tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9893363267856353502012-01-16T06:32:19.002-08:00Dedicated to documenting Portland, Oregon's unique transportation historyScott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.comBlogger211100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-12855516006063695892011-02-03T15:58:00.000-08:002011-02-03T16:01:31.510-08:00

I received this email from OPB:(You can cut to the chase by going to the Oregon Experience web page.)We wanted to let you know that OREGON EXPERIENCE: STREET CAR CITY will air on OPB TV on February 28 at 9pm. Kami Horton produced the half-hour special that explores how Oregon once had one of the most extensive streetcar systems in the United States providing cheap, comfortable public

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-52428834058093851972010-11-29T12:26:00.000-08:002010-11-29T12:44:19.870-08:00

Well, I promise at least one of these links is post-worthy: The City of Portland's Principal Planner, Steve Dotterrer has put together a fantastic presentation on Portland's transportation history. Through much labor, I embedded Dotterrer's audio to each corresponding slide. The audio is pretty good, but you'll most likely need to download the pdf's to listen. Luckily, its free (thanks City of

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-28855124976704838362010-03-18T07:13:00.001-07:002010-03-18T09:19:26.504-07:00

While I toil away in the gray halls of the bureaucracy, there are people working on transportation history. In the last several weeks I've seen a handful of articles and fielded calls about Portland's bike past.I was queried (I think "interview" would be too strong a word) by Outside magazine about the Portland's bike development for an article in the May edition. I'm not entirely sure of the

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-13942304769716689302009-07-29T09:42:00.000-07:002009-07-29T09:53:54.829-07:00

Ok, ok - I know it's been about two years and none of you believe that I am still here. Well, I am - kind of. I have been doing some transportation history work, but not so much to keep regular postings flowing.That said, I've got some links to articles I've written for the Oregon Encyclopedia Project and for the Oregon Historical Quarterly. The Encyclopedia Project is definitely worth

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-28390229960571832972007-07-15T16:47:00.000-07:002007-10-01T13:13:37.401-07:00

I haven't had much (any) time to work on Portland's transportation history, but luckily some others have.Jonathan over at www.bikeportland.org has a great post on Oregon's first attempt at changing stop sign laws for cyclists. Find it here.For anyone who is interested in the on-going Portland Bike History project, you can download a draft report that I am in the midst of updating with the help of

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-62733269222922449372007-05-09T07:49:00.000-07:002007-05-09T08:15:58.173-07:00

In the past couple of weeks I've found a couple of interesting sites worth checking out.http://tinyurl.com/2a7fk6 - An Oregonian link with articles on good recreational rides around town. This, of course, is not really history but I thought it noteworthy that the O used to have a weekly column dedicated to recreational riding that no longer exists.http://tinyurl.com/28azd9 - The Place of Bicycle

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-47639747747064290842007-04-03T12:31:00.000-07:002007-04-03T15:11:36.976-07:00

Although it's been a while since I've posted anything new, I assure you I have been hard at work. I will have posts on two projects in the next weeks, documenting historic streetcar development and Portland bicycle history, respectively.In the meantime, I was hard at work applying the finishing touches to an article on the Crooked River in Central Oregon that I have submitted to the Oregon

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-76324186172026288212007-03-12T20:29:00.000-07:002007-03-12T20:55:55.542-07:00

Since my last post on Portland's historic streetcar network, I've been hard at work re-creating the network on Portland's current street grid. The map is now done and the spatial analysis can begin. We will be asking if the city's urban development, specifically residential and commercial density as measured by the creation of new tax lots, was impacted significantly by the implementation of

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-27042172563925953472007-03-09T07:31:00.000-08:002007-03-09T08:56:19.965-08:00

I know, I know - this is a blog about Portland's history not Amsterdam's, but as I was biking up Highway 30 from Northwest to the St. John's Bridge I started to think about our city's self-congratulatory stance on the bicycling infrastructure.We undoubtedly have come a long way in building a comprehensive bike network since 1990 (if you want some statistics to prove our development, click here),

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-84762129576955994242007-02-28T08:05:00.000-08:002007-03-02T08:24:53.455-08:00

In my other life I am a capstone instructor at Portland State. Capstone courses are required for undergraduates and the class mainly focuses on a group project that serves a community organization. My course deals with bicycle and alternative transportation issues in Portland, and this term we are undertaking a historical research project for the Portland Office of Transportation. This is the

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-46627747008765448442007-02-25T09:23:00.000-08:002007-02-26T22:10:21.184-08:00

