There’s some hardball being played at Alpenrose, and it’s not on the baseball diamond.
On November 8th, the Hearings Officer (HO) for the Raleigh Crest Land Use application approved, with conditions, the developer’s plan to divide the 51-acre site of the old Alpenrose dairy into 263 lots of attached and detached houses. The Alpenrose site is in the Hayhurst neighborhood of southwest Portland, and its subdivision would be one of the largest housing developments Portland has seen in recent years.
Readers might remember that City staff had recommended against approving the application in mid-September, citing a number of issues which had not been resolved. Since then, the city and developer have hashed out those problems and come up with agreements on: the placement of the Red Electric Trail which crosses the northern edge of the property; environmental concerns about disturbance of the sensitive riparian environment at the site’s southern tip; inadequate sewer facilities, and stormwater management issues.
Despite the developer and City coming to terms on a range of issues, on November 11, the Hayhurst Neighborhood Association (NA) voted to appeal the HO Decision to the Portland City Council,
due to the impact of increased traffic on the safety of SW Shattuck Road and its intersection with SW Illinois St and SW 60th Ave. Neighbors also would like wildlife crossing signs to be installed on Shattuck during Stage 1 instead of Stage 4, and to be informed of the results of the wildlife crossing camera monitoring.
Traffic monitoring of SW Shattuck Road conducted by PBOT in August, 2024 showed that 91% of drivers were over the speed limit. Neighbors question the city’s decision to override the recommendation in the developer’s traffic study to install speed cushions on SW Shattuck, stating that there needs to be a “systemic evaluation” of changes to Shattuck. The neighborhood wants greater safety protection for crossing the future five-way intersection of SW Shattuck at Illinois St, which is a Neighborhood Greenway and Safe Route to School.
Before getting into the details of the intersection design, it is worth noting the interests of the three parties involved: the developer, the Public Infrastructure team of the Portland Permitting and Development Bureau (PP&D) and the Neighborhood Association.
The developer, the neighborhood association and the city
An appeal is a quasi-judicial hearing, in which the City Council acts as jury, and the appellant (in this case the NA) and city/developer present their cases in a trial compressed to fit into an afternoon session of City Council. It’s a chance for everyone to play Perry Mason, with professional lawyers guiding the show. Given the upcoming holidays, an appeal could very likely not be heard until 2025, after the brand-new Council is seated. The new Council structure, with its district representation and larger body, introduces uncertainty into the outcome.
Delay is a developer’s worst enemy. So it is in the developer’s interest to avoid the legal and financial costs of an appeal. The expense of a few speed bumps and stop signs is a rounding error compared to the cost of firing up their attorney and the expense caused by the delay.
The Hayhurst neighborhood association has genuine concerns about the safety of the children who will be walking and riding bicycles from Raleigh Crest, across Shattuck, to the Hayhurst Elementary School a few blocks away.
The task of the City’s transportation review is to try to apply rational and standard roadway treatments to an area of town with a very non-standard roadway network. For example, Shattuck Road runs for nearly a mile between Vermont St and Beaverton-Hillsdale Hwy without a single through cross-street or stop sign— and without any sidewalks. That lack of connectivity and infrastructure encourages some drivers to speed, and is dangerous to any road user outside of a car.
Contrary to what often gets simplified to “NIMBY’s opposing development,” the NA’s conflict is with the City, not the developer. The role of neighborhood associations is to hold the City accountable to its own code and policies — that is a big part of why NAs were created. In recognition of that role, City code waives the $6,566 City Council appeal fee for qualified NAs.
The developer is caught in the middle, between the neighborhood and the Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) engineers, holding the wallet and listening to the clock tick.
The intersection of Illinois and Shattuck
The intersection of SW Illinois, 60th and Shattuck sits at the crest of large hill. As noted above, Shattuck doesn’t have through cross-streets, stop signs or sidewalks, a common enough configuration in the southwest that I have a name for those roads — toboggan runs. Cars speed on them. Shattuck’s posted speed is 25 mph, but the developer’s traffic study, conducted in 2022, showed the average 85th percentile speed to be 11 mph faster. Also at issue is that the sight distance calculations for the intersection were based on posted, rather than on observed, speeds. And that the intersection’s situation at the top of a crest makes crosswalk marking less visible to a driver approaching from below them.
The developer’s initial traffic study, from April 2024, suggested that “The City and Applicant should collaborate to install speed cushions and the associated signage and pavement markings along the frontage of the new neighborhood on SW Shattuck Road,” per PBOT’s Traffic Design Manual. A month later, PBOT returned the study with comments, including that “Speed cushions require approval of the Fire Bureau prior to installation.”
The revised traffic study which the developer submitted in June dropped the speed cushion suggestion.
As part of the ongoing dialogue between PP&D and the development team, the developer submitted a conceptual design (above) of a tightened intersection box at Shattuck and Illinois, with striped crosswalks and bike crosses.
I asked PBOT to comment on their requirements for the intersection, specifically whether “the finding that stop signs and speed bumps are not warranted is so strong that it justifies the delay and expense of a City Council hearing.” PP&D Public Information Officer Ken Ray, relayed this response from PBOT:
As you are likely aware, the City of Portland has been working with the community and applicant on this project to identify solutions that meet PBOT’s goals for a safe, accessible transportation system, that align with traffic control best practices given the context of the land use case, and PBOT’s authority through that review.
PBOT is aware of the concerns related to speeding on Shattuck Road and the desire to ensure the crossing at Shattuck and Illinois is safe for all road users. The City shares those goals. Through the land use process, PBOT worked to evaluate a variety of options to improve conditions across the Raleigh Crest development site.
The design of the intersection at Shattuck and Illinois evolved through the public comment and hearing process, leading the applicant to include some additional improvements to narrow the existing intersection along with marked crosswalks and crossbikes were included in the design. Separate from this development, concept development for a new gateway treatment to enhance the existing neighborhood greenway on Illinois Street is underway.
All-way stop control at Shattuck Road and Illinois Street was evaluated through the traffic study, and it was determined that the volume of activity and the reported crash history at this location did not meet PBOT’s standards for stop sign placement. More information about the use of stop signs can be found here: https://www.portland.gov/transportation/traffic-operations/stop-sign-overview.
Speed cushions were also considered through the land use process. PBOT no longer has a traffic calming program due to equity concerns and lack of funding. It only installs speed bumps or cushions as part of projects for Neighborhood Greenways, Safe Routes to School, on known cut-through routes through Fixing Our Street funding, and at locations with known safety issues. Shattuck Road is classified as a Neighborhood Collector and Major Emergency Response street. Per the Transportation System Plan, “Major Emergency Response Streets that also have a Local Service or Neighborhood Collector traffic classification are eligible for speed cushions, subject to the approval of Portland Fire and Rescue.” It has been PBOT’s recent experience that Portland Fire has not been supportive of long stretches of speed cushions on Major Emergency Response streets. To be effective, speed bumps or cushions need to be placed at regular intervals along a corridor. In this case, review by City bureaus including PBOT and Portland Fire and Rescue did not establish that speed bumps or cushions are so critical the Portland Fire should consider their placement on a Major Emergency Response Route.
And that is where things stand for the moment.
I’m writing this post less than a week after the City Auditors Office wrote a critical report about PBOT’s Vision Zero program. One thing is clear to me: Vision Zero will not be successful if it is the purview of only a small group within PBOT. Everybody needs to share the Vision and make it a priority — PBOT Maintenance and Development Review, Water and Environmental Services, Fire and Police, the City Attorney, and the City Council and Mayor. I am hopeful that Portland can do this.
