Article contributed by Alan Armstrong

Last week, a group of about 20 Woodlawn residents got together to discuss the possibility of working with City Repair to enhance one of our intersections and create a  multi-purpose gathering place that engages our neighbors.  Several other neighborhoods in Portland have created similar projects with City Repair, a non-profit organization that educates and inspires communities and individuals to creatively transform the places where they live.

While this spot doesn’t have to be the final project location, the intersection that is at the top of the list right now is the odd corner where Durham, Holman, and 13th all merge together. There is a small, under-utilized park that could be re-purposed as part of the project. Rich Mackin, a Woodlawn resident, has also proposed a project to designate the intersection of Rose Parks and MLK as a Civil Rights Square, which could be the location where our City Repair project takes place.  Or maybe we can do both!

A lot ideas were generated at the meeting including:

Play area, play house and/or play structure
Food/harvest box
Free bin
Book exchange box
A fabulous light
A street mural
Road curves
Sheet mulch

Pavers and/or bricks
A bench
Chess table
Tea house
Big community table
Skateboard rail
Oven and/or grill
Kiosk and/or information board

Edible plants
Pee pit
Fire pit
Sand box

Our goal would be that any of these features added would be accessible to neighbors with disabilities and our elderly neighbors.  The next step in the process is to hold a meeting with neighbors to further hone our ideas.   For the project to be successful we need input from a representation of all members of our diverse neighborhood. The more, the merrier!

If you are interested, please join us at the next general meeting on December 2nd at Gregg and Nikki’s house, the big green house at the corner of Highland and Durham.  Potluck food will be enjoyed from 6:45-7:15 and the meeting will take place from 7:15 to 8:30ish.  Please note that Gregg and Nikki have a dog, and while he is large, he is very friendly.

Please follow this website for more information and project updates. If you have any additional ideas for the project please comment below or email Alan at StrongWorkArch //at// Gmail.com.

// See other city repair projects here.

To comment on this article, leave your comment below then send an e-mail to Comments [at] GoWoodlawn.com so we can push it on through.

November is the last month to sign up to purchase discounted trees through Friends of Trees.  The annual tree planting will take place on Saturday, February 28, 2009.  Friends of Trees not only provides a discount on trees, they help choose trees that are appropriate for your space, a team digs the hold for you, a team of  neighbors will plant the trees and volunteers will come check up on your trees.  This program is a great way to plant trees without the worry of getting it right, and a great way to help beautify the neighborhood.

The most convenient way to reserve your trees is to fill out an application on the Friends of Trees website.  There is a wide variety of styles available, including fruit trees.

•    Trees contribute to neighborhood livability.  They reduce city noise and glare, and also calm and slow traffic.
•    Houses on tree-lined streets command prices that are up to 20% higher than houses in neighborhoods without.
•    Trees reduce the energy needed to heat and cool our homes by 15-35%.
•    Friends of Trees prices are usually 80% less expensive than those of a contractor planting equal sized trees.
•    Trees help reduce greenhouse gas concentration by removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
•    And, the obvious ~ trees beautify our streets and neighborhood.

For more information, contact Laura Demeri, our neighbor who is coordinating the project for neighbors. LDemeri //at// yahoo.com or 503.285.5005.

To comment on this article, leave your comment below then send an e-mail to Comments [at] GoWoodlawn.com so we can push it on through.

Rich Mackin recently moved to Woodlawn and had the idea to do some sort of a project at the intersection of Rosa Parks and MLK.  Civil Rights Square is his working name for the project, and he’s looking for other fols to get involved. It is currently a rough sketch of an idea, but if you are interested in working with Rich on this project, you may contact him directly.  RichMackin //at // Gmail.com.

To comment on this article, leave your comment below then send an e-mail to Comments [at] GoWoodlawn.com so we can push it on through.

We’re having a land use committee meeting on Thursday, October 23, from 7 – 8:30 p.m. at the Woodlawn Methodist Church (1425 NE Dekum).

On the agenda:
* update on the kiosk
* plans for the “Dekum Corner” project in the building on the SW corner of Dekum and Durham.
* sign cap update
* revisiting the land use plan committees and workplans
* electing a chair for the land use committee
* and lots of other fun stuff

PLUS SNACKS!

I hope that you can join us.

