Any Portland/Vancouver competition? (sales, neighborhoods, buy)

[Pathwalker]

How do people in Portland view those who live across the river in Vancouver, and vice versa?

Where I currently live (Cincinnati metro), there is a degree of animosity that people in Northern Kentucky hold for those in Cincinnati, and vice versa. It's not everyone, and local governments try to claim that what happens on one side of the river benefits the entire region.....but there is definitely a noticeable air of competition back and forth across the river, with many in NKY belittling Cincinnati's sometimes "inept ability to get things done", claiming NKY seems to know how to get those same kinds of things done right. Likewise, Cincinnatians fiercely defend their side of the river against the barbs of those who attack it.

The Portland/Vancouver area is one place I'm seriously considering moving to. So I'm curious, do people on either side of the Columbia River trade jabs at one another? Is there any sort of "snobbery" that is prevalent among people on one side or the other, directed to toward those in the other state - or is there a sense of unity and cohesion in Portland/Vancouver?

[PNW-type-gal]

I wouldn't particularly call it competition, but I would say there's a bit of animosity. Vancouver was Portland's small, almost rural suburb for quite some time, prompting various nicknames implying the city (and everyone in it) was backward. At this point, though, there's virtually no difference between Vancouver and any other Portland suburb, with the exception of a very different tax structure.

Vancouver had one of the highest growth rates of any Portland suburb, and the vast percentage of that was from people moving across to river for more affordable housing (outside the urban growth boundary and a lot more sprawl) and more reliably-financed school districts.

One of the current issues is the I-5 bottleneck, both at the Columbia River and through Delta Park. Supposedly it's the worst restriction on the entire I-5 corridor, from Southern California to Canada. It primarily affects commuters, and the local neighborhood groups have fought (the fairly inevitable) expansion for years, with the underlying sentiment that it would only benefit trucks and out-of-staters.

Likewise the Port of Portland operates PDX, the airport, and Washington residents feel that they get the shaft over scheduling flights and having them routed over Vancouver residential neighborhoods. There is an interstate committee, but I've read a fair number of complaints that noise over Oregon sites gets higher priority than Washington sites.

[surveyorusa]

No, there's no "unity and cohesion" between the two areas. Vancouver is in Clark County which is more conservative than liberal Portland, although I think they have a Democratic Congressman. For the most part, Portlanders look down on Vancouver as a less sophisitcated, unincorporated suburb that doesn't have good public transportation or land use laws (thus, lots of urban sprawl; Portland has an urban growth boundary). On the other hand, Portland is where the jobs are for many Vancouverites, and they resent having to pay Oregon income taxes (state of Washington has no income tax). I think many Vancouverites resent Portland's elitist attitude.

Interestingly, though, after many years, Oregon and Washington are finally going to build a new bridge to augment the I-5 Interstate bridge, and light rail (MAX) may be included as part of that. Will that help unite the areas more? Vancouverites have previously voted down funding for a light rail system to connect into Portland, but the current Vancouver mayor is very pro-light rail. We'll have to see how the opposition plays out on that one!

Still, at least Portland's airport is IN Portland, not in another state the way Cincinnati's is! That's got to be a hard one for you folks to live down, knowing you had to build your airport in another state!

[sberdrow]

Live in both. Vancouver has lower housing prices, no state income tax. Ideal situation would be to live in Vancovuer, Work in Vancouver, buy your stuff in Portland, which has No sales tax. We both have starbucks every 3 blocks or so (thank god for that). As far as liberal/conservative. I can remember the last time I talked to a conservative. They just don't live here.

[Pathwalker]

Aside from Portland having a light rail system, it sounds as if the Cincinnati/NKY and Portland/Vancouver areas have more in common than I thought. Here in Cincinnati, the traffic headaches can really add up on I-75 going across the river, and if there is an accident on the bridge, it's a nightmare. The bridge was built in the '60s, and currently accomodates approximately 3x its designed capacity. Yet the government wants the area to find "creative ways" to cough up the 1.5 billion dollars to realign the interstate and replace the bridge. Technically, it's Kentucky's responsibility to do that, but I don't see how they could afford it on their own. This place desperately needs a light rail system, but the voters won't approve it.

