Creston Park, at 4454 S.E. Powell Blvd., is set to gain a new public skate park, Portland Parks & Recreation announced today.

Every household in the city should be within two miles of a skate park, according to a Portland Parks & Recreation study providing guidance for level of service. Sixty-five percent of city households are not – the largest percentage gap for the 13 types of assets in the study, according to PP&R.

In December 2022, Commissioner Carmen Rubio announced allocation of $5 million in system development charges for the skate park. Following research and comparison of several prospective Southeast Portland locations (including Powell Park and Glenwood Park), Creston Park emerged as the best option.

Creston Park currently includes an outdoor pool that is open in summertime, a recently renovated playground, tennis courts, a large lawn, a picnic area, a restroom building, and a parking lot. The most logical location for the skate park, according to PP&R, is the tennis court area east of the swimming pool. The tennis courts are in poor condition, the bureau stated, and that site could hold a sizable skate park.

The project will now enter the design phase, with construction of the skate park anticipated to start in 2025 and a grand opening possible in spring 2026.

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Plans to create a segment of the Council Creek Regional Trail in Washington County are moving forward. The project is in the early design phase and will move to final design in a few months.

The 6-mile-long portion of the multiuse path will connect Hillsboro to Forest Grove. It will be located about a quarter-mile north of Tualatin Valley Highway and serve as part of a network of trails planned to connect the Portland-metro area to the Oregon Coast. The project’s cost estimate is $28 million.

The full trail will be nearly 15 miles long. A planned north-south segment connecting Forest Grove and Banks and the Banks-Vernonia State Trail has not received funding yet.

The trail’s east-west portion will use the existing rail right-of-way between the Hatfield Government Center MAX light-rail station and Forest Grove. That section of railroad has not seen train traffic since 2015, according to the county.

A central path through the corridor following the existing railroad tracks was chosen for the trail alignment by the project’s steering committee in March. This location best balanced terrain, environmental and economic factors, committee members determined.

Washington County hired Alta Planning + Design for the preliminary design phase. It includes determination of a project footprint, alignment and scope, Washington County senior transportation planner Julie Sosnovske said. The project is 20 to 30 percent designed at this point.

“Fairly soon we’ll be putting out (a request for proposals) for final design,” Sosnovske said.

The RFP for engineering design is expected to be issued within the next few months.

Most of the trail will have a 12-foot-wide paved path. Some areas will be narrower, while others could be wider with access points.

The public was able to submit preferences for trail design and amenities (including benches, dog waste stations, restrooms, and landscaping). That comment period ended Sunday.

Approximately $25.3 million is committed to the project. That amount includes an approximate $1.5 million regional flexible funds grant from Metro (including a $154,000 local match) for preliminary design; a $17.5 million Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) grant from the Oregon Department of Transportation (including a $5.3 million local match); and a separate $6.3 million regional flexible funds grant from Metro (including a $790,000 local match) for enhanced intersection crossings. The project team hopes the RAISE grant will pay for construction of the basic trail.

“We may need to continue to seek funding for amenities,” Sosnovske said.

Washington County plans to issue an RFP for a general contractor in late 2024 or possibly 2025. Construction is estimated to begin in 2025. The trail could open in early 2029.

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PROJECT: Parklane Park expansion

LOCATION: Southeast Portland

SIZE: 25 acres

START DATE: April 2023 (ground to be broken)

ANTICIPATED COMPLETION DATE: fall 2024

COST: $29.7 million

OWNER: Portland Parks & Recreation

CONSTRUCTION MANAGER/GENERAL CONTRACTOR: Stacy and Witbeck

DESIGN TEAM LEAD: Walker Macy

PROJECT SIGNIFICANCE: A long-awaited expansion of Parklane Park will increase its size from 5 acres to 25 acres. It will gain a playground, a splash pad, basketball and tennis courts, soccer fields, a community events pavilion, covered picnic areas, a community garden, a skate park, dog off-leash area, paved walking paths, additional restrooms, parking, public art, and hundreds of new trees.

