Q: What section of Broadway is getting repaved? When is that happening?
The current repaving extents for NE Broadway are between NE 11th Ave and NE 24th Ave. Paving and restriping is scheduled to happen in late summer 2025.
The Broadway Pave and Paint project is taking a slightly wider look at the corridor between NE 7th Ave and NE 26th Ave:
- NE 26th Ave at the east end is the alignment of the 20’s Bikeway connecting Northeast and Southeast Portland.
- NE 7th Ave at the west end is an important north/south bikeway connection that links recently installed bike lanes to the Blumenauer Bridge over Interstate 84.
- NE 7th Ave is also eastern edge of the much larger federally funded streetscape project in Lower Albina focused on N/NE Broadway, N/NE Weidler St, and N Larrabee Ave.
Q: I see construction activities on Broadway—is this project already underway?
While visiting or traveling along NE Broadway, you may notice PBOT crews actively engaged in construction work along the corridor. This summer, we are updating curb ramps throughout the paving extent to bring them in accordance with the American with Disabilities Act (ADA). These construction activities typically happen roughly one year ahead of a paving project. Over the next 6 to 9 months, we will be engaging with business owners and nearby residents about changes to the street to support Broadway’s role as a safe, welcoming, vibrant, and accessible main street.
Q: What are the project goals and how were they created?
As we began engagement and analysis for this project, PBOT staff developed a set of four project goals based on established City policies and previous community engagement in the area to help guide our work as we begin exploring changes to NE Broadway.
- Support a Vibrant Main Street: The Broadway main street is home to many small, locally owned businesses that serve the communities along the corridor. We want to make the streetscape more supportive of a thriving small business community.
- A Safer Street with Slower Speeds: We want NE Broadway to be a safer street with a reduced risk of serious crashes, slower and steadier traffic speeds, and a more welcoming environment for everyone, however they choose to travel along the street.
- Improve Access for People Walking & Biking: Whether you’re trying to cross the street, catch the bus, or get where you’re going on a bike, NE Broadway can be a stressful and unwelcoming environment. We want to fix that.
- Develop a high-quality project with broad community support that supports adopted policies, meets city standards, and is delivered on-time and on-budget.
These project goals are developed to be clear and concise, yet are grounded in a strong set of adopted city policies to support safety, reduce emissions in our transportation system, and promote public life and active transportation. Some of the guiding plans and policies most relevant to this project are:
- Vision Zero
- PBOT’s Transportation System Plan
- Bicycle Plan for 2030
- PedPDX, Portland’s Pedestrian Master Plan
- TriMet’s Forward Together Service Plan Update
Q: How do I get engaged with the redesign of NE Broadway?
Paving projectsmay provide for an opportunity to rethink and reimagine how the street is designed and operated, since the roadway needs to be re-striped following the paving work and we can strategically add low-cost improvement projects to the work already underway by city crews and contractors.
PBOT’s Broadway Pave & Paint staff are beginning to directly engage business and adjacent neighborhood organizations about opportunities to improve the NE Broadway streetscape in coordination with the repaving project scheduled for Summer 2025.
PBOT staff have developed a set of project goals, a project timeline, and are ready to understand the opportunities and community needs along NE Broadway. We are beginning the project’s community engagement phase that will emphasize and uplift our project goals. Community feedback will be a guiding resource for this project’s outcome. We will be providing multiple opportunities for stakeholders to meaningfully engage and help shape any future changes to NE Broadway.
Q: What feedback has PBOT heard from community so far?
In early 2024, PBOT received a letter from the Northeast Broadway Business Association, Irvington Community Association, and Sullivan’s Gulch Neighborhood Association urging PBOT to leverage the upcoming paving project to pursue a corridor redesign that focuses on improved traffic safety and results in a calmer streetscape environment that is less dominated by motor vehicle traffic. These community requests affirm long-established policies and goals for how NE Broadway should operate – both as a main street and major transportation corridor in Northeast Portland.
Beginning in summer 2024, PBOT began initial conversations with business owners and neighborhood representatives along NE Broadway to better understand what’s working and what’s not working with the current layout of street. Some of the key themes we’ve heard include:
- Businesses and residents are concerned about high-speed traffic along NE Broadway, especially the way those high speeds impact safety and business vitality along the corridor.
- Many recounted personal stories of witnessing frequent car crashes and close calls along Broadway. PBOT’s Vision Zero team conducted an analysis of crashes between NE 7th Ave and NE 24th Ave and found that between 2013 and 2022 there were over 250 reported crashes on NE Broadway, 27 of which involved pedestrian injuries.
- A general consensus that while NE Broadway still should serve as a major transit and transportation corridor, the design of the street today is too automobile-centric. There is a strong interest in narrowing the existing travel lanes to reduce speeds and reducing the number of travel lanes from three to two to make the street more pedestrian friendly.
- A desire to improve and add more frequent pedestrian crossings, especially in the eastern segment of the corridor where there are fewer traffic signals or marked crosswalks.
- A desire to maintain or increase the number of parking spots on or near NE Broadway for visitors to the local businesses.
- Many business owners noted issues with a poorly managed curb zone, including areas where parking is not property regulated or enforced, and a need to reevaluate and adjust loading zones to improve business access needs.
- A desire by many to improve and protect the existing narrow striped bike lane to provide better access to business and destinations for people who would like to bike along the corridor.
- A desire by nearby neighborhoods to be able to comfortably walk or bike down to the main street – and by extension – a desire to see more active storefronts and places to spend time along NE Broadway.
Q: What types of changes are PBOT staff exploring?
