Category: Structures

The Emerson School: No longer at 105 NW Park Ave.

Here’s the building where I spent nine years of my working life.  And as of last week, it’s a building that no longer houses the school I used to work for.

That’s right!  After 15 years at this location, The Emerson School has found a new home in Northwest Portland.

In moving closer to get a picture of the “For Lease” sign I laughed at the site of the wagon wheel, which somehow managed to escape both the junk collectors and the movers. I guess the next tenant will get to decide what to do with it. (I don’t think there will be a next tenant. I’m guessing this building will be pulled down.)

A nice time capsule of the color the room used to be (fuscha and turquoise) before Bre repainted it a more soothing color.

I am so incredibly glad I did not have to do anything to facilitate this move (two days of the junk people and five days of the actual movers) and I’m very excited for The Emerson School’s new home.

Comfy Inn: The motel is a changing

Stuff is going on with the former Comfy Inn. I first profiled it on the Orange Door website in this post. The motel is even featured in the first three pictures, so you don’t have to scroll far.

In the years since that post, it’s had a stint as some sort of transitional-type housing for women with children. But now, it’s in the process of being disassembled.

I assumed this was going to become another tall mixed-use building, but it seems that that is not the case. My favorite website Next Portland tells me that:

Early Assistance has been requested by DECA Architecture for a project at 8355 N Interstate Ave:

Conversion of motel to apartments. Minor changes include: New walls, doors, lighting, paint, signage, and new finishes.

This is interesting. We shall see what they will charge for apartments in a converted motel. And how will the kitchen situation work?

Small house probably not long for this world

This house is right next to the Bethel Lutheran Church, but it looks too small to have ever been a rectory or clergy house.  I’m guessing that if there was a rectory, it was in the space the parking lot is now taking up, behind the church.

This house was built in 1927 and is 502 square feet. It was advertised for sale “as is” and said it would have to be a cash buyer on the sign. That usually means a tear down  It sold for $235,000 on April 19, so expect that soon there will be a monolith sprouting here. It’s got some nice details that I will miss.  Not to mention the loss of yet another sub-1000 square foot house. Not everyone wants a big place.

Some things found on Burnside

It was a sunny day–the first in a long time. There wasn’t much to do at work and the Laurelhurst announced that they were changing from a second-run to a first-run theater. My friend S. North and I made plans to see one last movie for $3.00. And I decided to walk from work to the theater.

This is a well-trod route for me, but here are some fun things I saw:

I’ve recently learned that the reason this building and the Hippo Hardware building (see below) have arcades, is that they were built before Burnside was widened. When it was, the ground floors were pulled back to make an arcade.

You can see the transition a little more clearly in this picture.

Here’s the Hippo Hardware building which has the same feature. This building will be torn down in 2–5 years. Hippo Hardware says their landlord has been awesome for 26 years and continues to be awesome (thus, the long lead time), but that something else will be built here so they will most likely move. Ironically, I rarely walk on this side of Burnside. But construction of a building (probably a building that will look much like the one that will replace the Hippo Hardware building) made me cross the street. Upside?  I got some pictures I wouldn’t have normally taken.

Closer to the Laurelhurst Theater, I noticed that the building of Burnside 26 has infringed on the sign of the now-defunct Chinese Restaurant.

I’m not sure how building code allowed that to happen. I’m also impressed the construction people didn’t knock holes in it.

A walk on Mississippi Ave.

I spent a lovely morning walking on Mississippi Avenue looking for Help Wanted signs for Job Spotter.  I found none on Mississippi.  Maybe the stores there are too fancy for help wanted signs in the window? I also took some pictures.  Here they are:

On the lower left, ghost stairs that are probably not long for this word given the pace of the development.  You can see a new building that has gone up, looming over the original house.  Will something else be built on its other side?

Some great side-of-building art.

 

Someone has repurposed a disco ball into a very large Victorian-style garden looking glass. That’s a really big disco ball.  I wonder where it once was?

New construction happening where there once were ghost stairs. In fact, I have pictures of those ghost stairs.  See them here.

 

I love this gate.

Here is some art embedded into the side of building with a QR code to go with it.  I did not scan it, but you probably could.

 

Amen to this statement.  @UnzippedPDX turns out to be two strippers who talk about whatever they want.  Here’s a link.

 


I liked this oddly-shaped bumper–or back panel–sticker.  The internet tells me it’s a famous line from Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” which also led to a discussion of if Bob Dylan coined the phrase.