With respect to cross-river animosity, you will sometimes hear NKY referred to as "the right side of the river". Right meaning correct, not conservative. It gets old after a while. Cincinnati should just annex NKY and get it over with. LOL! (Actually, to people in northern Ohio, Cincinnati is referred to as the capital of Northern Kentucky.)

And you're right about the airport situation. People on the west side of Cincinnati are directly in the flight path of the heaviest air traffic going into CVG. The noise is horrendous, and their complaints fall on deaf ears. Cincinnati indeed dropped the ball when it had the chance to locate the airport on this side of the river. Another ironic thing about that is how our official weather measurements are recorded. They are all taken at the airport in Kentucky. It can be amusing (and a bit deceptive) because while NKY tends to get more rain than we do, we likewise tend to get more snow than they do. Even the difference of a few miles can be somewhat significant in terms of precip totals. It could be a sunny, hot day where I live, but if it rains at the airport, the official record will show that we had "X" amount of rain for that given day. And while it may be 90 degrees in Cincinnati, if the airport only makes it to 82, then that goes down as the official temp for the day.

Thanks for the responses. Gives me some stuff to think about.

[PNW-type-gal]

The most frustrating thing about living in Vancouver is that ALL of your major-market news is Oregon-based, and it's as though there is a line at the Columbia River that says "here by dragons on the north side."

The local paper, The Columbian, has made some attempts to compete with The Oregonian, but it's still a small sister.

And the I-5 bridge dates back to 1917, with lanes added in 1958. It's currently 6 lanes (3 in each direction) but in both cases one lane peels off immediately after the bridge, leaving a bottleneck (even if the bridge isn't). Washington state finished a big construction project a few back and it widens back up almost immediately, but once traffic is backed up... it's backed up. The only other bridge, the I-205 (The Glen Jackson Bridge), opened in the early 80s and it's 5 or so lanes in EACH direction.

[JakeDog]

Vancouver is basically a boring subburb of Portland. No one who lives in Portland gives it much, if any, thought.

[mrpiggy]

That's funny, about Northern Kentucky and Cincinnati.
The snobs in Portland call Vancouver "Vantucky" and tell lots of redneck jokes. Unfortunately, there's some truth in what they say!

Originally Posted by WCRob

How do people in Portland view those who live across the river in Vancouver, and vice versa?

Where I currently live (Cincinnati metro), there is a degree of animosity that people in Northern Kentucky hold for those in Cincinnati, and vice versa. It's not everyone, and local governments try to claim that what happens on one side of the river benefits the entire region.....but there is definitely a noticeable air of competition back and forth across the river, with many in NKY belittling Cincinnati's sometimes "inept ability to get things done", claiming NKY seems to know how to get those same kinds of things done right. Likewise, Cincinnatians fiercely defend their side of the river against the barbs of those who attack it.

The Portland/Vancouver area is one place I'm seriously considering moving to. So I'm curious, do people on either side of the Columbia River trade jabs at one another? Is there any sort of "snobbery" that is prevalent among people on one side or the other, directed to toward those in the other state - or is there a sense of unity and cohesion in Portland/Vancouver?

[sberdrow]

Vancouver, in my time there was every bit as sophistocated as Portland. Book stores everywhere, great places to eat, Great coffee everywhere. I lived in Portland and vancouver for 11 years and I never heard the term Vantucky. I don't even have a frined in the Couve, that hunts. Can't find a Republican for miles.

[diggitydot]

Originally Posted by mrpiggy

That's funny, about Northern Kentucky and Cincinnati.
The snobs in Portland call Vancouver "Vantucky" and tell lots of redneck jokes. Unfortunately, there's some truth in what they say!

I was just going to post that, too.

I worked in Portland for many years and lived in various communities in Clark County. Yes, we joked about Vancouver being "Vantucky", but it's really just vast areas of suburbia more than anything else. I have lots of friends living in both Portland and Vancouver and they all each secretly envy and diss on various aspects of the other city from time to time.

In all, I like both cities, but for drastically different reasons.