exercise. It seems that people are far too emotional about their POV, lack an understanding of the give-and-take and middle of the road compromises that truly ‘get things done’ and generally a little bit too uninformed about the actual data, planning and engineering involved in making decisions. How can this be remedied?

  40. Build more roads? Please let me know where that has solved anything?

    The same could be said about MAX – has MAX reduced congestion? Has MAX resulted in negative traffic growth on the freeway and surface street system?

    Now we have Interstate MAX – has the amount of measurable pollution in the area dropped, due to automobiles being taken off the road and passengers riding MAX? It’s interesting that this survey comes out after MAX was built. Meanwhile we’re still talking about I-5 being congested through North Portland, so clearly MAX has not enticed people to park their cars and ride transit; or at least enough people to make a difference (or the number of people who formerly drove and now take MAX have been replaced on I-5.)

  41. Common sense tells us that the I-5 corridor is close to saturation and the level of emissions will stay high and kill people until the leaders wake up and start building alternatives.

    They will stay high and kill people so long as people use trucks and autos. There is no evidence that adding capacity somewhere else will reduce the amount people use I5 to any significant degree.

    The number and length of trips people take is based on how convenient they are and what the alternatives are. Make more trips convenient and you will have more traffic, and more pollution, not less.

    Common sense tells us I5 will remain congested no matter how many other highways you build. It connects several major employment and commercial centers in Portland, as well as providing them with south/north connections out of the area and connections to the major east/west routes.

  42. lack an understanding of the give-and-take and middle of the road compromises that truly ‘get things done’

    Zachary – What do you want done?

    Compromises are the result of competing views that are firmly expressed and win support. Nothing ever got done by people just trying to create a compromise. Compromise is the job of people who have the actual decision making power. That does not really describe most people here.

  43. With real transportation alternatives to where people and commerce can move to places where they work and shop and where product and services can flow in a manner that does not inhibit our ecomony and this is not unreasonable to expect.

    We do not have tose needed options and reasonable alternatives in place or planned in our region.

    With real alternatives in place that will provide alternatives to the core congestion found with what we see and experience with I-5/I-405/I-84 corridors then we place TDM/Tolls on all of the corridors heading into downtown Portland to cover 4-hours of AM and 4-hours of PM (6 to 10-AM) and (3 to 7-PM) peak period rush hours.

    Alternatives mean new roads and alterials to our work and industrial centers, new rail transit options with connecting bus lines that move people from homes to work without the use of a car, new bike and PED corridors/blvd. (with funding participation coming from the biking community, where at least 50% of the total cost is covered) and dramatic improvement in heavy rail capacity and capabilities to where our dependence on the use of trucks is reduced.

  44. where people and commerce can move to places where they work and shop and where product and services can flow in a manner that does not inhibit our ecomony

    This seems to me to be what exists now. You can get anywhere by motor vehicle. Perhaps this is outrageous, but is there some reason we should continue to invest in keeping it faster for people to drive their own vehicle than it is to use transit? Given the negative public consequences of people driving themselves, it seems like the investment ought to be in making transit use faster and more convenient than auto use.

  45. If we charged a TDM/Toll on all on ramps in the 4-hour AM and 4-hour PM Peak Period Rush Hours on all traffic on I-5/I-405/I-84 and Highway 26 coming into downtown Portland of lets say $1.50 or maybe an amount equal to MAX/LRT fees we could eliminate 90% of the rush hour congestion.

    The key is a across the board TDM/Toll on all major arterials and freeways leading into Portland. The revenue would be split equally between roads 50% and Transit/PED/Bike 50% to build new alternative capacity.

    We must reduce the level of emissions by reducing the number of vehicles on our highways.

    We have to many people using our highways for short trips contributing to the congestion.

    Just eliminating the on and off ramps to Hayden Island from the I-5 corridor creating frontage road access from Marine Drive would eliminate greater then 50% of the congestion on the I-5 Interstate Bridges, effectively almost doubling the number of vehicles that can cross the bridges.

    We must reduce our need to use our core level I-5/I-405/I-84 corridors or pay. When we have truck routes through a lot of our region then we put large TDM/Tolls on I-5/I-405/I-84, on all truck activity in the AM and PM Peak Period Rush Hours.

    By doing this we eliminate the need to expand I-5/I-405/I-84 corridors and the need for a new wide CRC replacement Interstate Bridge. We cannot afford to start this process anyway so why start something that has NO future or end.

