What if the CRC Thought REALLY Big?


A reader passes along this suggestion that we could emulate Turkey and build a tunnel all the way under downtown Portland into Vancouver.


19 responses to “What if the CRC Thought REALLY Big?”

  1. Of course, that’s a rail tunnel, not a roadway tunnel. But hey…

    Ya but we could have a rail, road, bike, and walking tunnel!

  2. Why stop there? Just build a tunnel from Wilsonville to Salmon Creek. :)

    Hell, let’s build it the entire way to Medford!

    (Dr-I need more meds!)

  3. Hell, let’s build it the entire way (from Salmon Creek) to Medford!
    That’s extremely close to a classic “Orygone” joke book series gaff, which, in later volumes, includes a map of Oregon with a “California-Washington” tunnel starting at the California-Oregon border near Ashland and ending across the Oregon-Washington border in Vancouver, WA. The series was built around the Tom McCall ideal of tourists visiting Oregon, but not staying.

    I also heard at the Wilsonville ODOT High Speed Rail Open House that someone suggested a rail tunnel under the Portland Metro Area at a previous open house as a way to speed trains through the area, since there’s virtually no surface space to do so except for the current rail alignments.

    The odd thing is the tunnel makes perfect political sense; we’re spending sewer money on bike paths and bioswales, renaming major streets for people of national importance to some with little or no connection to Oregon or its local metropolitan areas at the expense of everyone, and the current governors’ legacy is currently being defined by mass media as opening a new state park every year. Whereas at the same time we’re not maintaining the existing infrastructures we already have; or providing quality, equitable transit services for all at city, regional, and/or statewide levels.

  4. “Ya but we could have a rail, road, bike, and walking tunnel!”

    Well, what about me? I want to kayak to work. Can’t we build a rail, road, bike, walking, canoeing, and kayaking tunnel?!

    I also want bike-lane wide kayak channels dug into every street right next to the bike lanes!

  5. You forgot the alternate route, Jason, in case a tunnel was too expensive—a freeway tracing out the southern, eastern, and northern borders of the state–beginning just south of Siskiyou Summit, and rejoining I-5 in Vancouver.

  6. Actually putting the “three thru lanes” in a tunnel under the Columbia would allow the removal of the I-5 freeway between the tunnel portals…approx Mill Plain in Vancouver to Lombard in Portland. The old freeway ROW could be converted to a boulevard for local trips; the existing freeway bridges converted to arterial and light rail use with improved bike/ped facilities hung on the outside. Interchanges could be replaced with stop lights or round abouts, housing and commercial development could occur adjacent to the River on both sides, and Vancouver would lose the great freeway gash that splits it in two. And the City of Portland owns a tunnel boring machine, Rosie, now digger the East Side Big Pipe.

  7. I’d like to respond to a couple of things Jason said…

    First, “The odd thing is the tunnel makes perfect political sense; we’re spending sewer money on bike paths and bioswales,”

    Now, bioswales are directly a part of stormwater mitigation and it makes perfect sense to spend sewer money on them. There is no other revenue stream more closely targeted to that purpose, so I’m not sure what the complaint is here.

    As for sewer money on “bike paths”, that’s just plain untrue, despite early sloppy rhetoric from politicos and continued flogging of incorrect information in the press. So nothing to worry about there. (The truth is that bioswales and other sewer-related street improvement projects already on a long to-do list are being prioritized so that they happen concurrently with the designation of bike boulevards. Its a juggling of projects already on the list, not a diversion of money to new projects.)

    Second, hopefully not fanning the flames of a contentious (and mostly off-topic) debate too much, “renaming major streets for people of national importance to some with little or no connection to Oregon or its local metropolitan areas”

    Well, the last guy they renamed a street for, after a false start that did not follow the designated process, and a 2nd effort that did follow the designated process, was someone who did visit Oregon and led a big rally on the steps of the state capitol, and who for some time had a local vocational college founded in his honor and named for him.

    But if that’s not good enough, I’m sure a group of concerned individuals can start a campaign to remove any named streets which are named for people who never set foot here. I nominate Macadam. (snark)

  8. Lenny has a good point. In the past decade, we’ve constructed literally miles of subway tunnels for sewage, with relatively few problems. With nearly identical technology and expertise, we can build subways for people, trains, cars, freight, you name it…

  9. There already is a commuter tunnel for kayaks, it is just currently uncapped to take advantage of the good weather. It’s called the Willamette. :-)

  10. I didn’t forget about the ‘slight modification’ to I-5, that’s in “Orygone III” (the first one) that I have a copy of around my place, somewhere. Later books had the tunnel, and IIRC, the California-Washington Ferry.

  11. Yeah…let’s emulate Turkey. And put a prefabbed tunnel under 200 feet of water.

    Earthquake Risk: Seismic Gap South of Istanbul Poses Extreme Danger
    ScienceDaily (Jan. 19, 2010) — The chain of earthquakes along the North Anatolian fault shows a gap south of Istanbul. The expected earthquakes in this region represent an extreme danger for the Turkish megacity. A new computer study now shows that the tensions in this part of the fault zone could trigger several earthquakes instead of one individual large quake event.

    Lenny says:
    And the City of Portland owns a tunnel boring machine, Rosie, now digger the East Side Big Pipe.

    Seriously, that is good news. In case we have to bore through Forest Park for a bike trail or 12 lane freeway.

  12. ‘Speaking of 80s Oregon nativist schtick…

    “Where ya goin’ with all that beer?”‘

    One of the alltime great beer commercials but I think it was the 70’s wasn’t it?

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