Wednesday, April 25, 2012

The Eastbank Esplanade


Welcome to a belated Rose City Wednesday, friends!

Last weekend was truly glorious in Portland: blue & sunny skies, warm, with the fluffy Kwanzan cherries spangling the streets in the north end & the rhododendrons blazing elsewhere. In celebration of this fact, I betook myself for a walk along the Eastbank Esplanade on a brilliant Sunday afternoon..  



The walkway on the lower level of the Steel Bridge, looking east

The Esplanade goes from the lower deck of the Steel Bridge to the Hawthorne Bridge in a north-south direction. At that point it connects with another bike & pedestrian trail, the Springwood Corridor that ultimately leads to the southern suburb of Boring. The Esplanade was built as a replacement for a bicycle bypass that was washed out in a flood in 1996; construction took three years, beginning in 1998 & being completed in 2001. The Esplanade’s full & official name is the Vera Katz Eastbank Esplanade, in honor of the mayor who was in office at the time. It’s a lovely walk, easily accessible from Rose Quarter Transit Center on the east or from Waterfront Park on the west.

Here are some things I saw along the way!



Fishermen on the Kevin J Duckworth Memorial Dock-also part of the esplanade structure
A typical stretch of the Esplanade with the Burnside Bridge in the background
This Canada Goose was also enjoying the sunshine!
At some points the Esplanade is made up of these small girder bridges
View of downtown Portland with paddle wheel steamboat
Sculpture near the Oak St sign-although the only exits off the Esplanade are at four the bridges Steel, Burnside, Morrison, Hawthorne), streets are marked along the way
The Echo Gate below Morrison Bridge
At the southern end of the Esplanade, we leave the floating docks & bridges behind-that's the Hawthorne Bridge in the background
Statue of Mayor Vera Katz

7 comments:

  1. Thanks for letting me tag along, John. A virtual stretch of the legs, with interesting sights to see.

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  2. This is a great view of your new city! It is very appealing; thank you for the tour!

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    1. You're welcome, Cheryl! Glad you enjoyed it.

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  3. A beautiful place to exercise that dog. I have a thing for rusty metal sculpture, and am always charmed by sculpture of people sitting about in the landscape. I have a photograph of my mother and me, taken ten or fifteen years before she died, sitting on a park bench in Montreal with a bronze stranger. No doubt Mayor Vera has had to share that perch with many many people she would never otherwise have had anything to do with.

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  4. Hi Mairi: Thanks! It was a great outing--& actually continued after the esplanade--I forgot to put the "continued next week" tag at the end. Yes, even in the time I was around that little plaza several people posed with Mayor Vera!

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  5. What a nice venue. Parks and walking areas are probably one of a city's most important resources. They restore the soul. Love the statue of the the mayor.

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