Under Construction

PAWT

As is obvious to anyone who has been out and about in Portland lately, the whole place seems to be under construction. Summer road crews are busy repairing and remaking streets, and buildings of all sizes are sprouting like mushrooms. Developers are responding to low residential and commercial vacancy rates, marketing space to the throngs of people that want to live and work here. There has been action in all the fast-growing close-in neighborhoods, the mixed-use zones adjacent to the city center (South Waterfront and the ever-growing Pearl District), and downtown itself. In fact, what could be the fourth tallest building in Portland is set to start construction later this year. Well, restart construction. The Park Avenue West Tower has been on hold since 2009, leaving a gaping hole in the city center and a visual reminder of the recent recession. But these favorable economic conditions has prompted TMT Development to continue and even expand the project. The program for the building has changed several times already (more condos! less condos! more condos!), so who knows what will actually get built, but it seems clear that the skyline will soon be changing in a major way.

We're seeing the effects of this building boom in the office with more and more construction-related projects coming in. Back in 2008, we developed these graphics to help with street closure negotiations during the initial construction phase of Park Avenue West:

Ady Leverette was a designer and a principal at Fat Pencil Studio between 2011 and 2018.