To fully realize the plan for the SW Montgomery Green Street, the landscape architect was asked to study the project’s site character, determine the project’s overall stormwater management goals, investigate and respond to the site’s constraints, determine how bold of a green street is possible, and analyze the different modes of circulation throughout the neighborhood. This analysis provided the opportunity for 1.8 million gallons of stormwater runoff to be managed through the street’s “stormwater spine,” the potential for a significant transportation mode shift from auto-infrastructure to people-infrastructure, and the ability to have the street itself catalyze sustainable private redevelopment along the SW Montgomery Green Street corridor. The final product of these analyses is the creation of the SW Montgomery Green Street Plan which has proven to be highly implementable both in the near and long-term.
The SW Montgomery Green Street Plan is being implemented in multiple phases. Two blocks of the plan, the Smith Memorial Student Union Plaza and the Urban Center Plaza Retrofit, have been successfully completed by the landscape architect’s design team. Two additional blocks are targeted for implementation within the next two years, including the proposed Oregon Sustainability Center- Portland’s most technologically advanced, state-of-the-art green building site that aims to meet the rigorous criteria of the Living Building Challenge. With the strategic convergence of various partners and continued planning and implementation efforts, the SW Montgomery Green Street corridor will successfully activate the neighborhood and foster sustainability as a relationship between academic, residential, and business communities. This project’s implementation will serve as a new concept for street planning and a place-making model for other downtown streetscape projects in Portland and beyond.