What I Love, Hate, Like, Dislike about Portland Oregon (tax, law)

[2bpurrfect]

Originally Posted by SoLongTexas

Loved: Buskers, Chess downtown, Weird and wild people everywhere, closeness to trees.

Hated: Human excrement on the sidewalks, gauntlet of spangers on Burnside, cost of living and uppity locals. Also, pumping your own gas is just silly.

Liked: Mass transit, being young and meeting loads of new people.

Etc.

um, you mean NOT being allowed to pump your own gas? cuz it is illegal to self-serve here...

[2bpurrfect]

Originally Posted by urbanlife78

I definitely agree with the issues we will see with East Portland as it seems much of the lower incomes are starting to be pushed into that one part of the city. Portland should be trying to use the PDC to diversify the incomes of neighborhoods throughout Portland.

couldn't agree with you more. it's hard to find a place to rent or buy on the west side unless you have plenty of money. of course I've lived in the area a long time so i watched the rents spiral up a lot over time, and absolutely JUMP up recently.

[2bpurrfect]

Originally Posted by urbanlife78

Having no growth boundary wouldn't make inner Portland cheaper, so you would still have the same problem with inner city housing still being pricey.

the zoning folks really ought to allow a bit more development in nodes along the main hiways and major routes- there are sometimes too few populated/ commercial areas when you go driving outside of Portland metro- it's kinda scarey if driving at night away from town. If they allowed a reasonable amount of non-eyesore single landowner development ( i do NOT mean PUD's !), homes, apartments, duplexes, condos, and business- including
service businesses along the major byways, in pockets, outside the Urban Growth Boundary- it would be so much safer to drive long distance out of town to somewhere else. The growth needs to spider out somewhat, not just consume all the good farmland in a circle around the city boundaries. Too much population concentrated all in Pdx metro, not enough in the other areas of the valley or the whole state. When I say population, i mean single owners who build their homes, as I said, I do NOT mean large scale, like planned unit developments. Those are only good for the developers and builders, not the population in general.

[Mini-apple-less]

Originally Posted by jwuk45

Probably been mentioned already, but the nonexistent street lighting in many residential neighbourhoods in Portland is really annoying. I should not have to be shining my phone light on the sidewalk when I go walking at night.

I find the infrastructure out West in general is sub-par, due to the larger distances and libertarian politics.

[2bpurrfect]

Originally Posted by Mini-apple-less

I find the infrastructure out West in general is sub-par, due to the larger distances and libertarian politics.

which reminds me. there seems to be a very noticeable undersupply of STREET SIGNS in certain parts of portland and immediate suburbs. Don't they realize that street signs are essential so people can know where they are???????????????? Direction finding becomes impossible without them.

[Mini-apple-less]

Loves: Cherry blossoms, awesome karaoke, direct flights to Tokyo, Forest Park (though it doesn't make up for the nasty parks in Portland in general), great beer, Hawthorne Boulevard, legal bud

Dislikes: Just about everything else

[Mini-apple-less]

Originally Posted by 2bpurrfect

which reminds me. there seems to be a very noticeable undersupply of STREET SIGNS in certain parts of portland and immediate suburbs. Don't they realize that street signs are essential so people can know where they are???????????????? Direction finding becomes impossible without them.

Yeah not to mention 59 miles of roads that aren't even paved! Some parts of East Portland are practically favelas. And why does all the signage in Portland look like it's straight out of the year 1990 or something? I like retro stuff, but there's something almost creepy about how backwards Portland and Oregon/Washington feel. It really is like going 25 or 30 years back in time in a lot of ways.

[urbanlife78]

Originally Posted by Mini-apple-less

Yeah not to mention 59 miles of roads that aren't even paved! Some parts of East Portland are practically favelas. And why does all the signage in Portland look like it's straight out of the year 1990 or something? I like retro stuff, but there's something almost creepy about how backwards Portland and Oregon/Washington feel. It really is like going 25 or 30 years back in time in a lot of ways.

That is the responsibility of the people who live on those streets. It is starting to sound like the northwest might not be a good fit for you in general, you really should take some trips to other areas to see if there is anything better out there for you.

[VTHokieFan]

Originally Posted by urbanlife78

That is the responsibility of the people who live on those streets. It is starting to sound like the northwest might not be a good fit for you in general, you really should take some trips to other areas to see if there is anything better out there for you.

That's funny that you're trying to pin complaints of unpaved streets as somehow being indicative of someone not belonging here. It's indicative of 3 decades of poor governance

[pdxMIKEpdx]

The people who live on those streets are invited by the city to form what's called a LID.
Check it out:

https://www.portlandoregon.gov/transportation/35715

The problem with this is that the city has total control of contractors used and overall costs.

I lived on one of those streets.

We had private paving contractor come out and bid the job (all on the up and up, and per city codes), and armed with that cost knowledge we approached the city about forming a LID.

When the final cost was revealed, the whole thing just fell apart.
People scattered like a broken bag of marbles.

The city wanted over ten times the amount that the contractor would do it for, and was very excited about saddling us with a 400 dollar a month loan at 6% interest, or putting a lien on your house.

As VTHokiefan said, it's poor city governance.

The City of Portland shouldn't be trying to take blatant advantage of it's citizens and trying to fill it's coffers, it should be trying to help them out at the lowest cost possible.