WHEN GREG HERMENS sees the streetcar ease to a stop outside Nob Hill Bar and Grill—his business of 25 years—he couldn’t be happier. Every 15 minutes, the car unloads waves of curious tourists, many of which walk in his door.
Portland Streetcar, Inc., the nonprofit that owns the streetcars and works under contract with the City of Portland, celebrated its 10th birthday on August 12. In the next decade, its sights are set on expansion. Along with completing a $148 million citywide loop, Portland Streetcar is adding five locally produced streetcars to its Czech-made fleet of 10. But, with a price tag of $45 million per mile, it’s one of the pricier transportation projects around. Looking toward the future, streetcar enthusiasts and critics alike consider one critical question: Is it worth it?
To Hermens, the Nob Hill Bar and Grill owner, the streetcar means business.
“We definitely have seen a spike in customers since it was put in,” Hermens says. “It’s a no-brainer, really.”
And that’s exactly what Portland Streetcar wants to hear. While it is built with cash from transportation funds, the streetcar is intended, above all else, to be a development tool. Sure, it gets Portland State University students and Legacy Good Samaritan Medical Center workers from point A to point B, but it also aims to establish multi-use communities in between.
The streetcar’s $5.7 million budget comes from a combination of ticket sales, urban renewal money generated by development along the streetcar line, and city, state, and federal transportation funds. Even with the diverse funding sources, the new Eastside Loop that stretches from the Broadway Bridge to the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry is $5 million short for their 2011 budget, as that money is being put toward building a soaring new rail/bike/ped bridge over the Willamette River. The Eastside Loop is also five months behind schedule.
In 2009, a city-sanctioned public input group on the streetcar plan polled Portlanders and revealed that though 83 percent of Portlanders were in favor of the streetcar, 72 percent thought it shouldn’t be paid for from city funds.
But Executive Director Rick Gustafson of Portland Streetcar appears unfazed by the numbers.
“Now is a very uncertain time for business as usual,” Gustafson says. “But we create and serve an atmosphere people want: mixed use. We have the city on our side.”
While Portland Streetcar never predicted the amount of jobs that their business would create, a study by the Institute for Sustainable Communities shows that Oregon Iron Works, the Clackamas-based streetcar manufacturer, has added 20 jobs in response to the streetcar’s growth. Additionally, Gustafson says that it has ignited the creation of 10,000 housing units within 750 feet of the track since its initiation.
However, economist and Portland State University professor Eric Fruits sees the streetcar in a different light.
“Looking at the bigger picture, streetcars are expensive art,” Fruits says. “The streetcar cannibalized the bus system. Yeah, on a bus you run the risk of your bus being rerouted, but at least it’s frequent.”
Over the years, the amount of transportation money that goes toward the development-driven streetcar has irritated advocates for other forms of transit. In a push to increase streetcar use, two TriMet bus lines in Northwest Portland were rerouted.
“The bus will do anything that the streetcar will do,” says former TriMet employee and Northwest District Association (NWDA) Co-Chair Phil Selinger. “But the reality is, a lot of people won’t step on a bus.” Selinger says he often sees his Northwest Portland neighbors who work downtown pass up the bus to ride the streetcar.
Beyond sucking up transportation funding, the streetcar’s tracks impede another form of transportation: bikes. According to a 2008 study by Alta Planning and Design, nearly 70 percent of Portland cyclists crash on the tracks at some point. The streetcar currently carries 12,000 riders every day, while the US Census estimates that 17,500 Portlanders bike to work daily [“Track Attack,” News, Jan 6].
Joan Martocello, manager of the downtown Bike Gallery, says she supports the streetcar’s purpose, but she’s tired of doling out Band-Aids and Neosporin to track-battered bicyclists.
“I remember when the streetcar tracks were first laid, my biker friends and I thought, ‘Oh God! They’re ruining our town!'” says Martocello, who estimates she has at least three bicyclists a week coming in with bikes damaged from the streetcar tracks.
