Friday, December 9, 2022

Projects Needing No Opposition (Now)

 

Newspaper advertisement, 1964

One encouraging thought for architectural preservationists is that we don’t have to worry about saving “historic” projects that never made it off the drawing boards.  This inspiration is prompted by a new exhibit at the Architectural Heritage Center called Unbuilt Portland.

 The exhibit includes a dramatic painting showing 15 bulky stories of apartments grafted atop the old Masonic Temple (shown below) that is now a part of the Portland Art Museum. Among other non-starters is a tall spire that thankfully was never added to A.E. Doyle’s classical Roman temple of the U.S. National Bank downtown, some underground parking and highway plans..

The prospect of failed proposals brings to mind another major project not mentioned in the AHC exhibit.  It was a plan submitted to voters twice in 1964 to build at 64,700-seat domed stadium close to Delta Park in North Portland.  Proponents hoped the $25 million project would land a major football or baseball franchise, and perhaps even the U.S. Olympics.

The concept of a domed, multi-purpose stadium was still new in 1964, when Houston’s Astrodome was not yet completed and several other cities were conceiving stadia that could house both major league baseball and football teams.

 The Delta Dome was unique in that it would have had natural ventilation from air flowing through a gap between the larger inverted bowl that comprised the Plexiglas roof and the smaller seating bowl below.  The creative design was the product of the big Skidmore Owings Merrill firm that had designed Memorial Coliseum just a few years earlier.

Apartment proposal, circa 1955

 Delta Dome drew heavy support from local politicians, sports enthusiasts and business interests who believed the new stadium would be an economic stimulant.  A sportswriter contended the ballot measures gave Portlanders the choice of being “a Big League City or a Sad Sack Town.”

 Voters in May and again in November of 1964 took the sad sack town option, and that was the last we heard of Delta Dome.

 Had the dome been erected, there was a strong opinion that Al Davis would have located his AFL football team, the Raiders, in Portland instead of Oakland.  How long he would have remained in Portland is a good question; Davis later moved from Oakland to Los Angeles, then back to Oakland; his son later fled Oakland for Las Vegas.

 Further, the domed stadium concept proved unsuccessful elsewhere.  Today the Astrodome is long vacant; Seattle built the Kingdome and later imploded it.  It turned out that stadia built for both football and baseball didn’t provide optimum seating for either sport, and major league cities these days have erected separate venues for the two sports.

 With the defeat of Delta Dome, the City of Portland decided to buy Multnomah Stadium from the private Multnomah Athletic Club.  The 1920s-era stadium has been renovated several times since and is now used almost exclusively for professional soccer.    However, its current seating capacity of 25,000 suggests that another significant expansion likely will be in the offing (as Building on History has suggested earlier) if professional soccer continues to grow in popularity.

 The Architectural Heritage Center's Unbuilt Portland exhibit (along with other displays) is open Thursdays through Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., at 701 SE Grand Ave.  It might leave you with the realization that sometimes the city is better off with what it doesn’t achieve. 

 ----Fred Leeson

Join Building on History’s mailing list by writing “add me” to fredleeson@hotmail.com

 


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