The Addendum "I tried to write shorter ~Mark Twain
route99west.com/addendum
is an occasional journal of Oregon, from arts and books to public policy & transportation.
All content © 2006- by Alexander B. Craghead, except where otherwise noted.
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Week in Review... in review.
Week in Review, Vol. XI
Week in Review, Vol. X
Week in Review, Vol. IX
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Review: Vanishing Point
Week in Review, Vol. VIII
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Other Notable Blogs
Cafe Unknown
Travel, History and Portland Oregon by Dan Haneckow
Jack Bog's Blog
By Jack Bogdanski of Portland, Oregon. (Like he needs any other introduction by now? -- A.B.C.)
For Portlanders Only
"Why buy a mattress anywhere else?"
Good Stuff NW
Featuring stuff that is good in the NW
LOST Magazine
LOST Magazine is an online monthly magazine that combines elements of many other literary, online, and national magazines with a singular mission--to reclaim in writing lost people, places, and things.
Mapes on Politics
Way West of the Beltway
Outside Is America
A journal about photography, roadtrips, trains and life, with occasional detours into movies, baseball, music, family and more.
The Photographers' Railroad Page
Good photos usually have good stories to go with them.... The goal of The Photographers' Railroad Page is to provide an outlet for top quality photographs and their story.
Portland Food & Drink
Throwing Ourselves on the Grenade of Bad Food to Save You
Portland Transport Blog
A Conversation About Access & Mobility in the Portland/Vancouver Region
PowellsBooks.Blog
Authors, readers, critics, media -- and booksellers
Rambling West
The musings of a farmer with a typewriter and camera
Stumptown Confidential
Documenting Portland, Oregon architecture, history, and culture through photos, postcards, and words.
The Unauthorized Observer
Observations on faith, photography, trains, baseball, the city where I live (Fullerton, Calif.), anything that I find funny (a lot of things) or irritating (some things) and various incidents involving friends and family.
Under the Weather
...the open road, fatherhood, family life, music, railroads, photography, popular and unpopular culture, sex, violence, religion, the oppression of consumerism and capitalism and the general bullshit that makes up modern life.
Urban Planning Overlord
A blog to counter the myths, lies, and demagoguery others use against sound city planning to further their own ends, fair and foul - but also to urge the profession itself to pull back from the occasional wretched PC exces.
VanPortlander
Living in Vancouver; working in Portland. I have some thoughts.
Whiskey, Texas
...life and experiences in Texas and the Southwest. Recurring themes: Photography, railroads, fading ads / ghost signs, fallen-flag railroad logos, boxcars, bicycling, Texas music, pop culture, sports, road trips, literature, kids and family.
World Scott
The Travel Writing and Photography of Scott Lothes
Blegs & Bargains
Amazon Book Wishlist
B&H Wishlist
My eBay Listings
Powell's Books Wishlist
Friday, February 22, 2008
Week in Review, Vol. XI
Pronouncements of doom for various car styles have always amused me. Some time ago, my mother covered a screen with newspaper clippings of British sports cars -- the covers of magazines, newspaper articles, even classified advertisements. One of the articles is written in the late 1970s, and predicted the doom of the convertible. New U.S. safety standards, you see, made them inherently unsafe, and therefore it was only a matter of time before they would be gone from the market, a memory from the past. Labels: Automobiles, Civics, Design, Food, Portland, Transportation
Yeah. Right.
Well, now it's the muscle car's turn.
While in the world of transportation, it appears the Washington State Ferries sytem is in trouble. WS-DOT is even proposing a restructuring.
The mess gave me one of those "what ever happened to" moments regarding Mike Thorne. You might recall that Thorne used to be director of Port of Portland and quit to run for governor. When he dropped out of the race, he went to run the ferries in Washington.
So what's become of Mike? And can he be blamed (rightly or wrongly) for any of Washington's water-borne mess? Well he quit the ferry job in 2004 and returneed to Pendleton. As Seattle Times staff writer Susan Gilmore put it in 2004,"He said he came into the job with huge expectations, that he'd be able to achieve financial footing with no plan how to get there. Raising ferry fares drove away customers, voters rejected Referendum 51, which would have dumped billions of dollars into state transportation projects, and there were no plans how to replace the aging state ferries, some 70 years old."
And now? Notice that "Big Look" land use review that the legislature wants to fund? Thorne's a member. That may or may not mean anything -- put your tinfoil conspiracy hats on now if you wish -- but I find it an interesting path for someone who thought themselves a gubernatorial contender.
Which brings up another question: what ever happened to Ron Saxton?
Also up in Seattle, the Big O reports that it may only be a matter of time before the Sonics move to Oklahoma. The single commenter on the Big O's story says "who cares".
I have a question for you, ladies and gentleman. Who owns the Blazers? Where does he live? And what might he do if Seattle no longer had a pro basketball team?
Lastly, a food related story. Author Michael Pollan has been making the local circuit here lately, sending parts of the Portland food blogosphere into titters. Why? Pollan has written a book that dares to suggest that we should eat food, not "food substitutes".
Pollan has some interesting things to say, and Edible Portland sat down and did a video interview with him. The first part is here. I found Pollan's comments about Sour Cream and tofu-based meat substitutes to be so common-sense based that I had to pinch myself that I was hearing these words at all. Can it be? Might sugar and butter be... acceptable? It's so sad to think that Julia Child -- who seemed to improve any recipe by adding either butter or "booze" to it -- didn't live to see this day.
That's all for now.
