A noose was discovered in May at a construction site in downtown Portland, the contractor and client revealed recently.

The object – a symbol of racial intimidation – was found on May 20 at the site of the 4th and Montgomery Building, according to a Portland State University statement issued Tuesday. PSU indicated it was notified of the discovery on June 9, but did not explain why it waited to publicize it.

Andersen Construction is the general contractor for 4th and Montgomery. Andersen officials filed a police report and launched both an internal investigation and a third-party investigation, the company stated.

“First and foremost, Andersen Construction is disgusted and outraged with a hate symbol like this being displayed anywhere, let alone one of our own job sites,” the company stated. “We acknowledge the negative emotions and outright pain this abhorrent event caused and to the individuals at our project directly impacted, and to our Black community at large, we are so very sorry.”

“This act of hatred is heartbreaking,” PSU stated. “It is reprehensible. And it is particularly troubling at a moment when our country seems to be waking up – finally – to the legacy of slavery and our collective failure to address anti-Black racism. Incidents like this one, and similar incidents happening around the country, remind us how deeply racism is embedded in our culture and how far we have to go to attain justice for Black Americans.”

The seven-story, 175,000-square-foot project is a collaboration of PSU, Portland Community College, Oregon Health & Science University and the city of Portland, all of which will occupy space in the building.

Crews broke ground on the project in December 2018, and completion is expected this fall.

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A former surface parking lot on the Portland State University campus is quickly becoming a seven-story, 175,000-square-foot mixed-use building.

The 4th and Montgomery Building is rising on three-quarters of a block bounded by Southwest Montgomery and Harrison streets, and Fourth and Fifth avenues. SRG Partnership designed the approximately $104 million project, which is being built by construction manager/general contractor Andersen Construction. The building will be occupied by PSU‘s Graduate School of Education, the joint Oregon Health & Science University-PSU School of Public Health, Portland Community College dental programs, and Portland’s Bureau of Planning and Sustainability.

Crews broke ground in December 2018, and substantial completion is expected by November 2020, according to PSU. The building will have ground-level commercial space, classrooms, a dental clinic, and both academic and nonacademic offices.

SRG Partnership’s design matches the curved streetcar path that clips the block’s northeast corner. All sidewalks and access to the building will be generous and open.

To accommodate a significant grade change, designers used landscape walks, stairs, walls, benches and planters to define a central courtyard space while offering multiple access points.

Inside, the ground floor will feature retail spaces and a lobby. A central staircase will bring people to classrooms and offices for tenants on the second floor and above.

The design’s aim is for a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold rating. Sustainable features include a green roof with 62 percent coverage, a rooftop solar array, a large stormwater planter and a dedicated outside air system with radiant heating and cooling.

In addition, the building will have a high-efficiency envelope and exterior metal-panel cladding with punched window openings and bird-safe exterior glazing.

Currently, construction crews are gaining speed after a slow start that included additional excavation after the discovery of waste underneath the parking lot.

“We had an old building that they had torn down, and they buried quite a few things that we had to dig through and dispose of in the right manner,” Andersen Construction superintendent Paul Rovianek said. “It was nothing really crazy – just some roofing material, some bricks and different things like that. It’s surprising they buried all of that, but we sent it off and put it in the right spot.”

The new building will feature seven stories of post-tensioned concrete decks and reinforced concrete columns constructed around double building cores housing elevators and stairwells. The first two levels will feature oversized spaces, with ceilings ranging from 20 to 25 feet on the ground level and 16 feet on the second floor. Ceilings on levels three through seven will be 12 feet.

Andersen’s subsidiary, Andersen Structures Inc., is performing all of the project’s concrete work, and the firm’s carpenters are constructing formwork, installing shoring systems and stripping old formwork as the project moves forward.

“We just have the typical guys right now for this stage of the project,” Rovianek said, noting that concrete was being poured for the third level. “We have concrete and (mechanical, electrical and plumbing workers); the electricians and plumbers are here full time and the fire sprinkler guys are just in and out putting in sleeves and blue bangers.”

