The prediction that the bus lanes will cause business closures “in a matter of months” apparently has not yet come to pass.
I just got back from Paris late Tuesday evening, and yesterday I headed over to the Hillsdale mall to restock our empty shelves with enough provisions to last a long, cold weekend.
Luckily I was able to find a parking spot, the place was hopping!
Readers might remember the petition campaign against the new Capitol Highway rose lanes launched by the Hillsdale Business and Professional Association, the Hillsdale Neighborhood Association and other civic groups. One of the concerns was that the new Bus and Turn (BAT) lane would hurt small businesses in the strip malls. (To be clear and fair, not all of the mall businesses participated in the petition campaign.)
The rose lanes went in last September and the petition’s prediction that the “negative impact” will cause business closures “in a matter of months” apparently has not yet come to pass.
Nevertheless, last month the Portland Tribune published a piece, Transit project hurting businesses, which amplified the complaints of a few owners.
Well, it’s been three months since the rose lanes went in, and the parking lot is full. That doesn’t mean that balance sheets are where an owner wants them to be, but it does mean that the rose lanes are not preventing customers from reaching the mall.
I’m a frequent customer of several mall businesses. I bank at OnPoint, I’m a regular at Gigi’s, I buy enough at Paloma’s that I get the handwritten thank you letter. I ship my packages at the UPS store, buy groceries at Basics, I own eight succulents from Gurton’s and I like to top off my shopping sprees with an ice cream cone at Dairy Hill. (I even bought one of their cute ice cream cone t-shirts for my niece.)
Hey big spender!
I drive to the mall from the west and my experience is that the BAT lanes make it less stressful to enter and exit the parking lot. Drivers seem to be respecting the new rose lane—it was empty yesterday except for cars making the turn into parking lots—and a line of cars in the leftmost lane was moving calmly. In other words, things seemed to me to be working as intended.
I wish everyone well, and I hope all those shoppers I saw yesterday spent a lot of money. And if you need a thoughtful, last minute gift, the succulents at Gurton’s Plant Shop might do the trick.
Thanks for reading.
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Lisa,
Is one of the the biggest shopping days of the year the time to say a project had no impact on retail businesses?
I’ve been out of the country for 6 weeks, I stopped by the mall for some groceries when I returned and snapped a couple of photos.
But I noticed the crowded parking lot in early November also. Before my trip, I stopped into Paloma’s to get some clothes—it was the most crowded I’d seen it in the decade I’ve been shopping there. I also mailed some boxes at UPS, they had more customers than I had seen in a long time.
I go to Gigi’s weekly and usually have to wait for a table. The Starbucks is crowded with high school students, I could go on.
When the Tribune article came out at the end of November it did not jibe with my experience as a regular, weekly shopper at the mall, and I commented to that effect in the BP Monday Roundup. Nor did it seem like the reporter had even stopped by to judge for himself how many shoppers there were. That’s basic.
I’m sure pdx tribune will write something soon based on interviews of previously unsupportive business owners who now have new information through experience, and have changed there.mind and will totally offer quotes about how wrong they were. That’s my bike Xmas wish. As likely as Santa coming tonight (sorry jon if that wrecked the magic for.you)
That’s some good, on-the-ground reporting, Lisa.
Our family are regular Trimet users and we have all noticed how efficiently the buses now zip thru Hillsdale. Well, they do slow down regularly behind cars that are turning into the parking lots on both sides of the street, so it’s not all zipping, but my experience jibes with yours: the whole experience in Hillsdale is now a lot more relaxed b/c cars are finally taking their turn and not gumming up both lanes.
Yes, Virginia, it is possible to limit the places cars are allowed to go and the world won’t end – in fact it can be a whole lot more pleasant for everyone.
Merry Christmas to all.
Thank you Fred for liking the reporting. It’s a little tough because I really like Hillsdale, and the mall, and all those businesses. But i think they were wrong on the rose lanes. I hope they’ve moved into the black with the holiday sales.
It sounds like the complaint in the Portland Tribune article was that business is down during rush hour when traffic is backed up. Capitol Highway looks empty in the photos.
Capital Highway had a line of cars in the leftmost east-bound lane when I pulled in and out. But car traffic is way down through that corridor because of covid. PBOT had this graph of car volumes a little east of the malls pre- and during covid:
As you can see, traffic through the area is down 50-80%. But most of the business in the south strip mall are places you go as the destination of a trip, not as a spontaneous stop-by. Who, stuck in traffic, says to themselves, “Hey, I’m going to pull off and buy a succulent.” Maybe I pull off on a hot day for a diet coke at a drive-through.
There’s a lot going on in our world, blaming fewer customers on a rose lane is a stretch. Moreover, some businesses seemed to be doing OK. Join the crowd getting an order into City Thai mid-pandemic, take out Thai was everybody’s comfort food.
Never let reality get in the way of a good dig at non-SOV transportation options!