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Friday, February 15, 2008
Week in Review, Vol. X
First up this week: the saga of railroad service in Southern Oregon continued this week. RailAmerica, owner of the Central Oregon & Pacific, sent a response back to Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski stating that the company would undertake repairs to the currently shuttered Coos Bay line on its own dime. The hitch? The railroad conglomerate wants a commitment from the state that they will receive assistance for both repair costs and operating expenses on the route. Labels: Food, Portland History, Public Policy, Railroads, Transportation, Week in Review
The Governor wasted no time crafting a response, which said in no uncertain terms "no deal". As it sits now, it appears the state is still on track to pursue a forced transfer of the line to public ownership. That said, the fact that RailAmerica was willing to change their proposal at all suggests to this observer that they have "blinked", and can likely be moved further with the right amount of pressure.
The Seattle Times printed an op-ed this week highlighting the conundrum freight transportation is in: it's just not that sexy."Interestingly enough, the same representatives who want tax dollars to supplement ferry service to Vashon and Maury islands are not arguing that Puget Sound would be harmed by increasing ferry traffic.
In short, passenger services are considered worthy projects, while freight mobility gets the short shrift. Yet freight mobility is often responsible for vast amounts of the economy, and improvements there can make huge impacts on pollution and congestion.
These representatives also do not seem to be taking into account that transporting sand and gravel by barge, instead of by truck, saves fuel, reduces heavy truck traffic on area roads, reduces greenhouse-gas emissions and helps keep down the cost of state-(taxpayer-)funded transportation projects that benefit the entire region. One average barge keeps 186 heavy trucks and trailers off the road."
Two industrial stories of note this week. First up, the Willamette Week has a neat story on Oregon City's Blue Heron Paper. The company is one of the few independent paper companies left in the region. Less satisfying news comes via the Statesman Journal, who notes that the old Steinfeld Pickles plant is closing. Wonder where the pickles are made now?
Odd news roundup: the Albany Fire Department has gone retro; Stumptown Confidential brings us mod churches; LEGO hits the classroom; and a postcard mailed in 1929 arrives at last.
A quick hat-tip to VanPortlander for pointing out this tour of Interstate Avenue's neon. Cool stuff.
Lastly, a big loud amen to Katlheen Bauer over at Good Stuff NW for her post on foodie terminology addiction:"Then this morning I'm reading a seemingly harmless Valentines Day article in the NYT about couples who have different food preferences, and one woman says that she's been able to tolerate her husband's occasional need for animal flesh because she's not a "vegangelical." What?"
Kathleen, don't tell me you haven't heard about vegansexuality yet?
On that very sketchy note, I think I should leave now, quietly!
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Saturday, February 9, 2008
Week in Review, Vol. IX
Thanks to the good old viral hokey-pokey, this installment of Week in Review is a tad late. It seems everybody has caught it, or some variant of it, this week. Ugh. I'm still recovering but I'm at least functional again. I also managed to donate a significant amount of money to the "keep Ricola making cough-drops" fund. Thank you, Switzerland! Labels: Civics, Photography, Portland, Public Policy, Publishing, Railroads, Transportation, Week in Review
A lot of streetcar noise this week. Portland Transport on Monday broke news that the new loop for the Eastside had made the President's budget. Metro is now seeking public comment on the project.
The AP story, however, has not gone down well with some:"But the federal agency said that the Portland transit agency, TriMet, has to develop better ridership models and show the benefits of the streetcar system to get past the last hurdle for funding in 2009."
The Portland Streetcar, Inc., is not a division or affiliation of TriMet. Although TriMet has handled making federal funding applications for them, they are not responsible for planning decisions on the streetcar.
Meanwhile I can't help but feel that the grand expansionist visions of the streetcar system are eventually going to come into direct conflict with TriMet's extensive bus system. Why would the agency view streetcars on their bus routes, taking their riders and their fares, with anything other than alarm and anger? It makes no sense to build a competing system in the city; neither TriMet nor PSI will be healthier for it.
The remaining transportation roundup jumps all over the place. Also on Monday, a MAX train struck a TriMet bus downtown. Thankfully there were only minor injuries to one person on the bus, and no injuries to anyone else.
On Tuesday the Oregonian published a story on the design of the Columbia Crossing project. The story laments how plain the new bridge will be. At $4.2 billion, I'm not sure if all this debate will be moot anyway.
On Wednesday the Roseburg News Review put up a rather amusing Op-Ed on the closure of the Central Oregon & Pacific's Coos Bay line. The name "Snidely Whiplash" is used. Why do I feel that I need the voice of Edward Everett Horton to read the story out loud?
Friday brought an amusing story in the Big O about the TriMet hearings in Salem."One senator read a constituent's e-mail message.... [suggesting] replacing MAX with express buses that have drivers who can monitor riders."
It's nice to see the politicos are now being blatant asses by reading ludicrous comments such as that. After investing how many hundreds of millions -- its probably over a billion -- in federal and state funds, we should abandon our investment and convert back to buses? All so we can have a false appearance of safety? Or, well, you know, we could add, uh... enforcement?
Lastly, my friend Dan the history man should be happy to see that the Figo House will be saved after all.
A few other odds and ends of news. The Seattle P-I will have to treat online reporters the same as paper ones, which amounts to a victory for their unionized workers. Also in the Emerald City, some artists have created custom audio tours of the Seattle Art Museum. I wonder if we could do one for a walking tour of Portland? And in an "only in Portland" story, we now have a Vegan stripper joint.
In the photography world, Whiskey Texas has a lot of new stuff. Grain elevators, buZ blurr, and anti-sagging-pants billboards. Strange combinations, Wes.
There's also another essay up from Martin Burwash. Nice stuff as always.
That's all for now. Take care, folks, and if you catch what I've got, I recommend a lot of green tea and miso soup.
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