Downtown Portland News

[maccoinnich]

The City of Portland doesn’t regulate internal alterations to historic buildings. If the developer uses historic tax credits then the State Historic Presrvation Office (or maybe the National Park Service?) will review the work, and be able to insist that certain aspects remain. With or without those restrictions I’d be shocked if they proposed removing the staircase.

[maccoinnich]

Drawings [13 MB] and Staff Report for the Columbia Square renovation. Not a huge project, but anything that brings new street level activity to that part of downtown is a huge plus in my view.

[downtownpdx]

Agreed!^ Anything to enliven and humanize the streetscape around there is a plus. The Porter Hotel and upcoming Columbia mixed use tower will help the southern end of downtown as well.

[subterranean]

Honestly, the first floor of that thing looks pretty bad for interaction with the street.

[maccoinnich]

Originally Posted by subterranean

Honestly, the first floor of that thing looks pretty bad for interaction with the street.

What don't you like about it? The building definitely has some "if I was going there I wouldn't start from here" about it, but given where they are starting from I think it's a massive improvement.

[subterranean]

Oh, don’t get me wrong. It’s an improvement. I just don’t think it interacts very well with the sidewalk other than that one tiny corner. Not enough ground floor retail for how prominent the location is, IMHO.

[subterranean]

Some background on the Wells Fargo renovation and interview with the newly Portland-based West of West.

A post-Morphosis metamorphosis: West of West and the Wells Fargo Center renovation


BY BRIAN LIBBY
Last month, the City of Portland’s Design Commission approved a series of alterations to the Wells Fargo Center, Portland’s tallest building. Dating to 1972 and designed by Charles Luckman, the building—originally known as the First National Bank Tower—has long symbolized both the ambition of midcentury modern commercial architecture in the United States as well as the folly of its fortress-like approach to urbanism.

After the 40-story building was completed, it prompted our city to enact height restrictions. For some, this was a kind of alien spaceship that had landed: out of scale with the rest of the urban fabric and, in its unapologetic International Style heroism, possessing no sense of local architectural vernacular. Yet with the elegance of its marble cladding contrasting dark window frames, and the slender sculptural quality that comes from being a taller skyscraper, there is a kind of austere beauty to the Wells Fargo Center. Whether you love it, hate it, or feel indifferent, it’s a major component in our downtown skyline.

That the Wells Fargo Center and its accompanying five-story data processing center building across the street (connected by a sky bridge) are being renovated to be more pedestrian friendly and full of light is not a surprise. After all, the building was sold last year, and the new operators see the value in modernizing the building to be more welcoming at street level as well as inside.

Though the materials and forms of this building are compelling, it had its critics from the start, especially the nation's top critic of that time, Ada Louise Huxtable of The New York Times. “This tower will be tapered and rail-finned, with an accessory block-square box, in a manner that finally died unmourned in Detroit but that the Southern California sun seems to keep alive," Huxtable wrote of the Wells Fargo Center after visiting Portland. "In style, scale and impact it will be alien corn, in every sense of the word."

Continues at Portland Architecture

[MarkDaMan]

https://www.oregonlive.com/expo/news...linary-co.html

Proposal calls for 'culinary corridor' to save downtown food carts
By Elliot Njus | The Oregonian/OregonLive | Posted on October 31, 2018 8:53 AM | Updated October 31, 2018 12:13 PM

A small group of food cart enthusiasts is putting forward a proposal to keep a large contingent of food carts downtown even as development replaces the parking lots where they've thrived.

Their idea: a "culinary corridor," with carts taking over some of the curbside parking along Southwest Park and Ninth avenues between Director Park and O'Bryant Square.

That's no small lift. It could require major changes to the city's parking regulations and other parts of city code, as well as the county's health codes -- and someone would need to manage the whole program.

Portland's largest food cart pod at Southwest 10th Avenue and Alder Street is slated for redevelopment, and cart owners have been told they might need to vacate as soon as May.

"Suddenly the city loses out on 55 lunch spots, 55 small businesses," Burmeister said. "We need to find a way to preserve a piece of Portland that has been a part of the city for more than 30 years now."

One section of the Alder Street Food Cart Pod has already been vacated for construction of a 12-story, 197-room Moxy Hotel by Marriott. Across the street, a proposed 33-story hotel, office and condo tower would replace the larger collection of carts, and construction could begin as soon as next year.

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[tworivers]

Originally Posted by MarkDaMan

https://www.oregonlive.com/expo/news...linary-co.html

and cart owners have been told they might need to vacate as soon as May.

...(continues)

Just one line jumped out at me in that article . It would be awesome if that block was a giant hole in the ground one year from today.

