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rosecitytransit.org: transit in the rose city...maybe even Rose City Transit

1990 photo album vision

From the ATU/TRI-MET 20th Anniversary Photo Album, April 1990

It is June 2007, seventeen years since Tri-Met was first named Amercia's Best
Large Transit System. A sparkling, sunny morning greets the traditional thousands
of spectators flooding into downtown Portland for the 100th Rose Festival Grand
Floral Parade. It's one of the busiest days of the year for Tri-Met's 84 MAX
rail stations.

The Centennial Rose Festival has attracted more visitors than ever from Pacific
Rim neighbors. Japanese, Korean and Chinese visitors have taken MAX from Portland
International Airport to their various hotels downtown, in the Sunrise Corridor
or west to Hillsboro. The Zoo station is always a popular stop for tourists.
After the parade, they'll take the vintage trolley that circles the Willamette
River, stopping at OMSI, the Aquarium and the Historic Union Station Railroad
Museum.

The regional rail and bus service is efficient and has helped established
Portland as a major convention city and a gateway to the rest of Oregon's tourist
attractions. The number of jobs in the region has increased 35% since 1990,
but its famous quality of life is still intact. Clean air and open roadways
have not been sacrificed to growth and industrial expansion.

The central city has maintained its vitality and human scale. Electric trolley
buses serve the busiest inner-city lines, moving quickly and quietly through
traditional neighborhoods.

MAX's Westside Line carries workers to jobs in the Silicon Forest and suburban
professionals to downtown offices.

Small buses circle through suburban neighborhoods, bringing passengers to
transit stations that offer quick connections by rail or bus to a variety of
destinations. Elderly residents still ride Tri-Met for half fare. In rural areas,
residents call the LIFT door-to-door service that picks them up within a half
hour.

Such is the vision portrayed by just a few of the many development plans now
being put forth by business groups and local governments in the metropolitan
region. It's a vision of a future in which we can continue to grow and prosper
without sacrificing the qualities we value the most. Much of its success relies
on our transit system.

Our realization of this vision depends on our will and our ability to forge
the kinds of partnerships that will accomplish common objectives for community
development and to maintain and improve on the high standards for which The
American Public Transit Association first named Tri-Met America's Best Public
Transit System back in 1989.

It is said that we, as a society, can afford what we want to afford. Examples
abound of creative partnerships to achieve goals. If history is any indication,
the future may be as bright as that portrayed by the various visions being put
forth today.


By Jason McHuff, rctmail@jasonmchuff.net