Chiba Clock Tower

Here are a couple of photos of the Chiba Clock Tower at the north end of McCarthy Park on Swan Island. A sign at the base has a short inscription:

This solar clock tower was presented to the people and Port of Portland by Mr. Takeshi Numata, Governor of Chiba Prefecture and the administrator of the Port of Chiba, on June 5 1987. The Port of Portland and the Port of Chiba became sister ports in November 1980 to enhance the friendship and prosperity of the United States and Japan.

Apparently a "sister port" is like a sister city relationship between local port authorities, and Portland has several of these, also including Ulsan, South Korea (which also a sister city of ours) and Tianjin, China. This is in addition to Portland's half a dozen or so "regular" sister cities.

Apart from what the sign tells us, I don't know a lot about this clock. I found a city document comparing Port of Portland recreation facilities w/ other West Coast cities, which mentions the clock in passing, but that's about it. The library's Oregonian newspaper database doesn't seem to have anything about the clock, specifically, but it does tell us the gift-giving was mutal, as Portland shipped a Lelooska totem pole to Japan in 1986. (Lelooska also created the large totem pole next to the Chart House on Terwilliger, and various others around the area.)

You'd think a solar-powered clock from Japan would be a beloved local landmark in 2015 Portland. You'd think hipsters would ride their fixie art bikes to the solar clock and picnic on artisanal donuts and PBR while strumming their ukuleles, and then the tourist guidebooks would find out about it, and senior tour groups from Kansas would show up in giant buses to view Portland hipsters in their native habitat or something. But due to the weird out-of-the-way location, none of this seems to have happened, at least not yet. But at least this way I can talk about the Chiba Clock Tower and say "you probably haven't heard of it", for whatever that's worth.

Waud Bluff Bridge

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A recent post here covered Portland's new Waud Bluff Trail, at the north end of Swan Island. I mentioned in passing that the trail included a new footbridge over the railroad tracks here, and said something to the effect that I was saving the bridge for a separate post. I think on the theory that I'd done a few other posts about pedestrian bridges over railroads, and from what I could tell there was a manageable number of other such bridges out there, usually rather obscure, and thus a mini-project was born.

As I understand, today's official Waud Bluff Trail is new, but there has been an unofficial trail down the bluff here for a long time. The current trail seems to have incorporated an old service road, which once continued down to track level past the level of the bridge. I gather the route of the unofficial trail involved walking across the railroad tracks the old fashioned way, without a bridge. Turning the trail into something official involved building a bridge, since the railroad was never going to sign off on a new grade-level pedestrian crossing. Railroads apparently take a dim view of the human nature of pedestrians, since they also seem to want any bridges to be entirely enclosed, I suppose so people can't toss rocks onto a passing train, or jump onto the train as part of a daring Old West-style train robbery, or something.

The Waud Bluff Trail opened in spring 2013 after six years of planning and handwringing about funding. The bridge had been installed the previous December. This bridge made the whole trail possible, but it's not universally admired. A Bicycle Transportation Alliance article pointed out the new bridge design is not very bike or wheelchair friendly at all, and expressed hope for for a future retrofit, sooner rather than later.

The trail forms one small segment of the ambitious North Portland Greenway Trail, which would run between downtown Portland and Kelley Point Park. The segment across Swan Island from Waud Bluff to the south end would essentially incorporate existing sidewalks and bike lanes into the project, which is probably all you can do unless you want to build a flat trail halfway up the bluff, skirting Swan Island entirely.

Swan Island Lagoon

Here are a few photos from the Swan Island Boat Ramp, at one corner of the Swan Island lagoon, in the midst of a shipping and industrial zone. I haven't actually taken up boating; it just seemed like an interesting spot to go and take some photos. Looking around, you'll see some more or less natural areas, as well as a bunch of ships and barges docked at the ship repair facility downriver. There's even one end of a Freightliner wind tunnel protruding out over the lagoon, which is not something you'll see every day. Unless you work there, obviously.

