January 04, 2003
Tram Competitors Selected
According to The Oregonian, four firms have been chosen to compete to design the proposed OHSU aerial tram (part of the city's Marquam Hill Plan):
Portland Aerial Transportation Inc. -- known as PATI -- a nonprofit corporation formed to manage the tram project, picked a quartet of mostly young firms with wildly varying experience to design one of the few commuter tram lines in the United States. The selection process will be Portland's first international design competition.
Amongst the four firms, they are responsible for "a $200 million terminal being completed for Zurich International Airport and the master plan for the Adidas World of Sports" (Angelil/Graham/Pfenninger); a "swanlike, single-pylon Erasmus Bridge in Rotterdam" (UN Studio); a "major Vatican-sponsored church under construction in Rome" (Guy Nordenson and Associates); and a "dynamic wood-slat 'Dunescape,' a synthetic beach, in the entry courtyard of the New York Museum of Modern Arts' Long Island City branch" (Sharples Holden Pasquarelli).
For the sake of fairness, although so far I haven't seen any arguments to definitively sway me against the tram, I should mention the No Tram to OHSU site of the plan's opponents. I've yet to track down a website for Portland Aerial Transportation Inc.