When in Bridgetown...

There are several local bloggers who do a more than fine job depicting our local bridges in words and pictures, so I haven't made it a real focus here yet. I don't know if this will change in the future(I do, after all, have a book named Walking Bridges Using Poetry as a Compass waiting for me to pick it up off the shelf), but I do know I've been wanting to do a post on the Interstate Bridge for a while now. These shots are from the Vancouver side where I took a lovely walk today, but I think that I'll break my self-imposed rule about only posting pictures taken in Portland in much the same way I did for Mt. St. Helens a few entries back.



Part of the desire to write about the Interstate Bridge stems from coming across this image several weeks ago. Considering the cars and that the original bridge (the northbound span today) was built in 1917, it would appear the bridge is less than ten years old in this image. Or, well, it could be an entirely idealized image of the same era--I'm struck by the gleaming whiteness of the sidewalks and railings, as well as the standard multi-hued sunset. It all seems so... hopeful.

The other source of the desire to take a few photos and make a note here was a recent conversation I had with my mother, who lives in Kentucky. I couldn't tell you why it came up, but I was telling her about the bridge and the plans to replace it in the near future. I'm sure it's a matter of personal tastes, but I much prefer the soaring spires of the current bridge to the postmodern lines of the artists' renditions in that link. I realized in telling my mother about the bridge that I will really miss it once it's is gone-- I'll miss the towers rising up out of the fog on some mornings, marking the waypoint on my commute. I'll miss the standard issue green paint, the crazy counterweights which made me just a bit nervous the day that I realized that they're not much more than stacked cinderblocks; I'll miss the starlings that have given people so much trouble over the years, and I'll miss the Nessie-ish undulations of the bridge's arches as she reaches across the river.

215 SE 9th

The building seen here, now host to Biwa and other small businesses, is also the former site of the Pine Street Theatre (later the paramount music club LaLuna). The PST has had some recent attention due to being the location where a set by Bleach-era Nirvana was recorded (and released for the first time on a 20 year anniversary deluxe edition). Though it may seem calm--even placid-- here, this was once the happening spot of SE, tailoring to the needs of fans of everything from early alternative (mid-80s Sonic Youth) to grunge to hip hop (there was a notorious shooting outside a Cool Nutz concert that prompted a police officer to declare the venue could avoid problems by "not having hip hop shows"). I may have come to Portland a decade or so too late.

Plaza at the Standard building, SW 6th & Main

The slowness in posting of late can be blamed on my recently broken camera, and all the heartaches that accompany it... but now I've begun experimenting with a camera on a new phone, and it's not so bad. Maybe a a fix or replacement (don't get me started on the noxious nature of our throwaway culture) for the other will be in the cards soon...

Here, the fountain and wavy reflection all belong to the Standard, of course-- once the tallest building in Portland, and indeed once the tallest concrete structure in the world. There's a fascinating construction exhibit on it at the Architectural Heritage Center, I believe, showing just what an engineering feat this was (imagine the HVAC issues alone).

The reflection is displayed on the Congress Center building, so named for the long-gone Congress Hotel (1912-1980), designed by Herman Brookman and decidedly less shiny than the current structure. I doubt the hotel had a subterranean fondue restaurant to claim, either, especially as the arches over the stairway now leading down to The Melting Pot seem to be an architectural remnant of the original structure.

Perhaps the most interesting trivia about the hotel brought up by a brief search is that, according to the Rosicrucian Society Digest, in 1941, there were regular meetings of the Rosicrucian Society held in the hotel's Green Room on Thursday nights at 8:00. Those crusaders really were everywhere. Anyone have a good grail story about the Pacific Northwest?