In YOUR opinion, what are the top 3 political issues going on in Portland/Oregon (Beaverton: crime, home)

[khyron]

Since a lot of folks are mentioning transportation issues, here are some links that an outsider to Portland might find extremely useful as background information for current controversies:

streetcar "loop" expansion (already under construction)

"orange line" light rail (already under construction)

new transit/pedestrian bridge (already under construction)

significant streetcar faire changes (proposed last fall)

significant light rail fare changes (proposed this week)

[christiner81]

Originally Posted by khyron

Since a lot of folks are mentioning transportation issues, here are some links that an outsider to Portland might find extremely useful as background information for current controversies:

streetcar "loop" expansion (already under construction)

"orange line" light rail (already under construction)

new transit/pedestrian bridge (already under construction)

significant streetcar faire changes (proposed last fall)

significant light rail fare changes (proposed this week)

thanks!

[davemess10]

Originally Posted by hamellr

And the slow crawl South East Portland is taking towards poverty levels.

Care to extrapolate on this one?


I don't think the Sellwood is that much of a hot topic any more. They have secured most of the funding for it and broke ground a few months ago. I guess many Portlanders are still bitter at the Clacks that refused to pay their pittance (I being one of them), so maybe you're right.

[davemess10]

I will be pretty excited if/when the MAX bridge is built. It is going to provide a lot of service for SE'ers trying to bike across the river, and should alleviate some of the bike congestion on the Hawthorne, which is really the only bridge for the entire quadrant to get to the West side.
Also makes it a slam dunk to get to OHSU.

[hamellr]

Originally Posted by davemess10

Care to extrapolate on this one?

As Alberta area is gentrifying, a lot of the poorer people, especially minorities, are moving into SE Portland area. It's been slowly happening over the past two decades. The Portland Police have opened a couple of new stations down in that area and something like 75% (I don't have the correct number in front of me, but it's pretty significant,) of Police Patrols between 7pm and 5am are now in that area.

[The Cactus Leaguer]

Originally Posted by hamellr

As Alberta area is gentrifying, a lot of the poorer people, especially minorities, are moving into SE Portland area. It's been slowly happening over the past two decades. The Portland Police have opened a couple of new stations down in that area and something like 75% (I don't have the correct number in front of me, but it's pretty significant,) of Police Patrols between 7pm and 5am are now in that area.

interesting, I never viewed as Alberta to SE migration, to me it's more like everything close in has been gentrifying and poorer people are being pushed farther away from the city center (outer NE PDX and outer SE PDX), but I have no stats to back this up, just anecdotal...

[davemess10]

There was poverty in SE before the gentrification happened. Outer SE has always been more of a blue-collar and minority area, without huge incomes.

I would tend to agree with Cactus more. I mean, "Felony Flats" (where I actually live) is not nearly as bad as it was even 10 years ago (or so I'm told).
So I don't know if the SE is really getting poorer.

[khyron]

Originally Posted by davemess10

I will be pretty excited if/when the MAX bridge is built. It is going to provide a lot of service for SE'ers trying to bike across the river, and should alleviate some of the bike congestion on the Hawthorne, which is really the only bridge for the entire quadrant to get to the West side.
Also makes it a slam dunk to get to OHSU.

There's definitely no "if" at this point. Just a matter of time. Both the new transit bridge (still unnamed as far as I know) across the river and the Gibbs pedestrian bridge over I-5 are well under way now, if you haven't been down to the South Waterfront recently to see all the construction taking place. In fact major new portions of MAX and streetcar right-of-way have already been cleared (the majority of the east side streetcar expansion is done now, they're just putting up the wires and poles).

Between the two of them, access to OHSU for east side folks and Lair Hill folks is going to be amazingly improved...as well as access to rail transit into and around the city. Good stuff, I'm very excited about it all.

http://trimet.org/pm/construction/bridge (more info)

http://gibbsbridge.org/ (more info)

[davemess10]

Originally Posted by khyron

There's definitely no "if" at this point.

I have definitely been down there, and know it's been worked on, I just won't actually believe it until it's under my feet and I'm crossing the river. Who knows what will happen 3 years from now (and all the just depends on when the Cascadia quake hits, right?).

[Nell Plotts]

Odds are that bridge will do just fine, it will be the old bridges that fail.