The park’s existing amenities, including the playground, Portland Loo, sports field, basketball court and others, will be closed for use until project completion. Landscaped areas – including soccer fields and dog off-leash areas – will likely remain closed until the grass becomes fully established by summer 2025.

The triangular parcel that is now Parklane Park became a Multnomah County park in the 1970s, when surrounding subdivisions were built. Local residents planted many of the trees and installed red-and-white striped playground equipment, which led to the nickname “Candy Cane Park.”

In 1993, the park was transferred to Portland Parks & Recreation. In 2001, the city purchased 20 adjacent acres to the north that formerly served as a gravel quarry. The Parklane Park Master Plan, completed in 2009, is being used to guide new development.

When fully developed, the park will serve 2,682 residential units, including 706 that currently lack easy access to any park or natural area. The park’s immediate neighbors to the east are Oliver Middle School and Parklane Elementary School, which have a combined enrollment of nearly 900 students in grades K-8.

The project is being funded with $29.7 million in System Development Charges. The money should cover completion of nearly all elements identified in the master plan except for the aquatic center.

“Building Blocks” spotlights noteworthy projects either under construction or approaching the start of construction. To submit a project for consideration, please visit: djcoregon.com/building-blocks.

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PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Oregonians will soon have more options for camping — especially those looking for a quick trip — as the state parks department works to finalize details on a capital improvement plan.

Oregon Public Broadcasting reported on Thursday staff in the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department staff recently outlined some of the plans at a Parks and Recreation Commission meeting.

Park Services Manager Matt Rippee said expanded campgrounds are in the works for several state parks in the Willamette Valley, including Silver Falls and Champoeg.

“It also gives folks an opportunity, if a big storm comes through in the middle of the night, or a baby is crying, they can hop in the car and head home, and it’s not a four hour drive,” he said.

The expansion is part of an approved $50 million, by state lawmakers, to fund a series of projects over the next five years.

In addition, as part of the package the iconic Smith Rock State Park is set to receive $4 million to $6 million for upgrades throughout the park — including added parking, extended hiking trails and a visitor center.

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The Metro Council last week voted to adopt a new Parks and Nature System Plan that will guide development and planning for natural areas it manages for years to come.

Metro has around 17,000 acres of parks and natural areas in its portfolio, but until the new plan was formulated, there was no scientific system for classifying its inventory. The new plan describes the primary characteristics of 11 different “naturehoods,” a word Metro coined to organize its parks and natural areas based according to geographic and ecological identities.

outlined in the plan details the primary characteristics and values of each “naturehood,” from regional recreation to habitat preserves, and is based on scientific study, according to the Metro website. The system is expected to help Metro create consistency across the region when planning for natural resource protection, park development, amenities and programming.

Voters have approved bond measures that enabled Metro to acquire natural areas over the years, but that money could only be used for capital purchases. A special levy passed in 2013 will provide money for land maintenance and upgrades through a grant program as defined in the new plan, Metro Council President Tom Hughes said.

“This is a master plan on how we are going to spend money given to us by the voters,” he said. “We’ve spent some of it on purchasing property and (are now determining) what is the plan for maintaining this property now that it’s there.”

Hughes said Metro will provide grants to individual providers of parks in the metro area, whether they are cities or other entities.

“They know better than we do (what is needed) at the local level, and we’re trying to help their efforts – whether it’s towns or jurisdictions or citizens groups – to set up grant systems so it meets a variety of different kinds of needs.”

The new Parks and Nature System Plan is the result of two years of work by Metro staff and many meetings with community members and other stakeholders. Hughes said its adoption reflects the wishes of the community as a whole.

“As a region, we are a community that has great respect for the natural areas that we still have and a great desire to make sure they are well preserved into the future,” he said.

Metro will add a measure to the November ballot to extend the current five-year levy to 2023, to provide continuity and money for multiyear restoration projects, Hughes said. The goal of the levy is to protect clean water, restore wildlife habitat and provide access to rivers and other natural areas.