First off, thanks to all of you who commented or emailed me with ideas on where to track down the historic streetcar maps. The maps from the City of Portland site, which includes the 1890 streetcar network and several other snapshots, can be found at the Oregon Historical Society. If you do a search under "Transportation Network 1890" you can find them easily. They are actually hand drawn

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-73678207618428342402007-02-15T10:36:00.000-08:002007-02-15T10:44:17.357-08:00

I am working on a project right now with a fellow PSU student, Ben Kinkley, to overlay the historic streetcar lines on a current map of Portland. The idea is to determine how the streetcar system impacted Portland's development, particularly urban density. I am really interested in looking at the Springwater corridor (probably because its one of the few places I know where we've had a streetcar

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-44394085537576135762007-02-01T08:57:00.000-08:002007-02-03T16:54:36.730-08:00

While Oregon lore is full of stories about the defeat of the Mt. Hood Freeway, you don't hear quite as much about the building of Interstate 5. And with the Interstate Bridge taking center stage in the news lately, now is a good time to think about the entire I-5 corridor and how it has impacted Portland and its neighborhoods.Following the same pattern of development as many other U.S. cities,

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-18147840638731613922007-01-25T09:58:00.001-08:002007-01-25T09:58:53.971-08:00

A lot of us know a thing or two about Portland's more recent bike history, from the passing of the Bike Bill in 1971 to our current push for Platinum status. But what about those early years, from the 1880s to the 1920s? The bicycle was still a fairly new, innovative transportation tool and judging from maps like this one, Portland had a thriving Wheelmen Club and Good Roads Movement.The Oregon

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-33014989603549771072007-01-20T18:21:00.000-08:002007-01-20T18:27:52.487-08:00

Portland Walking Tours is looking for someone with charisma, a sense of humor, and an obvious love of Portland to help lead tours of the city. It's a part-time job with tips. They pay during training.If you are interested, find out more information and the application online here

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-26713482355766315222007-01-09T19:00:00.000-08:002007-01-20T18:11:31.038-08:00

According to TriMet's website, there have been 34 different companies that have served the Portland area's transit needs. That's a lot of history to document. Let's shed some light on this important aspect of Portland's development. Here are a couple of tidbits that I found doing an internet search on Rose City Transit, the private company that directly preceded the public agency

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-12829204414652581092006-12-23T11:54:00.000-08:002007-01-09T20:12:28.835-08:00

Has there ever been a more contentious time between transportation modes than right now? Cyclists vs. motorists, mass transit vs. new roads and highwyas; light rail vs. bus systems...Its enough to leave a multi-modal person (which is just about everyone to some extent) a little weary.Of course any time that competing interests are fighting for scarce resources there will be conflict, but is our

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-57336853216286564872006-11-29T20:38:00.000-08:002006-11-30T15:56:01.277-08:00

Yes, Portland once sported one of the most substantial streetcar networks west of the Mississippi. The Willamette Valley had electric rail from Oregon City to Vancouver in the early 1900s. Our current 18-mile long Springwater Trail is a former rail line. The Kenton neighborhood in North Portland, built by the Swift Meatpacking Company, was anchored by a streetcar line along Denver Avenue.The

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-22656804967594152722006-11-29T12:03:00.000-08:002008-09-22T11:52:06.818-07:00

Anyone who has even a fleeting interest in transportation has undoubtedly heard the story of how General Motors, Standard Oil, and Firestone conspired to buy up streetcar and other electric urban rail systems in order to supplant them with buses. But do we really have GM, et. al. to blame for our abandonment of streetcars and our adoption of the internal combustion engine for all things transport

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-36449965618392712762006-11-27T12:13:00.000-08:002006-11-30T16:01:57.885-08:00

This is from a presentation I gave at a film festival celebrating Portland Transportation. Much of the material comes from David Herlihy's comprehensive examination of the two-wheeled steed, Bicycle: The History, and from Steve Reed Johnson's dissertation on Portland Civic Culture.The bicycle was the culmination of a long quest for a mechanical horse – a human-powered machine that could replace

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-989336326785635350.post-71277702341168353502006-11-20T11:58:00.000-08:002006-11-30T15:57:45.343-08:00

There are many others that have looked (or are looking) at aspects of Portland's transportation history. In particular, Steve Reed Johnson of Portland State University has documented and graciously made public his work on Portland's civic life, including histories of the bicycle movement and the Mt. Hood Freeway. Johnson focuses on civic life, but his work on these important aspects of

Scott Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11008826072656616372noreply@blogger.com0