Read the entire article here on The Business Journal of Portland website.

Officials bat around results of site-seeing mission

By Andy Giegerich
Business Journal staff writer

As efforts to finance a big league stadium in Portland inch along, many Rose City baseball watchers have half an eye on a key upcoming issue: Where, exactly, would such a stadium sit?

"It will clearly have a big impact, wherever it goes, and the development around it will probably boom in both retail and housing," said Mark Edlen, whose Gerding/Edlen Development Co. produced such projects as the Brewery Blocks in the city's Pearl District.

Added Dave Logsdon, the city of Portland's spectator facilities manager, "It'll definitely bring a whole change to the Portland scene."

The city, though, has put its ongoing site exploration on hold until stadium backers complete a financing proposal for the $350 million-plus edifice.

The financing plan is about 80 percent complete, but the group has secured only about $100 million so far.

Mayor Vera Katz will focus on the site analyses once stadium backers identify more potential funding sources, said Scott Farris, the mayor's spokesman.

In the meantime, Logsdon and a team of city planners and number crunchers will expand on an analysis unveiled a year ago that ranked the viability of seven sites.

The 2003 analysis, on which the city worked with stadium architectural firm HOK Group, of Kansas City, Mo., studied such factors as whether the site offers good urban design possibilities, how many local properties can be developed around it and whether it offers adequate transportation possibilities.

The city-HOK team further studied the ease with which the site is developable, the site's cost and the timing in which a stadium can be built.

The early favorite, based on rankings in the analysis, is on the west side Broadway Bridge-area land owned by the U.S. Postal Service. The property, at Northwest Hoyt Street and Broadway, is home to the post office's Portland headquarters.

Postal officials estimated last summer, though, that it would cost them between $150 million and $200 million to relocate.

"We'll look into more detail regarding the surrounding neighborhoods, land acquisition, business acquisition and demolition costs," Logsdon said.

As such, they'll also likely revamp last year's site rankings, tallied on a scale of 1 to 7, and ranked on how well each site compared with the others.

From top to bottom, here's how they scored based on a 42-point scale:

• Post office -- 33 points: The site scored 7s, the highest ratings, in urban design, local development opportunities (because it's in the Pearl District) and transportation.
  
• Burnside/405 -- 26 points: Possibly the oddest proposed site, the stadium would sit on a massive platform-like structure built above Interstate 405, at West Burnside Street between Northwest 14th and 17th avenues. The site scored a 7 in the cost category. "It's a less costly option in terms of siting and land acquisition because we'd be using 'air rights,'" Logsdon said. "That is, the land would be in the air, because it's above I-405."
  
• Union Station -- 25 points: Site factors -- the stadium would need to wedge into the River District rail yards -- and the likely lengthy construction time frame elicited 1s in the city's initial ratings.
  
• Lents -- 24 points: A 105-acre plot near Interstate 205 and Southeast Foster Road, Lents scored 7s in the site factors and timing categories because it's vacant and massive enough to accommodate thousands of parked cars. It scored a lowly 1 on urban design because it sits about seven miles from downtown.
  
• PGE Park -- 24 points: The site scored well in the site factors section largely because it's already configured for baseball. The conversion to a bigger league park might not be easy because the property doesn't hold much expandable space.
  
• Lincoln High School -- 23 points: Lincoln, near PGE Park, suffers mainly from cost issues (the analysis' lowest rating; it's expensive to buy and relocate the entire high school) and the lack of local development opportunities.
  
• Blanchard/Rose Quarter -- 15 points: The early favored choice of Katz and Portland Planning Director Gil Kelley didn't fare well when compared with the other sites. The site tallied a 1 in the local development realm and 2s in urban design and cost.

Of all the potential stadium sites, Edlen said he's most interested in the post office lot, mainly because of its Pearl District locale.

Contact Andy Giegerich at agiegerich@bizjournals.com.

It's kind of hard to tell from this, but is the rating from last year?

I imagine some things will change. I'm going to bet, however, that the Blanchard site won't improve much, odd as that sounds.

Yes. This is from last year, Paul.

Site is really down to 2 or 3 depending on a few factors, with TIF $ being at the top of the scale.

On Friday my partner and I walked through the Pearl District and noticed all the amazing new development that's been going on in recent months. We both loved the architectural style of the buildings and how well they integrated with the surrounding area. However, when we walked by the Post Office, the building seemed to be so out of place. This seems to be more true then ever now that the Pearl is really taking shape. I visualized how a MLB Stadium would look at that site and ( to my biased ) I thought it would go well with the right style. My concern has to do with the residences in the immediate area. I wonder what they'll think of it being so close. Most people who have decided to live there, I'm thinking, chose to live there for the urban experience. The right MLB stadium at that spot would be consistent with that urban experience. As I ramble, I just wonder if this is one of the other important factors that Maury is talking about when narrowing down that list.

