Contemplation #1

I took this photo recently while on a photo spree out west of downtown Portland.  The Beaverton Transit Center stop is a great stop, for transit, but not so much else. 

Contemplation #2

So the Beaverton Transit Center is just oddly positioned, so the question is, "How do we fix Beaverton Transit Center so it would have more positive impact on the development of Beaverton?"

One thing is the surrounding land HAS to be developed in a transit oriented fashion.  There are apartments, which is a good thing, nearby that offer higher than normal densities.  But between the apartments and the stop is a large field that could literally fit two blocks of downtown Portland in it.  At minimum there could be an opportunity for substantial commercial development. 

On the other side of the station is a strip mall, oriented in entirely the wrong direction for the transit center.  This area needs to have additional store fronts added for transit friendly businesses (food, basic retail) that actually face the transit center instead of only the massive parking lot.

In addition to that Beaverton has a serious walk friendly problem.  The downtown core, which is mostly centered in the older part of Beaverton and NOT at the transit center, is the only area where the businesses are walk friendly.  Of course no planners where involved in the old part of town, people just logically laid out some roads and built the business store fronts in the obviously logical places - where people would walk.  How to bridge the gap between these areas, and the rather massive shopping mall sprawls in the area pose a massive problem to decreasing auto dependency and enabling people to actually walk to and from the various stores and businesses around Beaverton.

As I write this I've just realized I need to go through about a dozen more proofs and look at the maps a few more times before suggesting or even proposing a fix to the chaos and mess that is Beaverton.  If anyone else has insight and thoughts on this shoot some comments over, otherwise stay tuned and I'll have a more elaborate discussion based entry coming soon.  (I've already started taking notes!)