Plans for extending the North Park Blocks as a Green Loop connection came under scrutiny by the Portland Design Commission on Thursday.

Commissioners held a design advice meeting for the planned parks infrastructure as a condition of the Broadway master plan, a 2019 document that governs portions of the area in Northwest Portland.

The project encompasses Northwest Glisan to Johnston streets, east of Northwest Park Avenue. City planners envision a winding, elevated path for bicyclists and pedestrians to connect the North Park Blocks to the Broadway Bridge.

The North Park Blocks would carry the Green Loop — a pedestrian-friendly and bicyclist-friendly route that will encircle the Central City.

Yet the project isn’t expected to be built for years, and the discussion Thursday was hobbled by unanswered questions regarding timing, sequencing and the feasibility of building and maintaining a linear park in the troubled Old Town Chinatown neighborhood.

Gary Datka, a Portland Parks & Recreation project manager, said construction would begin sometime after 2030.

“We would expect somewhere between 2030 and 2035 this gets developed,” he said.

That raised the question of how the parks bureau should manage the area in the meantime. The properties are owned by Prosper Portland and not yet managed by Parks & Recreation.

Some of the parcels are likely to be used for laying down construction equipment, Datka said, so it doesn’t make sense to build park infrastructure before private development occurs, only for it to be damaged by construction activities later.

Portland Parks & Recreation “doesn’t want to build a bridge to nowhere in the interim,” he said.

Commissioners suggested some sort of interim park use would be appropriate.

“It really has to be an interim park,” Chairwoman Chandra Robinson said.

Commissioner Zari Santner cautioned that Parks & Recreation must prepare now to maintain the linear park before it’s built.

Santner suggested a public-private partnership could be used to maintain the area.

“That is something very, very fundamental that the parks bureau needs to address at this time,” she said.

The bureau “has never had the funding to take care of urban parks,” Santner said.

The design itself, from Portland landscape architecture firm PLACE, drew praise and concerns.

“The ascent, the massing, for me it works,” Santner said.

She criticized other aspects of the design, saying railings play too large a role and compete with tree plantings.

Designers heard from community members that the path design should provide adequate separation between pedestrians and bicyclists. The design accomplishes that with dividers, planters and other cues, PLACE designer Miguel Camacho-Serna said.

The ascending pathway will create room for a roughly 4,000-square-foot retail space underneath, Camacho-Serna said.

Commissioners urged designers and city staff to find ways to make the park work.

“There’s so much beautiful space for passive enjoyment, but the space for active enjoyment is maybe a little bit missing,” said Commissioner Sarah Vaz, who suggested food carts or small shops could help.

“It depends on how it’s going to be programmed and what the active uses are around it,” she added.

Also on Thursday, design commissioners appointed new officers. Robinson was named chairwoman, and Joe Swank vice chairman. Votes for both positions were unanimous.

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A new indoor aquatic center for North Portland is in the process. Portland Parks & Recreation is spearheading the project, which includes a focused outreach on underserved communities. The multi-phase project, currently in Phase II, is expected to take five to seven years to complete.

When complete, the center is expected to serve about 22,000 households. Currently, North Portland residents have a low level of access to indoor aquatic facilities based on the Parks 2020 Vision’s defined level of service goals – to provide a full-service community center within 3 miles of every resident. As the Charles Jordan Community Center lacks indoor aquatic programming, the new aquatic center will complement the existing community center and will fulfill the Vision Plan’s level of service goal for North Portland.

Working with North Portlanders, Portland Parks & Recreation will plan the site and develop a facility that meets the community’s needs for the entire North Portland peninsula.

In 2021, Portland City Commissioner Carmen Rubio directed Portland Parks & Recreation to begin planning for an indoor aquatic center for North Portland.

ELS Architecture and Urban Design has been authorized by Portland City Council for design services for site selection, programming, schematic design and land-use permitting. Capital Project Manager Robin Johnson Craig provided in an email that a subsequent request for proposal for design development, construction documents and construction administration will be released at a future date. This will be an open invitation for firms to propose for the separate design contract later in the process. Timing for the RFP has not been determined at this time.

