Plans are made to close a freeway ramp, and once again, SW Hills pedestrian safety is not a priority.
PBOT and ODOT will be having a “2045 Transportation System Plan Open House” at Multnomah Arts Center (Auditorium), 7688 SW Capitol Hwy from 5pm to 7pm on Monday Nov 9th.
Can’t make it? View projects and leave comments at
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2045TSP
until December 7th.
Why should you bother?
The Portland Bureau of Transportation just released its 20-year projects plan (https://www.portland.gov/transportation/2045tsp-committee) for comments, and boy do we need to comment!
SWHRL is in District 4, and here is a map of projects found in our area.
and here is the project list with priority, scoring and descriptions:
Probably the most-objectionable project for many will be the ODOT plan to close the I-405 southbound onramp at the corner of SW 14th and SW Montgomery Dr:
https://www.oregon.gov/odot/projects/pages/project-details.aspx?project=PLAN01
This will force drivers to cross 405 and use various Downtown streets to reach other 405 onramps. The end of the world? No, but those routes are already congested at peak times, and the closure could send thousands more vehicles into the PSU area each day. ODOT estimates that most of the 6700 former daily users of the SW Montgomery onramp will stay on 26 and 405 with the improved flow from the Montgomery onramp –
Reduced diversion to local streets as more trips stay on U.S. 26, I-405 and I-5.
i.e., fewer people using SW Vista, 16th, or Broadway Dr. as a cutthrough to avoid the tunnel; true, it might essentially end the traffic from the Sylvan exit, once those commuters realize the zigzagging and traffic lights waste more time than just going through the tunnel… or people will continue their habits and then merrily zip through PSU to get to an onramp. In any event, it’s ODOT transferring its problems to PBOT – and you.
A good trade-off? One more insult to SW Hills residents? Let them know what you think at the open house or online.
SWHRL is used to its residents being inconvenienced for the benefit of the suburbs; former SWHRL President Nancy Seton dug up this poem written when 405 first put a moat around Downtown;
“Freeway Brushes Portland Heights”
as copied down by Patsy Kneass from the Oregon Journal July 21, 1965. She thinks it might be by Lisa Paterson, who had a column “Scene and Heard.”
“For decades the burghers of old Portland Heights
Have passed to their children the lefts and the rights
For descending to town, or for paying a call,
By way of Montgomery, College or Hall.
To be an Old Portlander one must have Roots,
But to live on the Heights one must also know Routes,
And while Vista will do for the weak or the small,
It’s especially nice to use College or Hall.
But alack! On the lowlands now stirs such a clatter
That Heights dwellers peer to see what’s the matter.
The Freeway, they find, has cast a grim pall,
On the use of Montgomery, College or Hall.
For bulldozers snort where Montgomery once rolled
And the carnage on Hall Street’s a fright to behold
While a barricade frustrates the long-treasured knowledge
Of those who knew how to gain entrance to College.
And one may expect this increasing lament,
Until I can drive down as Grandmother went
By way of Montgomery, College or Hall,
I think I shall simply not go down at all.”
For some, the second issue is just as serious: the lack of pedestrian and cycling improvements in SW, let alone in SWHRL. With the exception of a few crosswalk improvements, most of the projects that would increase pedestrian safety or add to the existing ped/bike infrastructure are relegated to the second tier of priority; however, this is exactly the reason you need to speak up! PBOT states
These projects represent the greatest opportunity for community input to influence prioritization. Based on current analysis, these projects could reasonably end up either the financially constrained or unconstrained list. (sic)
In other words, let PBOT know which of these projects should be first in line for any additional funds! And it doesn’t need to be a SWHRL-specific project – SW Shattuck will be exceedingly dangerous to use for everyone once Raleigh Crest is built; schoolchildren and workers alike will need protected walkways and signaled crossings of some kind to get to bus stops along Shattuck and Beaverton-Hillsdale, for instance. It should be a top priority.
Locally, SW Fairmount and SW Dosch have long been asking for safer pedestrian access. SWTrails has pestered PBOT for years to put marked pedestrian crossings where the trail crosses major streets. Wouldn’t it be nice to not share the road shoulder to St. Thomas More with landscape trucks? And the Vista Bridge needs seismic work just as much as the other bridges in the list, but is listed in the last, “not gonna happen” category.
SWHRL residents may also offer suggestions of enhancements to projects listed, or ones that aren’t on the list but you feel they should be.
The TSP2045 page has many documents explaining the process and reasoning behind these decisions.