Monday Mailing
Year 23 • Issue 13 12 December 2016 1. Do Bike Share Systems Actually Work? 2. Portland Steps In To Save Oak Leaf Mobile Home Park From Redevelopment 3. Architecture At Zero’s Net-Zero Energy Competition Winners Announced 4. Facebook Safety Check 5. New Free Book: Sustainable Food Systems: The Role of the City 6. Webinar on Pilot Program to Expand UGBs for Affordable Housing 7. Employment Grows In 3 Out Of 5 Rural Counties 8. Defending Multi-Modalism 9. Measuring Rural Wealth Creation: A Guide for Regional Development Organizations 10. NITC Program Earns $15 Million Grant, National designation 11. Travel Oregon Launches Oregon Weather Compass 1. Do Bike Share Systems Actually Work? In the spring of 2010, a small group of entrepreneurs set out to change urban transportation across the United States. They began with a single modest system in Denver, and the concept has since expanded to more than 60 U.S. cities, including nine of the ten largest. In New York City, its biggest market, the system gets well over a million customer visits a month during peak season. If this were a startup, it would be a private equity darling. The CEO would be on the cover of Fast Company, praised as a bold, visionary captain of industry. It would be celebrated and debated for how it’s changing the fabric of urban American life. To access the full story, click here.
Quote of the Week: “Your body will honor you with wellness if you honor it with awareness.” ~Anonymous Oregon Fast Fact: A coin toss decided the name of Portland in 1845. The losing name was Boston.
2. Portland Steps In To Save Oak Leaf Mobile Home Park From Redevelopment The Portland Housing Bureau has provided a $1.3 million loan to help preserve a Northeast Portland mobile home park, the Oak Leaf, that was threatened by redevelopment. It’s the first time the Housing Bureau has stepped in to help preserve a mobile home park. “There are many steps to come, including upgrading the park, but this is a huge milestone,” said Portland Housing Commissioner Dan Saltzman. While the Oak Leaf deal is unique, the Housing Bureau has taken other steps in the past year to preserve housing that people on the brink of homelessness can afford. In June, it purchased the Joyce Hotel, a hostel that was the last remaining weekly stay building in the city. On Wednesday, it will seek authorization from the city council to spend $51 million to purchase The Ellington, a 263 unit affordable housing complex. To access the full story, click here. Page 1 of 6
3. Architecture At Zero’s Net-Zero Energy Competition Winners Announced The 2016 winners for the Architecture at Zero competition—and the competition’s up-to-$25,000 prize—have been announced. This year’s competition focused on the development of zero-net energy (ZNE) student housing for the San Francisco State University campus in California. Entrants were asked to create an overall site plan to accommodate the erection of 784 housing units and attendant programs like a student services center, food hall, and child care facility. The schemes were also asked to address parking issues. Further, the competition brief compelled participants to develop the design of one particular building from their proposal to a greater level of detail in order to convey ZNE performance compliance and to provide documentation attesting to these performance standards. To access the full story, click here. 4. Facebook Safety Check In times of disaster or crisis, people turn to Facebook to check on loved ones and get updates. It is in these moments that communication is most critical both for people in the affected areas and for their friends and families anxious for news. We want to provide a helpful tool that people can use when major disasters strike, so we’ve created Safety Check – a simple and easy way to say you’re safe and check on others. During a major disaster, Safety Check will help you: Let friends and family know you’re safe Check on others in the affected area Mark your friends as safe For more information, click here. 5. New Free Book: Sustainable Food Systems: The Role of the City Faced with a global threat to food security, it is perfectly possible that society will respond, not by a dystopian disintegration, but rather by reasserting co-operative traditions. This book, by a leading expert in urban agriculture, offers a genuine solution to today’s global food crisis. By contributing more to feeding themselves, cities can allow breathing space for the rural sector to convert to more organic sustainable approaches. Biel’s approach connects with current debates about agroecology and food sovereignty, asks key questions, and proposes lines of future research. He suggests that today’s food insecurity – manifested in a regime of wildly fluctuating prices – reflects not just temporary stresses in the existing mode of production, but more profoundly the troubled process of generating a new one. He argues that the solution cannot be implemented at a merely technical or political level: the force of change can only be driven by the kind of social movements which are now daring to challenge the existing unsustainable order. Drawing on both his academic research and teaching, and 15 years’ experience as a practicing urban farmer, Biel brings a unique interdisciplinary approach to this key global issue.. To access your free copy, click here. Page 2 of 6