In October, Rubio designated an additional $5 million in Parks System Development Charge (SDC) funding to go to the design and construction of the North Portland Aquatic Center. This brings the total SDC funding to $16.7 million, as Rubio had previously allocated $11.7 million toward the project. The project has also secured $15 million from a state grant. This brings the current allocation to $31.7 million.

The project is estimated to cost around $50 million. That estimate could vary depending on the final site selected, programming and cost and availability of materials.

The future indoor aquatic facility could have spray and play features, a competitive lap pool, a therapy pool, a spa, lockers and reserved party rooms.

The project is in four phases. It is currently in the second phase, which includes site determination, programming selection, schematic design and land-use permitting. The project will enter Phase III in winter 2024 through winter 2027. This phase includes selecting the design team, construction manager/general contractor, design development and construction documentation.

Construction is estimated to begin during phase IV, which begins in winter 2027 and will run through winter 2029.

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The Metro Council last week approved three requests by Portland Parks & Recreation for grants – via the 2025-2027 Regional Flexible Funds Allocation program – to pay for projects.

Approximately $4.86 million will go to trail construction from North Columbia Boulevard to Columbia Park.

The regional North Portland Greenway Trail provides a continuous route for active transportation, recreation, and access to residential, industrial, commercial and nature areas. This project will help fill gaps in the trail as well as create a safe, accessible bicycle and pedestrian connection between Chimney Park and Cathedral Park.

The project features on-road (neighborhood greenways on North Portland streets) and off-road (paved, multiuse trails in Baltimore Woods Natural Area and Cathedral Park) bicyclist and pedestrian facilities. It also features a safe, grade-separated bicyclist/pedestrian bridge at North Columbia Boulevard – a “high crash corridor,” according to the Portland Bureau of Transportation.

Also, $2.27 million will go to the Marine Drive Trail.

This PP&R project will help fill a major gap in the 40-Mile Loop by replacing dangerous on-street bike lanes with a designated bike path. This segment (nearly 1 mile) will provide trail users unparalleled views of the Columbia River and Mount Hood. When completed, trail users will be able to enjoy nearly 14 miles of uninterrupted off-street trail along the Columbia River from Northeast 33rd Drive to the Sandy River in Troutdale.

And finally, $1.9 million will go to the North Portland Greenway: Kelley Point Park.

Kelley Point Park is a historically and culturally significant place due to its location at the confluence of the Columbia and Willamette rivers. It is also the future northern terminus of the planned North Portland Greenway Trail. While much of the trail is already built within the park, there is a 1,400-foot gap that currently forces trail users onto the road. That will end after the trail is extended to the 40-Mile Loop and Marine Drive Trail.

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In East Portland, where Interstate 84 meets Interstate 205, offers 25 acres of parkland – an opportunity for respite from hustle and bustle. And now it’s even better.

A $5.75 million project concluded recently. It produced a gravity-oriented mountain bike trail, an asphalt pump track nearly 600 feet in length, a playground, a grassy area for gatherings and performances (when public health conditions allow), improved utilities including restrooms and a drinking fountain, and more.

“Gateway Green is finally the park we always dreamed it could be,” Paul Dickow, chairman of the Friends of Gateway Green board, stated in a press release. “This is a huge day for East Portland, Portland Parks, and off-road cyclists!”

The park now features two miles of single track, two pump tracks, gravity-oriented flow trails, and a bike park with an adaptive course for people in wheelchairs. Also, the habitat was diversified via additions of plants.

The project was paid with Portland Parks & Recreation system development charges and a $1 million Nature in Neighborhood grant from Metro. In addition to Friends of Gateway Green, project partners included Northwest Trail Alliance, The UNPavement Project and Sasquatch Trails.

Design consultants included GreenWorks PC, PBS Engineering & Environmental, and C2 Recreation. Minority-owned Raimore Construction served as the contractor.

“We didn’t want to reduce the quality of the bike experience out there but with added advancements improved upon them,” GreenWorks landscape architect Ben Johnson said.

Johnson worked to make sure people could access all of the trails in the park without disrupting the existing bike trails.

Because Gateway Green differs in elevation by approximately 100 feet from its top to its bottom, design and construction were challenging. A key design aspect was ensuring accessibility for all potential park users.

GreenWorks also improved the habitat to keep wildlife and recreational use in mind. For example, trees were planted in areas to provide shade for cyclists. The whole habitat was designed with native trees except for a few by the hub to give the area separation and prominence.

