BLOG: Last Saturday, I visited 4 porn stores, 5 strip clubs and 7 bars in 5 hours…

Sounds like a pretty good weekend to me, Sam! To paraphrase a line from the movie Stripes,:b>"I want to party with you, cowboy."

How did you fit it all into 5 hours? You ought to stay awhile next time.

Probably a whole lot of 'misc. cash' on those expense reimbursement reports. Next time, take Vera's chaffeur and save some shoe leather.

Seriously, though. If you are going to start complaining about careless pedestrians impeding the flow of traffic, they are likely to take out a contract on you.

Two legs gooooood, four wheels baaaaad. Haven't you heard, jaywalking is a timely statement of moral superiority that makes the SUV MAN slow down, and think about all the hydrocarbons he's spewing into the environment. The pedestrian always has the right of way, dude.

Besides, why are you wasting your time talking to all those business owners. They aren't interested in Portland's quality of life: they just want to make money. Money is baaaaad.

Merry Christmas!

Wow, Sam, was that title just a way to get attention because it hardly seemed relevant to your post? Maybe as city commissioner you could address why it is that Portland has more porn per capita than any other city in the US and that includes Las Vegas. I suppose that isn't too high on the commission's list of things to worry about. Hope your walking tour elucidates that all things are connected- traffic problems, crime, homelessness, and, yes, porn in Portland.

From what I understand, we have our state constitution to thank. Our broad first amendment rights don't allow local governments to discriminate among commercial businesses by the type of commerce in which they engage. Couple that with Oregon's most densely populated and largest city and it is plausible to me why we have the most porn per capita.

Ditto Jesse, There is a Reason the FIRST AMENDMENT was First. Some people need to re-read the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It's a good reminder a to why 'Free Speech' was first and the right to protect yourself was Second.

As for the Mystery Poster 'name and address withheld upon request', I too wish I did not have to waste precious petrofuel and drive 1 or 2 HOURS just to ride my mountain bike on a singletrack trail. We should have this sort of recreational opportunity close in to town. Maybe the 'Platinum' Status talk going around town will shed some light on the lack of riding opportunities for mountain bikers provided by the Parks and RECREATION Dept.

Good Job, Sam! Keep up the Good Work!

we need a bike lane all the way from the bridge on up. bike lanes make portland great!

Rich irony that "RWL11" is criticizing an anonymous poster for being anonymous (unless that's your real name, RWL11).

I believe the "name and address withheld upon request" is in homage to the default manner in which reader's letters to Penthouse Magazine were signed in the late 20th Century, B/I (Before Internet).

You see, back in the old days (circa 1960), pictures of naked people were mostly in magazines, and polite society felt it useful and necessary to keep this material away from children.

What part of the Bill of Rights entitles you to a mountain biking trail "close in to town"? Why do you think the city ought to subsidize your recreational activity?

I think it will not be clear what effect you'll have slowing down traffic on west burnside, or on other streets through town. I doubt it would improve business profits in those areas of town. I'm on west burnside to get through town or to leave. Slowing me down is not going to get me to stop and shop.

If any kind of change should be contemplated about street traffic, I suggets you spend money to add onto the small max that now services noethwest, etc. Get the thing to do a loop around the river or somethimg. Add big parking structures on the loop so there's not so much traffic into town.

The fact there's so much porn in town is noticable, yes, but what's more noticable is the lack of any other new manufacturing or productive business in the area. Do some work on that issue.

Steve Andersen,

I couldn't agree more with your concerns about manufacting and jobs. That's why I worked so hard to recruit Thortex Medical Manufactiring to Portland. It now employees over 120 good paying jobs in NE Portland. It also why I visited over 130 other businesses and asked them, "What can I do to help?"

