The City of Portland has released its first draft of changes they want to make to 82nd Avenue after the former state highway became their property last spring.
With $55 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds, the Portland Bureau of Transportation has begun design of key elements of their Critical Fixes: Major Maintenance Project on a 2.5 mile stretch of 82nd. The project will focus on “near-term critical safety and maintenance repairs” on two separate sections: from NE Fremont to NE Schuyler, and from SE Mill to SE Foster.
82nd will look a lot different once this project is completed. The draft calls for planting a lot of trees in concrete medians in the middle of 82nd Avenue.
PBOT laid out five goals for the project in a statement yesterday:
- Provide safe and comfortable places for people to cross 82nd Avenue by installing pedestrian signals, bike signals (at neighborhood greenways), and median islands
- Reduce the risk of serious injuries and fatalities for all people traveling by installing median islands in areas with a high crash history
- Mitigate the impact of extreme heat events by planting trees where possible
- Improve accessibility by installing ADA curb ramps for people using mobility devices, wheelchairs, and strollers
- Address maintenance needs through repaving, signal reconstruction, and updated street markings
As you can see in these images, PBOT does not show any bike or bus-only lanes — those will be considered in separate projects. Instead, this project is about helping people cross 82nd and taking initial steps to tame car drivers. While new types of uses aren’t yet on the table, PBOT does show a lot of small lane striping and operational changes (a.k.a. “access management”) for drivers at key intersections. At 82nd and NE Siskiyou, for instance, PBOT plans to remove right turn lanes on Siskiyou to “improve safety.”
Perhaps the most substantive piece of this draft concept are the median islands. PBOT has over 30 of them planned. These concrete islands will not only create shorter crossing distances for walkers, bike riders, and other users, they will also calm drivers by narrowing lanes, removing the center lane altogether, and limiting the types of turning movements people can make.
Some form of the word “restrict” in relation to driver turning movements, is used 19 times in the draft concept document.
In one segment of the project, PBOT will install a nearly continuous median from SE Holgate all the way to just north of Powell. There will be a new center median outside Portland Community College between Division and Harrison that will include numerous street trees (dots on the concept map do not equal trees — PBOT says it’s too early to know exact number).
The focus on trees isn’t just for their traffic calming or aesthetic impacts. As we covered over the summer, the lack of shade in east Portland directly contributes to “heat island” effects and as hot summers become more common due to climate change, PBOT wants to construct cooler streets.
New and upgraded signals are another big-ticket item in this project. Those will also allow PBOT to facilitate safer crossings and more efficient traffic flow.
PBOT has also released a project survey targeted toward business owners along 82nd. One aspect of this project with the highest potential for pushback is how planned median islands impact the ability of drivers to access driveways along the street. Given all the bad headlines about this issue on the recently completed Division Transit Project, PBOT wants to get ahead of the issue on 82nd. An online open house is also in the works for mid-April.
One thing to keep in mind with this project is that PBOT already has many plans and years of public feedback for how to improve 82nd Avenue. So they are not starting from square one and we should expect the public outreach process to reflect that. It’s also early in their effort to turn 82nd into a thriving main street — this being just the first of many phases to come.
Design of the project has begun and will continue this year and PBOT expects to break ground in 2024. The changes should be completed by the end of 2026. Check out the full draft concept here (PDF).
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