The revived plan to replace the I-5 bridge over the Columbia River between Portland and Vancouver has been hammered by two liberal transportation experts in Portland. New Urbanist Joe Cortright calls it “vastly oversized and over-priced.” David Bragdon, former president of Metro, one of the agencies that wrote the original plan, documented years of falsehoods perpetrated by planners and called the proposal the “most expensive, stupid something” that could be done in the corridor.
As I noted recently, the plan called for a 12-lane bridge to serve a six-lane freeway. It also included a bridge for light rail even though voters in both Portland and Vancouver had rejected funding for this light-rail extension. Piling stupidity on stupidity, the plan called for a bridge that couldn’t open for ship traffic, and because light-rail trains couldn’t go up a steep enough grade to allow such traffic, planners proposed to buy out several existing shipping companies rather than leave light rail out of the plan.
Predictably, Cortright complains about the 12 lanes without ever mentioning the light-rail boondoggle. Bragdon only mentions light rail to suggest that the Washington Department of Transportation planned to stab Oregon in the back by deleting light rail from the project after it was approved. The reality is that both the 12 lanes and the light rail were insane and planners were crazy to propose a project whose 12 lanes would alienate the New Urbanists and whose light rail would alienate fiscal conservatives.
What the region really needs is a third bridge across the Columbia. The last time the bridge was being debated, a third bridge was promoted by Portlander Sharon Nasset, but she was unable to overcome the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) opposition to any new highways and TriMet’s demand to infect Vancouver with its light-rail trains.
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Rail advocates came up with their own proposal for a third (and even a fourth) bridge. Both third-bridge proposals pointed out that the existing I-5 bridge is structurally sound and was projected by the Oregon Department of Transportation to have 60 years of remaining life in 2005, meaning 44 years today. ODOT recommended that the bridge be refitted to make it a little more earthquake proof, but I’m not convinced that earthquake-proofing every existing building and bridge makes sense.
Other than some Clark County politicians, no major player wants to admit that light rail makes no sense at all. For one thing, light rail is, by definition, low-capacity transit and Portland’s is the lowest capacity as the city can only run two-car trains. Buses could move far more people across the bridge than trains. For another, Portland transit ridership was declining before the pandemic: the city’s most recent, $1.5 billion light-rail line opened to great fanfare at the end of 2015, but ridership in 2016 was lower than it had been before the rail line opened. Finally, the pandemic is likely to hasten the decline of transit ridership, so spending another billion or two on more light rail is totally absurd.
So I agree with Joe Cortright that 12 lanes makes no sense. I agree with David Bragdon that Columbia River Crossing planners wasted $200 million telling lies and spreading falsehoods about the project. I also agree with Clark County residents that light rail is a bad idea. Oregon and Washington planners and political leaders need to focus on solving real transportation problems rather than an increasingly unlikely transit fantasy.
“What the region really needs is a third bridge across the Columbia.”
Which is what I said in my comment on the previous post on this subject.
Again, can anyone name a US city of similar size that has only two bridges (especially on interstate highways) over a major river?
But what is more likely to happen: absolutely nothing.
So glad I don’t live in Portland.
Another advantage to buses for commutes from suburbs like Vancouver to central business districts is that commuters can walk to a bus stop, not need a car, and the rail system doesn’t need parking lots. A big problem with the BART system in the San Francisco east bay is that the parking lots are too small, and relatively few commuters can walk to a station as they want to live in single family homes. In contrast the AC transit transbay bus system to San Francisco (SF) allows commuters to walk to a bus stop. This is a big saving in car ownership cost and parking lot costs. The ridiculous situation is that instead of allowing the AC buses to drive down market street in SF they are required to stop at the hugely expensive transbay bus terminal, and commuters transfer to MUNI buses. This is presumably just because MUNI doesn’t want other buses on their turf.
Ted, to add to your point, what strikes me is that not the 2 freeway bridges within 7 miles of each other. It’s that Pdx – Van is lacking are street type bridges?
What’s behind that? Is it just the unique nature of the Columbia crossing?
How much river traffic is there? A bridge – maybe if it has to be a drawbridge – parrallel to the RR corssing could go a long way in pulling local traffic off of I5.
Maybe they can get Elon to dig them a tunnel?
Good point about street bridges, prk166. I wonder if it’s because there’s a need for the river between I-5 and I-205 to be bridge free if planes have to make an emergency water landing? (The I-5 bridge can’t be too tall because of Pearson Field in Vancouver.) Otherwise, it seems entirely plausible to have a bridge at 33rd and/or somewhere on Marine Drive.
Tunnels would make the airport issue moot. Just don’t bring in Big Bertha! We saw how that played out in Seattle.
The lack of street bridges may be because the Columbia is such a wide river. There are street bridges across the Willamette in Portland. There are street bridges across the East River in New York City, but none across the Hudson. However, the second video above proposes a street bridge across the Columbia.