Comments on: More Portland Envy

By: File Under Portland Envy | hugeasscity

File Under Portland Envy | hugeasscity — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 19:22:28 +0000

[...] Portland envy among urbanists has become a cliche, and there may well be more hype than substance. But still, there is something palpably exceptional about Portland’s approach to promoting sustainable urbanism, and in particular they always seem to be a few steps ahead of Seattle. For example, here’s a list of Portland area organizations that contributed to the Climate Action Plan: [...]

By: Jeff

Jeff — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 19:34:44 +0000

Now this is the sort of stuff we need to see more often. However, I wonder about the issue of light density of light in Portland since this is suppose to be one of those cities that comes in with less than average sunlight.

By: cjh

cjh — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 17:21:17 +0000

Yeah, this Portland envy is sort of weird.

I can’t figure the comment about mixing high/mid/low – there’s very little residential “high” in Portland, outside of the Pearl and South Waterfront Disneylands, that is much newer than our old stock (i.e. from the 60s/70s). If anything Portland has been more sluggish in adopting zoning for density around MAX stations than some of its own suburbs. I mean, wouldn’t people generally agree that it’s odd that a central city is lower density than about half of its major suburbs? Of course, it has also been more sluggish in adopting the car culture that marks much of the other development in those suburbs, so eh.

By: Steve

Steve — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 07:20:42 +0000

Hey Wait — nice link. Interestingly for the issue of shared envy, Portland’s infill design prototypes feature some Seattle developments. For example, the precedents picture for 4b (Big Cottage Court) is recognizably a development just off 45th in Wallingford…

By: joshuadf

joshuadf — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 03:39:03 +0000

Hmm. Having lived in Portland I can hardly call it utopia. Compared to the other places I’ve lived, I see very little cultural difference between Portland and Seattle. The competition is healthy and pushes both cities toward sustainability faster than if we were always comparing ourselves to LA or Dallas.

By: Hey Wait

Hey Wait — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 00:48:57 +0000

RE: Portland envy…

Check out their just-released planning porn (aka “Infill Design Toolkit”):
http://www.portlandonline.com/planning/index.cfm?c=49254

hot!

By: Katie

Katie — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 00:35:46 +0000

“Who is Seattle’s Gerding Edlen?” That’s a very good question that I’ve been asking variations of for a while now on my blog (http://www.djc.com/blogs/BuildingGreen/?s=gerding+edlen). It’s not only that Gerding Edlen is a green developer… which we do have here in Seattle. It’s also the level of emphasis they put on green building. For example, Gerding Edlen dedicates part of their annual budget towards research and figuring out solutions to the problems that plague the green building industry. Locally…. I haven’t yet found a developer that does the same. (Though other professions do… for example, Arup though that’s on an international scale.) However Gerding Edlen is often candid about the profit it makes off of its green projects… so it would be interesting to ask them how that research budget is being affected by the current state of the economy. Great post!

By: Spencer

Spencer — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 19:00:37 +0000

Michael, have you been to Portland? Aside from the blunderous development of the Pearl and the downtown southend they have been very good at developing their midrise housing especially around commercial cores. I am amazed at Portland’s balance between high, mid and low density, their establishment and support of eastside neighborhoods that you can walk between, and their devotion to raising the bar on sustainable design. Sure they are not perfect but other than the Pearl and Southside they don’t seem to be in the development game to make tons of money while building the schlock like we do so well up here.

By: Joshua

Joshua — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 16:14:46 +0000

I totally agree, Michael. Why do we whine so much? I bet they don’t whine in Portland. I bet in Portland everyone is so cool they don’t even publicly acknowledge Seattle. Damn you, Portland!

By: Michael Robb

Michael Robb — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 08:52:31 +0000

Why does everyone in Seattle always act like Portland is this city made of gold and we would be so much better if we could just be like them? Have some confidence in yourself Seattle. Don’t be such whiners.

Should we strive to be better and improve upon our architecture and sustainability? Absolutely.

Lets do things our way and point out what we do best once in awhile. How about posting what makes Seattle a better place than Portland or Vancouver?

If Portland is such an amazing place then what are we doing living here?