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The Oregon Museum of Science and Industry has visions of transforming a portion of the Central Eastside Industrial District into a mixed-use zone able to accommodate housing, lodging and other new uses.

But zoning changes would be needed to make the so-called “OMSI District” possible, and city and industrial stakeholders are concerned that such action would be akin to what happened in the Pearl District, where land prices increased and industrial users were forced out.

Stretching north-south from the Hawthorne Bridge to the Ross Island Bridge, and east-west from Oregon Route 99E and BNSF Railway tracks to the Willamette River, the 68-acre district would be part of an “innovation quadrant” connecting with Portland State University and Oregon Health & Science University across the river, said Paul Carlson, OMSI’s senior vice president of strategic projects.

The district would include a mix of office space, structured parking, 200 hotel rooms and 900 housing units, and take advantage of incoming light rail and streetcar connections to the city center, Carlson said. OMSI also foresees a 70,000-square-foot facility expansion to the south, a public plaza connecting a southern entrance to a future light rail station, and increased riverfront access between the two bridges, he said.

“People could get off at the station, walk down a landscaped parkway past a hotel into a large plaza that would lead to a new southern entrance to OMSI,” he said. “Obviously we’re taking stock of OMSI’s future needs for expansion. We also thought that OMSI was in a position to lead development efforts in this area.”

OMSI’s plan was developed by ZGF Architects in conjunction with Leland Consulting Group last year, and approved by the nonprofit’s board of directors in November. The new developments would support approximately 3,700 jobs and attract more people to OMSI, the waterfront and the Central Eastside, Carlson said.

OMSI is the largest landholder in the proposed 68-acre district; others include Viewpoint Construction Software, Portland Community College, the Oregon Rail Heritage Foundation and Apple Foods Inc.

City planners and industrial users are concerned about the transformative effect the OMSI District would have on the greater Central Eastside Industrial District. The designated industrial sanctuary holds more than 17,000 jobs, noted Troy Doss, senior planner for the city’s Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, which is engaged in an extensive land use process for the entire Central Eastside.

Planning efforts for the Central Eastside are under way, and will ultimately tie into an update of the city’s Comprehensive Plan, Doss said.

“The fastest thing you can do to undermine an industrial district is to introduce residential to it,” he said. “We want to work with OMSI to develop a master plan that is more consistent with the direction of the district. We want them to be successful, but are not convinced residential is the best way to do that.”

The OMSI District plan would require zoning to change from industrial use to mixed use; that would basically allow a range of uses, including housing, retail, lodging and structured parking, Doss said. The area would become similar to the Pearl District, he said.

Substantial housing already exists on Grand and Division avenues adjacent to the proposed OMSI District, Doss said.

“What they’re proposing is not unlike what we have in the Pearl, South Waterfront and Lloyd districts,” he said. “It’s not what we’re trying to achieve with the Central Eastside. We are looking at more employment-related uses.”

Industrial users worry about housing in particular, but also potential impacts on freight mobility entering and exiting the district, said Debbie Kitchin, president of the Central Eastside Industrial Council. The group has reviewed the OMSI District plan, but not taken a formal position.

“The inclusion of housing would have a big impact on the surrounding industrial sanctuary,” Kitchin said. “We would like to find uses more compatible with that area than housing.”

While the plan would be a dramatic departure from the rest of the Central Eastside, the OMSI District would be geographically isolated enough that the surrounding area would not be affected, Carlson said.

OMSI’s plan would allow construction of office towers able to attract research and development and other craft or light industrial firms, Carlson said. The district could become a green building showcase, he added, with new office buildings using shared heating and cooling systems built from the ground up. Structured parking garages also could be a significant part of the build-out.

“We have the opportunity for sharing infrastructure costs because we don’t have a lot of (old) buildings,” he said.