[2oh1]

Their idea: a "culinary corridor," with carts taking over some of the curbside parking along Southwest Park and Ninth avenues between Director Park and O'Bryant Square.

I'm having trouble imagining how they would even fit there, unless a few blocks of the street ware entirely closed off. It's already a tight fit.

I'd love to see O'Bryant Square square redesigned from scratch, turning it into a food cart block.

[DMH]

Originally Posted by MarkDaMan

https://www.oregonlive.com/expo/news...linary-co.html



...(continues)

With the Design Commission requirement that the proposed 35-story tower project build out the first section of the Green Loop on its SW 9th Ave side, with the closure of O'Bryant Square, and with the impending loss of the largest food cart pod, it is high time for a City design charette for pedestrianized Park and 9th Avenues that accommodate food carts in the ROW up to and including O'Bryant Square. Food carts could be a means of activating the two narrow streets while providing a small rental income stream to the City coffers

[maccoinnich]

DJC reporting ($) that Multnomah County is selling the Gladys McCoy Building to Urban Renaissance Group for $11.1 million.

[2oh1]

EDIT: never mind. The surface parking lot on the corner of SW 11th & Columbia is being repaved. I thought maybe something more was up, especially after all of the cars were removed. Nope.

I have to assume it's just a matter of time before that lot, along with the Plaid Pantry and its parking lot, will be developed... someday. But not yet.

[MarkDaMan]

PBJ is reporting an early assistance intake for SW 1st and SW Pine (Goodman) Block 28.

https://www.portlandoregon.gov/bds/article/702823

Construction of a new 5-story building (57,000 gsf). Multi-use tenants will include
retail and building support spaces on level 1. Office space levels 2-5.

[MarkDaMan]

Portland Building update as of 12.6.18. They've started re-skinning the project.

[MarkDaMan]

https://www.oregonlive.com/expo/news...newest-ho.html

First look: Downtown's newest hotel, Woodlark, combines 2 historic buildings
By Elliot Njus | The Oregonian/OregonLive | Posted December 13, 2018 at 07:00 AM


Elliot Njus/Staff

Downtown Portland's historic Cornelius Hotel, headed for demolition in 2013, will instead reopen Saturday as a 150-room boutique hotel in combination with its next-door neighbor, the Woodlark Building.

Together, they'll be known as Woodlark House of Welcome.

It's the latest in a long list of new Portland hotels to open in 2018. Downtown has added some 800 rooms in 2018 alone, with hundreds more under construction.

Most, however, are newly built. Fewer have opened in renovated historic buildings.

The Woodlark hotel, at 813 S.W. Alder St., is owned by Gordon Sondland's Provenance Hotels and NPB Capital and operated by Provenance.

"We're really excited to preserve these new buildings and breathe new life into them or bring them back to their original use," said Kate Buska, a spokeswoman for the hotel group.

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[urbanlife]

I am happy the Cornelius Hotel has been saved and renovated back into a hotel, I am a little sad the Woodlark was converted into a hotel because that was one of the old office buildings in Portland that was great for small start up businesses that needed some office space but couldn't afford to be in one of our modern office buildings.

[MarkDaMan]

https://www.bizjournals.com/portland...1(subscription required)

Multnomah County sells health department headquarters building for $9.9M
By Jon Bell – Staff Reporter, Portland Business Journal
a day ago

About a month after unloading its downtown courthouse for $28 million, Multnomah County has sold another surplus building for almost $9.9 million.

Seattle-based Urban Renaissance Group, which has been busy in Portland of late, teamed up with private equity firm Gaw Capital USA to acquire the county's Gladys McCoy Building for $9.85 million. The 10-story building, which sits at 426 S.W. Harvey Milk St., is currently home to the headquarters of the Multnomah County Health Department.

...

In a release, URG noted that it plans to renovate the Gladys McCoy Building into about 100,000 square feet of modern office space that could be available for rent in the spring of 2020.

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[DMH]

Originally Posted by MarkDaMan

https://www.bizjournals.com/portland...1(subscription required)



...(continues)

This is great news. The J.K. Gill building was a handsome contribution to the downtown shopping district when Gill sold fine stationery to a public that still wrote letters. Under the stewardship of the County, the building has been a dreary & forgettable edifice. I look forward to the renovation and to the reactivation of the old landmark in a part of Downtown that has received so little attention in recent years (except for the first food cart pod across SW Stark.)

[Derek]

Renovation of the 1857 Hallock & McMillen Building on the corner of SW Naito Pkwy & Oak looks like it's finally under way. It's fenced off and partial removal of the facade has begun.