Industrial parks have fascinated me for a long time. They are largely an artifact of the 20th century, but with their arrangement of small-to-medium industrial buildings and extensive rail infrastructure, in many ways they were the last expression of 19th century economics, philosophically obsolete from the moment they were built. A visit to the average [...]

Last week, the Metro Council endorsed the High Capacity Transit System Plan. This plan identifies a series of corridors throughout the region as the next logical routes for high capacity transit. Despite the fact that the plan does not specifically identify modes for each corridor, many of these routes are spoken of as potential MAX [...]

It began with, as usual, a Monday lunch. Dan, Portland blogger, avowed transit geek, and ideas guy, had a question: were transit systems in the northwest well developed enough that a person could ride from Portland to Seattle, purely by using local busses? No Greyhound, Gray line, Amtrak, or charter systems. True, public busses.
For a [...]

One-hundred and one years ago this month, the Oregon Electric Railway opened up between Salem and Portland. The OE offered itnerurban transit service to residents between the two cities, allowing people in rural areas the benefits of urban jobs and educations. More frequent commuter trains worked the line from Portland to Wilsonville, about a third [...]

Can we have a time-out on the whole streetcar expansion thing?
Recently, the Oregonian printed a story on the impending Portland Streetcar System Plan. What’s really interesting is to compare the system’s proposed map, (as shown here in a Big O rendering,) with historic maps of the Portland Traction system, such as this one from 1924. [...]

Recently, Portland City Commissioner (and Mayoral candidate) Sam Adams and County Commissioner Ted Wheeler have been promoting a new revenue plan to fund street maintenance. The fee would be a City of Portland fee, and the city has put up a website for the proposal:
“The Safe, Sound and Green Streets Proposal was conceived to address [...]

Willamette Week yesterday put up a short, skeptical story on the state’s experiment in a GPS-based mileage tax. The piece provides a nice overview of just why many reasonable people find the idea to be — shall we be kind? — of questionable merit.
For those unfamiliar with the concept, the Oregon Department of Transportation has [...]

Parade Magazine this weekend highlighted passenger rail’s future and the debate over Amtrak funding. Many Amtrak press articles end up being way off base, either making Amtrak out to be a saint persecuted by the Eeeeevil Bush Administration, or to be a big pork-barrel project that exists solely to put public money into union employee [...]

I’ve been watching with interest for the last month or so as the City of Portland’s proposal to rename Interstate Avenue became a political boondoggle. Although I have strong feelings on the matter, I’ve stayed out of commenting on it, largely because I am not a citizen of fair PDX, and since I don’t brook [...]

Over at OregonLive, they are reporting about a new tram proposal, this time for Troutdale:
Milwaukie-based Mass Tram America hopes to build wind turbines and solar-panel structures from Troutdale to Mount Hood. They would be used as power and infrastructure for a tram system that would carry passengers and freight — ultimately nationwide.
The current Portland Aerial [...]