Overall, this was a good day for a walk.

The rest of the walk

This particular Friday, I took off of work for one of my favorite kind of no-work days: a day with no plan.  After blogging, I decided to walk to the ballot drop box to turn in my ballot.  That turned into a very long walk, because I further decided to walk down Interstate to take some pictures of some buildings that would be destroyed to build a mixed-use complex. You can read that post here.  I also combined this with looking for Help Wanted signs. Not for me, but because Job Spotter pays me in Amazon credit for each one I find.  I’ll have more about that at the end of the month.  In the meantime, here are my pictures from my walk.

When I moved to Kenton, this block was a KFC.  It went out of business after maybe a year.  Eventually the building was pulled down and the lot sat with a chain link fence around it for some time. But now: apartments.  A lot of them.  No parking either, which is unfortunate, as Lombard does not have any street parking, so all of these apartment dweller’s cars will be parked on neighborhood side streets.  This is turning our two-way side streets into defacto one-ways because there are solid lines of cars on both sides of the street making it impossible for two cars to pass each other.  The city should have started regulating neighborhood parking 10 years ago, but they did not, and so things are going to get very bad before they get better.

This was a one-story building that sat unused for all of my time living here.  In the last year or two, it was pulled down. And now its a lot with a chain link fence. It’s right across the street from the Rosa Parks Max stop, so I’m assuming it will become a mixed-use complex soon, though there isn’t anything on Next Portland.

Here is another thing that affects street parking.  Putting a six-unit apartment building on a lot where one house was.  This takes a structure that most likely had off-street parking and turns it into one that will probably bring 5+ cars parked in the street.  I know that the idea is that we are so great at transit that one doesn’t need to own a car, but the reality is that we are pretty good at transit and most people do own cars.  When my company conducted focus groups of one part of the city where the no-car thing is supposed to be easy, all but one of the 21 people had cars. Some had more than one car per household  Yet all were living in an area that is being built up without parking because supposedly no one needs cars.  I’d like to see a better system, one that doesn’t assume free street parking for people who do have a car and don’t have on-property parking. (And that includes my own household, one with no off-street parking, two people and one car.)

I would guess this guy is a scrap metal dealer as his truck and trailer are always loaded with metal things.  Incidentally, he lives in a four-unit, one story apartment complex, the type that are being torn down to build 24+ unit places that he probably could not afford to rent.  Here’s hoping that his complex doesn’t get sold to developers.

This used to be the site of the bowling alley.  It will now be mixed-use apartments.  Early on, a sign posted showed a swimming pool was included, but I’m not certain that will be part of the final product.

A very specific photo taken for a person who doesn’t actually read this blog, this is the front office of Edge, our old gym. It’s now an auto repair place. I was surprised to see how hip it looks.  Also, I’m pretty sure that’s the same couch that was there when Edge was there.  Either they bought the exact same kind and color (it’s Ikea, so that’s a possiblity) or Edge left it.

This was a home with a storefront facing Interstate, and a Taco Time.  It is now a pit. It will soon be more mixed-used apartment buildings.  I’m sad that I didn’t take a picture of either of the previous buildings, because the house/storefront was fairly unique to Interstate, and the Taco Time was in good shape. It was a leftover landmark from the time before Taco Bell became ubiquitous, a.k.a. my childhood.

This was, once upon a time, a single story building that had a convenience store–or maybe a cigarette shop?–in it.

I can no longer remember what used to be here.  Maybe a house.  These are not-so-new (but not older than five years) and are, according to the flyer, not apartments you can rent, but a LIFESTYLE.  Cue the eyeroll.
Zillow estimates they are $1075 to $1565, which gets you no parking and no washer/dryer, or a laundry room.  The website recommends using transit, but the person writing the copy clearly isn’t interested in taking transit, as they mention the #72 and the #4.  The #72 is close by. The #4 is far, and shares a stop with the #75. They entirely skip over the #44, which is between the #72 and the #4.

Also from the website: Our controlled access building offers a sleek, well-lit focal bike storage area. Your bike will be art, not just transportation on two wheels!

This has been here the longest of the buildings on this post.  It used to be the site of the Camelot Motel.  It is income-restricted (I think) and the mixed-use part of the building house the offices of Proud Ground, which is the organization that made it possible to buy our home.

This style of infill apartments drives me crazy.  I would love if they could design something more complicated than: box.

