Connecting South Downtown and Old Town Chinatown to the Waterfront

City of Possibility is pleased to present the draft findings of our workshops to re-envision two downtown neighborhoods' and their connections to Waterfront Park.

With the City of Portland's upcoming design competition to re-envision Waterfront Park, City of Possibility has convened a series of workshops, or charrettes, to explore how to better connect downtown to the waterfront -- to create a better park and spur more residential and neighborhood development in downtown.

The draft results of our first study--the Harvey Milk and Oak corridor--can be found here.

Now we turn to South Downtown and Old Town/Chinatown. Despite PSU, the Halprin Open Space Sequence fountain plazas and other major assets, South Downtown remains cut off from the river by 1960s-era roads and buildings. With its array of cultural institutions, older and new aid organizations, and the coming of the Steel Bridge skate park, Old Town/Chinatown is ripe for reinvention.

After meeting with numerous neighborhood leaders and organizations, City of Possiblity brought some 60 urban designers and creatives together with top city decision-makers to explore how these districts can become, in effect, waterfront neighborhoods where more Portlanders will want to work and live.

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

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