6. Webinar on Pilot Program to Expand UGBs for Affordable Housing Join DLCD Staff for a Webinar - Monday, December 19, 2016, Noon to 1 p.m. Register for the Webinar Webinar connection details and password will be sent to registrants. Register by e-mailing amanda.l.long@state.or.us Overview of the Pilot Program In 2016, the Oregon Legislature passed House Bill 4079 (HB 4079), which aims to boost affordable housing by allowing two cities to develop affordable and market rate housing on lands currently outside urban growth boundaries (UGBs) without going through the normal UGB expansion process. The law directs the Land Conservation and Development Commission (LCDC) to set up a process and select two pilot projects, one for a city with a population up to 25,000, and one for a city with a population greater than 25,000. The proposed pilot project sites can be up to 50 acres, cannot be on high value farmland, and must meet other requirements. The pilot project cities must ensure the affordable housing on the sites remains affordable for the next 50 years, and must demonstrate efforts to accommodate and encourage needed housing within their existing UGBs. The Department of Land Conservation and Development (DLCD) has drafted rules to implement the program; LCDC will consider adoption of those rules in January 2017. After rules adoption, DLCD will adopt a timeline for pre-applications and full applications for those cities interested in the program. Eligible Cities The legislation limits, and draft rules clarify, which cities may apply. Eligible Cities over 25,000 Population: Albany, Bend, Corvallis, Eugene, Grants Pass, McMinnville, Medford, Redmond, and Springfield. Eligible Cities up to 25,000 Population: Incorporated cities except those in Clackamas, Marion, Multnomah, Polk, and Washington counties and cities in Jefferson County served by the North Unit Irrigation District. Interested Cities and Parties – Please Let Us Know If your city is interested in the program, we strongly encourage you to attend the webinar. If you are interested but cannot attend the webinar, please let us know so we can keep you up to date (e-mail amanda.l.long@state.or.us). Rulemaking Input The Department invites interested parties to submit or give testimony on the proposed rules prior to the January 26-27, 2017 LCDC meeting in St. Helens. Written testimony should be sent to amie.abbott@state.or.us, with copies to casaria.taylor@state.or.us and gordon.howard@state.or.us. Additional Information Copies of the legislation and draft rule, notes from the Rulemaking Advisory Committee, and other materials are available at http://www.oregon.gov/LCD/Pages/HB4079_AHPP.aspx
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Questions/Contact Gordon Howard Senior Urban Planner gordan.howard@state.or.us (971) 673-0964 Register for the Webinar Webinar connection details and password will be sent to registrants. Register by e-mailing amanda.l.long@state.or.us 7. Employment Grows In 3 Out Of 5 Rural Counties Employment grew in about 60 percent of rural counties (1,227 out of 1,976) between the first half of 2015 and the first half of 2016. Rural counties with rising employment levels were located in all regions of the country, but concentrated in the Midwest, the Southeast, and Pacific Northwest. Many counties with falling employment levels were located in States with significant oil and gas resources that had seen employment growth in past years, such as North Dakota, Oklahoma, and Pennsylvania; this trend reflects a recent decline in mining activity. Rural employment has risen modestly— including an increase of about 1.3 percent between 2013 and 2015—as the national economy has recovered since employment levels bottomed out in 2010. Employment grew another 0.5 percent between the end of 2015 and the second quarter of 2016, when it reached more than 20 million workers. Still, the overall rural employment level remains well below its pre-recession level. This map appears in the topic page for Rural Employment and Unemployment on the ERS website, updated November 2016. To access the full story, click here. 8. Defending Multi-Modalism President-elect Donald Trump has selected Elaine Chao to be transportation secretary. It is a clever selection: she is both a woman and an ethnic minority, and a politically experienced Washington insider (she previously served as Secretary of Labor and is married to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell). She is also politically very conservative. Chao is a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a "free market" policy institute that advocates automobile-oriented transportation planning. This represents the old transportation planning paradigm, which evaluates transportation system performance based primarily on motor vehicle travel conditions, using indicators such as roadway level-of-service, average traffic speeds and traffic congestion delay, and considers walking, cycling and public transit to be inferior modes, to be avoided as much as possible. This perspective favors automobile-oriented transportation investments, such as highway expansions and parking subsidies, and considers expenditures on active and public transport to be wasteful and unfair. Reflecting this paradigm, the Heritage Foundation's Tyransportation Policy Recommendations would eliminate federal funding for anything but highway projects; it would end all federal support for public transportation, congestion reduction and air quality programs, transportation alternatives (which include walking and cycling improvements), partnerships on livability programs, ferry services, the federal lands access programs, scenic byways, and education programs. To access the full story, click here.
