Oh, joy. I used to live right across SW 16th from Lincoln High, and we already had an insane parking problem in the neighborhood. The owner of my apartment building had sold all of the building's parking to Lincoln High students, so we were given the "go by streetcar" line the moment we signed the lease. When baseball games or any other event ran in the neighborhood, trying to find so much as a temporary spot, so you could haul in groceries, was already impossible, and and the only options for those of us who needed parking was to pay nutso prices for a parking garage down the street that thought four SUVs could fit into spaces painted for three Civics. And yet somehow all of the new residents in those new condos will gleefully hop and skip to the streetcar.

Jack, I believe you and all of the others when you tell me that Portland used to be a great place once. I really do. I'm just realizing that my bad experiences there were due to arriving just in time for the rot to set in, and it only got worse since I left.

What does "underutilized" mean and what "parcels" are they referring to? The football field and track at Lincoln? Surely they can't mean the whole school? But it sounds like they mean the whole school. That's crazy.

I've said it before and I'll say again... residents of Portland have been utterly and completely sold out to real estate developers and social engineers bent on persecuting said residents right out of town to make way for a new kind of resident who want to live in a newly rebuilt Portland. The geographic location is too valuable to waste on any but the most valuable customers.

All of he above and arrogant doesn't even begin to describe these people!

... And it's only 253 more days until Wim Wiewel announces that Sam Adams has been hired as the Katz/Edlen Professor of Sustainability at PSU's Hatfield School of Government.

Just a little "repurposing" going on here . . . move along . . . nothing to see . . .

"When people consider moving to Portland they often use Lincoln High School as a judge of the PPS district because it is in the central city."

Doesn't it sound like some little enclave of city planners pulled that straight out of their butts?

The Portland Public School properties and the Portland Public Park properties are the only large parcels of land left in the city, and the developers have been angling for years to wrangle them from the public.

Remember the sale of 14 acres of Mt. Tabor Park to Warner Pacific College? When requesting documents for review from the Parks Bureau, one of the executive staff quipped, "It's a big park", as if that made it okay to carve away for cronies. Same attitude goes with the school yards.

It will require a fight on the part of citizens to keep these properties in the public domain, utilized for the good of the public, indefinitely.

Note the zoning for the school nearest you. Look on Portland maps. Most schools are in residential areas and match the zoning of the surrounding residential area, with open space often making up the greater part of the property. The 10.9 acres of Lincoln HS is zoned High Density Residential and includes no open space.

From Portland Maps:
RH (High Density Residential) zone
The RH zone is a high density multi-dwelling zone. Density is not regulated by a maximum number of units per acre. Rather, the maximum size of buildings and intensity of use is regulated by floor area ratio (FAR) limits and other site development standards. Generally the density will range from 80 to 125 units per acre. Allowed housing is characterized by medium to high height and a relatively high percentage of building coverage. The major types of new housing development will be low, medium, and high-rise apartments and condominiums. Generally, RH zones will be well served by transit facilities or be near areas with supportive commercial services.

Franklin is also slated for development, a is Jefferson, as it is already zoned Institutional Residential,(IR). At least, this zone includes a school.

From Portland Maps:
IR (Residential Institutional) zone
The IR zone is a multi-use zone that provides for the establishment and growth of large institutional campuses as well as higher density residential development. The IR zone recognizes the valuable role of institutional uses in the community. However, these institutions are generally in residential areas where the level of public services is scaled to a less intense level of development. Institutional uses are often of a significantly different scale and character than the areas in which they are located. Intensity and density are regulated by the maximum number of dwelling units per acre and the maximum size of buildings permitted. Some commercial and light industrial uses are allowed, along with major event entertainment facilities and other uses associated with institutions. Residential development allowed includes all structure types. Mixed use projects including both residential development and institutions are allowed as well as single use projects that are entirely residential or institutional. IR zones will be located near one or more streets that are designated as District Collector streets, Transit Access Streets, or streets of higher classification. IR zones will be used to implement the Comprehensive Plan’s Institutional Campus designation. The IR zone will be applied only when it is accompanied by the “d” Design Review overlay zone.

I've pondered what the zone for Franklin was before it was IR. When inquiring with the city, I was told that since they had new computers, they couldn't retrieve that information any longer, and I would need to put in a FOIA request and pay to find out.

For comparison, check out Grant HS zoning.

Electronic information has made it very easy for the slimeballs to either lose information, alter information, or claim it's too hard to retrieve and will require an exorbitant fee to retrieve from the archives.

If a high school is underutilized, what are all these "greenspaces" and parks that we have all over the place?

If Lincoln High School is underutilized, is Pioneer Courthouse Square "wasted space"?

http://oregonbusinessreport.com/2012/04/why-is-portland-rebuilding-their-best-school/

^myself
One reason... to get it off of valuable real estate and relocate it to someplace less desirable.

How about taking your "new urban renewal area" (any and all of them) and sticking them where the sun don't shine. My Lord folks, why do you KEEP electing clowns who support and promote this absolute garbage?? Bad idea and candidate who thinks it's a good idea does NOT need to be elected. Portland are you listening?

SCAM!

Native Oregonian,
Some of us are not only listening, but devoting a lot of effort to try to stop this downward spiral of Portland.
Why do we KEEP electing clowns who support and promote this absolute garbage??
Good question.
I would characterize that we have a choke-hold on democracy and elections here. When the insiders and press pre-select the "chosen" ones, we are in big trouble. Others are not allowed in important debates. Often people then will lay back and think what is the use here?
Let us not forget that is what they want the people to do. One cannot live under this negative agenda we have had to deal with here in our city without feeling a bit battered and then inclined to give up. I was at a city council hearing a few years ago when another citizen said to me, she was surprised people come to the hearings anymore but that it is the stubborn ones who keep coming and objecting.
At any rate, I see this election as a crossroads, if the people continue to vote for the pre-selected ones, whether by money or press, heaven help us.

Portland should just change it's name to Put-on. So 21st Century! Don't even need eminent domain when you got an eminence front.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfGOGv4aock

And Puton State U. -- they aren't called the Vikings for nothing!

My Lord folks, why do you KEEP electing clowns who support and promote this absolute garbage??

Most elections in Portland are decided in the Democratic Party's primary. Not only do primaries tend to attract the most ideologically extreme members of a party, but any Portland residents that aren't registered Dems don't get a say. We get politicians that are way left of center because they reflect the politics of the Democratic primary voters that elect them.

Republicans should just re-register as D's then and affect the primaries.

There's more to the "Portland Phenomenon," P.P. Portlanders approach elections as if they were picking from a select array of Swatch watches. "Oh, look! This one is made by emancipated minors in a density-infilled metropod, and fed only a recycled vegan diet. No antibiotics, either! And, all the metal and plastic parts are created from confiscated automobiles."

...but any Portland residents that aren't registered Dems don't get a say...

I think there are quite a few registered Dems who don't get a say either, and I might add that don't like the party or their choices. My perception is that we have an insider clique here and if one isn't a part of it, too bad.
There are Democrats who want fiscal responsibility and do not go along with what has taken place in our city.
As for myself, I am no longer for the R or D kabuki theater. There are issues that are more important than sticking with the party line.