While Portland Streetcar’s Gustafson says this is a top issue for him, he remains uncertain about how to improve it. For now, he remains set on future development. “It may take some time to be an instant success,” he says. “I think that after the loop is finished, people will finally see how dramatically different the streetcar is.”
For now, Southeast businesses are uncertain about the looming loop. Eastside construction will have disrupted Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Grand Avenue for over two years. Terry Taylor, director of the Central Eastside Industrial Council, calls the construction a “nightmare,” and dreads the business taxes to follow.
But the overarching sustainability aspect of the streetcar leaves many convinced.
“At the end of the day, it’s an important tool in creative a livable, workable neighborhood,” NWDA’s Selinger says. “If it gets households to drop from two cars to one, then it’s worth it.”
Streetcar by the numbers
Portland Streetcar budget for 2011-2012: $5.7 million
Projected 2011-2012 net income: $275,000
Daily ridership predicted in 2001: 3,500
Weekday ridership in 2008: 11,900
Number of streetcars on the line: 10
Miles of streetcar tracks in Portland in 1916: Over 300
Cost of new 3.3-mile streetcar loop: $45 million per mile
Jobs created at streetcar manufacturer Oregon Iron Works: 20
Housing created within 750 feet of rail since creation: 10,000 units
CORRECTION: The original online version of this article misstated the current delay in the Eastside Loop project. It has been corrected.
I like the street car but I had a bad experience with one of the operators/drivers (a rude jerk). How you treat people really makes a difference in the experience they have.
“…she has at least three bicyclists a week coming in with bikes damaged from the streetcar tracks.”
See? The streetcar creates business!!
Mercury didn’t include all the funding sources for the trolley. In several cases parking meter revenue is diverted to trolleys, as the case in South Waterfront. Plus gas tax money in the form of STIP dollars are diverted. Trolley fares pay for less than 3% of their construction, maintenance and operating costs. Not a good deal. Talk about subsidies!
“The Eastside Loop is also three years behind schedule, once slated to open in 2012 but now likely delayed until 2015.”
Four more years of construction? Are you f**king kidding me?!
The streetcar is an expensive toy to put on the front of postcards. The claim that it “creates” development is complete bunk. It beggers belief that redevelopment of the Pearl wouldn’t have happened anyway, but the streetcar people claim responsibility for ALL of that development. Asinine. Same with South Waterfront. That development took place because the PDC used Urban Renewal to pay the developers a shitload of money, not because there is a streetcar there.
As a city, we need to move beyond the “feel good” stage of these very expensive projects and actually figure out if they make sense in the long term. The aerial tram was 400% over budget and will lose money forever. But it sure “feels good” doesn’t it?
2015? Where do get that? The eastside line is scheduled to open 5 month slate in about one year: September 2012: http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.s…
@Blabby – Sorry, that three year delay sentence was a mistake that was struck from the print version but still found its way online. The Loop won’t be fully built out until 2015, but it will still open in 2012. It’s only five months behind schedule. The article has been corrected.
all the cool neighborhoods and commercial districts are along late 19th/early 20th century streetcar routes – the brick one-and two-story storefronts that incubate businesses date from that era. It took, what, 50 – 75 years for them to be appreciated again? There are significant trade-offs between bus and streetcars, and it is good to discuss them, but it’s possible a single decade is too short in the life of a city.
It comes down to white middle/upper class people don’t like riding the bus. And Portland proper is pretty much White-upper-middle-class defined.
Buses are cheaper to operate, they are more flexible, they can adjust their schedules on the fly far easier than trains, they can avoid obstructions, they don’t all fail when electricity fails or ice storms take out lines (arguable.)
A better system would have been SF’s electric bus setup, which allows buses to use two different lanes, overhead electricity, and not dedicate entire areas of pavement for trains and bike-breaking wheel-wells.
