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Vital
Signs After a three-decade death spiral, downtown Eugene is finally starting to show some vital signs. The Connor and Woolley families that own much of the property lining the old pedestrian mall on Broadway and Willamette Streets are rumored to be finally near investing in redevelopment after years of sitting on the property. The developers have been busy with major renovation projects in Portland's Pearl District and elsewhere. Connor & Woolley's local real estate agent Sue Prichard declined to confirm the rumor about a new focus on Eugene, but she didn't deny it either. "I'm not at liberty to say," she told us. "Normally I like to talk, so that should tell you something." If Connor and Woolley redevelop they'll add to already building momentum in the area. The new downtown Public Library is attracting almost a million visits a year, the Oregon Research Institute plans a new office building with hundreds of workers across the street, a new apartment building with ground floor retail is planned for next to the WOW Hall, the Aurora Building apartments are rented, a new grocery store proposed and a gleaming new federal courthouse is under construction nearby. A new medical center is likely to be built next to EWEB. On the edges of the old pedestrian mall, there're signs of life. A wine bar plans to open on Olive Street, and a new pizza restaurant and Thai restaurant on Pearl and coffee shop on Willamette give an almost Portland-like vibe. The Tate, a six-story condo project, is planned at 13th and Olive. City officials, such as Director of Cultural Services Robb Hankins and Mayor Kitty Piercy are cheer-leading Eugene as an arts center, along with organizations such as DIVA and Maude Kerns. Design standards for new development have already been approved for the core of downtown. But downtown's history has been littered with disappointments. Three years ago Connor & Woolley said they were near an investment decision, but did nothing. The pedestrian mall put in 35 years ago to compete with Valley River Center failed. Urban renewal destroyed much of the area's historic character to replace it with concrete slabs. The city spent several million to reopen the pedestrian mall to cars, without much to show for it. Yet now, the regional economy is on a comeback and its hard to see how downtown can remain comatose for long while real estate booms everywhere else. It's also hard to see how Eugene can hope to be much of a city with a dead downtown. Downtowns fight costly and environmentally destructive urban sprawl, make cities livable and proud and attract the creative residents and visitors who make economies thrive. Without them, there's no there there.
Downtown
Savers The critical element of any downtown is people walking. Lots of people make businesses thrive and make streets alive. Culled from other cities and ideas floated in the past, here's a list of ideas to bring locals and tourists downtown. All of these people projects will cost money, but no more than the concrete parking garages and asphalt projects that miserably failed downtown in the past.
• Control Sprawl. Salem saved its downtown in large part by forbidding shopping malls on the edge of town. Santa Monica drove movie theaters downtown by forbidding them anywhere else. But Eugene has never used its zoning and planning power to protect downtown from urban sprawl. Forty-years ago, the city allowed Valley River Center to build next to a freeway interchange and suck the life out of downtown. • Stop Subsidizing Sprawl. Eugene spends hundreds of millions of dollars on freeways and other infrastructure to subsidize urban sprawl while downtown gets almost nothing. The city could waive or sharply reduce systems development charges downtown to recognize that downtown development is more efficient, and could tax parking spaces on the edge of town to recoup subsidies and help level the playing field. • Farmer's Market Building. Seattle, Vancouver, Baltimore, Boston and dozens of other cities have revived their downtowns with year-round, indoor farmers markets. Eugene used to have such a building. Its arched ceilings are now buried under the ugly façade of a medical supply store at Broadway and Willamette. It could be restored and expanded to bring droves of tourists and locals downtown. • Merry-go-round. Salem's downtown merry-go-round is a big draw for kids and adults. Other cities, like Mansfield, Ohio, have also used carousels to bring people downtown. Salem's go-round was built with community donations and many volunteers. • Murals. Hiring a bunch of starving artists to paint the dreary cream and concrete walls downtown would cost little and add some color back into the urban area's cheeks. • Central Park. Eugene lost a lot of park/pedestrian space when it clearcut the pedestrian mall. Tearing down some of the hulking eyesores downtown and planting trees and grass could make Eugene's heart green. • Kids. The new library has already made downtown a major kid draw. A kid market full of kid-oriented stores, fanciful play structures, climbable sculptures, rock climbing wall, recreation center and/or skatepark could build on the theme. • Fountains. Portland and Corvallis have people-friendly fountains with changing jets that kids and adults love to play in and watch. Hood River has a waterfall with leaping salmon sculptures. Eugene had its old tank trap fountain, but it hadn't worked in decades and was ripped out with the pedestrian mall. Eugene's heart needs more cascades like the fountain at the Park Blocks. • Swimming Pool. Eugene needs a new swimming pool. How about downtown? Vancouver, B.C., has a big downtown indoor pool. A pool in Portland has a recirculating river running through it filled with swirling, laughing kids. • Trees and Flowers. Victoria, B.C.'s economy booms with tourists attracted by hanging flowerpots from lamp posts. Eugene could celebrate its forests and gardens with an explosion of native street trees in plots of wildflowers downtown. We hear 75 large hanging baskets have been ordered for downtown and will arrive next week. That's a step in the right direction. • UO Students. Encouraging or even subsidizing a UO student dorm downtown would bring lively young people to the city's heart, fueling cafés, book stores and night life.