  46. Bob,

    What I am saying is that many alternative transport advocates are blind in one eye, supporting the experts when they are supportive of the alternative transport agenda, but in denial of the experts and attempt to lock them out or discredit them when the expert’s information and reports run counter to alternative transport programs and schemes. What made the Banfield Max line successful was that it was coupled with a freeway widening and improvement project where many of the basic construction costs such as overpasses and grading were shared, thereby bringing down the price tag for each of the two modes had they been build individually and at the same time reducing overall congestion. Our highway capacity at the very least must keep up with population growth.

  47. Our highway capacity at the very least must keep up with population growth.

    It never has in the past. Nor is it going to in the future. At least not without a lot of investment to make the region less livable and keep the population growth to a minimum.

  48. This is a very serious comment about Peak Period TDM/Tolls on all of our major freeways and highways feeding into our region.

    With the use of electronic tolls collection for expedited entry with toll collection at every metered on-ramp and with camera’s when anyone tries to get through without paying we can start saving lives.

    Our region can start limiting people on to our major roads that lead into core Portland using motor vehicles. We can do it faster and better then New York. We can out do Vancouver BC, we can show the way.

    Just think of the revenue that can be directed to creating new alternative to the use of these roads that have to many vehicles and as a result kill to many people because of emissions.

    Just calculate the number of trips/incidents of travel on I-5/I-405/I-84 and highway 26 and maybe even include highway 213, that happen every day in the AM and PM Peak Period Rush Hours.

    If you do not need to be on any of these TDM/Tolled roads in the AM and PM Peak Period Rush Hours you do not pay anything. If you find an alternate road or mode of transit, you do not pay this TDM/Toll. It is a user fee in Peak Periods, with NO escape, NO exceptions and at all metered ramps.

  49. Paul –

    I think you should write that idea up and see if Chris will publish it as a guest column. I think it deserves its own discussion.

  50. Sorry Ross but you have it backwards, having roadway capacity keep up with growth will make the region not only more livable, but also create a more viable and healthy economy. It has only been in the last two decades or so that roadway capacity has lost ground compared to growth, in part due to the siphoning off of highway funds to subsidize to and from downtown transit and bicycle infrastructure; and in part due to political motivated social engineering rather than transportation engineering.

  51. I don’t understand why they can’t put in electric buses instead they are overspending on electric trains that aren’t very flexible, go incredibly slow and impede traffic. Today I went from Lloyd using MAX then transferred to the streetcar to go to 21st and Northrup. It took almost an hour. The same trip on the 77 bus only took my 20 minutes. The train is not a very good form of transit, in my opinion. Stop building them and wasting our tax money on totally impractical and overly expensive Disneyland projects!

  52. Greg,

    The best thing about a multi modal system is that you can choose the type of transportation depending upon the trip. Why would you take MAX and the Streetcar when there is a much quicker option? BTW you can probably bike that distance in the same time. Both the streetcar and MAX have their uses…but as with anything you have to select the right tool for the job. If you use a saw to hammer something it doesn’t mean that the saw if flawed…it means that you need to pick the right tool.

  53. Why is it that whenever “electronic toll collection” comes up that people jump all over it like it’s a magical place?

    There will be a lot of people who are not regular residents of the area – are they simply to be banned from the area because they don’t have a toll transponder? I can see the warning signs now: “VEHICLES WITH ELECTRONIC TOLL PASSES ONLY; ALL OTHER TRAFFIC MUST PARK ON SHOULDER DURING RUSH HOUR.”

    A toll plaza? Where can one be built in the I-5/north or I-84/east corridor? There isn’t any room.

  54. “The best thing about a multi modal system is that you can choose the type of transportation depending upon the trip.”

    I just don’t know what I’m going to do once I move back to the Salem area. Does anyone know if Amtrak has a monthly pass option for unlimited trips between Salem and Portland? Is it even feasible to leave in the morning and come back in the evening or do they have frequent enough service for “commuters”? I’ve been riding Amtrak enough lately that it’s actually starting to grow on me! I actually LIKE it. I wish I could say the same for our trolleys in Portland (I don’t care what you call them LRT, Streetcars, etc., it’s just another attempt to be like everyone else – in this case, San Francisco).

  55. having roadway capacity keep up with growth will make the region not only more livable, but also create a more viable and healthy economy.

    Well, that has not been the Portland experience has it? In fact, Portland was losing population in the early 80’s – the 25 years since have been pretty good. What drives the region’s economy is the quality of life and that is not improved by highways that divide the region and increase traffic and congestion.

  56. “the 25 years since have been pretty good.”

    Depends on who you talk to. I am appalled at the influx of migration coming to the region and thus making it just like all the other BIG American cities. We are no more “livable” than anywhere else. I’m sorry but cramped living quarters and riding around in cramped streetcars isn’t my idea of livable. Pretty soon we’re going to be as neurotic as the people in Manhattan – caged like zoo animals.

  57. “We should just bury more freeways.”

