23 26 JUNE 202 Peter Finley FRY Land Use Planning & Design Consultant Peter Finley Fry AICP Portland, USA PORTLAND, OREGON STRATEGIES OF GROWTH MANAGEMENT
PORTLAND, OREGON STRATEGIES OF GROWTH MANAGEMENT The Portland region does not have strong physical boundaries. The region grew from a settlement along the banks of the Willamette River where a gully cut through the heavily forested west hills from a deep section of the river to the fertile Tualatin Valley. The slightly sloping river bank developed to include Portland s high-rise Class A office towers, art museums, performing art centers, industrial and commercial buildings, and Portland State University. Though the West Hills and river embrace a vertically built and dense downtown, a plank road that became a freeway constructed up through the steep gully to the Tualitan Valley flooded the valleys and rolling hills of western Oregon with development that sprawls for miles. Tualatin Valley is now home to high technology plants, flex office buildings, and suburban style housing development. Portland lacks the physical barriers of San Francisco with the peninsula hemmed between the San Francisco Bay and Pacific Ocean. Even Los Angeles wedges between the San Gabriel, San Bernardino, and Santa Ana Mountains and the Pacific Ocean on a relatively thin coastal plain. The rapid and seemingly unstoppable subdivision and development of farms further and further from the urban center created state-wide concern, and subsequently, a mandate to stop sprawl. In 1973, the State of Oregon passed Senate Bill 100 and mandated a comprehensive plan for each county and city. The plans were guided by State Goals including a requirement for each community to establish an Urban Growth Boundary. In 1992, the Oregon state government required the designation of urban reserves : areas held in reserve for urban expansion when further growth was required.
The boundary served two purposes; protect surrounding farm land and ensure that government would not be forced to serve inefficient and sprawling development patterns. Currently, the boundary serves a third purpose and generates public debate over regional livability. Some argue that constrained growth creates markets for higher valued housing and commercial buildings, quality cultural institutions, and a rich urban fabric. Others argue that the boundary causes density, congestion, expensive housing, and unattractive, small lots. In the early 1970s, the state mandated a Metropolitan Study Commission to streamline distribution of water, sewer, and fire districts and end overlapping service districts. Columbia Region Area Governments (CRAG) was formed to replace over two hundred service districts. Local Boundary Commissions were also formed to review any boundary adjustment. In 1979, the Portland region established the Metropolitan Service District (METRO) with three initial responsibilities: regional waste management, transportation planning and investment, and the urban growth boundary. METRO replaced the Local Boundary Commissions. The urban growth boundary generally follows the incorporated boundaries of cities, allowing zoning for denser development inside the line. The boundary is a line on the map that manifests in suburban neighborhoods on one side and farm land on the other, divided by black plastic sedimentary fences. The expansion of the boundary, even by a few hundred acres of land, is a fiercely fought political battle. METRO, now a government serving 1.3 million people who live in three counties and 24 cities makes
decisions that are routinely appealed into the court system, regularly reaching the Oregon Supreme Court. The expansion of the boundary is quickly evolving into a lurchlike process, an occasional earthquake, based on the perception of science underpinned by real estate dynamics. The supply of land for industry and housing is quantified, a pattern of preferred development determined, the expected growth in demand by 2040 is estimated, and METRO planners calculate the amount of land that needs to be brought into the boundary. However, the location of expansion appears determined by the preference of development interests that prefer the flat lands of the Tualatin Valley on the west side to the rolling forested slopes of the Cascades Mountains, east of downtown Portland. Ironically, the opponents of expansion conduct highly publicized neotraditional town planning in the rural eastern hills to entice expansion to the east and block further development of the fertile western valleys. The actual effect of the Urban Growth Boundary is not clear. Portland disdains Los Angeles with its California attitude of plentiful land, sprawling subdivisions, and a love of cars. Los Angeles County, United States most populous with 10 million people, contains more then one third of the United State s new suburban cities. Yet it is rapidly becoming one of the densest American cities with the city growing by 6 percent and the center city by 21 percent. Los Angeles city planning director claims that there is no great ground swell of support for high density. It happens through the market. People are making choices. They want the new homes with the new countertops, but they also