The land around the boat ramp is not quite a city park; for some reason it's owned by the city's Bureau of Environmental Services, the local stormwater and sewer agency. I'm not sure what their interest in the place might be, since it looks like it predates their Big Pipe project on the other side of Swan Island.

This area was actually once part of the Willamette River, back when Swan Island was still an island, before the channel was filled in during the early 20th Century. Swan Island then became home to Portland's municipal airport until the current one opened in 1940, and it quickly became a shipbuilding center during World War II, churning out the war's ubiquitous T2 tankers. After shipbuilding wound down, it eventually evolved into today's general industrial zone. It seems like an unlikely place to put a public boat ramp. There are very few river launch points along the lower Willamette, so I suppose the city saw a chance to add another and grabbed it, even though boaters may have to dodge tankers and grain ships and Coast Guard dredges in order to use it.

As with much of the lower Willamette, the river here is full of all sorts of icky stuff, and there are big signs here warning people to never, ever, ever eat any fish caught here. Fishing in the Willamette has become a popular activity among some local immigrant communities, so the signs are translated into several languages to make sure people get the memo.

In some of the photos you'll see a rather photogenic abandoned and half-sunken boat not far from the boat ramp. This has been there for several years, and it's part of a larger abandoned boat problem the state continues to wring its hands about. Apparently nobody has the legal authority or the funding to do anything about it, so abandoned boats in state rivers just continue to sit abandoned indefinitely while nature slowly takes its course.

A Vintage Portland photo from 1935 shows this area in its short-lived airport days. A comment on the article mentions that the Swan Island lagoon was a popular waterskiing spot in the 1950s and 1960s, back before the word "Superfund" was invented. Eew.

Waud Bluff Trail

Here are some photos from Portland's short, steep, and shiny new Waud Bluff Trail, which connects the north end of Swan Island to the residential area above, near the University of Portland. The trail's only about 1000 feet long, but with an average 10-13% grade, and at the bottom there's a footbridge over railroad tracks, and there are steep stairs on the other side of the tracks. (The footbridge gets a post of its own, because, um, them's the rules here.) There's a further 700 feet of flat trail between the footbridge and the dead-end street next to the Coast Guard base.

There's a nice in depth article about the trail at BikePortland; when I visited, nearly all of the other people there were biking up the hill. The article follows the trail downhill, in the opposite direction to all the cyclists I saw, who were doing the climb and looking very determined about it. I hope none of them were expecting cheering crowds or KOM points at the top.

So there's a nice view of Swan Island and downtown from along the trail, which is the main reason I visited. The city thoughtfully installed a couple of turnouts so you can stop for the view and not be in anyone's way, which is what I did. And if you're riding the hill, the turnouts are a chance to get off your bike and give up and wait for the team car to come pick you up. While all the other cyclists ride by and roll their eyes and giggle as they steamroller their way up the hill like it's nothing. At least you get to laugh last when they inevitably test positive for EPO or 'roids or something.

Big Pipe Portal

This stop on our ongoing public art tour takes us to industrial Swan Island, home to Big Pipe Portal, a monument to... um... an enormous sewer pipe. The sculpture is a round archway at the south end of McCarthy Park, on the upstream side of Swan Island. It's a short walk from the McDonalds, in case you need somewhere to park or have a sudden craving for a McRib. The RACC description explains what's going on here:

This sculpture is sited on the banks of the Willamette River at the confluence of the East Side and West Side Combined Sewer Overflow (C.S.O.) tunnels, and is surrounded by a man-made home to heavy industry. The sculpture echoes an ecological approach to the built environment wherein manufacturing is interwoven with our shared natural resources.

Although the Big Pipe Project is the largest infrastructure project in Portland history, it is largely invisible. Working closely with the Bureau of Environmental Services, the sculpture celebrates this hidden work by revealing and readapting massive precast concrete segments of the Big Pipe. These pieces of infrastructure are now put to work in support of art and narrative. Partially buried in the alluvial bank, the sculpture traces out the circumference of the hidden pipe and transforms it from an industrial artifact into a woven arch of currents and eddies.

The page also notes it was created by the design firm rhiza A + D, which also designed Cloud Cavu at the Cascades MAX station near the airport.

