Powell-Division Transit & Development Project

Cities of Portland and Gresham, OR | (2014-2015)

The Powell-Division Corridor stretches eastward from Central Portland 13 miles to the heart of downtown Gresham. Today, the corridor is characterized by a range of land uses and market conditions. While the pace of development in close-in sections of the corridor has accelerated in recent years, much of the corridor is dominated by auto-oriented land uses and a stagnant real estate market. A proposed bus rapid transit (BRT) line has the potential to drastically alter the landscape along the corridor and catalyze new development, but only if local policies are tailored to leverage this public investment.

Fregonese Associates worked with the Cities of Gresham and Portland to perform a market-driven assessment of 12 nodes along the Powell-Division corridor to assess their transit-supportive development potential over the next 5-10 years. The Envision Tomorrow suite of Urban Planning tools was then used to create alternative development scenarios. These scenarios helped the City of Portland and the City of Gresham evaluate potential zone changes, public realm investments, and development incentives that will help to leverage the region’s investment in high capacity transit.

In addition to scenario analysis, our team led an extensive public outreach campaign which included urban design charrettes and interactive instant polling. The information gleaned from public input was used in conjunction with our scenario analysis to create a land use vision for each node within the corridor and an action plan was created to help guide policy and implementation in the short to medium term.