want to be close to the old church and family. Los Angeles applies many of the new zoning concepts being fervently opposed in Portland. These are resulting in inner-city houses, lofts, and the Grove a large, pioneering mixed use urban project with a trolley and walkways connecting the market to blocks of new stores. Portland rejects Los Angeles, even as Los Angeles builds bike trails, cultural institutions, and internationally known museums. The crux of Portland s debate is livability. Each side justify their positions with their vision of livability. Expansion advocates argue that people want large lots with lawns and back yards and want to be spread out. A former Mayor of Wilsonville claims that people are forced to settle for smaller yards and older lots. Oregon voters mandated compensation for regulatory restrictions. Community planning processes are constantly inflamed by density opponents. The chief petitioner of an anti-density measure ran for the position of METRO s president. Her opponent claims that the anti-density measure would be the end of the Urban Growth Boundary and working collaboratively among cities and counties. Boundary advocates argue that urban style row houses and condominiums are demanded by a population with far fewer children. Urbanist envision a life style free from yard maintenance and in close proximity to restaurants, museums, and night life. Portland s inner-city Pearl District nearly doubled in density; Hillsboro, on the edge of the urban area increased from 2 residents per acre to nine. Oregon s Homebuilder of the year claims $320,000 homes on 3,800 square foot lots is its most popular product. Portland
central core remains healthy with all time low vacancy rates of 2.6 percent. The retail market is viewed as one of the strongest sales per capita areas in the country. Projects underway include high rise Class A office towers, multiple block mixed use redevelopment, a $45 million modernization of the Civic stadium, and the largest Suzhou-style classical Chinese garden outside of China. Government planners redefine the arguments in scientific terms calculating housing prices and infrastructure costs. The Pleasant Valley Urban Reserve, a rural valley recently brought into the boundary, requires approximately $157 million for infrastructure including roads, sewers, and utilities. The developers state that they can not pay for the infrastructure as that would price homes outside the reach of the working class; the public refuses to pay for the demands of newcomers. And, pressure grows as developers entice property owners outside the boundary with lottery-like prices for their property of $50,000 per acre worth $5,000 as farm land. Their projects then fail in the face of weak market demand and time delays and costs imposed by the government and anti-growth forces. As boundary line conflicts rage at the edge of Portland, new private and public investment quietly builds on certainty. Restaurants and grocery stores reinvest in modern facilities confident the disposable income of surrounding neighborhoods will not flow away to new subdivisions. The transit authority replaces bus ways with light rail and street cars improving efficiency and reducing the cost of the system certain that rider ship will grow. International distribution companies buy land, demolish structures,
and construct modern industrial plants in intercity locations in direct contradiction to theories of prohibitive land prices. Portland s investment patterns mimic Los Angeles. An growth boundary of mountains, oceans, bays, or regulatory lines create a market tension similar to the force a dam creates; focusing the water s force down a mill s race. Market pressure flows where people choose to be close to their families and institutions that provide certainty in a world that can change so quickly and leave people and their homes high, dry and vacant. Portland s development pattern resembles Los Angeles. But unveils in a noisy and public debate inspired by the threat of 252,000 new immigrants to Portland between 1990 to 2000. While Los Angeles s 10 million people dominates the national economy. How can Portland so loudly complain of density increases of 2 people per acre to nine people per acre? How can a city with less density then Los Angeles, Houston, Texas, or Phoenix Arizona loudly suffer relatively benign growth pressures? Perhaps the Urban Growth Boundary s actual effect is to precipitate a lively public debate airing such issues as infrastructure, quality of life, and well planned urban expansion - not just to constrain growth.