Upon the park’s opening in 2017, it had only a single track and bike park. It was “bare-bones,” Chris Bernhardt, of C2 Recreation, said. “(It) didn’t feel like a park.”

Now Gateway Green is expected to become a regional destination for cyclists of all skill levels as well as an attraction for many others.

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A plan to reform O’Bryant Square, in downtown Portland, is slowly advancing, more than two years after the plaza was abruptly closed because of structural issues with the parking garage underneath.

The city of Portland is investigating potential demolition of the underground garage and ground-level plaza. A contractor doing design work for all of the city’s garages is also evaluating options for O’Bryant Square, Portland Bureau of Transportation spokesman Dylan Rivera stated in an email message.

“We’re asking our contractor to give us an estimate for what it would cost to remove the parking garage and deliver a site that will be usable for our partners at Portland Parks & Recreation,” Rivera stated.

Portland Parks & Recreation plans to eventually build anew on the half-block site between Southwest Washington and Harvey Milk streets, and Ninth and Park avenues, according to a spokesman.

“A�ڳٱ�� PBOT fills in the parking garage, Portland Parks & Recreation will work with the community, adjacent property owners and other stakeholders to build a new park on the site’s surface,” Parks bureau spokesman Mark Ross stated in an email. “The exact schedule is unknown at this time.”

A contractor, IML Services of Vancouver, Washington, submitted an early assistance application July 22 on the city’s behalf for demolition of the garage and park.

“The contractor needs this permit to gather the details we need for a good cost estimate,” Rivera stated.

“Our goal is to remove as little material as possible,” he added. “For example, if we can preserve the sidewalks and trees, that might be one way to save money.”

Portland Parks & Recreation, the plaza’s owner, has been hampered by budget cuts.

O’Bryant Square has been closed since March 5, 2018, when structural deficiencies were found. The approximately half-block square was a popular lunch spot for workers in the area as well as tourists visiting the Block 216 food cart pod until it closed in June 2019 to allow construction of a 35-story mixed-use tower that will include a Ritz-Carlton hotel.

Hennebery Eddy Architects and downtown advocates have been involved in imagining for O’Bryant Square a future design that reflects the Park Blocks to the north and south.

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The city of Portland will extend the North Park Blocks in a project that will help lay the groundwork for the Broadway Corridor.

Portland Parks & Recreation is allocating $8 million to transform a city-owned parking lot into a public green space. The lot currently forms the northern terminus of the Park Blocks that extend through downtown and Northwest Portland. The property is next to the Pacific Northwest College of Art, and is bounded by Northwest Glisan and Hoyt streets, and Northwest Eighth and Park avenues.

The new park will transition into another new park on the redeveloped U.S. Postal Service site.

“Extending the North Park Blocks will add valuable green space to the Central City and give Portlanders additional access to the housing, offices, shops and transportation routes which the Broadway Corridor project will offer,” Mayor Ted Wheeler stated in a news release. “Parks are an integral part of this new neighborhood that is adding thousands of new households and offices.”

The Broadway Corridor is a master plan to redevelop 33 acres of Northwest Portland led by developer Continuum Partners of Denver.

Creation of the park will be paid for via system development charges, which are assessed to new developments.

“The newest North Park Block will provide an important place for neighbors and visitors to relax, to play and to reflect,” Portland Parks & Recreation Director Adena Long stated.

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More than a year after closing O’Bryant Square because of structural deficiencies, Portland Parks & Recreation still has no capital budget, no design and only a vague time line for reopening the half-block plaza in downtown Portland.

Parks officials hope to reopen the public plaza by 2023. By then, it’s possible that a neighboring 35-story mixed-use tower, not yet started but expected to hold more than 1 million square feet of space, will be completed.

City officials, architects and downtown business owners met Wednesday to discuss the future of O’Bryant Square as part of Design Week Portland. The event, hosted by Hennebery Eddy Architects, came as O’Bryant Square was closed for the 399th consecutive day.

Hennebery Eddy Architects, led by associate principal Will Ives, has worked pro bono on various design concepts for O’Bryant Square. The early concepts have focused on creating a “flexible, open public space,” Ives said.