Excavation work is also wrapping up with installation of a communications vault, while ironworkers from Local 29 and R2M2 Rebar and Stressing are laying down rebar for the concrete decks.

“It’s a lot of the usual suspects,” Rovianek said with a laugh.

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In the early returns for Portland’s eco-roofs standard, following the rule is the exception.

Of four Central City projects subject to the city’s eco-roofs rules since the standard took effect in July 2018, only one has met the standard. One was approved by the Portland Design Commission with a much smaller eco-roof atop the podium, and requests for significant modifications of the rule are being made for two others.

In baseball, hitting 1-for-4 is about league average. In city planning, it could be an early warning sign that the rule is either infeasible, or that the city is unwilling or unable to enforce it via the design review process.

“I think it’s a concern for the city,” said Benjamin Nielsen, a senior planner for the Bureau of Development Services. “Developers are having a hard time with some of the requirements of the standard, particularly when solar panels are involved.”

So far, the only project to meet the city’s eco-roofs standard comes from the city of Portland and three partners. The seven-story Fourth and Montgomery project, also known as the Jasmine Block, is under construction in south downtown with an eco-roof that meets the city’s rules. The project will provide space for the city, Portland State University,��Oregon Health & Science University�����Ի���Portland Community College. SRG Partnership designed the building, and Mayer/Reed is the landscape architect. The roof includes solar panels.

The eco-roofs standard took effect last summer as part of the Central City 2035 Plan. Incorporated into Title 33 of city code, the standard requires eco-roofs on new Central City buildings of 20,000 square feet of net area or more within certain zoning.

Eco-roofs are intended to convey several benefits. They reduce urban heat islands, manage stormwater, improve air quality and provide habitat for birds, pollinators and plants.

To meet the standard, at least 60 percent of the roof area must be devoted to eco-roof features, as defined by the Bureau of Environmental Services. The remainder may be occupied by mechanical equipment, solar panels, wind turbines and other items.

Portland’s eco-roofs standard was modeled after Toronto’s, said Mindy Brooks, a city planner with the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability.

Portland’s standard has roots in an earlier, voluntary program. Developers could earn bonus height in exchange for eco-roofs. The Central City 2035 Plan rolled back that bonus, among others, in favor of concentrating on affordable housing incentives. Eco-roofs were made mandatory.

The trend of project teams requesting modifications for eco-roofs bears watching, Brooks said.

“I think we need to continue to monitor it and see how it goes,” she said. “We’ve had a couple of very unique (projects) be the first ones out of the gate. So it’ll be important to monitor and see how it proceeds.”

Architects and developers have approached the standard in different ways.

At Block 216, the Design Commission agreed to a modification that places the eco-roof atop only the terraced podium, and not the 35-story tower. The Block 216 eco-roof will cover only 33 percent of the roof area, far below the 60 percent minimum.

GBD Architects is designing the project. Before the Design Commission, architects from GBD argued the wind forces at the tower’s 460-foot height would make an eco-roof unworkable and perhaps unsafe, with the potential for soils and plants to be blown afar. Two design commissioners said an exception to the eco-roof standard may be necessary for towers.

GBD did not respond to interview requests.

City officials are researching how eco-roofs can be built atop towers. The bureaus of Planning and Sustainability, Development Services and Environmental Services are looking into how high winds affect tower eco-roofs, and will issue guidance to future project teams.

It may just be a matter of more complex engineering, Brooks said.

“We did some quick research and did not find wind shear at high altitudes being a problem for eco-roofs,” Brooks said. “At high altitudes, engineering becomes more complex, just as anything does at that altitude.”

Brooks said the city wants to get it right before issuing any guidance.

“We heard what (the architects) said and we want to make sure whatever guidance we provide is appropriate,” she said.

Bora Architects is proposing an entirely different solution at Lincoln High School. The project team proposes to meet the standard at ground level, with plantings. The standard would be met with 63,600 square feet of landscaped areas.

At a May design advice meeting, Bora Architects principal Christopher Linn said ground cover performs better as a heat and carbon sink, and requires less maintenance, than an eco-roof.

