Judgment Day for Columbia Crossing?

Today Portland’s city council will take its first public vote on the $4.2 billion plan to replace the current I-5 bridge over the Columbia River.

According to an article by Dylan Rivera in today’s Oregonian, the council is expected to approve only parts of the project while calling for more analysis (that factors in higher gas prices) and a “signature distinctive design”.

I was especially glad to see the second point made. Hopefully local leaders understand that a flat slab of concrete like the I-205 bridge should not be allowed to happen here. But it has to be more than talk. To succeed as a design, the bridge must not be hampered by height regulations because of the nearby Pearson Field in Vancouver. And the selection process needs to be sound: either a design competition or some kind of blue-ribbon panel that understands why a bridge by Santiago Calatrava (his bridge in Valencia, Spain is at left), Norman Foster (a bridge of his in France is pictured below) or Renzo Piano or other designers of that caliber is vitally important.

I’ve also wondered if there is any chance of Portland being able to take some of the federal dollars that would be pledged and use it on another transportation project. Instead of $4.2 billion on an entirely new bridge, what if we spent a fraction of that cost adding rail, bike and pedestrian access to the existing spans and then used the remaining funds elsewhere. I believe that’s more or less what happened when the proposed Mt. Hood Freeway was scratched and the funds from that project were applied to the city’s first light rail line.

Let me put this another way. If you had to decide between (A) the new Columbia bridge and (B) having the east bank overpass  removed from its spot along the Willamette and that portion of the freeway buried underground, which would you pick? Even though I’m not necessarily against the Columbia span, I’d much rather have the east bank overpass removed.

I also can’t help but think of the bypass highway for Highway 99W at Newberg and Dundee that has been desperately needed for more than 30 years. I’m biased because such a road would make visits to my hometown of McMinnville a lot easier. But many thousands of people living down in the Willamette Valley feel the same way. What if you could drive from Portland to Lincoln City or Newport without hitting a stoplight? After all, I’ve spent vastly more time in stop-and-go traffic moving through tiny Dundee than I’ve ever spent in gridlock trying to cross the Columbia on Interstate 5.

One other quandary I’ve felt about supporting the bridge project. Both lawmakers and local press have emphasized that a major impetus for the new bridge is that it would ease things for freight. But freight could in many cases be better served by rail transit. I’d love to see a campaign to get more freight off the roadways. Giant 18-wheel trucks are a dangerous hazard to other motorists. I can’t go along with a bridge plan if the overriding principle is that it serves freight. There are way, way too many big trucks on the road as it is.

In an op-ed from today’s Oregonian, city council member and mayor-elect Sam Adams cautioned that the council’s vote today “is not the ultimate or final ‘yes’ to begin building the new bridge. Approval today will only move the bridge project proposal from one phase of evaluation to the next.” If we are to go forward, though, Adams will need to show leadership in ensuring that if we commit to this bridge, that it’s the right one.

Comments

[billb]

There is an exhibit of Artworks depicting a Park Covered Bridge
over the Columbia at the NW Lucky Lab Brewpub [activity rm] on NW Quimby above NW 19 th st. Like the historic Covered Bridge , a Park Roof will protect drivers/bikers/walkers from winter storms [reducing accidents] , absorbs the rainfall [eliminting pollution runoff], and protects the roadway [eliminating much expensive maintenance]. Imagine a picnic in a beautiful and vast public park floating high above the Mighty CColumbia. Design Matters !

[Double J]

Super happy about the signature design... I've been lobbying my ass off about it publicly and privately (not execting any resilts) and it's good to hear Sam's old promise of a serious design is still on the table. If Portland wants to be a design city... this project has to have serious design.

I also think it's wrong to mix this project's funding with other transit projects that need fixing... there is a tendency to see the billions of dollars and want use it as a panacea in many areas but that isn't how these things work. It goes by a tightly defined project by project allocations. Besides 4.2 billion is already a tight # for the bridge budget.

[JayC]

With all of the analysis and planning for the future that goes into this type of project, how can the availability of oil (which is used to move all of the vehicles and freight on this proposed bridge) in the next 15-25 years not be taken into consideration? The era of cheap oil is over. We're coming down the other side of peak oil now and its going to be a fast drop. Lets plan realistically and not squander our remaining resources on foolish plans to encourage increased motoring, sprawling and importing our goods from thousands of miles away.

[ws]

If the CRC were really about creating something beautiful, then alright, but the true purpose of the proposed bridge is for something ugly that no pretty design like those in the pictures above can correct.

The new CRC bridge is designed to continue the practice for as long as possible, of enabling the familiar SOV commute back and forth across the river everyday between job and home. Sure, talk is made about adding light rail, and a little bigger bike/pedestrian path to the 4.2 bil bridge, but these don't seem like very serious efforts to address the problems that create the demand for a higher capacity bridge.

[stan]

I would totally love to put I-5 on the eastside underground, the problem is that in my occasional moments of honesty about that subject I don't see how it pencils out. It isn't like the Mt. Hood Highway in that if the new CRC bridge went away there would be money available for an eastside tunnel. There isn't a guarantee that the feds would just agree to give us the money allocated to the CRC, Washington sure as hell isn't going to give us their half of their CRC budget so we could fix the inner eastside. Another problem, if you're going to spend billions to sink the highway you're signing a death warrant for the SE industrial area. The only way an underground freeway makes sense is if the area is rezoned to take full advantage of the newly exposed waterfront. Absent the rezone there would still be increased gentrification issues. Even when(if?) the streetcar starts going down MLK/Grand there is going to be increased pressure on the industrial area.