What's Happening Now
Construction Update:
The City of Portland's contractor Landis & Landis Construction, LLC began major construction work on June 14 along SW Capitol Highway.
This Week's Work
The contractor started clearing areas along SW Capitol Highway from SW Spring Garden Street to SW Marigold Street, focused on areas where future retaining walls will be built. Before work began, biologists surveyed trees for bird nests, surveyors installed stakes at property lines, and tree protection fences were installed.
Week of June 21
- Clearing, grubbing, excavation, and installation of rock base will continue on SW Capitol Highway, continuing from SW Spring Garden Road to SW Marigold Street, and extending further south to SW Brugger Street, still focused on future retaining wall locations.
- Crews will be trimming trees on SW Garden Home Road and SW Capitol Highway, to ensure that equipment does not strike or damage trees.
- The contractor will start establishing the access road from SW Garden Home Road to the Multnomah South stormwater facility, along the alignment of SW 42nd Avenue north of Garden Home.
- Traffic impacts: Activity on SW Capitol Highway and SW Garden Home Road will require flaggers at times. Two-way traffic will be maintained on both streets, but expect some delays. Previously communicated daytime closures on SW Garden Home Road have been postponed two weeks due to pipe supply issues.
Week of June 28
- Clearing, grubbing and excavation will continue on SW Capitol Highway between SW Spring Garden Street and SW Brugger Street. Retaining wall footings will start to be excavated.
- Clearing and excavation will begin in the Multnomah South stormwater facility. Trees were already cut here in 2010.
- Traffic impacts: SW Capitol Highway will continue to require flaggers, but two-way traffic will be maintained. Less activity is expected on SW Garden Home Road this week.
Looking Ahead
- Pipe installation on SW Garden Home Road between SW 42nd Avenue and SW Capitol Highway is expected to begin around July 6. This will require daytime closures of SW Garden Home Road, with local access only. The contractor will work with residents on any access issues.
- Night work is proposed at the SW Multnomah Boulevard / 40th Avenue intersection in late July, for six nights from 7:00pm to 6:00am. As part of the Noise Variance process, area residents have been notified. This work is necessary to install pipes and maintenance holes across SW Multnomah Boulevard without significant disruption to traffic. The six nights will be spread over a period of about two weeks.
- The major southbound detour of SW Capitol Highway will start some time in August. PBOT will release a Traffic Advisory in advance.
Virtual Open Houses:
A live presentation and Q&A session took place on Zoom the evening of Thursday, June 10th. You can watch the video here.
A separate, self-guided open house featuring an interactive map covering the construction schedule and project details is available here:
https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/6c526f12bc934701b3a2731e0bab4188
Construction news and project updates
Project Description
This project will improve safety and mobility for all modes of travel while improving stormwater management, protecting water quality in local streams, and updating water supply infrastructure to meet modern demands. Portland’s Bureau of Transportation, Bureau of Environmental Services, and Water Bureau are working on the project together to reduce costs, improve efficiency, and enhance service delivery to the Portland community.
The project will add a continuous sidewalk and protected bike lane on the east side of SW Capitol Highway, and a multi-use path on the west side of the street, from SW Taylors Ferry Road to SW Garden Home Road. The project will collect and convey stormwater runoff through inlets and pipes to four new stormwater treatment and detention basins located nearby. The project also will upgrade the SW Capitol Highway water main to a larger, more seismically-resilient pipe between SW Marigold Street and SW Garden Home Road, with additional main replacement on SW Carson Street.
Please note that this project involves traffic detours. June-July 2021 will involve a series of closures of SW Garden Home Road and SW 40th Avenue between SW 45th Avenue and SW Capitol Highway, as well as several nights of night work at SW Multnomah Boulevard and SW 40th Avenue, for pipe installation. Then starting in August 2021, all southbound traffic on SW Capitol Highway will be diverted to SW 45th and 48th Avenues via SW Garden Home Road, and returning to SW Capitol Highway via SW Taylors Ferry Road. This includes TriMet buses. This detour will remain in place for the remainder of the 18-month project to help the contractor complete the project in a more safe, efficient fashion. Northbound traffic and TriMet buses will remain on SW Capitol Highway throughout the project. PBOT will issue Traffic Advisories in advance of these major traffic changes.
Project Background
Providing sidewalks and bike lanes on this segment of SW Capitol Highway has been a community priority for nearly 30 years. This segment, between SW Garden Home Road and SW Taylors Ferry Road, hosts over 8,000 vehicles per day, is served by TriMet’s #44 bus line, and currently has no sidewalks, bike lanes, pedestrian crossings or standard stormwater facilities.
The city’s project development process for this corridor began with the Capitol Highway Plan in 1996 and continued with the SW Capitol Highway Plan Refinement Report in 2011 and the Capitol Highway Corridor Stormwater Concept Design in 2016. In each of these cases, the city faced challenges in developing a buildable project with limited funding and challenging physical constraints.
In 2016 and 2017 sufficient funding came together from the voter-approved "Fixing Our Streets" ten-cent gas tax, development charges, Environmental Services, Water Bureau, and the State of Oregon, allowing the project to advance. The project team worked closely with the community from 2016 through 2020 to refine the design and discuss property and neighborhood impacts and benefits.
Project Funding
This joint PBOT-BES-PWB project is funded through the Fixing Our Streets city gas tax, Transportation System Development Charges, Oregon Lottery-backed bonds authorized by the 2017 State Legislature, Bureau of Environmental Services funds, and Water Bureau funds. Fixing Our Streets is contributing roughly $6.6 million of the total project budget of $27.5 million, making this the largest project funded by the Fixing Our Streets program. The construction contract value is approximately $14 million, with remaining funds attributed to planning, design engineering, right-of-way acquisition, project management, and construction management and inspection.