• Trolley. Portland has given its downtown a boost with a modern new street car and restored historic street trolleys are a huge tourist draw in San Francisco. Eugene used to have trolleys and could bring them back. Downtown students could ride a trolley to the UO, and students on campus could easily ride downtown. • Hippie Museum. Almost every guidebook and travel article about Eugene says we're stuck in the 1960s. It's a ridiculous stereotype, but why not make the most of it? Eugene could ride the baby boomer nostalgia wave by creating the first Museum of the American Hippie, painted in tie-dye and with a huge lava-lamp on the roof. • Movie Theater. A movie theater with stadium seating could fit downtown, take advantage of existing garages that are underused at night, and draw big crowds. • Craft Market. Using one of the big empty hulks downtown for the Holiday Market and/or the off season of the Saturday Market and/or Oregon Country Fair would enliven the area. • Control Cars. 6th and 7th avenues provide a river of cars through downtown, but few people. Narrowing the four-lane streets to add parking, trees and sidewalk cafes would make downtown a lot more livable and reconnect the Hult Center traffic island to downtown. • Arm Twisting. A major factor in Portland's successful downtown was public pressure and pleading from the mayor and others to keep big institutions downtown and attract new ones in the name of civic pride. That has never happened in Eugene. Other ideas for enlivening downtown include a flea market for garage salers, art center with working artists in window fronts, a crazy cuckoo clock with shows every hour, an outdoor theater for plays, school and church choir concerts, a Eugene peace memorial and parades by Lane County Fair animals and Oregon Country Fair people every year to kick off their events. There are plenty of ideas to enliven downtown, just not enough leadership.
Building
Up Downtown It's good to have downtown Eugene smiling again, off its anti-depressants and thinking enthusiastically about a new round of investments in its evolving centers. We don't always conceive of it this way, but our downtown, like most downtowns in medium-sized to larger cities, is multi-centered. Our core sub-areas come quickly to mind: the Fifth Street Public Market Center, the Park Blocks-Governmental Center, the Train Station-Post Office Center, the Hult-Hilton Center, the Library-LTD Station-Atrium Center, and the soon to be realized Courthouse-Cannery Square-Riverfront Center. Our Downtown Plan is to further develop these identifiable magnets and to link them together with an aspiration called great streets. Note the way that recent projects, such as the Public Library, LTD Station, Train Station, and Courthouse reinforce this mental shish kabob of lines and dots, of key centers and connecting streets. And expect new investment in downtown to add to and respond to this mental map. Think of Broadway, with its eastern makeover, as a line with three circular areas, one at each end and one in the middle. On the eastern end, envision an enhanced downtown entrance at Broadway and Mill. In the middle is our Four Seasons crossroads at Broadway and Willamette. And on the west is Broadway Place. Can a remodeled Penny's building and further development of the Broadway property north of the Library and proposed new ORI building be far behind? The proposed Whole Foods-Shedd complex has the potential to help the city realize a long-desired major entry to the downtown on East Broadway. If in the process we can once again avoid locating a parking garage on 8th, it will keep plans for 8th Avenue's pedestrian greatness on track in its march toward the riverfront. Think of Willamette, too, as a series of beads on a string, representing what's been done, what's happening (The Tate, rapid transit) and what remains to be done between the Train Station and 18th. Great streets are not just important roads to private investment. They are key components of our downtown open space system of streets, urban forest, parks, plazas, squares, fountains, artwork, gardens, greens and other public places, all of which build up our common identity, shared amenity and the meaning of downtown. A glance at Portland's downtown tells us how important it is to build these places out of high quality materials — as if we cared — to plant elegant trees, and to try to resist painting every curb in sight a garish yellow. Downtown's centers and connectors are a public-private affair, with each partner critical to the quality and prosperity of the evolving set that makes a significant whole. So let's get on with our civic share and remove the butterfly parking garage and remake the north Park Block. Add Library Square to the Library-ORI-Atrium open space and put the parking under. Build Courthouse Square and connect it with a gracious portal and passage to the riverfront. And while we're still thinking of lines, let's preserve the possibility that one or two of those lines might still be blue. Jerry Diethelm is a professor of landscape architecture at the UO. He is also a member, along with Charles O. Porter and Jerry Rust, of the Executive Board of the Emerald Waterways Citizens Committee, Inc.
