Since it is part of the Brooklyn neighborhood, we should have decision authority about what happens to the island. We sacrificed our riverfront years ago for the Ross Island Bridge thoroughfare, how about returning the favor granted by this opportunity?
Tim - 16 years ago
Give the Brooklyn Neighborhood access to the island in their backyard and the river.
Rudy Barton - 16 years ago
In urban design terms, what to do with Ross Island is a microcosm facing the region. It is a mistake to look but not touch. Parts of the island definintely need protection, but parts of the island definitely need access to learn. Isolating Ross Island from the rest of the city ignores serious urbanistic issues and prevents us from truly addressing serious friction points of urban development. Creatively confronting the need to balance the natural world with the consequences our daily lives will allow us to see the urgent need to reduce such consequences. People who use Forest Park, Oaks Bottom and the Columbia Slough treasure and work to protect those areas - similar stewardship can happen with Ross Island.
Ron Miller - 16 years ago
What about making Ross Island the center point of a World's Fair? The last World's Fair in the US was in Knoxville in 1982 -- Portland hosted the World's Fair once in 1905. The theme of the fair could be the unique way that Portland blends our urban and natural environment. Ross Island and Oaks Bottom could form the core of the park and then an additional area could be just north of the Rose Garden. Keep development to a minimum, re-use existing structures and re-claim some of that industrial area between the Rose Garden and Swan Island for natural areas.
Since it is part of the Brooklyn neighborhood, we should have decision authority about what happens to the island. We sacrificed our riverfront years ago for the Ross Island Bridge thoroughfare, how about returning the favor granted by this opportunity?
Give the Brooklyn Neighborhood access to the island in their backyard and the river.
In urban design terms, what to do with Ross Island is a microcosm facing the region. It is a mistake to look but not touch. Parts of the island definintely need protection, but parts of the island definitely need access to learn. Isolating Ross Island from the rest of the city ignores serious urbanistic issues and prevents us from truly addressing serious friction points of urban development. Creatively confronting the need to balance the natural world with the consequences our daily lives will allow us to see the urgent need to reduce such consequences. People who use Forest Park, Oaks Bottom and the Columbia Slough treasure and work to protect those areas - similar stewardship can happen with Ross Island.
What about making Ross Island the center point of a World's Fair? The last World's Fair in the US was in Knoxville in 1982 -- Portland hosted the World's Fair once in 1905. The theme of the fair could be the unique way that Portland blends our urban and natural environment. Ross Island and Oaks Bottom could form the core of the park and then an additional area could be just north of the Rose Garden. Keep development to a minimum, re-use existing structures and re-claim some of that industrial area between the Rose Garden and Swan Island for natural areas.
I would turn it into a golf course.