The Big Pipe project is a long-running city project intended to keep raw sewage out of the Willamette. Early on, the city made the unfortunate (but common) decision to have city sewers and storm drain runoff use the same pipes. This obviously saved money, and it generally did the job, except when the combined system was overloaded. When that happened, the overflow, um, material had to go somewhere, and unfortunately the only place it could go was directly into the river. And even more unfortunately, the system was overloaded a lot, because it rains here. So the idea behind the Big Pipe was to install enormous underground pipes on each side of the river to catch the outflow before it got to the river, and eventually direct it to the big sewage plant in North Portland. The westside Big Pipe actually tunnels under the Willamette right around here, and a huge (and mostly underground) pumping station here on Swan Island (next door to Big Pipe Portal) sends it uphill for the last leg of its journey to North Portland. As the description above explains, this was the largest and most expensive infrastructure project in Portland history, and yet the only parts of it visible to ordinary citizens are higher sewer bills, and a drop in the number of "ZOMG Don't Touch The River" alerts on the evening news. Don't get me wrong; like most people over eight years old, I'm basically ok with the sewer system being invisible. I can see how the Bureau of Environmental Services (the oh-so-delicately-named sewer agency) might feel their $1.4 billion investment has gone unappreciated, though. So the art helps the public imagine just how big the pipe is, without making people dwell on what's burbling through the pipe.

McCarthy Park expedition

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Today's thrilling adventure takes us to Portland's little-known McCarthy Park, a tiny spot on the Willamette up on Swan Island. Yes, industrial Swan Island, which isn't an island (anymore) and has no swans. The park's just a small grassy area tucked between two Freightliner office buildings, with a few benches, a historical marker, and a small ramp for launching small boats, probably nothing bigger than a canoe or a rowing shell. The big deal here is that it's about the only (legal) public access to the river between downtown & the St. Johns Bridge, so the park offers an unusual view of the river and downtown. So I thought I'd go take a few photos, and then see what (if anything) the Interwebs have to say about the place.

The signs indicate the park's owned by the Port of Portland and not by the city, which may explain why I'd never heard of it before last week. The Port's all about no-nonsense he-man stuff -- cargo ships, airports, and heavy industrial parks -- so operating a grassy riverside picnic spot isn't really their core business, and they don't make a lot of noise about it. Zero, in fact, as far as I can tell.

My guess is that the park was created as part of the Port's gigantic Swan Island Industrial Park. Perhaps when the Port decided this would be the white-collar corner of Swan Island, they figured they ought to spruce it up a little.

The Wikimapia page for one of the adjacent Freightliner buildings claims it used to be an upscale shopping center back in the 70's. Now, if anything Wikimapia is even less authoritative than Wikipedia (even I've added to it on occasion), but the "Ports O'Call" building is kind of unusual. It's kind of a rambling Craftsman-style complex, and it's not hard to imagine it divided up into swanky boutiques. Probably swanky macrame and gold medallion boutiques, it being the 70's and all. Apparently the idea of shopping on Swan Island sounded just as weird back then as it does now, since the mall eventually cratered (according to Wikimapia) and eventually Freightliner bought it.

The industrial park (and mall) replaced earlier WWII-era shipyards, which in turn displaced Portland's original airport. So what comes next, condo towers?

The city's "River Renaissance" site has a page about the park, describing it thusly:

McCarthy Park is a small, relatively unknown park on Swan Island with beautiful views of the city and the river. It is mostly used by local workers during lunch hours and after work. The park is the only place where people can access the river between the Steel Bridge and the St. Johns bridge.

It also appears on the city's North Portland Walking Map, which is where I first heard of it, and it also shows up on the state's Willamette River Recreation Guide, although neither provides any further info beyond the location.

A May 2002 Oregonian article, "When Business Shuts Down, Island Is Like Private Hideaway", sings the praises of the park, which we're told is quite nice outside of 9-to-5 business hours.

