Work begins on footbridge to South Waterfront
POSTED: Wednesday, January 12, 2011 at 08:51 AM PT
BY: Sue Vorenberg
http://djcoregon.com/news/2011/01/12...th-waterfront/
The $13 million Gibbs Street Pedestrian Bridge will span 700 feet over Interstate 5 directly below the Oregon Health and Science University aerial tram.
Underground utility work has started on a new bridge over Interstate 5 that will provide South Portland’s Lair Hill neighborhood with improved pedestrian and bicycle access to the developing South Waterfront District.
The $13 million Gibbs Street Pedestrian Bridge will span about 700 feet and run from the intersection of Southwest Gibbs St. and Kelly Ave. on the east side to the intersection of Southwest Gibbs St. and Moody Ave. on the west - directly below the Oregon Heath and Science University aerial tram.
“This is a project that came out of the tram,” explained Jean Senechal Biggs, a project manager with the Portland Bureau of Transportation. “It’s a commitment to the Lair Hill community that the city of Portland made when the tram was put in.”
About $10 million of the funding comes from the Federal Highway Administration, with most of the rest of the funding coming from System Development Charge fees on new development. It should take a year to construct, with the planned opening in January 2012, she added.
“Scaffolding should go up later this month on both the east and west sides, and in February and March we’ll start drilling the foundation shafts,” Senechal Biggs said.
CH2M Hill designed the steel box girder bridge, and Wildish Standard Paving is the prime contractor on the job. Wildish bid $6.8 million for its part of the job.
Most of the above-ground work will start in spring, when crews from Wildish will begin adding columns and decking, Senechal Biggs said.
The bridge will be flat - despite sloping terrain underneath it - and will be about 60 feet off the ground at its high point on the South Waterfront.
CH2M Hill designed an access area on that side with a long, winding stairway and an elevator that is big enough to hold bicycles with kids’ trailers attached, Senechal Biggs said.
“The elevator tower will be like its own building - with a glass enclosure,” she said.
The bridge will dovetail with other work on the South Waterfront, including the grading of Moody Avenue to align it with a new transit, pedestrian and bike bridge that will be part of the Portland to Milwaukie light rail, said Chris Armes, project manager for the Moody Project with PBOT.
It will also help residents access OHSU’s planned Schnitzer Campus, which the university plans to build on a 26 acre parcel it owns in the South Waterfront District.
“The vision for that area and the South Waterfront is that the north end will mostly be the Schnitzer Campus, with classrooms and educational research,” Armes said. “The central district will be housing, the new Elizabeth Caruthers Park and residential neighborhoods, and the south district I think is still sort of yet to be determined.”
Another goal for the area and the bridge is to eventually connect the Lair Hill neighborhood to the Willamette Greenway Trail as it extends along the river, said Jody Yates, the city’s design project manager for the bridge.
“We’re requiring developers in that area to provide some sort of access to the Greenway, and some already have,” Yates said.
There’s a small part of the Greenway at the South Waterfront that isn’t yet connected to the rest of the Greenway - although eventually the plan is to have the trail span both sides of the river with access across the Willamette at the new light rail transit bridge and also on the Sellwood Bridge as that project gets going, she said.
“We want people to be able to go all along the river,” Yates said.
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