“I think we have a proposal that better meets the intent of the guidelines than putting planting on the roof,” Linn told the Design Commission. He did not respond to interview requests from the 91��Ƶ.

Some commissioners said they were amenable to the proposed ground-cover solution.

“I’m OK on the (green roof) modification,” Commissioner Sam Rodriguez said. “I believe it is meeting the intent to some extent.”

Brooks, in an interview, said Bora’s approach “could be appropriate” if it goes beyond the minimum standard, and fulfills the stormwater-management and heat-reduction functions.

The team proposing the five-story PAE Living Building at Southwest First Avenue and Pine Street is also seeking a modification to the eco-roofs standard. ZGF Architects is pursuing Living Building Challenge certification, which requires 75 percent roof coverage by solar panels.

“Eco-roof beneath the panels would not be viable, as the required strategy to maximize on-site production necessitates a flat array of panels, without spacing: thus the eco-roof would not get adequate light or rainfall,” ZGF wrote in its application for a modification.

The Historic Landmarks Commission is set to review the PAE Living Building on Monday. The requested modification on the agenda is simply stated: “To not provide the required eco-roof.”

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The 4th & Montgomery project led by Portland State University has shrunk in response to escalating construction costs.

Conceived as a nine-story building, the downtown proposal has shrunk to seven stories. It’s now 174,000 square feet, down from approximately 200,000 square feet.

That makes for increasingly tight quarters for PSU and its project partners – the city of Portland, Oregon Health and Science University and Portland Community College.

The four parties are moving forward with the $102.5 million project. The City Council will consider a development agreement Wednesday, and the project team is scheduled to go before the Design Commission on Aug. 2 for a type III design review.

“In PSU and OHSU’s case, we each had a set amount of funds for the project,” said Dan Zalkow, PSU’s associate vice president for planning, construction and real estate. “The size decreased due to some higher-than-expected cost escalations.”

Private developers say competition for contractors, skilled labor shortages and increasing materials costs are making projects unaffordable.

As a result, instructional space has been cut, from nine classrooms to four. Office space for PSU’s Graduate School of Education and its School of Public Health has been reduced too.

The design is from SRG Partnership. Andersen Construction is on board as general contractor. Bora Architects conducted an initial programming study.

At one point, the project team considered using mass timber in the building. That proved impracticable, Zalkow said.

“It was considered and it was evaluated as an option, but it was determined not to work well economically or programmatically for this project,” he said. “It had some limitations to how the space was laid out that were challenging for us to work with.”

Instead, the building will feature concrete and steel.

The building will devote approximately 50,000 square feet to the joint OHSU-PSU School of Public Health. Another 30,000 square feet will be city of Portland offices. PCC will have 30,000 square feet for a dental clinic. PSU will also own approximately 14,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space, and the ground floor will have some common lobby space.

The property is bounded by Southwest Fourth and Fifth avenues and Montgomery and Harrison streets, near PSU’s main campus.

The building should have space for five or six retailers on Fourth and Fifth avenues and Montgomery Street, Zalkow said. The building’s Harrison Street side will have a loading area.

The retail spaces could include casual restaurants offering lunch fare in the college neighborhood. But other uses would be welcome, Zalkow said.

“We hope to have a mix that includes more than just places for lunch,” he said.

The city and PSU laid the groundwork for the 4th & Montgomery project in 2015, when the Portland Development Commission (now Prosper Portland) agreed to convey the property to PSU for the project. The city has also referred to the project as the “Jasmine Block,” a name dating to when the PDC owned the property.

If design review goes smoothly, the project team hopes to break ground in early December, Zalkow said. Completion is slated for Oct. 31, 2020.

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The four partnering agencies behind a 10-story project tentatively called 4th and Montgomery are in the early stages of exploring the use of mass timber.

The proposed idea was confirmed Wednesday by Alisa Kane, the city of Portland‘s green building manager. Joining the city to develop the project are Portland State University, Oregon Health and Sciences University, and Portland Community College.

