http://www.portlandtribune.com/news/...06753612823300
East side gets its couplet, but what about the west?
East Burnside/Couch project revives the westside debate
By Jennifer Anderson
The Portland Tribune, Apr 1, 2010
L.E. BASKOW / TRIBUNE PHOTO
By the end of the month, East Burnside and Couch will be one-way streets with new bike lanes, crosswalks, parking and other amenities. Until then, detours and road closures abound. For up-to-date information, check
www.keepportlandmoving.org.
Eric Martin is grateful for the changes to come outside his shop on East Burnside Street – he just hopes they come quickly.
For next three weeks, lower East Burnside and surrounding streets are a traffic logjam, as construction crews complete the $18 million Burnside-Couch project that has been at least a decade in planning.
“A lot of businesses feel if we can all make it through this construction, and it will probably take six to eight months, the neighborhood will survive and be better for it,” says Martin, owner of Grendel’s Coffee House, which opened seven years ago and is one of the oldest businesses in the area.
The project will bring massive change to Burnside between Third and 14th avenues. That district has developed in recent years into a funky row of boutiques, restaurants, salons and studios – businesses that have struggled to stay afloat amid minimal foot traffic, limited parking and an uninviting streetscape.
By the week of April 18, East Burnside and Couch will turn into a couplet of one-way streets, going east and west, respectively.
Both streets will slow to 25 mph, and be regulated by traffic signals and crosswalks at every corner. The addition of bike lanes and parallel parking spots will meet commuters’ and shoppers’ needs.
A new intersection at East Burnside, 12th Avenue and Sandy Boulevard – what’s been called the most dangerous and confusing intersection in the city – will complete the transformation.
Overall, the project will make East Burnside a friendlier, more accessible street and help spur development, the city hopes.
But while excitement builds over the East Burnside/Couch couplet, this activity also isn’t going unnoticed just across the Willamette River. The whole idea of a couplet actually started on the west side of the river, and proponents of that idea are trying to revitalize their efforts in light of the eastside progress.
“It was unexpected that we’d wind up with it on the east side when the east side was an addition to the west side,” says Powell’s Books owner Michael Powell, president of Friends of Burnside Couch, the group that began pushing for changes on West Burnside and Couch a decade ago.
“Because of funding and the easy public process, (the east side) moved ahead,” Powell said. “That’s great. I take comfort in the fact that what we can do on the east side, we can do on the west side.”
Powell and Vic Rhodes, executive director of the Friends group, say they haven’t dropped their dreams for a westside plan at all – in fact they hope to bring a scaled-down proposal to City Hall this summer.
West side’s story
Initially, the proposal for the westside couplet came to $80 million, since it stretched from the bridge to Northwest 24th Avenue and included infrastructure for the streetcar project that will come at some point in the future.
The high price tag – as well as opposition by a vocal group – stalled the westside project, despite the City Council’s endorsement of the plan in 2002.
Now, Powell and Rhodes say they’re actively working on getting the funding streams together for an $18 million couplet proposal that would extend only to 15th Avenue, rather than all the way to upper Burnside.
It would turn Burnside and Couch into a one-way couplet, add 170 parking spots along Burnside and put bike lanes on the lower part of Burnside near the bridge. It also would install traffic signals and crosswalks on every corner on Burnside and Couch, allowing motorists on Burnside to make left turns.
Finally, painted curb extensions would narrow the crossing distance for pedestrians on lower Burnside.
But the westside project faces two major obstacles, just as in previous years: getting the funding lined up, and gathering enough political will to overcome the opposition.
Powell says he is working to line up the local improvement district now, which will be one piece of the funding package. An improvement district requires that 51 percent or more of the property owners within an area sign a petition to share in the cost of a transportation improvement such as a sidewalk or street.
Another revenue stream for the westside project would come from $4 million in bonding from metered parking. The rest would include a mix of money from the Portland Development Commission, the city and other sources.
The eastside couplet, meanwhile, was funded with $4.6 million in city transportation system development charges, $5.4 million in Portland Development Commission tax increment financing, a $250,000 Oregon Department of Transportation grant and $7.6 million in federal transportation funds.
Stan Penkin, chairman of the homeowners’ association at the Henry condo building at East Burnside and 11th Avenue, says he’s opposed to the westside couplet project because it doesn’t seem to be in the scope of the city’s larger planning efforts.
He and other critics believe changing Couch into a one-way street will add up to three times as much traffic and potentially speed up traffic rather than slow it down, disrupting its pedestrian-friendly character.
Says Liz Scott, a resident of the Henry: “People come from all over the world to look at the success of the Brewery Blocks. Why take something that works so well and destroy its character?”
Rather than turning Couch into part of a couplet, both are in favor of other, more inexpensive fixes to Burnside that would improve its safety and livability.
Mark Edlen, managing principal of Gerding Edlen Development, is split on the issue. He believes the traffic on Couch would negatively affect his company’s properties on the Brewery Blocks, so he’ll oppose the project on their behalf as he did a few years ago.
But he says one of his condo buildings, Indigo, south of Burnside at 12th Avenue and Washington Street, would benefit from the project, so he’s signed the local improvement district petition on their behalf.
Supporters such as Rhodes say the westside changes will simply extend the downtown grid of one-way streets and stoplights north, ending the chaos caused by four-way stop signs at the busy intersection near Whole Foods and Powell’s.
“Eleventh and Couch is the center of the universe for mayhem, if you will – pedestrians, autos, streetcar,” Rhodes says. “By making the system part of the grid, you eliminate half the pedestrian conflicts.”
Powell adds that five of the 10 most dangerous intersections in the city are between the Burnside Bridge and the Park Blocks, so more safe walking and biking amenities stand to benefit everyone.
Besides the political will for and against the couplet, the deciding factor will likely be the financing.
Catherine Ciarlo, transportation director for Mayor Sam Adams, says the mayor will look closely at any proposal, but, “we’re in the middle of an economic recession and we do not have the money,” she said. “We’ll look at the cost and benefits of the project in relation to everything else that (the bureau of) transportation is trying to fund.”
jenniferanderson@portlandtribune.com
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