http://www.portlandonline.com/shared/cfm/image.cfm?id=211100

Your insight is generally spot on. The zoning and development ideas you espouse may well be on their way with the coming rail projects. What will become of a redesigned 17th ave and the nearby environs will be critical to the emerging “new” face of Brooklyn. The irony is that it may look a lot more like the historic Brooklyn.

One last point, the blue collar (socioeconomic, not manufacturing/labor necessarily) heart of Brooklyn will likely stay in place for some time. Over 50% of our properties are rental, that should keep roofs over working folks heads for a while.

Keep the comments coming and maybe you can visit again for the Ice Cream Social.

First as to the preservation of some sort of the blue-collar origins and history of Brooklyn, all of you had better check the color of your shirts. The collars seem to be getting very white to me. During my stay in the neighborhood, I spent about an hour wandering around Brooklyn Park talking to families and individuals who had come to enjoy the outdoor movie. I met many professionals, particularly in service industries and IT. They all talked about their homes with great affection and about how they had bought into the neighborhood initially for price and then had turned around and put a lot of money into their homes. The era of the affordable house in Brooklyn for any family or set of individuals making less than $100,000 per year would seem to rapidly ending. This was reinforced by my quick inspection of the few places for sale (What Real Estate Slump?). The new duplex on Rhine was particularly impressive (great job of designing a new structure that fits the spirit and look of the neighborhood). However, the price tags would exclude many folks. Lance’s interest in preserving at least some lower priced housing would already seem to be gone. The only hope would be for more Condos or very unimaginative reuse of some of the existing space. It would require many complex partnerships between existing landowners, the city and developers. Here is a suggestion, what about those terrible old narrow houses on the west side of Franklin? Imagine a bunch of condominiums on that block. In addition, all efforts to tear down any of the newer, hugely ugly apartments and returning that space to single family, owner occupied use would be a vast improvement.

The key to the future of Brooklyn would seem to be the coming changes in public transport and the necessary changes in energy use. From what I am reading off of the neighborhood news site, you may well have both a streetcar running down Milwaukie and a Max Rail line running through the neighborhood in a decade or so. Combine that with the compact nature of the neighborhood and its proximity to downtown and all most of the rest of Portland, you could well become a nearly car free neighborhood. Imagine riding up Milwaukie to the Lloyd center and down Milwaukie to the stores and restaurants of Bybee and Sellwood on wonderful electric trains. Eat your heart out Amsterdam! Also, imagine a new kind of all electric vehicles, designed just to run errands. You could live you whole life in Brooklyn and never start a gas-powered car.

At random:
The neighborhood is getting younger. Many children at the Park and from number of pregnant ladies there are a lot more on the way. Make Brooklyn School back into a neighborhood school?
I stayed at the Brooklyn Center Suites. A great place to house an out of town guest for a few days while keeping them close.
Get inside the Sacred Heat Church if you have never done so. The restoration is terrific.
Cross the Ross Island Bridge (maybe on your bike on a nice day) and go up the hill as my mother always called it (she was the Medical Record Librarian at the then Uof O Medical School) to the Oregon
Health Sciences Complex. Costs four dollars and it is a brief ride but such a magnificent view of Brooklyn as well as downtown Portland.
I think the sole of Brooklyn has moved from the taverns to the True Brew.

Well, the best of luck to all of you. Greatly enjoyed my visit and I appreciate all of the people who spent some time with me at movie night event. I will be back next year, and if things work out, would love to talk with many more of you.

Ron Nugent

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2008/08/train_kills_woman_near_lacey.html

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1218939909101780.xml&coll=7

Many know me, and there is charm in our neighborhood that we have the train roundabout and that we have business dependent upon the railroad.

Last year, my parents moved in with me for about a year while their home was rebuilt after a house fire. They loved how the community stands together and is much more friendly than when they lived here. They wished their neighborhood was as good a place to live as mine.

The fact that the trains have changed how loud and how often they use their horns was a challenge. They would be trying to talk to their doctor or their contractor and have to stop the conversation because the train horns were so loud and continued for such a long time. Yes, as a child we had the trains and they used their horns. The style or type of horn was different - certainly not as annoying as we have today. We couldn’t remember them being as loud or as persistent, especially during the nighttime.

Being a business person in the neighborhood who has to talk to people on the East Coast, I am often teased that during conference calls, we have to stop talking because, even with the doors and windows closed, the train horns are so loud and so long. I’m often fumbling to try to find the mute so I don’t bother clients or business associates during a call.

The fact that they do this at 3:00 am as well as during the day is part of the problem. It seems reasonable to ask that the volume and length of the horn be adjusted.

I have to admit that one of my neighbors is just as concerned with all the dogs barking and people fighting in the middle of the night as they are the trains. Add all these noises together and it causes problems.

I love my neighborhood, my friends in the neighborhood, and the sense of community that we have here. Again, it seems reasonable to ask for a change in the volume and length of the train horns so that we continue to have one of the most livable neighborhoods in Portland.

As for the illegal extended closures of the intersection at 12th and Clinton, you can call 866-628-8867 to complain. You need to get the engine number(s). What I do is any time I’m stopped by a train, I get the engine numbers right away and then if the gate is closed for more than the allowed 10 minutes I call. You need to be persistent, they don’t seem to be all that interested in enforcing this.

Im very interested in your article as I am preparing to do what you are doing, except for the Kenton Neighborhood. The train noise here is unbelievable and at all hours of the day and night. I dont know yet which railroad company owns the line that parallels Columbia Blvd (both East and West of I-5), but I am hoping to find out soon.

Like one of your readers said, I dont mind an occasional horn, but, there are times where they blast the horn for nearly a minute at a time on a regular basis.

Thanks for any direction you can give me…

On the other hand, does anyone know why the train whistles last for minutes at a time? Was there some incident, someone/something got hit in a populated area and now the trains are forced to do this?

I want the whistles to tone down, and will sign a letter requesting such at the next ice cream social.

However, I would choose the NUISANCE of the whistle if it means a single life could be saved.

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