Reporting from Beaverton
Elected leaders from the southwest part of the region said Tuesday they generally like the idea of reducing vehicle emissions in the Portland region – if they can get help from TriMet to make it happen.
Metro councilors Kathryn Harrington and Carl Hosticka joined city councilors and planning commissioners from Beaverton and Tigard in a joint meeting Tuesday afternoon at the Beaverton Library, to talk about Metro's Climate Smart Communities project and other planning endeavors in Washington County.
Studies for the climate project are in their second year; Metro and the region's cities were told by the Oregon Legislature that the region's per capita vehicle-based carbon emissions must be slashed by 2035.
Metro officials have emphasized that each city will be able to come up with its own answers for reducing those emission levels, and have also stressed that simply implementing the cities' already-adopted master plans will get those cities very close to the emissions targets.
"I am much more at ease with this challenge than I was a year ago," Harrington said of the state climate mandates. "But we do have a gap we need to meet."
The local officials at the table quickly coalesced around one main concern – transit service.
"We have to be able to move the workforce and we have to keep our commitment when we develop high-density residential areas that are on a bus route," said Beaverton City Councilor Betty Bode. "I see that commitment crumbling due to economic times, and that is precisely the time we need more commitment for transit to move people."
One of the more debated elements of the research for the climate project is the assumption that an increase in transit, called for in the region's transportation plan, will actually come to fruition.
Bode said the cutbacks from TriMet pose a challenge to cities and developers – cities are pushing for denser new development, but developers, and their financiers, are skeptical of the long-term access to transit in the new areas.
"Are they going to believe it when we say we're going to build farther out, and we're going to have transit out there? And then 'Oh gee, we didn't do that that well?'" Bode said.
Tigard City Councilor Gretchen Buehner said the bus network in Washington County hasn't significantly changed in decades, since when the county was largely rural. She said TriMet essentially adopted the existing suburban routes run by Rose City Transit and the Blue Bus network.
"In the intervening years, there have been very, very, very few routes added to serve Beaverton, Tigard and out to Hillsboro," she said. "Basically, they're the same routes that existed in the days of the Blue Bus... I've been working for almost 15 years trying to get TriMet to look at what was happening density-wise in Washington County."
Harrington said it isn't just TriMet's problem alone to solve.
"We're going to have to work together," she said. "We're blessed with a great transit system now. We are the envy of places throughout the country. If we want to realize communities' visions throughout the region, while preserving farm and forest land, we're going to have to work to solve some of the problems we have."
The session wasn't a constant pile-on of TriMet, nor was it united in saying density is the answer to every problem. Beaverton planning commissioner Mimi Doukas said the region's cities have committed to downtowns, corridors, improving urban design and density in the corridors to support transit and livability.
But, she said, suburban development – "the white picket fence" – can't be forgotten, either.
"Those white picket fences are critically important, and we need a place for them," she said.
And even in areas that are planned for density, said Beaverton planning commissioner Jennifer Nye, excellent transit service isn't a silver bullet for development.
"We have quite a gap to get developers to build, even in downtown Beaverton where there's a great level of service," she said. "If we want the communities we've envisioned, we've got to find the money somewhere to make it happen."
Note: An earlier version of this story had the incorrect target year for emissions reductions. The target year is 2035. This version has been corrected.