Sam

Sam,
I do also agree that there are one too many nudy shops here in Portland. But I guess that is what you get for living in a capitalistic society. They pay their rents, pay their taxes and etc so why should anyone else be allowed to tell them how to manage their business?
Professionally I manage the Web site www.reporting-ethics.com. On it I post different articles on my site.
In one I have on my site concerns the country of Italy. To deal with it, they have increased the taxes they pay to pay off their debt.
That sounds as though this might be an easy solution. But of course this might mean making a lot of people mad. But it would be in the place of paying other taxes from us hard working citizens.

With regards to Coffeetrader - interesting spin, however my view is that we have so much porn not due to the capitalist mentality but due to the "no judgements" mentality. Another topic for another time perhaps.

For Sam, interesting that Vegas was brought up - I was back there a few months ago and I saw the solution to the pedestrian versus car problem, sky bridges. Lord knows it CAN'T be any more expensive than this insane idea - PLUS it allows cars and other motor traffic access to the city. We're talking commerce here folks, quit trying to drive business away, ultimately, business is what pays the bills (directly through taxes and indirectly through wages).

Whose the hippest commissioner? thats right, its SAM! now if only he was sitting at the rack boozing it up and buying some porn instead of just chatting about traffic controls. that is a man I could roll with. not that traffic and pedestrian safety isn't important. good work sam.

I have worked one block south of W Burnside for over 15 years. I walk, bike, and sometimes drive all over downtown. I have an opinion based on this varied and long experience. (I also have a radical idea at the bottom of this message.)

First, I would like to emphasize this point: One could not build an actual fence much more effective at dividing downtown Portland than is the existing virtual fence of Burnside.

As the crow flies, I am half the distance from the Brewery blocks as I am from the Pioneer Square area. Regardless of that physical reality, I frequently shop or dine south of Burnside and rarely north. This is true even though the northern area is often more attractive for a variety of reasons. The reason all comes down to the Burnside crossing.

Burnside is difficult, unsafe, and annoying to cross on foot, bike, or in a car.

Pedestrian crossings are too far apart near the park blocks and scary to use. The motor traffic moves too fast and too often ignores the law to stop for pedestrians in marked or unmarked crosswalks. It is impossible for pedestrians crossing south to north on Park near the AT&T building to see traffic on the left without entering the first lane of the street. Where lights exist, the cycles are too long red and too short green. Turning motorists put too much pressure on pedestrians in the crosswalks because they, too, have had to wait too long on red and fear loosing their green light too soon.

Drivers trying to cross Burnside have to be very familiar with Portland's peculiar mismatch of streets in order to know how to move across Burnside legally. If you are in the wrong place and don't know how, it can be very challenging unless you are willing to risk using a bus lane.

Drivers on Burnside who need to turn left have even more challenges. Not only are there few legal left turn lanes, but if you try to do a three-rights to equal a left maneuver, you will then enter the crossing Burnside problems mentioned above.

Another large issue with Burnside is esthetically it is very unattractive. It has nice trees, but they don't compensate for the too narrow sidewalks with no parking buffer space to insulate walkers from fast, exhaust spewing, dense, noisy, motor traffic.

Part of the reason you found so many of Portland's underworld businesses on Burnside is that they are often the only kind of businesses that will locate on such an ugly street. Even vernerable Powell's Books appears to be making a effort to move it's primary entrance from Burnside to Couch, leaving the Burnside entrance as a back door.

I think the goal should be to move west bound traffic off Burnside and onto Couch. This would free up space on Burnside to provide parking and widen sidewalks. Burnside paired with Couch should make as workable a traffic solution as any of the other one-way pairs in downtown. The trade off of slower through traffic will be far outweighed by the benefits of tying together north and south downtown Portland.

Now here is my radical idea:

The argument that Portland needs Burnside as a major east-west through route is valid and important. We don't have another route that can substitute. This is true for both the east side and west side equally.

Both sides of the river have serious problems. On the west, Burnside is bad from the river to the canyon. On the east it is especially bad near the horrible Burnside, Sandy, 12th intersection.

