[PRCo] Fwd: Clang, clang -- a trolley may be in your future

[James B. Holland]

--- In PCC_Cars at yahos.com, "Peter Folger" <transitman at ...> wrote:

Clang, clang -- a trolley may be in your future.

http://www.oregonlive.com/oregonian/stories/index.ssf?/base/news/1193622\
932249580.xml&coll=7

Portland Streetcar - Planners want to know which neighborhoods will
welcome new lines
Monday, October 29, 2007, DYLAN RIVERA,  The Oregonian Staff

The next big thing for your neighborhood: How about the Portland
Streetcar?

Emboldened by the success of the downtown streetcar line, city leaders
want to expand service into a network that would crisscross the city.

Unlike bus service, city planners say, a streetcar could generate
business and political momentum for clusters of midrise housing and
commercial centers that could spread the walkable feel of popular urban
neighborhoods.

About 140 miles of the city's busiest streets show potential for new
streetcar routes, said Patrick Sweeney, project manager for the Portland
Office of Transportation. Those streets have dense enough housing,
employment and shopping -- and are zoned for more.

In the next six months, the transportation office will rank potential
routes based on neighborhood and business support. Technical details,
such as relatively flat terrain and wide intersections for railcar
turns, also will be evaluated.

The toughest nut to crack might be finding a combination of neighborhood
support and property ripe for redevelopment that could help raise
millions of dollars in private money for each extension.

At three open houses starting today, residents will have a chance to
plead for or against a line in their neighborhoods.

"A community that has a corridor and advocates for their own corridor is
so important to us," Sweeney said. "If they don't support it, we're not
going to pick a fight with a neighborhood."

Streetcars could make more neighborhoods resemble the popular retail
corridor along Southeast Belmont, built originally along a streetcar
line in the early 20th century. Likely routes could include Northeast
Sandy Boulevard, lined now with car dealerships, vacant lots and
low-slung buildings.

Streetcar routes could help determine how the city grows and absorbs its
share of the 1 million new people expected to move to the metro area by
2040, said city Commissioner Sam Adams, who oversees the transportation
office.

"It's a tough but important goal to try to accommodate the next 300,000
Portlanders within a quarter-mile of transit," Adams said. "In doing so,
that protects the single-family neighborhoods that we have. If we do it
right, it stands to strengthen our main streets and town centers."

At the earliest, a handful of the strongest potential lines might be
built from 2010 to 2020, Sweeney said. Much of the money would come from
a new federal program known as Small Starts, designed to help pay for
streetcars.

Portland's plan might be among the most ambitious in the nation, said
Gloria Ohland, a spokeswoman for Reconnecting America, a nonprofit
transit group based in Oakland, Calif. "Portland is certainly leading
the way in this effort, and other cities are really looking to Portland
for guidance."

But many questions remain.

If a streetcar would bring denser development, does it stand a chance in
a city where neighborhood associations sometimes criticize even modest
proposals for multistory buildings?

If a streetcar depends on financial contributions from developers, are
there enough along each route who agree?

Initial indications say yes.

The City Council has given preliminary approval to a new line along
Burnside and Couch streets downtown. Planners have tentatively placed a
spur from East Burnside up Northeast Sandy to the Hollywood neighborhood
on a regional transportation plan. That's a first step in seeking
federal money.

Dozens of neighborhoods from all corners of Portland expressed desire
for a streetcar line at an open house last summer, Adams said.

The Sullivan's Gulch neighborhood of Northeast Portland strongly
supports an extension from the Lloyd District east along Northeast
Broadway, said Peyton Snead, neighborhood association co-chairman. The
streetcar could take traffic off Broadway, make pedestrian crossings
safer and bring other amenities, he said.

Others are more skeptical.

Developer Joe Weston, who said his large piece of the Pearl District
benefited greatly from the city's first streetcar line, questions
whether eastside lines will prompt much redevelopment and business
investment.

Weston, who owns about 20 blocks along Northeast Sandy, said the city
should wait for the extension along Martin Luther King Boulevard and
Grand Avenue to open in about four years to see whether investment
follows.

But streetcars have become so popular that the city needs the plan it's
about to embark on, said John Fregonese, a regional planner whose firm
lost a bid to create the streetcar plan. "A plan allows you to examine
these things in a logical way, and you can decide not to do it and
you've only spent enough money for the plan."


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