Connor & Woolley Holdings
The extent of the empire of the families of Don Woolley and Thomas Connor is nearly rivaled in magnitude by the effort required to figure out what the families actually own. Connor & Woolley names appear as owners, partners or officers in at least five property-owning legal entities: Jenova Land Company, Spring Properties, Station Holdings, an enterprise called "Woolley 3," and the Donna P. Woolley Trust. The families also own properties in their own names. In Lane County, these holdings appear to include: 380 and 401 W. 3rd Ave.; 140, 180, 199, 207, 285, 291, and 295 E. 5th Ave.; 252 Lawrence; 133, 164 and 175 W. Broadway, Centre Court Building on Broadway and 703 E. Broadway; 445 and 449 Willamette, and 1399 and 1655 Franklin Blvd., as well as numerous lots downtown and to the north without determinable legal addresses. Some properties have different owners listed, but the same mailing addresses for tax bills, implying common ownership. Many of the vacant and partially vacant holdings have for lease signs in their windows, referring potential renters to real estate brokers/property managers Prichard, Evans & Elder. Sue Prichard of the agency told EW she was not at liberty to discuss her clients' development plans, and a call to Tom Connor Jr. was not returned. The property owners have declined media interviews for years. What's all of it worth? According to county records, the total market value of this partial list exceeds $24 million. The value of 175 W. Broadway alone is listed at $5.5 million. The large three-story brick building with the long row of dark, obscured widows most recently housed Symantec, and decades earlier Bon Marché. — Daniel Epps & Ted Taylor
A
Downtown Vision DIVA, the Downtown Initiative for the Visual Arts, began its efforts about three years ago to bring the visual arts into parity with the performing arts in the greater Eugene community.
Its establishment at 110 W. Broadway in November 2003 has created a cultural community center with classes, lectures, exhibitions, performances, and artists' services. It has a growing multi-media and film program that has attracted and built a young audience. DIVA has received national recognition for these activities. As a purely bootstrap effort DIVA has been successful beyond the dreams of its founders. Our programs currently bring 1,000 people a month through our doors and DIVA is progressing in its goal to become self-supporting. DIVA's mission is to be a "catalyst for visual arts activities in downtown Eugene" and it has been effective in its mission. Collaborative efforts have been most successful and have put to rest the fears of many that our efforts would dilute, weaken or compete with existing arts organizations. We firmly believe that all arts activities strengthen the cultural life of our community. Downtown Eugene Inc. is working toward a marketing program to brand downtown as a regional arts center, and Robb Hankins, the director of cultural services for the City of Eugene, is promoting Eugene as "the World's Greatest City for the Arts and the Outdoors." Funding for support and signage should be seriously considered from our city councilors and the Budget Committee for both these efforts. I'm writing, however, to speculate on what's next. With the rumors and discussion of future change and development in downtown Eugene, I want to encourage us, as a community, to think of the next step and to be engaged in the decision-making. An arts facility such as DIVA has been included in the recent city of Eugene Downtown Plan. Of course there are no funds to provide such a facility at this time. Typically a capital campaign would be organized to raise funds, but perhaps there is another way. I'd like to propose exploration of other opportunities such as a public-private partnership. This is a strategy that has been successful in many other cities. Recognizing that typical retail development is not currently working in our downtown, can we forge a partnership to encourage private commercial development to include a visual arts center? Can we find investors in this concept? Can we encourage our Planning Department to use its tools to leverage our progress and secure a permanent location for the visual arts downtown? I believe we can fill an entire city block with arts and related activities. Consider the possibility of a truly comprehensive visual arts center and the activity it would create. Let's bring together DIVA, Maude Kerns Art Center, the Eugene Glass School, the Lane Arts Council office and a sculpture and ceramics facility. Add classrooms and exhibition spaces, a rental gallery, a small lecture and performance hall, an experimental/independent film theater, an art supplies store, and studio space for artists. A major component would be a large "art" film theater. Consider too a sculpture garden and room for storage and display of a regional art collection. Within the downtown we already have in place parking structures, a bus transit center, and an arts resource library. It is time to begin serious discussions of possibilities, specific properties, investors, private developers and city of Eugene participation. I invite you to take the initiative and join DIVA to work for development that includes a visual arts center and an arts-active downtown. Carolyn Kranzler is an architect, arts advocate, past-president of City Club of Eugene and one of the founders of DIVA and a current member of its board.
Green
Heart Downtown design doesn't just affect the people who live, shop and do business there. It also impacts the region's air, water and soil. Careful urban planning can enhance downtown Eugene's environmental, as well as economic, sustainability.