The parks bureau closed O’Bryant Square on March 5, 2018, after visible structural issues were discovered in the underground parking garage. The bureau soon erected a fence that has remained in place.

In the months since, the city has made little progress on reopening the plaza.

“It’s nothing urgent or imminent,” Parks & Recreation spokesman Mark Ross said.

At the same time, the parks bureau has struggled with a $7 million budget deficit, and is considering closing Sellwood Community Center and Columbia Pool in ongoing budget talks. “We have a lot of needs and very little money,” Ross said.

The parks bureau has dedicated $1.5 million in system development charges toward planning for O’Bryant Square’s future. The bureau’s proposed 2019-20 budget includes no additional funding for O’Bryant Square.

A full rebuild of the plaza is estimated to cost $10 million or more.

“For us, that is a huge lift,” said Britta Herwig, the parks bureau’s capital program manager.

The parks bureau has also undergone leadership transitions. Adena Long, formerly of New York City, was appointed parks director in February; Kia Selley had served as interim director for several months after Mike Abbaté resigned in May 2018.

In August 2018, Mayor Ted Wheeler reassigned oversight of the bureau from Commissioner Amanda Fritz to Commissioner Nick Fish.

“We absolutely have common cause in getting it reopened,” said Sonia Schmanski, Fish’s chief of staff.

Commissioner Chloe Eudaly’s office has also been involved in O’Bryant Square discussions. Eudaly’s chief of staff, Marshall Runkle, is awaiting the results of soil tests. Initial analysis suggested soils are pressing laterally against the parking structure, Runkle said.

Depending on the results of the soil tests, Runkle is working on a plan to reopen O’Bryant Square pending a long-term project to rebuild the plaza.

“We’re going hard on: is there an interim solution?” Runkle said. “We should know in a matter of weeks the results of those tests, and I think that will help us get to the next step in this conversation.”

O’Bryant Square opened in 1967 as a continuation of the Park Blocks, Parks Foundation Executive Director Randy Gragg said. It arrived as Portland was establishing public spaces throughout downtown, including Lovejoy Plaza in 1966 and Keller Fountain Park in 1970.

O’Bryant Square was for a time a vibrant gathering place for Portlanders, Gragg said.

“This is where people went to mourn the death of John Lennon in 1980,” he said.

Over time, O’Bryant Square came to be associated with drug use and homelessness. The plaza suffered from a lack of ground-floor activity on neighboring blocks to the north, west and east, where large office buildings and a parking lot lack retail spaces facing the plaza. The fountain was shut off in the early 2000s.

“It’s sort of a textbook case of how not to design a park for public use,” Gragg said.

Use of the park grew during the recession as the parking lot on Block 216 became a popular attraction for food carts. Many customers of the block’s more than 50 food carts would eat their meals in O’Bryant Square. The remaining food carts are expected to be evicted as soon as this summer to prepare for excavation of the tower site.

There have been some suggestions from Gragg and others that O’Bryant Square could be part of a Culinary Corridor through downtown Portland. The City Council may consider a resolution to that effect, Runkle said.

There should be a solution for O’Bryant Square, said Tim Eddy, president of Hennebery Eddy Architects.

“It was an open space that had its issues, but it was a really valuable, heavily used open space in downtown Portland,” he said.

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O’Bryant Square in downtown Portland may remain closed until May 2023, more than five years after it was fenced off because of structural deficiencies, according to a letter from Portland Parks & Recreation.

“We’ll do a full public process,” said Allison Rouse, a Portland Parks & Recreation project manager. “There will be a steering committee assembled.”

Commissioner Amanda Fritz has dedicated $500,000 of revenues from system development charges to pay for the planning process, parks spokesman Mark Ross said.

The city is working on redevelopment plans for the site. Design concepts should be ready about a year from now, Rouse told the Design Commission.

The timeline is likely to raise questions in downtown Portland, where half-blocks of property typically don’t sit unused for five years. Other public plazas in the area are used heavily.

Greg Goodman, co-president of Downtown Development Group, said the process shouldn’t be so slow.

“That’s disappointing to say the least,” he said. “That’s an extended period of time. Hopefully we can help them through a process that is much quicker.”