McCarthy Park also shows up in a blog post at OregonLive as a fun place to take kids, with all the rocks and driftwood along the riverbank. Gee, I dunno. I'm not sure touching rocks and driftwood along this stretch of the river is such a great idea. I mean, sure, maybe all those ooky chemicals will give your kid amazing superpowers. Or maybe not. Probably not, in fact.

It turns out the path through the park is just one segment of the larger "North Portland Greenway Trail". Right now this trail stretches for about a mile on Swan Island. The eventual goal is for the trail to follow the river from downtown all the way to St. Johns and beyond. Which is pretty ambitious, since right now much of the route is a patchwork of heavy industrial uses and Superfund sites.

A local advocacy group called npGreenway has a map of the envisioned route. They've also got a Flickr stream here.

I ran across couple of articles about the trail at the Tribune and BikePortland, and a fascinating, in-depth blog post, "Walking the Greenway Trail on Swan Island".

I honestly had no idea there was a park on Swan Island, much less a mile-long trail. I realize it's been in the paper a few times, and I might have even glanced at the news a bit. But it's also way up in North Portland, outside my neighborhood, so I suppose I just wasn't paying attention.

I think the idea behind the trail is to sort of mirror the westside's Willamette Greenway Trail, which was plotted out way back in 1987. It's still not really complete, so it may be a while yet before you can bike out to Kelly Point on the new NoPo edition.

Here's a BikePortland piece about a recent bike tour of the area further north, including the area around Bridge 5.1 I was too chicken to go investigate. I was kind of pleased to see that one commenter echoes my sentiments about adding pedestrian/bike access to the rail bridge. It wasn't me. Cross my heart.

Incidentally, it kind of amuses me how the alleged "park" properties up there have such sunny, bucolic names: "Willamette Cove" and "Harbor View". They sound like upscale gated communities or something. You certainly wouldn't hear the names and think "Superfund", but that's what they are.

I didn't follow the Greenway trail when I was there, partly because I didn't realize the extent of it, but mostly because I was worried about parking. If you look at the satellite photo above, you'll see parking lots all over the place, but they're for Freightliner employees only. I parked a few blocks away at McDonalds, but I figured I shouldn't stay away too long in case the tow truck mafia was staking the place out. As I left I went through the drive-thru and got a coffee and one of those new "Southern-style" chicken biscuits, I guess to get right with the Law or whatever. Turned out to be kind of tasty, actually. I've seen a couple of mentions of there being dedicated parking for the Greenway somewhere else, but I'm not sure quite where it is. You might be better off taking the bus -- both the 72 and the 85 finish their runs just a block or two from the park. I know that's what I'll do next time around.

The rest of my Flickr photoset is here. FWIW.

The Skidmore Bluffs

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A few pics of a secret little spot up in North Portland, a park the city calls Mocks Crest Property, and everyone else calls the Skidmore Bluffs [map].

The park's a small grassy area atop high cliffs overlooking the Willamette. To the south you can see part of downtown Portland. Directly below, you get a great view of the Union Pacific railyards if you're into that sort of thing, and to the north you can see parts of Swan Island and industrial North Portland. Further to the west, across the river, are the green hills of Forest Park. It's quite a view. Great place for a picnic, or to watch the sunset, or take pictures, or just hang out, etc. I didn't check to see if there's WiFi here, because that would be too geeky even for me. So ymmv if you show up with a laptop and expect to work on your PowerPoint slides or whatever. And if you'd rather work on your sales presentation than enjoy the view, why would you go to the trouble to get here, anyway?

I didn't tinker with the colors in photo #2 here. It really is that green, at least in the right light, during the right time of year.

A small sign at the park says it was purchased with Metro Greenspace money in 1995, and the parks website says the city's owned it since '98. The city hasn't done a lot with the place in the short time it's owned it, but that's fine. Leave it like it is. No railings please. They block the view, and all they do is protect stupid people from gravity. If you haven't realized by now that falling off of stuff from a great height is bad, it's time for you to go, that's all I'm saying.

If I was going to add anything at all to the place, maybe a trail to the bottom via one of the gullies bordering the park to the north or south. Or even better, possibly a steep, vertigo-inducing set of stairs. That would be fairly awesome, actually.