Mike Houck, executive director of the nonprofit Urban Greenspaces Institute, was involved in the development of the new Metro plan, which he said is “hugely important.”

So far, according to Houck, voters have been amenable to Metro’s efforts to acquire more natural areas, and the new plan will help guide decisions on how to manage those resources.

“Metro has been very explicit about what land they were going to purchase and that’s why the public approved it,” he said. “The expectation was that they would manage it appropriately, primarily for natural resource values.”

Houck said the plan makes clear that Metro’s role in parks and natural areas is not to compete with local park providers’ efforts but rather complement them, and that Metro is not really focused on recreation but rather conservation of natural areas.

“One of the critical things about Metro is that they have one of the most highly regarded ecological staffs in the region, and the plan is predicated and based on science,” Houck said. “They are looking from a perspective of ecological value, not just to put a trail here or there.”

The new plan also provides a framework for upcoming discussion by the Metro Council on how to provide money for future management of natural areas, Houck said.

“The plan is an exciting next step in the regional effort to protect natural areas and provide world-class areas and trails for the Portland and Vancouver region,” he said. “But it’s simply a step and there is a lot of work to be done in the future.”

One step needed is development of an overview and a funding mechanism for all the parks and natural areas, whether they are owned by Metro or other jurisdictions, Houck said.

“We still need a long-term, regionally-based planning source for managing not just Metro’s natural areas, but we need an overall regional view,” he said.

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A new park in Northeast Portland’s Cully neighborhood is set to open this week, and a federal grant will help Portland Parks & Recreation build another larger park nearby.

Construction crews from Wilsonville-based R & R General Contractors are wrapping up work on the 2.4-acre Khunamokwst Park, at Northeast 52^nd Avenue and Alberta Street, and a fence blocking public access to the site is set to come down on Friday, Portland Parks spokesman Mark Ross said. An official grand opening ceremony is scheduled for May 16 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Portland-based GreenWorks designed the $2.5 million project, which includes a playground, skate park and picnic area.

Portland Parks, together with community organizations Verde and Help Us Build Cully Park!, also recently secured a $500,000 grant through the National Park Service to build the 25-acre Thomas Cully Park on Northeast 72^nd Avenue, near the intersection with Killingsworth Street. With the grant, Help Us Build Cully Park!, a coalition of 15 community-based organizations, has now raised $4.85 million to transform the former landfill into a park, said Tony DeFalco, Living Cully coordinator for Verde. The first phase of the project is estimated to cost $6.7 million, he said.

Plans for Thomas Cully Park include an accessible playground, a walking trail with exercise equipment, scenic overlooks, an off-leash dog area and a youth soccer field.

ESA Vigil-Agrimis, which has a Portland office, is designing the park, and Portland-based Colas Construction will be the general contractor.

Initial site work is already under way on the project site and city officials hope to start construction by the end of this year, Ross said. The park is scheduled to open in late 2016 or early 2017, he said.

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A community service project initiated by the International Living Future Institute will transform a vacant lot in Northeast Portland‘s Cully neighborhood into a small park.

Over the past four months, a group of Portland architects, landscape architects and Portland State University architecture students have worked with neighborhood residents to design the $20,000 project. Plans call for the addition of native plantings, a gravel path and a decorative steel wall at the Oregon Department of Transportation-owned lot near the intersection of Northeast Killingsworth Street and Northeast Portland Highway.

On Saturday, between 30 and 40 volunteers are expected to attend a work party to plant about 500 native plants. Solar-powered lights also are in the works. The park is expected to be net zero in regard to both energy and water usage.

John Shorb, an associate with Portland-based Opsis Architecture, organized the project as the concluding event of ILFI’s 2014 conference in Portland.

“The intention was to actually have a physical, hands-on activity for the attendees to have a lasting impact on Portland,” he said.

The ILFI, which promotes green building, was looking for a way to reach an underserved community, Shorb said. That led to project partnerships with ODOT and nonprofit Verde, which has worked to add green space in Cully.