The building is planned for a site near PSU known as the Jasmine Block and will feature some retail and commercial space along the classrooms and offices. PSU is leading the project and will be the anchor tenant.

The site was once proposed as the site for the Oregon Sustainability Center, an ambitious high-rise that would have showcased Oregon’s green industry.

The city is a tenant and owner of one floor of the project. Its Bureau of Planning and Sustainability will relocate to the building upon completion.

The project is in the planning stage until May. Move-in is scheduled for fall 2020

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About two weeks remain for firms to submit complete design and engineering prices for Fourth and Morrison – a project being developed jointly by the city of Portland, Portland State University, Portland Community College and Oregon Health & Science University.

The request for proposals was issued last week by PSU. Proposals are due May 10. A mandatory pre-bid meeting has already been held.

The four owners are collaborating to build on three-quarters of a downtown block once eyed for the Oregon Sustainability Center, an ambitious environmental high-rise project that fizzled. PSU will administer and manage the project on behalf of the other owners. The project budget is $102 million, with $71 million dedicated to hard construction costs.

The ownership group is seeking a building eight to 10 stories with 190,000 square feet of “high-density urban mixed-use” space of condos, offices, classrooms and retail space, according to the RFP. The building will contain:

• 56,000 square feet for PSU’s Graduate School of Education;
• About 30,000 square feet of city offices without “public-facing” uses;
• 29,000 square feet for PCC to operate its dental hygiene, dental assistant and dental laboratory technology programs (including a dental clinic serving patients daily); and
• 56,000 square feet for OHSU‘s School of Public Health, with classrooms, offices, clinics and a “human subjects research area.”

Owners are aiming for a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold rating, with “aspirations” of achieving LEED platinum.

To date, the list of firms that have expressed formal interest in the project includes Hennebery Eddy Architects, LEVER Architecture, GBD Architects, Bora Architects, SRG Partnership, Soderstrom Architects, NBBJ, Ankrom Moisan Architects and Woofter Architecture (designer of the PSU Viking Pavilion project nearby).

Bora performed an early programmatic assessment of the project.

A request for proposals for a construction manager-general contractor will be advertised in late May, according to PSU spokesman Kenneth Ma.

PSU hopes to agree to terms with a CM-GC firm by June, according to the RFP. Then core and shell construction documents will be expected by the following May. Final completion is expected by December 2020.

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Portland State University, Oregon Health & Science University, Portland Community College and the city of Portland announced plans Monday to build a $100 million, nine-story downtown building that would house offices and academic facilities.

The project set for a city-owned parking lot at the southeast corner of Southwest Fourth Avenue and Montgomery Street would bring together the OHSU–PSU School of Public Health, PSU’s Graduate School of Education, PCC‘s dental program and city government offices.

The institutions plan to open the building in September 2020. It would mark the first time all three higher-education institutions and the city shared a building.

A request for early assistance published Monday called for a nine-story building with ground-floor commercial use.

The ground floor would hold a mix of retailers and restaurants, according to a PSU news release. PSU plans to operate a low-cost counseling center on the site, and PCC would move its dental clinic from its Sylvania campus to the downtown building.

The partners have asked the state Legislature to approve $51 million in bonds for the project. Additional funding would come from the three institutions and the city, which would all have ownership interests in the project, according to a PSU news release.

PSU plans to purchase the lot from the Portland Development Commission.

The project is planned on a site previously targeted for the Oregon Sustainability Center, a proposal that then-Mayor Sam Adams and then-Gov. Ted Kulongoski launched in 2012 and fizzled when the Legislature declined to approve $80 million in bonds.

A PSU spokeswoman said the new proposal is different.

“It’s really a brand new project. It has new partners and it’s going to be a different building,” PSU’s Suzanne Pardington Effros said.

The project is at the top of the list of capital priorities from Oregon universities, Effros said. “Being at the top of the list makes us pretty confident,” she said.

Bora Architects has done some preliminary design work for the project, Effros said.

A request for proposals for a design firm will be posted in April, and design work is slated to begin in July. The team is aiming to break ground in 2018.

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