NE Broadway is intended to function as a major transportation corridor for vehicles and transit, and a pedstrian-friendly commercial main street. These dual roles can sometimes live in tension with one another. However, with a street design that better balances these competing functions, NE Broadway can better live up to it's intended role in our transportation system.
A major question that PBOT staff analyzed early on was: How would NE Broadway operate if the typical street cross section had two general purpose travel lanes instead of three? What we found through our technical modeling exercise confirmed what we were hearing from many of those who live near or work daily on NE Broadway: the street today is overbuilt for automobiles.
Today, NE Broadway is only using 50-60% of the total automobile capacity during peak travel hours (morning rush hour), and is overbuilt during all other times of day. This excess space dedicated to automobile movement translates to fast vehicle speeds, major difficulties safely crossing the street, and a lack of space for bike and pedestrian improvements. We found that if we were to eliminate the additional west-bound travel lane that is introduced at NE 24th Ave, the street would largely function well today and in the future, resulting in minimal localized diversion or delay.
The good news is that by narrowing lanes and reducing the number of travel lanes, it allows for the PBOT planning team to work closely with business owners, neighbors, and other stakehodlers to redesign the street to better meet their needs.
Some of the initial design ideas we’re exploring include:
- Pedestrian refuges and marked crosswalks: The investments help improve pedestrian safety and make it easier for people walking to access business and destinations on either side of the main street. Specifically, we’re looking at creative strategies to add new crossings with median islands at the unsignalized intersections between NE 16th Ave and NE 24th Ave where crossing the street is exceptionally difficult.
- An improved bike lane design: The Broadway Pave and Paint team want the bike lane on NE Broadway to be among the highest quality main street bike lanes in the City of Portland. We see enormous potential to increase access for people biking to businesses and destinations all along NE Broadway. Today’s substandardstriped bike lane is narrow and stressful to use. We see a major opportunity to prioritize excess roadway space on NE Broadway to make more space for people biking.
- Maximizing On-Street Parking: PBOT has heard from businesses up and down NE Broadway that it’s a major priority to preserve as much on-street parking as possible as we redesign the main street environment. We are looking at new strategies, including angled-in parking between NE 17th Ave and NE 24th Ave, to increase supply in some areas to offset parking that may need to be removed for pedestrian and bicycle safety improvements or better bus stops.
- A lower speed limit with adjusted signal timing: Vehicle speeds on NE Broadway are too fast. This is partly a function of the auto-mobile centric design the street has today, but also a function of outdated and uncoordinated traffic signals that allow drivers to speed without any impediments. By retiming the corridor for an operating speed more compatible with a commercial main street, we can make the street operate slower with a more steady progression.
- Enhanced bus stops to serve the Line 77 and Line 17: This project will be delivered as TriMet begins to roll-out a new service plan for the multiple bus lines that serve NE Broadway. The Line 77 connecting Hollywood to NW Portland is getting upgraded to frequent service, while the Line 17 is getting a service upgrade and a new, simpler route via NE 33rd Ave, Broadway, and Multnomah. We’ll be making adjustments to bus stop locations and improving bus-stop quality with this corridor update.
- A new Curb-Zone Management Plan for NE Broadway: In addition to parking supply, there are major improvements PBOT can undertake to make the existing on-street parking supply on and around NE Broadway work better for existing businesses and visitors. That means revisiting loading zones, time-stays, and other regulatory quirks to help better manage the curb zone. PBOT is not considering adding additional metered or parking permit zones on NE Broadway through this project at this time.
PBOT will be releasing a design options report later in Fall 2024 for community feedback and input.
Q: What do adopted PBOT Policies have to say about NE Broadway?
PBOT’s Transportation System Plan sets a baseline policy direction for every street in the City of Portland. It’s fair to say that NE Broadway has “high expectations” set upon in terms of the role it plays in the citywide transportation system. It has the highest classification for all modes on the local street system, save for freight.NE Broadway must balance it’s role as a major commercial main street as well as a street that moves many people every single day. These expectations are not mutually exclusive, but can sometimes live in tension with one another.
A high level description of each policy classification is listed below, more information can be found in PBOT’s Transportation System Plan.
- Major City Walkway: Major City Walkways are intended to provide safe, convenient, and attractive pedestrian access along major streets and trails with a high level of pedestrian activity supported by current and planned land uses.
- Major City Bikeway: Major City Bikeways form the backbone of the city's bikeway network and are intended to serve high volumes of bicycle traffic and provide direct, seamless, efficient travel across and between transportation districts.
- Major Transit Priority Street: Major Transit Priority Streets facilitate the frequent and reliable movement of transit vehicles that connect Central City, regional centers, and town centers with each other and to other major destinations.
- Urban Design - Civic Main Street: Civic Main Streets serve people throughout the City and are designed to emphasize multimodal access to major activity centers. Civic Main Street design should typically include the following: wide sidewalks with a through pedestrian zone, a furnishing zone, and a frontage zone; closely-spaced pedestrian crossings; separated bicycle facilities; way-finding; transit priority treatments as needed; vehicle lanes; low vehicle speeds; medians and/or turn lanes as needed; and limited driveway access.
- Major City Traffic Street: Major City Traffic Streets are intended to serve as the principal routes for interdistrict traffic that has at least one trip end within a City of Portland transportation district. Safety should be the highest priority on Major City Traffic Streets. Safety countermeasures should be employed on Major City Traffic Streets to address identified safety risks with a focus on eliminating fatal and serious injury crashes for all modes.
- Major Emergency Response: Major Emergency Response Streets are intended to serve primarily the longer, most direct legs of emergency response trips
- Truck Access Street: Truck Access Streets are intended to serve as access and circulation routes for delivery of goods and services to neighborhood-serving commercial and employment uses.