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[music playing]
Marcus Mundy: If you know anything about Portland, you know
that it consists of a whole bunch, a whole series of individual neighborhoods, each with
their own character, their own flavor, their own demographic in some cases; and so we have
an opportunity to maintain the strength of the communities, which is all the people,
not just the people who can afford lattes and condos, but the people that live throughout the region.
Kathryn Harrington: Metro, as well as the three county governments,
and all 25 cities, and the various stakeholders, land use advocates, natural resources advocates,
citizens were able to come together on a plan that we think will work well for generations
50 years into the future.
Robert Liberty: Making the Greatest Place is a continuation
of 30-year effort to change how we grow in the region and the state, to change from a
sprawling pattern of development to compact, vibrant cities surrounded by farm and forestland,
and natural resources.
Richard Whitman: Urban growth boundary in the Portland area
has been very successful in terms of reducing the amount of farmland and forestland that
has had to be used for urbanization over time. The urban growth boundary concept started
as part of Oregon's statewide land use program about 35 years ago, and the basic idea is
that communities will have limits in terms of how far they grow so that they grow efficiently
within that area, and so that we conserve the very important farmland and forestland
that's very productive here in Oregon outside of those boundaries.
Craig Dirksen: Every time you find a reason not to build
on an acre inside the urban growth boundary, you are sentencing an acre outside the urban
growth boundary to eventual development. So which thing do you want to preserve? A piece
of land inside the UGB that's probably already somewhat ecologically degraded anyway, or
preserve a piece of pristine land that's outside the UGB?
Burton Weast: The traditional ways of financing infrastructure
and development is not going to work in the future, because we have a lot of changes occurring,
as we all know. Money's harder to come by, markets have changed. So Metro reached out
to the business community and said, "Why don't you help us?"
Robin MacArthur: Great plans don't mean anything unless of
course we have investment dollars to focus our investments. We have really evolved in
the past couple of years at Metro from a planning agency to start to think about what kind of
investments on the ground do local communities need to help grow up, to build their downtowns,
and their main streets. And so we're trying to develop an array of services at Metro under
the 'Making the Greatest Place' moniker that describes the technical and financial resources
that we might be able to provide at the local jurisdiction to do that.
Male Speaker: Building on transit lines like this allows
people not to have a car.
Fred Hansen: Having transportation options is one of the
key elements of making a place livable. The place that has only a car -- the only way
to get to a coffee shop, a dry cleaner, a grocery store -- really limits what one gets
to be able to do.
Male Speaker: We just come down here all the time. [laughs]
Female Speaker: We used to drive, right? Male Speaker: Yeah, but there's no place to park.
Fred Hansen: Here in the Portland region we consider to
have a walkable, bike-able, transit-friendly community is something that is very, very
important. It's really what makes for livability.
Marcus Mundy: Our average incomes here are actually lower
than a lot of cities on the West Coast. Part of 'Making the Greatest Place' is to try and
explore implementing this principle that the benefits and burdens of growth and change are
shared equitably.
Robert Liberty: Well, they're trying to make sure that each
community is included in every neighborhood.
Michael Jordan: We're taking the approach that there are 25
cities in three counties, and if they reach their vision, we're successful.
Marcus Mundy: For the city to be great
they need to be -- it needs to be reflective of the population that is represented there.
So as long as planning agencies from Metro to the U.S. government do that, then I think
we'll be in good shape.
Robin MacArthur: It's really about community. It's not just
Portland. I mean we -- the conditions are ripe here. We're very excited because there's
a long history of planning, but I think that folks across the country really want these things.
Robert Liberty: What we do here is far from perfect; we have
a lot of work ahead, but I hope it's inspiring to other people in communities like ours to
try to make a better future for all the citizens. [music playing]