When the Civic Drive MAX station officially opened in Gresham in early December after 13 years of planning, the benefits went beyond connecting the neighborhood to the region, residents to jobs and visitors to the vibrant, pedestrian-friendly Civic Drive neighborhood.
For several small and emerging businesses in the region, the benefits translated into jobs.
R&R General Contractors, Inc., the prime contractor for the construction of the Civic Drive MAX station and a Disadvantaged Business Enterprise firm, put together a project crew of other small and emerging businesses that accounted for almost 77 percent of the construction project. According to TriMet, it’s the highest DBE percentage on any TriMet project to date.
Based in Wilsonville, R&R specializes in heavy construction including light rail, underground utilities, roadways and other structures. After winning the prime project contract, it subcontracted out several of the jobs to other small and emerging firms including A2 Fabrication, Green Art Landscaping, O’Neill Electric and Workhorse Construction.
Metro's transit-oriented development program invested resources in Gresham's Civic Neighborhood to support the area's transit-oriented lifestyle with higher-density housing and a mix of retail uses located close to transit. On another transit-oriented development project – Town Center Station in Clackamas County that opened earlier this year – the contractor hired more than 300 to 320 subcontractors and suppliers, with 50 percent hired from the Portland area.
Using Disadvantaged Business Enterprise firms, as was done for the Civic Drive MAX Station construction, helps support the region's six desired outcomes by equitably distributing the benefits of growth and change.