Sam;
Several comments:
1. You were Vera's right hand person when she and Peter Koller cooked up the tram idea. You need to take some personal responsibility for the current situation -- and not blame it on the cost of steel.
2. This is the third time the City has gone with an architectural design competition. The first time we ended up with the Portland Building -- which subjects employees to a perpetually grey working environment. The second ended up with an unaffordable design solution for covering the Mt. Tabor reservoirs. The tram design is the third attempt using a design competition approach. When will the City staff learn that it should not separate "design" from a rigerous process that also includes community input, goal setting, use programming, budgeting, construction feasibility, and finally cost containment?
3. Both the OHSU Marquam Hill site and the South Waterfront site are "transportation constrained" (ie., there are only limited street connections available due to topographic and other constraints). The tram does nothing to help alleviate congestion -- it should connect with Tri-Met's eight bus routes on Barbur Blvd. so employees would have access to public transit rather than have to drive to the already congested OHSU hill site and the soon to be congested SOWA site in order to use the tram. This connection was considered early in the tram design process, but was eliminated as being "too Costly."
4. The tram is sucking public money away from improvements needed to make the SOWA area successful. Where is the money going to come from for the greenway, for needed parks, and for transportation improvements?