Commissioner Nick Fish will take charge of Portland Parks & Recreation on Tuesday as part of Mayor Ted Wheeler’s reshuffle of bureau assignments. Until then, Commissioner Amanda Fritz leads the parks bureau.

A spokeswoman for Fish’s office said they had few details regarding plans for O’Bryant Square. A spokesman for Fritz could not immediately be reached for comment.

Goodman said he was optimistic Fish could expedite the square’s redevelopment.

“I think with Nick’s involvement and a partnership, I think we can move it along a lot faster than that,” he said.

Goodman said he would discuss the future of O’Bryant Square with other civic leaders. Construction should take only about a year, he said.

O’Bryant Square was closed March 5 after structural defects were found in the small SmartPark garage underneath the plaza. It had been a popular lunch spot for West End office workers and tourists to eat food cart meals, but had also long drawn complaints of attracting drug use, public intoxication and homeless camping.

The parks bureau declined a request submitted to interview Rouse, who is leading the planning. But the bureau’s letter to the Design Commission, dated Aug. 18 and submitted as part of the design review process for the proposed 35-story tower on Block 216, provides some additional hints of O’Bryant Square’s future. Planning will be based on a 2007 concept design for the square, but updated to adhere to current guidelines.

The parks bureau intends to redevelop the square and keep it as public open space. The bureau does not plan to reopen parking underneath the park.

The square will be redesigned to “complement and not compete” with Director Park and Pioneer Courthouse Square, and may “be greener.”

Uses could include a small performance space, some sort of recreation feature or food-vendor space.

For now, the sidewalk remains closed along Washington Street, forcing pedestrians to detour. Dylan Rivera, spokesman for the Bureau of Transportation, said the agency is working with the parks bureau to decide the future of the plaza and underground parking.

“As we learn more about the time frame needed for construction, we will consider improvements to the temporary traffic control plan, including a temporary sidewalk on Southwest Washington,” Rivera stated in an email.

Goodman and others have suggested the square would be a logical landing spot for some of the dozens of food carts that would be evicted from Block 216 if developer Walt Bowen’s tower proposal moves forward. The project team has attended three design advice meetings and is scheduled to return for a fourth such meeting with the Design Commission on Sept. 13.

It’s also unclear how O’Bryant Square will integrate with the Green Loop – a six-mile route through Portland’s Central City that passes by the square on Southwest Ninth Avenue.

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O’Bryant Square will be closed indefinitely to the public because of structural issues with the underground parking garage on the block, Portland officials said today.

“We just got a better understanding of the situation with the structure,” said Dylan Rivera, a spokesman for the Portland Bureau of Transportation. “Our engineers have advised us that it’s probably best to limit public access out of an abundance of caution.”

Engineers found flaws in walls, joists, columns and footings of the SmartPark garage.

A fence will go up around the block beginning today. Sidewalks will be closed as well, forcing pedestrians to detour. City officials asked the public to stay away from the block while the fence is erected.

It’s not clear what comes next for the half-acre site. City officials said it would take time to evaluate the cost of reconstruction and any other options.

“Long-term plans haven’t yet been identified,” said Mark Ross, a spokesman for Portland Parks & Recreation. “It’s going to be a city effort. The bureaus will have to work together to solve a challenge.”

The half-block site is bounded by Southwest Ninth and Park avenues, and Stark and Washington streets.

The plaza has been a popular destination for customers of nearby food carts, but locals have long complained the site is blighted with street youths and homeless individuals. A fountain on the plaza has been shut off for years.

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Portland Parks & Recreation will use more than $250,000 in rebates it received last year to launch a new project designed to save water and energy at 48 sites in the city.

The bureau last year earned a total of $267,191 in rebates from Energy Trust of Oregon; the credits mainly were related to energy-efficient upgrades made to various building control systems. Those upgrades include installations of solar panel arrays at several community centers, including the Matt Dishman Community Center in the Eliot neighborhood.

The rebates will be reinvested in a pilot program for an energy and water performance contract to study how reliance on utilities can be reduced at Parks & Recreation sites around the city. The goal of the program will be to reduce maintenance and utility costs by approximately 20 percent at those locations.

If the pilot program is successful, it will likely be used to help the city move toward its goal of using 100 percent renewable energy by 2050 – a target identified last year by Portland officials.

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