Carpet manufacturer Interface donated $16,000 for the project.

The lot will eventually serve as an entrance to the future Cully Park about a block away, Shorb said.

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The Cully neighborhood in Northeast Portland has only one park to serve its 13,000 residents, according to city of Portland officials.

That will soon change when a new park is built on the Werbin property, a 2.4-acre site located on Northeast 52^nd Avenue. The park is now in its design phase, and Portland Parks and Recreation has asked for public feedback on . The designs differ in the size of their gathering, garden and playground spaces. One option also includes a skateboard and skating area.

The public has until July 9 to submit an to give feedback on the designs.

The park, called Werbin Park, will be the first park in the neighborhood with a playground, according to Tony DeFalco, neighborhood resident.  However, DeFlaco hopes the park will go beyond providing recreational benefits.

“It’s critical that the investment at Werbin has economic benefits for low-income people and people of color,” he said. “Ideally, the (construction of the) park should provide workforce opportunities.”

DeFlaco is also the coordinator of Let Us Build Cully Park, a coalition of 15 nonprofit organizations that is working to transform a former landfill site on Northeast 72^nd Avenue into a large park.

Construction on Werbin Park is expected to start late this year or early 2013.

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After more than a decade of conceptualizing, planning and designing, Fields Neighborhood Park is now under construction in the northeast end of the Pearl District.

R&R Construction this month started work on the $3.1 million project, in which a 3.2-acre parcel is being transformed into a recreational field and play area.

Fields is coming out of the master plan that first spurred creation of the Pearl’s Jamison Square and Tanner Springs Park – two elaborate public spaces featuring a popular interactive water fountain, artificial wetlands and walking paths. Fields is intended to complete the recreational picture.

“I think it’s going to be kind of a game-changer for the North Pearl District,” said Dave Davis, president of the Pearl District Neighborhood Association.

Davis, whose condominium overlooks the park, said access to a large swath of land where residents can exercise, play softball or throw a flying disc is long overdue for the dense downtown area.

But design involved more work than plotting four corners of a field and planting some turf. Andrew Sullivan, an associate principal at , which designed the park, said the community wanted to make sure the San Francisco firm got it right.

“A lot of people know, short of something happening with Centennial Mills, that this is the last big piece of open space that is planned for this area of the Pearl,” Sullivan said. “So it’s their last real chance to get the park they want for their future, family or whatever their agenda might be.”

Sullivan said some people wanted the space to be a huge dog park, while others wanted children’s play areas, and others wanted only a field. The result is a design featuring all of those elements with a motif that aims to conjure the swirling, sweeping, eddying image of the nearby Willamette River.

Sullivan said the plan is to include artistically scoured lines in the sidewalks, interactive play walls for children, permeable pavers and rain gardens to recycle stormwater. But a big design aspect will be wave-like planters and tree canopies.

“I think what we’re trying to do is use the planter to kind of pop lots of different colors,” he said. “We’ve got these sweeps at both the ground level – these beds of perennials and canopy trees around the perimeter – and these sweeps that will have really nice spring blossoms as well as fall colors.”

Sullivan said another focus will be encouraging kids to interact with nature. Play walls will invite children to reach plants through openings and play areas will steer kids through planters rather than around them.

“It reinforces the idea that kids are in a natural setting instead of putting them on a rubberized surface, on an asphalt lot, with just plastic equipment,” he said. “I think putting them in a natural setting, and pushing for more imaginative play leads to a richer experience.”

One original design aspect that will not be present is a pedestrian bridge linking the Fields park to the Portland Development Commission’s nearby Centennial Mills site. Shawn Uhlman, spokesman for the PDC, said the agency is reviewing development proposals from Venerable Properties and Daniels Real Estate for that site. The preferred proposal is planned to be presented during a meeting on May 23.

Sullivan said the Fields park was designed to accommodate construction of a pedestrian bridge to the Centennial Mills site when that property is finally developed.

The Fields park also represents completion of negotiations between Hoyt Street Properties LLC and the city of Portland.