All-in-all the trains are simply there because people with more money refuse to use buses as transportation.
Where do trains work well? Long haul mass transportation, i.e. the MAX as we have it.
As a daily bike commuter, I’ve had my fair share of run-ins with the streetcar tracks. And you know what, each one was my fault. I’ve since learned to avoid the tracks (biking down Johnson or Marshall instead of Lovejoy) cross them carefully when I have no choice.
I would love to see the streetcar spread more into Portland, though the $45 million/mile seems a little steep. I am sure there are ways to reduce this cost, and that as they plan more track, a scale of economies will help to reduce it too.
As to the bus vs. streetcar argument, I think that streetcars are a more flexible transporation option when you consider the ease of taking a bike onto the streetcar or entering on a wheelchair or with a walker. It is also zero-emissions (or has the potential to be depending on source of electricity).
Lastly, the streetcar is attractive and shiny and a lot more appealing than a bus. It does attract new development and visitors to the city. Portland may be paying a high price, but I can almost guarantee other cities will try to emulate this and create a net positive change in the world.
I’m with Blabby on this.
And those NW folk would get on a bus if it was their only option to get downtown.
Electric busses would have been alot cheaper.
Who cares if a few dumb cyclists scrape their knees because they weren’t smart enough to avoid the track?
Oh frankeib, our resident supply-side teabagger. Always on que with the ad-hominem attacks and baseless name-calling. What a ray of sunshine you are.
Fyi, NW is ALREADY downtown.
Oh, it’s DumbosA the Racist again.
Re-read what Selinger said.
I’m not tea-party. Far from it.
I love streetcars in the abstract, but Imagine instead of the Eastside streetcar loop, half that amount of money spent on world-class bike infrastructure (grade separated cycle-track, etc.). I think that would have done a hell of a lot more to get people out of cars and could have been a huge boon for businesses, residents, and visitors alike.
I knew i could count on you with a swift and witty retort, frankeib. You never miss a beat, do ya!
@Chunty. Nice to see your avatar! Welcome back.
The disconnect between favoring streetcar and a willingness to pay for it should be of real concern for Portland Streetcar as they move toward expansion to Lake Oswego and increasing/enforcing fares as well as dropping out of the free ride area. Overall, I don’t think folks view streetcar as a worthy or cost-effective transportation investment or even an effective alternative mode choice. This may in turn fuel this rebranding or enhanced branding of the streetcar as a development driver.
As for being a development driver, it all well and good to note that 10,000 units of housing have been created within 3 city blocks of the alignment but that doesn’t really mean anything.
The housing was creating during the biggest housing boom in our nation’s (and city’s) history, development during this hey-day can hardly be pinned to a train. Also almost all of the development (if not all of it) was created within urban renewal areas, thus a lot of the financing was subsidized by public dollars.
Looking at any given housing project claimed to be “ignited” by streetcar, you have to wonder what does that really mean?
Did the existence of the streetcar enhance the marketing of the project? And without streetcar, the marketing edge was lost thus no project?
Did streetcar result in an ability to forgo or reduce investment in private parking and other car-centered investments by the development (thus serving as an indirect public subsidy)?
Did it reduce system development charges for the development (again supporting another public subsidy)?
If the project in question benefited from any other public support (subsidized financing, grants, tax incentives, reduced system development fees, etc.), would the elimination of all those other public subsidies still mean the project would’ve happened? In other words, was streetcar really the magic publicly financed bullet?
Moreover, how much of that housing has been “successful” housing? Isn’t the much bemoaned South Waterfront development with 750 feet of the tracks? The 10,000 biotech jobs certainly never happened there what has been the status of that housing?
The bottom-line is that this article’s engaging and provocative title isn’t answered. And if this is suppose to be a “we report, you decide” moment, nothing is presented to inform a decision.
