Maine Monitor Article on Reducing the Number of Vehicle Miles We Travel

I had the pleasure of talking with Marina Schauffler of Natural Choices, LLC for a couple of climate-related transportation articles this month. I’ve always admired her in-depth journalism and Sea Change column in The Maine Monitor. It’s a joy to speak with someone who already knows so much about the issues and at the same time is open to and actively seeking additional perspectives.

Here’s the Sea Change column she just wrote on Maine’s need to reduce vehicle miles traveled, within the state’s rural and also pandemic contexts: “Driving seemed inescapable until it wasn’t.”

2020 Winner of GrowSmart Maine’s Outstanding Project Award

Congrats to Tom Watson & Port Property Management on the 2020 GrowSmart Maine Outstanding Project award for 82 Hanover Street in Portland!

As Will Savage of Acorn Engineering, Inc. shared this month, “In 2017, the City of Portland released an RFP for the redevelopment of a former Public Works maintenance building at 82 Hanover Street, a brownfield site in a state of blight and disrepair. Port Property Management devised a plan to convert the site into a vibrant, pedestrian oriented, mixed-use commercial center.

Today, the project is fully occupied with a lively variety of local food, beverage, fitness, and service businesses…and all of the new social and economic activity at 82 Hanover has helped attract other investments to the neighborhood.”

As a Transportation Demand Management practitioner, it was a good planning challenge for me as part of the larger work of the extensive site team. I was a genuine pleasure to work on this project with Tom and his capable Port Property staff, plus Will Savage and Sam Lebel at Acorn and William Bray of Traffic Solutions – and all the rest of the smart and capable folks involved:

• Architect: Ryan Senatore, AIA LEED-AP BD+C
• Structural: Aaron Jones
• Environmental: Lucas J. Benedict & Mark Arienti – Acorn Environmental Services
• Surveyor: David Titcomb
• Select Interior Fit-up: Robert Barrett, Matthew Ahlberg
• Attorney: Hawley Strait
• City of Portland Planning Division: Nell Donaldson, Jodie Keene, Tuck O’Brien and Jeff Levine 

What a good crew to bring important redevelopment visions like those of Tom’s into being. I appreciate everyone’s work!

As the award description details the broader impacts, “Multiple new market-rate and affordable housing units, for rent and for sale, have recently been developed in the nearby vicinity and 200 additional units are in the planning phases for other adjacent lots. 82 Hanover is an example of how strong city leadership partnered with a visionary smart growth-oriented developer can provide the catalyst to transform a [semi] abandoned industrial block of town into a vibrant new neighborhood.”

This includes Tom’s application this fall to the City for developing housing at adjacent 52 Hanover – which I’ve enjoyed as another great opportunity for creating a robust site Transportation Demand Management Plan.