Best,
Joellen Pail
WNA Co-Chair

 by Woodlawn Voice editor Anna Van Tol

For the last several years Maureen Ray has been serving the Woodlawn Neighborhood as the Woodlawn Newsletter Editor, founder of the Land Use Committee, and worked on a number of neighborhood events and projects. Her work has helped to connect new and old neighbors and develop our community. Maureen is leaving the Woodlawn neighborhood to join her life partner in a nearby neighborhood. There can be no doubt, wherever Maureen goes she will make that community stronger.

Maureen moved into the Woodlawn neighborhood about four years ago and immediately began looking for ways to improve and connect the neighborhood. Somehow she has managed to be an ESL teacher, mother, creator of after school projects for at-risk youth, and a hardworking neighborhood volunteer. Maureen is a woman with an enormous heart, and a devotion to bettering society that we Woodlawn neighbors have been blessed to have been served by.

Here is what Maureen said she likes about volunteering: Read the rest of this entry »

The City of Portland’s Office of Transportation, in partnership with PSU, offers a Traffic and Transportation class.  Students learn about traffic and transportation alongside neighborhood activists who want to see change happen in their neighborhoods.  The partnership results in real-life learning for the students and a free education on how to better neighborhoods for the activists.  They offer a limited (but generous) number of scholarships to neighborhood activists.  This annual class will be offered this fall term.

FROM THE ANNOUNCEMENT:

Calling all neighborhood activists – Learn how the city that works, works! And how you can affect change in your community.

The Portland Traffic and Transportation Class offers Portlanders the opportunity to learn about the city’s transportation system while working on actual neighborhood projects that affect your community.  Work with decision and policy-makers, planners, scholars and engineers to get your neighborhood transportation project moving.

This interactive Portland State University class is open to all Portland citizens and full scholarships are available to qualified applicants. Learn more on the website.

// more info

Another neighborhood success story. The Tribune reports the Port of
Portland is taking off the table planning for a third runway for the next 30
years. Congrats to CNN, NECN and EPNO.

READ THE ARTICLE HERE

This is something CNN, NECN, and EPNO neighborhood groups have been
organizing. While the article is clear the economy and gas prices are
fundamentally changing demand for airflight, Bill Wyatt still acknowledges
neighborhood opposition was a factor. A Cully neighborhood leader is quoted
too.

Woodlawn Historian Anjala Ehelebe has been unearthing Woodlawn stories and photos for years and her efforts have finally been compiled into a beautiful book, Portland’s Woodlawn Neighborhood, showcasing our neighborhood’s unique history. Woodlawn was the first settled area of Portland and our history is rich. You may notice it in the diagonal streets (oriented to the street car line), the majestic red brick firehouse and the historic Village Ballroom and there is even more chronicled in Anjala’s book.

Portland’s Woodlawn Neighborhood is available for perusal at the general meetings and for purchase at major book stores. In the near future, Anjala will have a book signing at Reflections book store and we will put an announcement up when the details are finalized.

// Portland Tribune Article on Anjala’s book

Six miles, six hours, zero traffic….Imagine enjoying a leisurely stroll or bike ride with friends, family and little tykes without having to worry about cars. Thanks to the City of Portland, this will be possible during Sunday Parkways, a six-mile “temporary park” connecting North Portland neighborhoods and residents.

The festival is patterned after Ciclovias, an event that first became successful in South America. Every Sunday from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. the city of Bogota, Colombia closes 70 miles of major roads so that people can bike, roller blade, run and stroll without traffic. The Ciclovia has become a major community activity and on an average weekend 1.5 million people enjoy the traffic-free boulevards. Another term for this concept is “Sunday Parkways”, and they’re coming to North Portland, close to Woodlawn, this summer.

Each park along the way will feature a line-up of music, entertainment and activities, including yoga for seniors, food, tango lessons, a kids’ choir, pickup games of kickball and baseball, Tai-Chi, acupuncture, pedi cab rides, kids activities and plenty more.

// Schedule of activities

When I first moved into my house, I was excited to watch little things pop up out of the ground – treasures planted by the two residents who tended this plot before me. Along with the flowers and buds emerged every-growing-taller grass. To my mounting list of tools/equipment to purchase, did I really have to add a lawn mower? I was dreading it. Not only did not I not want to mow, buy a mower (or borrow one), I really didn’t want grass. I wanted edibles and snipables: things I could eat and share with others. So I got rid of my grass.

I got tips from my neighbor who long ago took out her grass. Three years later, I’m the happy tender of a wood-chipped yard. And I’m watching three neighbors now remove their sod. And a neighbor who put in fresh sod. Grass removal is not for everyone, but if you’re sick of your grass or wish you had more room for gardening, you have options. Here is my method, in the most basic description: Read the rest of this entry »