The Portland City Council on Wednesday gave the go-ahead for city bureaus to continue working with private landowners to develop one of the largest remaining unbuilt parcels in the city.

Commissioners voted unanimously in favor of adopting the Parkrose-Argay Development Study, which calls for creation of a public-private partnership to develop the 32-acre Rossi Farms site – around the intersection of Northeast 122nd Avenue and Shaver Street, where the Parkrose and Argay neighborhoods meet. A series of public workshops were held over the past year to determine a preferred alternative that provides views of Mount Hood to the east. Plans call for nearly 750 new apartments, as many as 138 new townhomes, a handful of cottages, commercial space and a new grocery store along 122nd Avenue.

“Thank you, Mr. Rossi, to you and your associates for helping making this a really grand vision,” Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said. “This could have gone in a very different direction, but you really gave the template to the community to be able to shape this.”

The resolution approved by the City Council directs the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability to now work with the Rossi, Garre and Giusto families as well as Prosper Portland to “gauge interest in a future private-public partnership for development of the 32-acre site.”

Other city commissioners were equally enthusiastic.

“This site is so full of exciting potential,” Commissioner Chloe Eudaly said.

The 32 acres span both sides of 122nd Avenue and are near Parkrose High School, Parkrose Middle School and Shaver Elementary School.

The historic Rossi Farms red barn sits on the site and is likely to be repurposed as event space or something similar after public input showed strong support for the structure’s retention and reuse.

A total of six preliminary concept plans were devised by a work group featuring representatives of city agencies, the East Portland Action Plan, the Parkrose School District, Scott | Edwards Architecture, Walker Macy, Lancaster Engineering and others.

The yearlong process identified the View Corridor alternative as the most to the community. A new street would run diagonally through the east side of the site and toward Mount Hood to preserve and frame views of the mountain. Green spaces on either side of that main street would have even better views.

North-south streets envisioned to support mixed-use development would be oriented with views of Mount St. Helens in mind and be offset from connections to streets to the north to discourage cut-through vehicle traffic.

Barry Manning, a senior planner with the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, told commissioners that preliminary planning showed plenty of investment opportunity in the Parkrose/Argay area, albeit at perhaps a lower level of return than the central city.

Consultant “Johnson Economics felt that there was a pretty significant opportunity to develop rental apartments on this site,” Manning said. “This area hasn’t seen much new investment activity. The pricing of rents in the area doesn’t support concrete-podium construction but would support wood-frame construction.”

If the concept plan were to be implemented, the property owners would need to agree on a more formal mechanism to make decisions together. This could take a range of forms, such as a written agreement, or creation of a more formal legal entity.

A suitable developer with experience developing master plans on a large site will also need to be brought on board, along with the required variety of contractors involved in such an enterprise.

Joe Rossi spoke Wednesday on behalf of his family, which has owned the property in question for more than four generations. The family intends to work with the city to bring the concept plan to reality, he said.

“I can’t say enough how much this exceeded my expectations,” Rossi said. “We’re going to go all the way through on this. The first step was the zoning we got; we had really good public input in the zoning process. This was the second step, and the third step will be for us to come and stay involved.”

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