    Ask the people from Massachusetts how well THIS worked for them!

  58. We are no more “livable” than anywhere else.

    Having lived elsewhere, I beg to disagree. As do many of the people moving to the region. With population growth comes challenges. And there have definitely been changes in Portland over the past 20 years, not all of them for the better.

  59. I haven’t LIVED anywhere else outside of Oregon but I have travelled to a lot of other places. I have been to some of the places we are supposedly trying to emulate – San Francisco, Boston, L.A., Dallas, and Manhattan. I don’t think we’re heading in the right direction, either, having grown up in the rural areas of Oregon and seeing how fast the giant Portland metropolis is gobbling up all the surrounding land in a frenzied pace. It won’t be long until we’re L.A. all over again but a supposed “livable” version where everyone is cramped and nobody owns a car except those who can afford to pay the penalties. I just love how so many people who come here from far away places like to say how “it’s not so bad here” and they are ALL from somewhere else. Just do an informal survey and walk around the streets and just ask people “so how long have you lived in Portland?” You’ll be hard pressed to find anyone who’s been here for very long and VERY few who have lived here their entire lives. Time to put a moratorium on immigration into Oregon. Put Tom McCall’s advice into practice. This is the only way we are going to keep the area livable.

  60. Time to put a moratorium on immigration into Oregon.

    Maybe, but it isn’t going to happen. Population growth is an issue throughout the world. Oregon isn’t the only place its a problem.

  61. Greg,

    Go here – http://tickets.amtrak.com/itd/amtrak/multiride

    Salem is “SLM” and Portland is of course “PDX”.

    I just punched it in and a 10 ride in 45 day ticket is $58. A monthly pass is $160. (These prices are subject to change at any time and therefore are not presented as a guaranteed fare, only the quoted fare at the precise time I am posting this message. It might be higher or lower when you look.)

    However, your schedule options are going to be very limited by Amtrak:

    Northbound: leaves Salem at 6:57 AM, arrives Portland at 8:20 AM. (The Salem-Portland segment is the least competitive with auto, because the Union Pacific railroad mainline veers east to Oregon City, and between Canby and Clackamas the track is speed-restricted due to geography (being between 99E and the Willamette River, with numerous curves).

    Southbound: a bus leaves Portland at 5:45 PM and arrives Salem at 6:45 PM. Or you can take a train that leaves Portland at 6:15 PM and arrives Salem at 7:22 PM.

    If you work 8-5, you’re out of luck. If you can adjust your schedule (I can’t), then you might be able to do a 8:45-5:45 – that’ll give you time to catch the evening bus. Plus you need to consider commuting time from Union Station to whereever you’ll be in the Portland area; and bus service to Union Station has been drastically reduced thanks to Mall construction (it is, however, still frequent service on the 9-Broadway/9-Powell, plus the 77 crosstown.)

  62. Erik,

    I don’t think that’ll work but thanks so much for the info! I didn’t even know they had passes like that – good to know! I wish they had more frequent service – then it would be truly viable to live in Salem and work in Portland and still have a “commuter” train to get there. I guess I’ll just have to keep looking in the Salem area.

  63. It’s ironic that I have called for a more regional approach to transportation planning, including a commuter train between Portland and Salem – but on this forum I have been repeatedly pooh-poohed because “it’s not necessary” or I’ve been given some lame excuse.

    So, thanks to many of the “pro-Transit” people – if you want to get from Portland to Salem or vice-versa, you have an awkward Amtrak schedule, Greyhound (how many people here have ridden Greyhound?!!), the three-plus-bus-smorsaborg (TriMet to Barbur TC, SMART 201 to Wilsonville, SMART/Cherriots 1X to Courthouse Square, Cherriots to destination), or the good ol’ AUTOMOBILE.

    There is a sizable number of families in which one adult works for the state government in Salem; and another works in the private sector in Portland. Since Salem has little to offer to private sector business, and moving the State Capitol to Portland is not even a sensible question, the better approach is to manage transportation needs. While that seems to be a valid issue in the Portland metro area, that concept is completely lost as soon as you hit the Wilsonville city limit (once you’re outside the TriMet service area).

  64. I think that is, well, quite pathetic that there aren’t better options to/from Salem. Why on earth can’t they put in more tracks along the existing right of ways? I also don’t understand the logic in putting a commuter train from BEAVERTON to WILSONVILLE? Why didn’t they just improve the existing Amtrak route down the valley? I am definitely not a LRT/Streetcar aficionado but I would definitely be in favor of additional improved service to/from the Vancouver, B.C. Eugene megalopolis route.