The assertion that streetcar “has ignited the creation of 10,000 housing units within 750 feet of the track since its initiation.” is basically taken at face value. The only counterpoint is limited to its potential impact on bicyclists and that its construction is disruptive, neither of these things relate to the question of streetcar’s effectiveness as a “development tool”.
At this point, nearly a half billion dollars in tax dollars for extension of this system to Lake Oswego is still in play. And most of the discussion has been around the efficacy of streetcar as a “development driver”.
Given this, I would love to see a part 2 of this article that actually attempts to answer the question it poses. There is a lot of money at stake here.
I love public transit. I grew up in DC and used Metro daily to get to work. The best system I ever used was the Shuttle UM service (University of Md) while I was a student. The service was free to 30,000 students – just show student id. The University did a study of where students lived and deployed buses – small 28 seaters to standard TriMet size buses – depending on ridership. The small buses were attractive and comfortable. 2.9 million student rides took place on these buses last school year and they connected to Metrorail stations enabling many students such as myself to go to far flung jobs without having to pay for multiple modes of public transit. The University saved a fortune on parking lot construction and gridlock and was able to build more dorms and classrooms instead. I love buses. Instead of dissing them as ugly, lets make them smaller, stylish, abundant, subsidized so they are dirt cheap and deploy them where people live and work instead of where we would like them to live and work. Charge two quarters to get on with no fare zones. This would avoid the need for costly fare machines and make the experience as easy as possible for the public. I would say they should be fareless but resulting loitering could freak out the masses and decrease ridership. Best thing about this plan – it is ready to be implemented immediately without the need for construction delays so our air gets cleaner in 90 days instead of three years.
This was a pretty sloppy review of Portland’s extremely successful streetcar system. Nowhere did the author bother to mention that light rail costs taxpayers about a dollar less per rider than buses do. Last time I checked, no bus line has ever created $3.5 billion in private development in under a decade.
I don’t believe the farebox recovery for streetcar (i.e the share of operating costs covered by fare payment) has ever cracked 3 percent. For most typical public transit systems (TriMet, King County Metro, etc.), and farebox recovery of 20 percent or more is the norm (for bus and rail).
The difference between what is paid in the farebox and what it costs to operate is generally made up by public taxes or fees (local, regional, and state primarily). The question of what is the public cost per rider for streetcars versus other transit modes is a interesting question. Personally, I would be surprised to learn that the operating subsidy paid by the public for the streetcar is less per rider than on the bus or on MAX.
Like the “10,000 housing units within 750 feet” the cataloging of total development along the street car route at $3.5 billion is another “success measurement” that keeps floating out there. However, almost all of the streetcar alignment is within Urban Renewal Areas (North Macadam, South Park Blocks, and River District). So attributing all development in these areas to the presence of streetcar clearly ignores the full set of URA subsidies, financing, policy/zoning incentives and related development initiative that the Portland Development Commission actively employed to promote development in these areas.
That said, the streetcar alignment that lies west of NW 16th is not within a URA. So a potential quick snapshot to try and control for the impact of the URAs on development along the alignment could be looking at how many of the 10,000 new housing units happened within the non-URA area and how much of the $3.5 billion in new private development occurred in the non-URA section.
But probably the best way to measure the actual unique role the streetcar has had on development would be to compare new private development in the area West of NW 16th to NW 23rd from southside Pettygrove to nothside Johnson to the NW 16th to NW 23rd from the south side of Johnson to the northside of Davis.
Basically, same neighborhood and general building and zoning make up with streetcar versus no streetcar during the past 10 years.
King County bought some cool hybrid electric buses for $500K each. One mile of streetcar would buy 90 buses. What we should be paying for first and foremost is a *mass* transit system not a limited transit system that may or may not stimulate business development as if street cars were the only factor in business development. Have you seen the retail vacancies in the Pearl District lately?
The streetcar = $3.5 billion in new development claim was recently addressed by the a PolitiFact Check, verdict? Mostly False:
http://www.politifact.com/oregon/statement…