Riley Whitcomb, system development charge program manager for Portland Parks and Recreation, said Hoyt donated the three-acre site in exchange for consideration of a $650,000 waiver on a future development project. Whitcomb said $400,000 of that waiver would come from the parks bureau and the remaining $250,000 would come from the PDC. He said it was a small price to pay for an integral piece of property.

“We really needed that extra land, and from that standpoint it was a very good deal,” Whitcomb said. “The value of the property is a lot greater than the credits that we will likely eventually give them.”

Aaron Slowik, project manager for R&R Construction, said its contract completion date is January 2013. Davis said neighborhood residents are anxious to see the finished product.

“We wanted an exceptional park rather than just land and a couple trees thrown here and there,” Davis said. “But the proof is in the pudding.”

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In one area of upper Northeast Portland, it’s not a walk in the park to find a park to walk in.

“Cully is by a number of measures, one of the most, if not the most, diverse neighborhoods in the whole state and also one of the most park deficient, habitat deficient, low-income neighborhoods in the city,” said Alan Hipolito, a community advocate, a landscape construction contractor and the executive director of Portland-based nonprofit .

Verde is joining a 17-group coalition, , in an effort to turn a 25-acre former gravel mine and landfill site in the Cully neighborhood into a flourishing community space called Thomas Cully Park.

Hipolito said the group recently completed a historical records search and community interview for a human health risk assessment at the site; it’s presently testing the water, land and air quality. The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality and the Oregon Office of Environmental Public Health are paying for that $135,000 assessment, Hipolito said.

Verde also is working with , a natural landscape planning and design firm in Portland, to develop a master plan for the park. Hipolito said development of the entire park will cost between $15 million and $18 million, and that he hopes to finish the first phase in the next two years.

“There are parks built on top of landfills all over the country all the time over the past 10 to 20 years, because in a lot of cities … landfills are some of the only close-in, open space that they have,” he said. “So they’ve got to find a way to reuse them, and parks are a pretty recognized reuse of landfills now.”

The city is going to need parks like the one planned in Cully if it is going to meet its long-term goals for green spaces.

According to Portland Parks and Recreation‘s 2009 progress report for , approximately 75 percent of Portland residents are within easy reach (one-half mile) of a park. For the bureau to reach its goal of 100 percent in the next eight years, 46 new parks are needed, the report stated.

According to Hipolito, approximately 13,000 people live in the Cully neighborhood. One park – roughly four acres – exists within Cully’s four and a half square miles.

The progress report also estimated that 29 future parks could be paid for through the city’s system development charge acquisition program. For the Cully park, at least for now, development is requiring a lot of fundraising.

Hipolito said construction of the first phase will cost between $2.5 million and $3.5 million. Approximately $1.5 million has been raised, with another $300,000 in in-kind donations, and $500,000 potentially on the horizon. He said that in May the coalition plans to initiate a Friends of Cully Park fundraising effort to raise the balance.

One small piece of the project that is progressing is development of a 30,000-square-foot community garden. Hipolito said the garden will not sit on the actual landfill, so it’s clear to move forward.

Portland-based landscape architecture firm is working with students at Harvey Scott School to design the garden. Principal landscape architect Jason King said it’s an effort to help instill a sense of ownership.

“We’ve been facilitating the process through to kind of guide (the students) in the right path but really not be too heavy-handed about designing it for them – letting them be the ultimate authors of the garden,” King said.

King said the trial-and-error process of deciding where to place planters, faucets, tables and other amenities has resonated well with the students. He said they are starting to ask bigger-picture design questions, like how an entrance will work in conjunction with the larger park, and whether raised planter beds should be made more accessible for elderly populations.

“They’re starting to make that next layer of connections,” he said.

King said that only about $45,000 is available for garden development, so his company is donating its time to the project.

“I think the idea that you can actually create some usable spaces with landfill space … particularly in the Cully neighborhood, it’s a great opportunity because there is such a deficit of usable green space in that neighborhood that it just makes a lot of sense in that way,” he said.

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