Sponsor
Portland State University. Department of History
Term of Graduation
Winter 2009
Date of Publication
2009
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (M.A.) in History
Department
History
Language
English
Subjects
Express highways -- Oregon -- Portland -- History, Highway planning -- Oregon -- Portland -- Citizen participation, City planning -- Political activity -- Oregon -- Portland, Transportation -- Oregon -- Portland -- Planning -- Evaluation
Physical Description
1 online resource (2, iii, 109 pages)
Abstract
In 1955, The Oregon State Highway Department helped usher in the freeway building era in Portland by publishing its plan for 14 modern freeways designed to crisscross the city. A major component of that report was the Mount Hood Freeway, a route designed to pass through southeast Portland, connecting the city to its expanding eastern suburbs. Other freeway routes in the Portland area were given precedence over the Mount Hood Freeway and by 1969, when the route obtained federal interstate status, urban freeways across the nation had become highly controversial. Over the next seven years a struggle ensued pitting those who brought new perspectives in urban transportation planning to Portland against those who felt that accommodating the ever-increasing use of the automobile was the answer to the city’s traffic problems.
The growing opposition to the Mount Hood Freeway in the early 1970s included southeast Portland residents, but it also had the support of elected officials, at the city, county and ultimately the state level. Federal environmental legislation requiring an environmental impact study encouraged freeway opponents and they were bolstered when, in 1973, the Federal Highway Administration agreed to allow cities in the midst of freeway revolts to trade-in portions of their interstate funding for money that could be used on other transportation projects including mass transit. While citizen activists helped delay the freeway, the actions of Portland mayor Neil Goldschmidt, Multnomah county commissioners Donald Clark and Mel Gordon, and Governor Robert Straub, led to the complete cancellation of the Mount Hood Freeway’s construction. In 1976, Governor Straub received the approval of his trade- in request and over the next fifteen years, money once earmarked for construction of the Mount Hood Freeway was used in numerous other Portland-area transportation projects, including the area’s first light rail line. The Mount Hood Freeway was never constructed, but the impact of its planning is still felt in Portland today.
Persistent Identifier
https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/42389
Recommended Citation
Ballestrem, Val C., "“In the Shadow of a Concrete Forest”: Transportation Politics in Portland, Oregon, and the Revolt Against the Mount Hood Freeway, 1955-1976" (2009). Dissertations and Theses. Paper 6671.