July 3, 2007, The Oregonian Online, Steve Duin

This is one of two articles I have seen since Friday about the return of Columbia Sportswear to the Central City with the mention of the tax break request for Blanchard.

I would really hope the city and Opus give CS everything they want at the Burnside Bridgehead! Everything! More height! More towers! Change the configuration to office and work/live space to give CS the ability to have some of their employees right on site.

Losing Blanchard will be the loss of the last inter-city location for a MLB Stadium. The USPO site is going condo within ten years.

This is really bad folks!

BB

"Scrawny neck of the woods?" I think Steve needs to get out of his office (in the decrepit Oregonian building) more often.

And yes - Bridgehead all the way, baby.

So as of the 30th of August we have this news from the Oregonian.

Columbia Sportswear Staying Put by Andy Dworkin

So the good news is Blanchard can still be set aside for a minor league ballpark with design for MLB expansion. The bad news is the Burnside Bridgehead Project isn't going anywhere, let alone up.

Thanks PDC for not choosing the logically choice, BEAM! BEAM understood the market and had the best chance for completing the plan. Their only issue was the Couch/Burnside Couplet hadn't been accounted for. BEAM could have then accounted for the Couplet and we would have broken ground months ago, if BEAM had been given a chance.

PDC screws up on BB and OCC Hotel work. That was a bad few years for PDC judgement. Hopefully Metro can move forward on the hotel even if the current plan isn't my favorite.

BB