Here’s an update on the spot I featured in February 2017. My new favorite site Next Portland tells me this will be a 4-story, 30 unit apartment, with no parking. The kicker?  The two adjacent lots are also being developed into a “new 3-story multifamily apartment building with 19 one-bedroom dwelling units” and also quite possibly a “new 3-story 6-unit development”  That side street went from one 8-unit apartment and one home, to 49 for-sure units with a possibility of 55.  That’s a lot of people and their needs to add to 1.5 blocks.  Again, I’m for density, but what I don’t see, is the city addressing the parking issue.  While this is built right on the Yellow Line Max, that does not mean that 50+ units will be rented to people without cars.

Looking down the block on Dekum.

From that same site.  This is the kind of thing a certain type of people will look at and mutter about government over-regulation. I found it delightfully inventive.

And there’s yet more construction on Interstate!  This is going to be 51 units of affordable housing.  Finally, we get to the affordable housing!  Now known as Charlotte Rutherford Place, this will have, “51 new units of affordable housing …serving low-income households earning up to 60% of the median family income, with a portion of units reserved for those experiencing or at risk of homelessness. On-site resident services will include culturally specific recovery and employment support through partnerships with Miracles Club, NARA, and the Imani Program.”

There will be on-site surface parking, but I’m guessing that means about 10 spaces, not enough for all units, or even half of them.  Again, the city needs to get out in front of the parking thing.  When I lived in Boston, all the neighborhoods had permit parking.  At any rate, it’s nice to see a small iota of affordable housing, among all the other developments.

Guess how much this house costs.

Here’s a potential new feature for the blog:  A guess at the current real estate prices in Portland, Oregon.  This is a 4-bedroom, 3-bathroom home that sits on Interstate very close to the Rosa Parks/Interstate intersection.  It has a driveway, and from my observation, it was refurbished when it sold before–about five years ago.

What do you think the price of this house is?

Did you guess $685,000?  Then you are a winner.

Upholstery Block

Riding my  bike to work, I noticed this sign.  When I’m biking, I don’t like to stop, so I resolved to come back at a later date with my camera.  A random Friday off from work and a delay in demolition gave me my opportunity.

We’re looking at the block between N Webster and N. Alberta on Interstate.  My new favorite website Next Portland, tells me this block will turn into the Aniva Apartments.  There is a picture of what it will look like. It will have 90 units and tuck-under parking according to the building permit.

Here’s what’s here now, from Alberta Street:

And here’s the other end of the block, from Webster street:

This upholstery shop was here when I moved to Kenton in 2007.  It was one of two on Interstate.  Both have closed now, but there is now one on Lombard, and one in Kenton, so our net loss of upholstery shops is zero.

I took a picture of the backyard.  Soon, that house on the right won’t have much light on that side.  They will also get to enjoy a bunch of people being able to look right into their backyard.

This is the only house that will come down.  It occurs to me I should take a walk down Interstate and capture all the current houses. When I once told someone I lived on Interstate, she said, “I didn’t know there were any houses on Interstate.” I responded that there were a lot, but perhaps in 50 years there won’t be any.  Best to make a mark of them now, just like we did for the motels of Interstate.

The parking lot for the building on the corner of Alberta and Interstate.  Someone was living in the back corner of it, before they put up the fence.

This building will also go, which suprised me, as someone recently put some money into renovating it (newly paved parking lot, new paint job, general upgrades.) There was a coffee shop there for a bit, but it closed, probably for lack of customers. Ironically, once the new building goes up, I would put good money on it having a coffee shop.

There will also be a new building happening across the street. Proud Ground, the people who own the land my house sits on, will be developing the block across the street.  It hasn’t made it through review yet, so isn’t on the Next Portland Map, but the Portland Observer reports that 41 of the 50 units would be Proud Ground condominiums. It would also give priority to residents displaced by the gentrification of North/Northeast Portland.

Here’s what the block looks like now, from the Webster side:

From the Alberta side:

The cleaners and the shop with the yellow awning were in operation until recently.

Lots like this–with surface parking in front and the stores set back from the street–are in short supply on Interstate. It’s hard to see, but there is housing on this block already.  The building that houses the convenience store is hooked to another building running parallel to Interstate. It has apartments on the upper levels. It took me nearly a decade to notice them.

J’s Market is still open, though I’m guessing it won’t be for long.

No one has come to remove this phone booth, so I guess it will eventually be the job of the people who level the lot.