February 11, 2004
The Win-Win Of Relocating Fire Station 01
This morning we attended a presentation by the Portland Development Commission and Portland Fire & Rescue on the relocation of Station 01, sponsored by the Old Town/Chinatown Visions Committee.
PF&R and PDC are "proposing to relocate the station and consolidate PF&R's administrative offices to the block between Davis and Couch and 1st Avenue and Naito Parkway," according to the announcement of this morning's presentation:
Relocation of the station was recommended in the "Downtown Waterfront Development Opportunities Report," approved last year by PDC's Board of Commissioners. The purpose of the study was to identify public and private actions needed to stimulate new development activity in the area between the Downtown core and the Willamette riverfront. The consultant team recommended several strategies to blend the downtown core to the River, energize the waterfront, create a successful and safe downtown residential neighborhood and reawaken the city's beautiful historic districts.
The relocation of Fire Station #1 site was identified as the most critical action for reinvigorating the waterfront area, Naito Parkway and Ankeny Plaza. The Skidmore/Old Town Historic District is one of Portland's two National Historic Landmarks and is considered along with New York's SoHo district to be one of the country's premiere cast iron districts. At its current site, the fire station occupies the only full block without an historic structure in the district. Redevelopment plans for the current fire station site will create a mixed-use residential catalyst project, revitalize Ankeny Plaza, improve the streetscape along Naito Parkway, and promote the proposed Portland Public Market.
At the proposed new fire station site, block design will create active street fronts. Plans for the new fire station include a public fire museum, Fire Learning Center and storefront retail with openings on sidewalks, particularly on Couch, First Avenue and Naito Parkway. The new station will have underground parking and bring more jobs to the Old Town/Chinatown neighborhood as fire administrative offices will be consolidated at the new station. The historic Globe Hotel Building on the southwest corner of the block will also be preserved. Seismic upgrades and renovations will be completed by the time the station is constructed. Active ground floor uses will include retail or a restaurant with upper floors providing housing or office space.
Curiously, there was a rather peculiar resistance to the relocation in the part of some of those present at today's standing-room-only presentation in the basement of Central City Concern. Much of it appeared to be centered around the premise of not wanting to live and work around a fire station.
Not to repeat our pet peeve from the earlier item on the local liquor control ordinance, but this strikes us as a bunch of people who want to live and/or work in the middle of a City but not have to deal with the necessary realities of doing so.
In this case, the necessary reality is that Station 01 needs to be sited in a location from which response time meet PF&R's requirements to properly serve the public. And as it stands today, they means either remaining in its current location, or relocating to "Block 8" -- the block between Davis and Couch and 1st Avenue and Naito Parkway.
It certainly doesn't help that half of the Naito family is being utterly pigheaded about the entire proposal, as seen in this Daily Journal of Commerce article from this past January:
[Naito Corp. Vice President Verne] Naito said he's "very concerned" about the effect the proposed location for Fire Station No. 1 would have on the Old Town area.
"The fire station's being relocated because it's an unwanted use in the area it's in right now," Naito said. "As the largest landowner in Old Town, we are very concerned about putting a blighted, unwanted use in our portfolio."
Yes, that's right. Let's advance the discussion by alleging that a fire station is some sort of ghetto-like stigma to a community. That's extraordinarily helpful, Verne. The acrobatics in order to reach whatever orifice that came from must have been something to see and perhaps suggest you should consider a career with Cirque du Soleil.
Most of the oppositional concerns at today's presentations were fairly similar in essence, if not quite so asinine in tone and blunt content.
It baffles us, frankly. This entire endeavor seems like a complete win-win all around. Just north of Burnside, we'd get a state-of-the-art central PF&R facility, complete with learning center, museum, and retail space on the ground floor of the historic Globe Hotel building, while at the old station site we'd get a revitalized Ankeny Plaza, likely complete with Portland Public Market (a project we pimp every time we're discussing this part of downtown).
As for the issue of how the relocation of Station 01 to Block 8 would affect that area of Old Town, we'll leave you with a point made by Commissioner Randy Leonard, with whom we briefly discussed this project prior to this afternoon's City Council session.
When a public safety facility movies into an area, Leonard argued, criminal activity tends to clear out. It doesn't matter that this is a fire station, not a police station. What matters is that it's a public safety facility that operates on a 24/7 basis.
How anyone involved, Naito or otherwise, would find this to be "a blighted, unwanted use" for their community (or, in Verne Naito's case, their "portfolio") simple escapes us.
There are any number of development and redevelopment projects in Portland worthy or opposition, or at least a strong and healthy skepticism. It's just that the relocation of Station 01 to Block 8, and the concommitant revitalization of Ankeny Plaza doesn't happen to be one of them.
This entire area is called Old Town for a reason, and perhaps it's all the Portland history we've read over the past year that has made us feel connected to it. It deserves to be a place to which Portlanders want to go. It deserves to be a place to which Portlanders who don't happen to be local history buffs feel connected.
It's a win-win for Old Town and for Portland as a whole. It's time for Verne Naito to comprehend a picture larger than his woefully narrow (and utterly incorrect) interpretation of what's good for his "portfolio," and step up to do what's right for the community at large.