You can see the hillside's been neatly trimmed up, probably so the brush won't catch on fire later in the summer. I have no clue how they do this. All I know is that you couldn't pay me enough.

So here are a few comments about the place from out on the interwebs. You'll notice that everyone says the place is top secret insider info (although they posted on the net to say so). So shhhh, don't tell anyone. I don't want to spoil anyone's fun, of course, but I figured it'd be OK to post about the place here since nobody reads this humble blog anyway. Beside, I'm just repeating stuff that was already out there on the net, and posting a few photos. It's not like it was that secret, really. And what could really happen anyway? It's a small park in a quiet neighborhood, it's not like it'll suddenly be overrun by buses full of Japanese tourists or "active seniors". And unless someone proposes building an ultra-luxury condo tower next door, which is highly unlikely, the place isn't going to be on the parks bureau's radar for the foreseeable future. So don't worry, it's all good.

The Dirt Cheap Guide calls the place "Mocks Crest Park":

Little known to the public, this small park in North Portland's Overlook neighborhood offers sweeping views of industrial districts (Union Pacific Railyards, Swan Island, and the Northwest Industrial District), bridges (Fremont Bridge, St Johns Bridge, and Railroad Bridge), West Hills neighborhoods (Hillside, Kings Hill, Washington Park, Council Crest, and Marquam Hill), downtown, the Willamette River, and miles of Forest Park. Mocks Crest Park isn't on most maps and isn't mentioned by the parks and recreation dept, so this is insider knowledge. And it's panoramic for sure. The view at night of all those lights is also serious (I imagine the sunset would be good since you're facing southwest).

Mocks Crest Park is at the dead end of N Skidmore Terrace.

The Zinester's Guide to Portland once described it:

We haven’t included this li’l gem of a park in previous editions because we were jealous and preferred it to be our li’l secret. Well, what is popularly known as the “Skidmore Bluffs” is not so secret anymore. This is basically a patch of grass at the west end of Skidmore, sitting on Mocks Crest, the bluff overlooking the Willamette River below. You won’t find softball fields or rose gardens here, just some of the best views in Portland. You’ll have downtown and Forest Park on the opposite bank, and the industrial riverside areas and UP’s Albina train yard directly below (which explains why this spot is popular with the hobos). It’s a great spot to watch the sun set over the West Hills and contemplate life.

And a review on Yelp says:

Portland purists may be disappointed that I'm letting the cat out of the bag about one of Portland's best green spaces to watch a sunset and hang out with friends while overlooking the industrial maze of Swan Island and the west hills across the river. While other popular parks and crannies are widely known (Mount Tabor, Forest Park, Peninsula Park, and Laurelhurst are among my and others' faves), the Skidmore Bluffs is somewhat lesser-known. Therefore, ride your bike up there and bring your camera--the evening light is great for snapping shots of your photogenic friends lazing and laughing together at the Bluffs. To get there, take Skidmore all the way west until it ends. Take right and first immediate left, and you'll end at the Bluffs.

And from a bike forum post:

- go to the skidmore bluffs. from East Broadway, take Williams north to Skidmore.
take a left on skidmore and ride west (toward the river) until you come to the end. take a right and then an immediate left. (skidmore blvd vs. skidmore ave) at the end of the block you'll find the park.
it's an amazing overlook of the city/trainyards/forrest park. I don't think it's an official park because lots of people drink there but there are still benches and such. GREAT at sunset or at night. big bike destination. bring a tallboy and friends.

CafeUnknown just calls it the "Nameless Park", and has a photo of the place.

For a bit more of the unique Skidmore Bluffs vibe, check out "Bluffs, but not bluffing" at Mirror and Shadow.

A couple more photos:

This is the "grand" entrance to the park, on Skidmore Ct. (not to be confused with Skidmore Terrace). I'm not sure what was here before the park. Someone's house, maybe?

Cottony bits, caught by the wind. If I believed in magic -- and I'm not saying I do -- I'd say there was a bit of it around here.