First, city center development can reduce sprawl, which occurs when low-density houses and commercial areas sprout up on the fringes of cities. Generally, sprawl is characterized by large distances separating homes from workplaces and neighborhood services, forcing people who live on the outskirts of cities to drive everywhere rather than walk or use public transit. The antidote to sprawl is compact urban development. When people live near vital facilities — grocery stores, drug stores, restaurants and bars; offices and movie theaters and clothing shops and transit stations — they can walk, ride bikes or take buses where they need to go. This cuts back on automobile pollution and traffic while pumping up the local economy. Compact urban design also reduces public infrastructure costs; utility and sewer lines already exist downtown, while suburban development means building more lines for fewer houses. But compact development carries a higher price tag than development on the fringes, because real estate values are higher in urban centers and re-building old structures tends to cost more than new construction. Before developers propose downtown housing projects, they need to feel confident that the investment will pay off. Cities committed to compact urban growth can encourage downtown housing by partnering with developers to create mixed-use urban areas through tax credits, subsidies and infrastructure assistance. "If the City Council really wants to see housing and revitalized businesses, there needs to be some type of public investment in these activities," says Rich Margerum, an assistant professor in the UO's Planning, Public Policy and Management (PPPM) department. Cities such as Portland, Berkeley, Calif., and Madison, Wisc., have successfully paired public with private investments to encourage housing units in city centers. The city of Eugene has too, in at least one instance. City planners partnered with developer Hugh Prichard to build Broadway Place, a downtown housing complex that was completed in 2000. Prichard funded the construction of 170 apartments, and the city paid for the 750-unit parking garage underneath, which serves both Broadway Place residents and downtown Eugene visitors. Prichard sees first-hand the results of downtown housing on automobile use. He says that in the suburbs, city code requires 1.5 parking spaces per living unit, and usage is about that. Closer to downtown, at the Lincoln School apartment complex, residents use less than 1.25 parking spaces per unit. And at Broadway Place, located just a few blocks from the downtown transit station, residents use less than 1 parking space per unit. "Our experience is, people downtown are using less cars," Prichard says. Professor Jean Stockard, the head of the UO's PPPM department, mentions another important factor to encourage walking: perceived safety. She says that people are more willing to walk when there are ample sidewalks, trees and a bustling atmosphere downtown. "Areas tend to be perceived as safer when there are more people," Stockard says. "It's not happened with Eugene." Bob Doppelt, director of a sustainability research program at the UO's Institute for a Sustainable Environment, and academic coordinator for the university's Sustainability Leadership Academy, is providing technical assistance for Mayor Piercy's sustainable development phase for downtown. He says that downtown design not only affects transportation patterns, but also energy needs. "Climate change is going to increasingly be a driver of our economy, and one thing it may do is to create an increased demand for summer cooling, which will put more stress on the energy systems and lead to more costs down the road," he says. Research shows that urban areas are hotter than their rural surroundings, a phenomenon known as the "urban heat island effect." Concrete buildings, rooftops and asphalt roads absorb and store solar heat on hot days, then re-release it after sunset. Not only does this cause people to use more air conditioning; increased temperatures also exacerbate smog. According to researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, L.A., smog concentrations increase by 3 percent for every degree above 70 degrees Fahrenheit. To keep urban temperatures down, Doppelt suggests more natural landscapes, which hold less heat than paved surfaces. Heating and cooling costs can be kept to minimum by using well-insulated buildings with natural ventilation systems. Downtown design also affects water quality, Doppelt says. Paved surfaces cause stormwater to collect pollutants and run directly into local waterways. One way to counter-act that effect is by designing bio-swales, natural areas that act like small wetlands. Storm runoff flows into the bio-swales, where it drains into the soil or evaporates instead of discharging into the river. Many European cities incorporate bio-swales, but it may not be possible in downtown Eugene because the area is already highly developed, Doppelt says. Green roofs, however, are an option. By growing plants directly on rooftops, developers can reduce runoff while enhancing cooling and heating. If sustainability is a goal of downtown design, Doppelt says, then designers should plan for current and future environmental, economic and social constraints and opportunities. "Sustainability is, at its core, the ability to adapt to change over time," he says. "You don't want to box yourself into a certain path that will reduce the choices you will have in the future." Doppelt says that the environment, the economy and social welfare are increasingly interlinked. For example, climate change will reduce water availability in the Northwest, and households, businesses and government will be under increasing pressure to reduce CO2 emissions from fossil fuel. Eugene's urban planners can benefit from an awareness of those connections. "How can we reduce our use and dependency on materials that rely on carbon or produce greenhouse gases? It really requires a system approach to think those issues through," Doppelt says. "Eugene has done a good job over the years, and we need to stay focused on a systems approach."
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