In Europe where they have over congested arterials like Burnside they have dug out motor subways below grade for through traffic. The surface traffic can then be calmed and, and esthetics and safety improved for all uses.

When I drove these tunnels the first time it was novel and a bit confusing to have the main flow of traffic dive down and under, but the benefits very easy to see as I could rapidly traverse many blocks without stopping and cross traffic to contend with. When I then walked the surface streets above the tunnels and imagined all the traffic below and out of sight, I was delighted with the tremendous improvement in the esthetics of the urban environment. We could do worse than emulate Paris or Barcelona!

What would be very cool would be to do this done with Burnside even to the eventual extreme of a tunnel under the river, leaving the surface bridge uncongested with plenty of room for bikes and pedestrians, even with room for an everyday open marketplace extension of the weekend Saturday Market.

Install left turn lights for west-bound, left-turning traffic on Burnside. Otherwise, drivers are forced to use the "three-rights to equal a left maneuver" (or the one right and two lefts maneuver) which heavily adds to traffic congestion in the Brewery Blocks.

Sam, I like the couplet idea in theory. I think they work well in a lot of other parts of Portland - NE Broadway/Weidler, downtown, and SE Stark/Washington come to mind. But I also think you have to be careful here. Splitting off one traffic direction and making Burnside a four-lane "super roadway" may be good for traffic flow numbers, but would only create a more foreboding boundary, as Michael talked about. In addition, you'd have a double-whammy on your hands with the new barrier of Couch's additional traffic. I understand that you have to be responsible to future growth, but from what I know about traffic planning is that no matter how big you build, the roads will be under capacity before you know it. This was often the case in the middle of last century when the Interstate Highways were going in, and I think it would be true here, too - sort of a "if you build it, they will come" response mechanism. We're an auto-loving society and the more the addiction is fed, the more we'll keep using.

To the complaints about gridlock in the Brewery Blocks, I agree that driving through that area is a hassle because of pedestrians, but making it a pedestrian-friendly part of town is vital to its character. Auto-drivers tend to get impatient (I'm pointing fingers at myself here) when multiple groups of peds cross in front of them, but we all need to understand the importance of having districts like this in our city, as well as planning ahead and avoiding driving in them if we're in a hurry.

Finally, a suggestion regarding pedestrian safety: a lot of the intersections in the B.B. don't have lines painted for pedestrian crossings. I think these should be installed, as it's easy for drivers to miss a stop sign - especially when there's so much to distract as you drive through the area - and over-run the stop. Visually, it's much easier to know you have to stop when there are crossing lines painted on the roadway.

Stephen's comments deserve some clarification. The proposed couplet would only put two eastbound lanes on Burnside and two westbound lanes on Couch. The 'extra' space on Burnside would allow parking on both sides, just like now on Couch, and like Couch would continue to have.

This is true from (I believe) SW/NW Second, west to NW 15th, the extent of the couplet on the west side. The section from Second to the North Park Blocks,where medians exist now, would have two eastbound lanes on the south side of the street, and would have parking and/or a public plaza on the north side of the medians, which would remain, with their trees. Some modifications would be necessary to allow left turns from eastbound Burnside at every intersection.

Doug Klotz

I've been wanting you to do well in city counsel.

I wasn't sure about the project that started you off here, do something to understand the economy of that part of town? Do some research to come up with a plan for traffic along Burnside? Meet with business owners along some central part of town?

I imagine it was valuable to walk around and talk with the owners. The whole counsel should be doing the same.

I am not sure that Burnside deserves special attention that other streets don't.

I still think that the city counsel needs to look at pushing a transportation plan to prepare for more expensive and scarce gasoline. Will your street work help do that?

I've also thought that the state is bankrupt. Governemt is becoming unable to address it's welfare needs. This problem will extend to being unable to help housing forclosures soon.

I think the best use of resources will be to encourage Portland's international trade. We need to be making things here that are sold for real money elsewhere. What can the city counsel do about that?

All I can think of are Mary's and Magic Gardens. what are the other 3?