Will Portland ever build more freeway lanes? (house, to live in)

[58rhodes]

Originally Posted by eric351982

This may sound like a silly question but how can China have all this snazzy new infrastructure and we can't even have an adequate freeway through portland? Is it cheap labor?

in the US we build by committee

In China --not so much

[urbanlife78]

Originally Posted by Nell Plotts

He is talking about replacement of the I-5 bridge across the Columbia.

Adding lanes to I-5 through Portland would be very difficult and extremely expensive.

I will put money on the I-5 bridge across the Columbia collapsing in my lifetime if it isn't replaced.

I thought so but wasn't sure when I read his post. That one is a complicated deal involving two cities and two states, that is a lot of government to deal with.

[58rhodes]

at or around 33rd is the only place you could build another bridge.

[thedownlow]

Portland will build a bike lane on the freeway before they build any extra lanes for cars.

[58rhodes]

Originally Posted by thedownlow

Portland will build a bike lane on the freeway before they build any extra lanes for cars.

I sure hope so

[doity]

Originally Posted by drum bro

If the orange line went to Lake Oswego and the green line went to West Linn.

If the bypass had commuter rail along it/ i5. then went from Vancouver to Salem.

I think that would make Portland the best city on the west coast to live in for a while

First off, I cannot believe that this thread (that I started) is still going months later. Anyway, to respond to 'Drum Bro' I wonder if he has spent time in either West Linn or Lake Oswego? Because I have and I have lived in both places. How would light rail get up the hill or in any of the numerous neighborhoods? We already have decent bus service. Supposing I was to commute to work every day by MAX, if there was service here, it would likely take over an hour and a half to get to work and I work near the airport. I can already drive in 20 minutes if traffic is light.

I would like to contrast Vancouver with Portland as far as widening roads and planning for the future. It seems like Vancouver is trying to keep up with growing population by widening freeways and adding lanes,etc. The state of Oregon and the city of Portland on the other hand seem to have their heads in the sand about the problem. Instead of dealing with the problem at hand our leaders in Oregon are more concerned about 'fixing' a problem (global warming) that they don't even understand.

[urbanlife78]

Originally Posted by doity

First off, I cannot believe that this thread (that I started) is still going months later. Anyway, to respond to 'Drum Bro' I wonder if he has spent time in either West Linn or Lake Oswego? Because I have and I have lived in both places. How would light rail get up the hill or in any of the numerous neighborhoods? We already have decent bus service. Supposing I was to commute to work every day by MAX, if there was service here, it would likely take over an hour and a half to get to work and I work near the airport. I can already drive in 20 minutes if traffic is light.

I would like to contrast Vancouver with Portland as far as widening roads and planning for the future. It seems like Vancouver is trying to keep up with growing population by widening freeways and adding lanes,etc. The state of Oregon and the city of Portland on the other hand seem to have their heads in the sand about the problem. Instead of dealing with the problem at hand our leaders in Oregon are more concerned about 'fixing' a problem (global warming) that they don't even understand.

To reach the hilly parts of Lake O and the hill that is West Linn, light rail would have to rely on tunneling to reach those areas, or possibly a combination of tunneling or regrading of land to make an easier slope. Though not saying either would happen because Drum Bro's ideas did seem kind of silly, just stating that is how it would probably have to be done to reach those two towns.

20 minutes to get to work? That sounds like you already live pretty close to work as it is. Public transportation will never be designed for everyone, it is typically designed for where the most amount of people are going in order to create the most use for it.

As for Vancouver widening their roads, much of the Van was built post automobile and much easier for them to build wide roads through newer parts of the city without having to tear out existing homes and businesses. It is already set up for suburbia, besides, wide roads can also be found in the suburbs of Portland. Though wide roads aren't always the answer to fixing high traffic volumes. What Vancouver lacks is good transit that helps people across the river and to their destinations in Portland. Which this is evident in the amount of traffic the two crossings have.

[BLAZER PROPHET]

The main problem is money.

It is too expensive in this day and age to build new freeways. Funding cannot be gotten. We may be able to add a lane to our existing freeways and express roads, but that's about it.

Light rail can be expanded a bit, but it is also deeply expensive and really doesn't move all that many people.

So the idea is to be creative and try and eliminate a portion of the downtown jobs. That can be done by moving those jobs to the suburbs (office buildings in places as Hillsboro, Gresham, Vancouver, Wilsonville...) and people can easier live in their work areas. A second thought is working from home- and some businesses do just that. Staggering work times helps (as an example I work 6-4 so my early commute is easy).

[NatureYogi]

I haven't finished reading this whole thread yet (and am eager to), but here's an interesting article on Portland traffic:
Portland traffic jams ranked nation's 10th worst (if you can believe it) | OregonLive.com

The author disagrees with the study ranking Portland as 10th most congested U.S. urban commute , linking to a second article on a study describing what he feels is a more accurate raking of Portland as 17th in U.S.

The second article points out some positives: Portland has relatively short distance of commute (though congested). And its good public transportation and bicycle-friendliness create less traffic.

But it also suggests allotting 85 minutes (assume they mean during peak hours?) on Portland freeways and highways for what with no traffic would be a 20-minute drive. Eek!

By the way, what one poster here said about Europe planning to eliminate cars? Wow! Very ambitious! Makes me picture this island in Michigan I once visited that doesn't allow cars. Felt old-fashioned and peaceful.

Sadly as a former bike-and-public-transit-only gal for years, I admit when I got a car (my job required it) it truly improved my life so much, saving time and opening up so many travel options, making me the one now offering rides instead of asking people for rides. I do feel guilty because I value earth-friendliness and my car isn't even the greenest kind. But places like Portland make it easy to use bicycles and public transportation and to live in walking distance of fun things so will start using my car less.

[jjpop]

Originally Posted by urbanlife78

As for Vancouver widening their roads, much of the Van was built post automobile and much easier for them to build wide roads through newer parts of the city without having to tear out existing homes and businesses. It is already set up for suburbia, besides, wide roads can also be found in the suburbs of Portland.

What failed to happen in the suburbs of Portland is that many of the connector roads between the individual cities did not get upgraded post automobile. So while the new subdivisions might boast wide roads with turn lanes, etc. many of the roads that connect the cities are still about as wide as they were when they were built, or maybe a little wider.

These are the kinds of roads that, in other metro areas, would have been expanded and turned into expressways or at least widened to accommodate more lanes. Why did that not happen here? Partly because of geography and terrain (for example, Hwy 43 from Portland to Lake Oswego is constrained by the side of the West Hills on one side and the Willamette on the other), but also I don't think the will or money was there to buy out landowners to expand the roads.

Most of my examples of inadequate connector roads are on the west side of the Metro, but I'd imagine others would be able to point to ones on the east or south side too.