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9. Measuring Rural Wealth Creation: A Guide for Regional Development Organizations Presents concepts and samples to create a development plan for measuring progress in rural wealth creation for rural development organizations (RDOs) involved in community and economic development. Specifically identifies 8 forms of capital measures useful to evaluate progress in rural wealth creation including the skills, understanding, physical health and mental wellness of the individuals within the community. To access a copy of the guide book, click here. 10. NITC Program Earns $15 Million Grant, National designation Portland State University has secured a five-year grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation for transportation research, education and outreach. Portland State's Transportation Research and Education Center, TREC, will administer the grant, expected to be worth up to $15.6 million. The grant names TREC's National Institute for Transportation and Communities program, or NITC, as one of five national university transportation centers. TREC will expand the NITC program and add new partners University of Arizona and University of Texas at Arlington. Existing partners University of Oregon, Oregon Institute of Technology and University of Utah remain partners in the Portland State-led program. The NITC program will focus on four research areas: increasing access to opportunities; improving multi-modal planning and shared use of infrastructure; advancing innovation and smart cities; and developing data, models and tools. Among the 11 projects funded in the first year of the grant are: • A smart platform for connected vehicle infrastructure and signal control; • A multidisciplinary look at how the concept of walkability has left out disadvantaged neighborhoods and how to address those gaps; • Two innovative efforts to help transit connect people with jobs and opportunities; • An examination of the economic and business effects of converting infrastructure for nonmotorized transportation; • A study to inform proactive traffic management during major disruptive events. TREC Director Jennifer Dill said the grant affirms the NITC program's contributions to improving transportation nationwide. "Since our center's founding in 2006, we've provided the research and insight to help transportation agencies serve all users," Dill said. "We're honored to continue leading this charge for the next five years." The latest grant means TREC has brought Portland State $48 million from a single federal program in the last 10 years. The requirement that each federal dollar be matched from a nonfederal partner has multiplied the effect of that investment, creating fruitful partnerships with more than 100 agencies and organizations nationally, including the Portland Bureau of Transportation, Metro, TriMet and the Oregon Department of Transportation. "This grant recognizes that Portland State research has shifted the national conversation around transportation," said Portland State President Wim Wiewel. "It used to center on moving as many cars as quickly as possible. Now we ask how transportation can give people access to opportunities and best serve our communities." U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon said Portland State is a natural choice to host a national transportation center. "With Portland on the front lines of the transportation technology and mobility changes that are redefining livability, there is no better place than Portland State University.
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"Portland State's international reputation for ground-breaking research on multimodal transportation, strong community partnerships, and urban sustainability will ensure that the national center will continue to be successful in Portland." Under the Fixing America's Surface Transportation (FAST) Act competition, U.S. DOT received 212 applications for 35 grants creating five national centers, 10 regional centers and 20 lower-level centers. National centers must obtain matching funds equal to the $15.6 million grant amount, distributed over federal fiscal years 2016 through 2020. 11. Travel Oregon Launches Oregon Weather Compass The Oregon Tourism Commission, dba Travel Oregon, recognizes that our region’s legendary rain may be its most famous winter weather pattern, but it’s hardly our only one. Remarkably, sunnier (or snowier) skies are rarely more than a couple hours away. Travel Oregon’s new Oregon Weather Compass is the first-ever mobile site designed to point local and visiting explorers to the weather they want, along with a range of activities to make the most of it, using real-time weather data provided through a partnership with The Weather Channel. "Oregon’s diverse geography is well-known, as travelers can take in pristine beaches, rugged mountains, high desert and lush valleys without leaving the state," said Todd Davidson, CEO of Travel Oregon. "Distinct climates come with such diversity, meaning that somewhere in the state this winter the sun is shining or the snow is falling. We’re pleased to make it easy for explorers to find the weather they love, as well as activities that will allow for maximum enjoyment and memorable moments." Developed by Wieden + Kennedy, the Oregon Weather Compass is a mobile site for explorers geographically located in the state or within 300 miles of its border. According to a recent study by Pew Research Center, the most "universal" task among smartphone users is accessing location-based information, with 90 percent of users seeking directions and other location-related details. With an eye toward this behavior, Travel Oregon set out to ease the trip-planning process, leading with weather-appropriate suggestions for various locales. "Oregon has a lot of different weather climates any time of year, from the coast to the mountains to the desert," said Matthew Carroll, art director at Wieden + Kennedy. "We just want people to know they can find the weather they’re looking for, even in the middle of winter." When using the Oregon Weather Compass site, users simply hold their phones flat, like a compass, then select a snow, sun or rain icon. Users are taken to a location page featuring a potential destination within a reasonable drive (183 cities and towns around Oregon, along with associated attractions as featured on TravelOregon.com, are represented). The location page includes the destination's description, expanded weather forecast, driving directions, and a link to more information and possible activities – from coastal storm watching in the rain to snowboarding down slopes of fresh powder to kayaking rushing waterways in the sunshine. The site conveniently links to navigation, and a share button is ideal for rounding up fellow adventurers to join the fun. The Oregon Weather Compass is a free site and only available as a mobile experience. For more information, click here.
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