Community Workshop

Re-Visioning the Franklin Street Arterial

On May 31, 2007 the Bayside Neighborhood Association and the Munjoy Hill Neighborhood Organization held a community workshop to identify the current problems with the Franklin Street Arterial and to articulate principles that a re-design would need to incorporate. The event was co-sponsored by Portland Trails and Portland Landmarks. Over 70 members of the public attended.

Historically, Franklin Street had been a two-lane street, lined with over a hundred homes, businesses, and historical buildings. Cross-streets provided east/west access to neighborhoods, Lincoln Park, and vibrant immigrant communities. Urban renewal plans of the late ‘60s led to the razing of all development along Franklin Street and the construction of a large-scale roadway in order to facilitate automobile access onto and off of the peninsula. This design emphasized the automobile over all other uses, destroyed neighborhoods, and virtually cut off the eastern part of Portland from the rest of the city.

The City of Portland’s Peninsula Traffic Study, begun in 2000, stated that Franklin Street might need to be widened to an eight-lane roadway. This plan promoted high speed traffic on the peninsula and failed to address the issues of safety, pedestrian needs, inefficient land use, and a poor ‘gateway experience’. The Traffic Study was tabled by the City Council in 2006 at the urging of the surrounding neighborhoods.

The Re-Visioning Workshop came as a reaction to the Traffic Study. Diverse members of the community came together to examine the full potential of the corridor in a holistic context, considering issues of safety, transportation, land use, urban design and revitalization, and the environment. One key outcome of the Workshop was a consensus-built Community Vision Statement.

In summary, redesign of Franklin Arterial will reverse outdated planning assumptions and reintegrate the Portland Peninsula.

In December of 2007 the City of Portland requested and received $30,000 to continue the redesign study of the Franklin Corridor. This study will follow a Context Sensitive Solutions model, treating the corridor in a holistic manner with input from the community.