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How much is 160,000 square feet of vertical development rights worth in downtown Portland? The city is about to find out.

Prosper Portland and Portland Parks & Recreation are offering transferable development rights from O鈥橞ryant Square. Calculated as a ratio of lot size to developable area, it comes out to 160,000 square feet.

The development rights sale is intended to appeal to a developer interested in a multistory project in central Portland. The floor area ratio is transferable within an area called Sector 1, which encompasses downtown Portland, the Pearl District and Old Town Chinatown. The area is approximately bounded by Marquam Bridge in the south, Fremont Bridge in the north, Interstate 405 in the west and the Willamette River in the east.

A request for offers was issued April 11, and responses are due by 2 p.m. on May 2.

Floor area ratio is commonly bought and sold among property owners and recorded by the Bureau of Development Services. Parties to the transaction are not required to divulge terms, leaving city officials with no accurate way to analyze comparable sales.

鈥淲e鈥檒l be interested to see what offers we receive, because it鈥檚 a fairly opaque market right now,鈥� said Shelly Haack, program manager for Prosper Portland.

Any project using the FAR development rights would remain subject to maximum height limits, city officials said.

Parks & Recreation officials plan to use proceeds from the FAR sale to fund the renovation of O鈥橞ryant Square. The plaza at 800 Harvey Milk St. has been closed since March 9, 2018, after structural deficiencies were discovered in a SmartPark garage underneath the square. The fenced-off plaza appears increasingly incongruous kitty-corner to the 35-story Ritz-Carlton tower now being built at Block 216.

Upgrades to O鈥橞ryant Square depend on funding, said Lauren McGuire, assets and development manager for Portland Parks & Recreation.

鈥淲e don鈥檛 know what we鈥檙e going to get for the FAR, so we don鈥檛 know what the renovations are going to look like,鈥� she said.

Greg Goodman, co-president of Downtown Development Group, said the idea could be expanded with other city properties to create an endowment for parks. He said it鈥檚 鈥渁n embarrassment鈥� that O鈥橞ryant Square has been cordoned off for more than four years.
鈥淗opefully they can get out of their own way and we can get our parks into the shape that they need,鈥� he said.

The city of Portland is also seeking federal money for O鈥橞ryant Square. In January, the city submitted a request for $5 million in grant funding from the U.S. Economic Development Administration. The city stated that it would contribute $4.4 million more.

The city is retaining 20,000 square feet of FAR rights at O鈥橞ryant Square for its own uses. The offering also states that the city has the right to reject a bid that it deems to be too low. The request for offers states that the offering 鈥渋s intended to support projects at transfer sites in active development and is not intended as an FAR banking opportunity.鈥�

The request for offers is available at: .