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August 9, 2004
Riding Around America: Portland Impressions
Click here to view the photo gallery.
Now that I am in Seattle with a bit more time on my hands I can write little bit more about Portland. Even though I was only able to spend one full day in the city I left with a favorable, and contradictory, impression.
I mentioned most of the positive things before. The transportation system seems to be excellent. The light rail trains are probably the smoothest thing I have ever ridden. They glide along the streets and don't seem to cause any traffic problems, although it was Saturday so I may have a false impression. I also stayed in the downtown area most of the time so I'm not sure how viable public transportation is for those who live in the suburbs.
In addition to living up to it's reputation of having good public transit, the city is also great for walking. Downtown is not a very large area and city blocks are small compared to other cities which makes it very pedestrian and bicycle friendly.
The contradictory aspect of the city is it's people. From what I could see, there are two types of people in the city: the younger population (20s and 30s) is hip, middle class and tatooed, and everyone else is homeless. Of course I'm generalizing here but the number of transients that I saw during my short time in the city was astonishing. I realize that there are homeless in every city but I didn't expect to see so many in Portland.
In general I think Portland is one of those cities that is better to live in than visit. From a tourist's perspective there isn't all that much to see. For me, this was no problem because I like the everday stuff just as much as I like tourist attractions. For example, I spent the better part of my afternoon walking along the river and looking at the bridges, as you can probably tell from the photo gallery.
My impression that Portland is midwestern-ish stuck as I saw more of the city throughout the day. Since I've spent most of my life in or around Minneapolis I couldn't help comparing the two and there are some similarities. They have a similar vibe. The only differences are that Minneapolis is larger, more congested, and has worse public transportation. Maybe they aren't so similar after all, actually. Or maybe Portland is what Minneapolis wants to be.
Posted on August 9, 2004 at 11:31 AM