The PDC has served as Portland's urban renewal and economic development agency for 50+ years. The commission began as strictly urban renewal-focused and is now more concerned with economic development. Recently, they have altered their focus to work toward a city that is healthy, prosperous, and equitable. PDC provides funding for private projects that work toward urban renewal, requiring projects to meet LEED Silver certification standards; though many projects are exceeding those standards voluntarily. The Green Features Grant Program provides need based funding to applicants looking to cover the incremental costs associated with sustainable building or adopting sustainable practices.Portland Development Commission (PDC) works closely with the mayor and the public to develop and implement long-range plans for the city. Formerly two separate entities, the Bureau of Planning and Bureau of Sustainability, they decided to combine services upon recognition of importance of sustainability as component of planning. Some of their major initiatives discussed include:
- Action Plan - agenda for reducing greenhouse gases through land use planning, transportation, building design, etc.;
- Eco Districts - energy efficient systems/districts through heating/cooling strategy where heating/cooling are shared between buildings;
- Oregon Sustainability Center - demonstration project, totally sustainable building, generate own heating/cooling, retain/recycle water, etc...financial issues, hoped for state funding but last legislative sessions didn't provide any funding so project in jeopardy, typical class A leases around $30-35/sf, this building double...Split house makes new policy implementation/funding difficult
One example of a public-private collaboration was STOP - Sensible Transportation Options for People, in which PDC and citizens worked with the mayor, who worked with the governor to avoid a freeway through southeast Portland and to instead focus on improving public transit.
A statewide planning bill in 1969 created Urban Growth Boundaries, limiting sprawl and preserving the natural landscape. The idea of growth boundaries encourages building up rather than out, resulting in improved densities. Adequate (20 year) employment and population supply must be evident to justify expansion of growth boundaries. The Metro 2040 plan defines density targets within centers and corridors across the city for consideration when determining growth boundaries for city. The PDC has seen a reversal of the trend in recent years from losing housing to suburbs to keeping housing local and seeing more infill...attributes some of it to lifestyle change
Sustainability at Work (SAW) - Provides free assistance to businesses to be green. The foundation for SAW was the Climate Action Plan, originally a 1990s program that thought about environment and climate change as separate issues. The plan transformed to integrating environment with the economy and proved that the city can reduce emissions and increase jobs/economic growth at the same time, resulting in cost savings to businesses and the realization that they could export knowledge gained from building green. Green/sustainability became part of the language as the city decided to take it a step further and make it not just about the environment or economy, but also people. As we quickly realized, Portland has made it to the social stage.
As with any sustainability program, initially there was an adoption curve for businesses. In the early 90s, the focus of the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability was on recognition of early adopters; now it's about bringing the late adopters up to speed, "no longer pulling up the ceiling, now pushing up the floor", connecting them with free resources, incentives, and support. There has been no shortage of resources for businesses interested in greening their operations/buildings, but businesses weren't aware until now. Still, most of them don't know how to do it, but a sustainability adviser within the bureau visits with businesses and can make recommendations and connect them to resources to make improvements, with a focus on low-cost/no-cost improvements
The recently adopted Portland Plan takes a strategic look at the city to translate into a comprehensive plan, a goal of which is to incorporate the climate action plan into long-range planning for the city - i.e., how does transportation impact climate, etc (how does "this" affect "that" all the way through planning process).
Part of the city's strategic plan includes the Bike Plan. Portland boasts and aggressive bike program, which has evolved over time from simple bike lanes to a complete cycle track. The ultimate goal is for a safer, separate facility for cyclists. The cycle track, mentioned frequently is a demonstration project near Portland State University.
Portland actually has a bicycle master plan, adopted 2-3 years ago to increase market share for cyclists. The market is segmented 4 ways:
- bold/aggressive rider - no matter what
- slightly aggressive
- interested but concerned (key segment)
- never gonna ride
In order to increase interested/concerned riders, Portland is working on what they refer to as bike boulevards, a process through which they convert a local street into a bike street, still allowing all traffic, but structured primarily for cycling and/or pedestrians.
A key strategy of making Portland pedestrian and bicycle friendly was to go after low-hanging fruit first -heavily cycled streets are converted first. Overall support from the Chamber of Commerce and city council has been strong, but there is concern about lost parking for businesses. Once people get over the hump and start cycling, they get into it and adjust lifestyles and become cyclists first and transition from two cars to one car to no cars.
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