  65. WOW – I actually found out a way to get from Portland to Grand Island/Dayton area! You can take MAX to Hillsboro and then get on a Yamhill County bus that then takes you from Hillsboro to MAC and on to Dayton. I might have to give this a try :) It would be a 3 hour ride but I am curious now.

  66. There’s also a bus that connects McMinnville, Newberg and Sherwood, where you can connect with the 12 or 94.

    http://www.yctransitarea.org/

    It looks like they recently changed their “99W Link” service – used to be only two trips to Sherwood, now there are eight – and the bus now goes to Shari’s instead of the Cinema.

    However, for the morning rush hour commuter there is only one bus (leaves downtown McMinnville at 6:04 AM, arrives Sherwood at 6:50 AM); the evening bus leaves Sherwood at 6:40 PM and arrives McMinnville at 7:36 PM. Hardly a convenient or commuter-friendly schedule.)

    I was in Seattle today and saw some of Sound Transit’s finest highway coaches for their long distance routes connecting Seattle with Tacoma and Tacoma’s suburbs… Would be nice if Portland had something like that…

  67. “Would be nice if Portland had something like that…”

    Yes it would be very nice. How many BILLIONS have been wasted on dinky LRT trains and streetcars that don’t even go very fast or carry that many people? They won’t even provide us with that information – probably too embarassed at the cost/benefit analysis. I’m now starting to think that they should just rip out all the tracks and put more buses in place. We could have some sort of hybrid buses that work on the overhead wires while IN city and biodiesel OUT of the city. Why are these politicans so focused on the little trains that couldn’t? They’re not really THAT cool. We need to get a REAL system like the other big cities have. If Portland wants to be world class instead of Disneyland then it needs more buses, wider freeways and CHOICES for the consumer! Not everyone can be expected (or forced) to live in expensive and cramped verticle cubicles and ride the streetcar up the block to do their overpriced shopping or go to work. For all the money that’s been spent they could have developed better intra-regional transit systems instead of the streetcars that barely go faster than you can walk and only benefit the downtowners.

  68. To the comments about burying the freeways: Very expensive – you’d need to have potential devlopers fund it (think of all that prime real estate), which is dicey in the current market. Also, you haven’t solved ANY of the air quality issues, you’ve now only made them much worse in a highly localized area (where the vent shafts are). On the one hand, this allows you to build filters to trap and remove contaminants, on the other hand, you now have a continuous expense of removal.

    Greg Tompkins opines that we need CHOICES for the consumer. I agree. We need more bike infrastructure so that there are options other than cars and transit. A recent study by PDOT indicated a significant fraction of people would be willing to bike to work if it were “safer”, or if shower facilities were available. We need to encourage that by developing more bicycle infrastructure and public shower facilities in major employment areas. These should (at first) be tax-free and ideally primarily subsidized, like the road system was for cars. Cyclists should not initially be taxed (I know JK and TP will disagree here), because we’re trying to encourage people to move away from cars. Once we’ve increased the percentage of cycle trips from 5-7% to 20-30%, we can start talking about taxing bike infrastructure, through a “tube and tire” tax or something.

    If we move 20% of car commuters to bike, we free up a lot of existing capacity, and we reduce maintenance costs. All the bicycles in Portland produce less wear on the roads than a single double-trailer semi. (No, I don’t have stats, and the reason why is because wear and tear on asphalt by a single bike is not statistically distinguishable from normal weathering – it’s that small)

    Choices mean cars. Choices mean transit, walking and bikes. JK likes to ask “how does this affect low income people?” – bikes are much more affordable than cars, and if low income individuals have shower access at their work, then they get the benefits of reduced cost to maintain their transport, fitness without a gym membership, and satisfaction at the personal accomplishment of getting somewhere under their own power. While cycling takes 2-3 times longer than motoring, it’s comparable to transit, and if a transfer is involved, it’s actually frequently faster than transit.

    Disclosure: I take Tri-Met on average 2 days a week, and I bike 12.5 miles one way on the other 3 days. I am 60 lbs. overweight – I started slow, and it’s nowhere near as hard as people think if you start slow and build up to it. My commute time is the same by either method: 60-80 minutes. It would take me 25-30 minutes by car.

    If we want true choices, we need to cater to means of transportation other than cars. We also need to continue to provide for cars in a reasonable and fiscally responsible manner. A lot of people bring up Peak Oil. PO will result in 1 of 2 things – either fewer cars, or cars that run on something other than petroleum. In either case, reasonable road investment (i.e. road investment that transports people effectively without destroying neighborhoods) is a requirement. Either we’ll have cars that need to be accomodated, or Peak Oil will force a mass move to transit and bicycles. If the latter is the case, existing roads can easily be repurposed to accomodate hi-speed buses and bicycle “freeways”. All it takes is some paint and some political will.

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