Office vacancy in downtown Portland is among the highest in the nation. Retail has hollowed out. But some argue the pandemic just accelerated problems that were already there. Who's right and is there any realistic path back?
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Add your commentI worked downtown at a law firm for 12 years. My building is now 40% empty. The lunch spots I went to for a decade are closed. The parking garage I used cut its rates by 60% and it still isn't full. This is not a minor shift.
the people demanding workers come back downtown are commercial real estate investors and building owners. just identifying who benefits from that argument so everyone can factor it in.
I commuted from Beaverton to downtown every day on MAX for eight years. Now I work from my spare bedroom in the same house and those eight years of commuting feel like something I did in a previous life. I'm not going back. Not for anything.
Other cities have revived downtowns post-pandemic by converting office space to housing. Portland keeps talking about it. Talking is different from doing.
Three years ago I would have said downtown was going to bounce back. Two years ago I was less sure. Now I think we need to fundamentally reimagine what downtown is FOR rather than trying to recreate what it was. That's a scarier conversation but probably the honest one.
Downtown Portland had a Nordstrom, a Saks, and a Meier & Frank. All gone. This predates the pandemic and the remote work conversation. Retail in urban cores was already dying before COVID gave everyone an excuse.
Anyone challenging the people who want to stay remote: what exactly is the offer? Rush hour on I-84? Parking that costs more than lunch? An office building with one sad coffee cart? Make the case.
I miss bumping into people. I miss the energy of a busy city block at lunch. I miss feeling like I was part of something larger. I know that's not an economic argument but it's real and I don't think remote work advocates account for it enough.
The city needs residents downtown, not workers. Workers leave at 5pm. Residents create neighborhood life 24 hours a day. Build housing, not return-to-office mandates.
When my company went fully remote I saved $380 a month in parking, transit passes, and downtown lunch prices. I bought a house partly with those savings. Am I supposed to feel bad about that?
Hot take nobody wants to hear: downtown Portland was always kind of mediocre compared to comparable cities. Like objectively the streetscape, the blocks, the retail mix — it wasn't great. We're maybe mourning something that was never as good as we're remembering it.
My employer just announced 3 days in office starting January. I'm actively job hunting for something fully remote. I'm not even mad about it I just know what my priorities are now and they didn't used to be this clear to me.
I started a small food cart in 2019 near the PSU campus. Perfect timing lol. I'm not downtown anymore. Can't be. The foot traffic isn't there.
people keep saying 'convert offices to housing' like it's a simple thing. the floor plates in most office buildings are too deep for residential. the plumbing and ventilation are completely different. it's expensive to convert. not saying don't do it, just saying it's not a quick fix.
Portland has some incredible bones downtown. The transit mall, the parks, the access to the waterfront, the existing density. The bones are good. The will to build on them seems absent.
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