Clinton to the River project.
The City of Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) is pushing hard to win a $1.9 million federal grant to fund the Clinton to the River Multi-Use Path. To encourage supportive public comments on the project (that can be made online), and to make the case to the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) that the project should be selected, they’ve released a new video touting its safety and livability benefits.
The project would create about a half-mile of a multi-use path and bike boulevard connection “to complete a seamless 2.8-mile bicycle route adjacent to the Portland-Milwaukie light rail alignment”.
The video focuses on the need for new bikeways and better walking conditions as well as the need to balance the existing industrial uses of the Central Eastside. Here’s how the film’s narrator puts it:
“Through strategic bike and pedestrian investments, we will take a critical step forward toward unlocking the potential of the corridor and building more livable communities for the next 100 years.”
Watch the video below…
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I bike and run through this area multiple times a day, and will be glad to have the connection from Ladds to the Springwater Corridor improved.
That shot of the cyclist making a left turn at 1:04 made my heart stop. Not sure why, but just looked very dangerous although its probably just perspective.
I was more concerned with the law-breaking children led by an otherwise responsible adult running the stop sign at 1:15… I keep seeing people on bikes breaking the law in these pro-bike advocacy videos and it makes me sad…
There was a group of 20-plus riders, and an adult was standing in the intersection as a lookout/traffic controller. Generally, staying grouped together in such a situation is not only safer, but less disruptive to other road users – the idea of being that 10 seconds for the entire group to pass is a lot better than 20 x 3 seconds for each individual. Of course if the group is large, they should break up into smaller groups to keep the flow of intersections somewhat normal.
That section with the New Copper Penny falling from the sky is from last year’s State of the City speech and is actually the intersection of 92nd and Foster – nowhere near this project.
Both are cool nonetheless.
I was going to mention that as well… there’s very little mention of the Clinton-to-the-River connection here, but I suppose it’s meant to be seen by people with no idea of current Portland infrastructure and ideals…
That’s an interesting point about the buildings falling from the sky. It’s an animation technique, but one used frequently in transit-oriented development videos. I wonder what it would feel like if the buildings were animated to emerge from the ground up? This style seems to respond to our simcity-like approach to land use planning.
It’s nice of the city to try improving the safety of commuters through the area, but frankly it’s not _that_ bad of a connection rolling past the opera, OMSI and the cement factory. Connecting the Springwater through Sellwood would probably be more useful than providing an alternative to the Hawthorne bridge for MUP users.
live farther out in SE (Mt Scott) and will say my gripe is not about having a safe/easy route to get downtown, but not having a good route to go north/south. The 205 trail is great, but it’s so far east it is basically useless if I’m trying to get to anywhere from the Hawthorne district to Alberta Arts, NoPo or St Johns. I use a mish-mash of zigzagging along arterials and neighborhood streets to get to work everyday, but there simply is nothing comparable to the multiple good routes available to take you downtown. It would be great for the city to consider these types of needs as well, rather than working on the assumption that downtown and the river are the only places people want to go.
Precious little money and lobbying time are available to be spent for alternative transportation (as unfortunate as that is), and I just wish the people who decide what projects get selected would take into consideration real needs instead of their pet gentrification projects. A good transportation network will connect all people and all neighborhoods with each other, not just to downtown.
There is a project in the works now — with a public meeting coming up at the end of January — to create a “50s Bikeway” that would provide a better north-south route in SE Portland. (more info at http://www.portlandonline.com/transportation/index.cfm?c=53345) I, too, live in the Mt Scott Arleta neighborhood and am hoping this project happens soon. I had also heard about a 70s bikeway concept, but I don’t believe the City’s actually working on implementing it yet.
totally… that’s why I’d like to stay up with the 50’s bikeway project…
and the 205 path is only “good” to me… too many hills and bad/unsignalled intersections…
This is a great project and worthy of funding, but I’d add that there are plenty of other great projects on the list that deserve to be funded. The Milwaukie/Tri-Met grant application for a bike ped bridge in S. Milwaukie also deserves a vote from anyone who wants to see a “Springwater like” trail (the trolley trail) fully developed to Oregon City.
http://www.secorridorproject.com/project-kellogg.html
I wonder how the Chevron felt about being squished by that shiny new condo.
I for one would rather see them develop a different street, than Clinton. The inner east side is not all of PDX. I will coincide that the history of pdx is to concentrate resources on the inner east side, and downtown. This at some point will need to stop in order to create a more unified city.
Yes I am a better dweller, that has lived in outer SE for 41 years: ), and it has been ignored for too long.
Totally agree. All the money in Portland projects goes to the same areas. It is sad how small they have made this city look. I live in inner SE but it would be nice to see more projects outside this area. Believe it or not Portland also has a west side, many of you may have never seen or heard of it… I’d love to see a path connecting Btown to downtown so the B’nT’s can have an option to avoid that stupid hwy 26.
I haven’t yet found an overview of potential projects, just a list of project names on oregon.gov, which doesn’t tell me much. The survey asks for one’s level of support for each of the projects within a region, so it would be great to know more about them. The Clinton to River video in this article, and the link for the SE Corridor Kellogg Lake bridge in the comments are both helpful.
Has anyone found an overview of all the Portland-area projects? Or overviews for the potential projects in any other region?
Here is a list of all the grant applications in PDF form so you can read any application you would like.
ftp://ftp.odot.state.or.us/2010_TE_Applications/
Thanks for the great coverage of this project. It is great to get the word out about this project..