Casey, I think many of us would love to see a baseball stadium at that post office site, so close to downtown and with great views of the city. The bigest hangup there is going to be how costly it would be and long it would take to relocate the post office. They've talked for years about a new central P.O. out at the airport, but we need a site we could start working on pretty fast.

We shall see.

Well, Casey, there are a number of factors in the Park location, cost, the obvious overriding factor, but others as well.

A ballpark as close to downtown is preferable for a number of factors.

For one, the business community is most dense in that location. The other is the fact that most of the hotels are located there as well.

Whether Edlen sees a ballpark near the Pearl as an "upside" is hard to get out of this article, and I haven't heard which way he lies on the matter.

What is a fact is this quote:

quote:

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"It (the ballpark) will clearly have a big impact, wherever it goes, and the development around it will probably boom in both retail and housing."

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That sounds fairly positive to me, and represents a developer's point of view.

As to the current residents in the Pearl... Good question.

The Pearl District reflects an individual that wishes to be as urban as they can get, while retaining a level of opulence. It's extremely trendy and upscale; with lots of nice restaurants, designer shops, and the signature art galleries.

How that sits against a ballpark depends on the park itself.

Placing the park next to the Pearl would make the design properties jump up a notch or two I would think. You want something that blends with all the new/old lofts and would tie in with Lightrail and the trolley.

Cost is the issue... that and time, as BC mentioned. If something like Federal dollars were somehow tied into the site, then I think it's more than doable.

I haven't heard as much, so it's a work in process.

I will say this, I believe that it's in the top sites for possible selection. Just too many possibilities for it.

Wow, the Post Office site is by far my favorite. I had just assumed the Rose Quarter site would be chosen. It's really surprising to see it at the bottom of the list, but I'm not disappointed.

I mentioned the issue Casey brought up about putting the stadium in the Pearl a while back. Will the Pearl residents want thousands of people, not a few of which will probably have drunk too much beer, streaming out past where their kiddies are running around in the Jamison Square fountain? I doubt it. I did read that the residents hate Postal Service trucks coming through in the middle of the night, though. That wouldn't happen anymore.

I thought the Post Office site also had some brand new lofts just built to the west. These lofts have taken out part of the footprint for the stadium. I thought the alignment from home plate to second base was also an issue since the alignment was North/South.

The two northwest locations had these issues in common, high cost and the alignment mentioned above.

Blanchard seems too low, but maybe cost wasn't brought into the equation last year. I think cost will become the top issue, if not now, then six months ago. I also think Blanchard will give us more money from urban renewal.

No matter where it goes downtown (I consider the inter eastside part of downtown), I will support it if the dollars add up. But if we chose a site that requires cash from a new owner and a different site doesn't require cash from the owner, I would go for the cheaper site and have that bargaining chip available.

BB

OK, I'll try to be brief on this...

I would love it if they put it at the post office... heck, I'd love it if they put something, anything at the post office that fit in better with the fabric of the Pearl... and yes, a baseball stadium would fit in perfectly there. Obviously the cost is prohibitive, but if the feds paid the cost of moving the stadium, then that would be ideal. Sounds crazy, but hey, in DC they keep batting around federal transportation grants to pay for a big chunk of their stadium, so why not.

Many of us assume that Blanchard is 90%+ likely to be the site. I agree, but I do have some concerns. Blanchard makes sense when you look at it the transportation access, and the convention center/Rose Quarter nearby. It also has a lot of potential to fuel growth in the area.

When you look at recent stadium successes in terms of fueling growth, I'd say the two best examples were Cleveland and Denver, and both had the benefit of underutilized buildings in the area. Portland's equivalent is the Pearl District and Old Town, not Blanchard.

So I could see Blanchard working, but I could also see it taking a lot longer for the area to take shape.

With the Pearl District sites, you know that they would be a crown jewel in an already-successful story.

Here's one other crazy thought about the post office...

Given that it would take longer to build a site there (maybe 4-5 years?), perhaps that would be a good thing(?), and here's why:

1. Longer time period @ PGE means more time to retire their debt, frontload the player payroll taxes to pay off the bonds, etc.

2. The Post Office site, if done right, would be the absolute diamond centerpiece in one of the most successful land redevelopments in the US, if not the world. Can you imagine all the people that would pile in on the train from Seattle to Eugene, in part to savor the world class restaurants and shops all within walking distance or streetcar distance of a picture perfect stadium, complete with the river just beyond the outfield and Mt. Hood views framed around the scoreboard. Slice of heaven.

Oh, but Blanchard would be cool too.