Current Conditions:

This site is the most intensively used of the four sites inventoried.  A school takes up the western half of the site, and two apartment buildings sit on the northeast corner of the block.  The school is a low-lying 1970s style school building with few redeeming design qualities. 

Of the apartment buildings, the building on the northeast corner nicely frames the street and has some distinctive qualities, including attractive rounded deck on each corner.  The second apartment building is box-like.

Adjacent Buildings and Uses:

The area directly around the site is fairly dense residential, with the exception of the southern edge, which borders a green open space on the Portland State University campus.

There are residential towers on both the north and east sides of this site.  The Rose Schnitzer Tower on the block north of the site provides subsidized housing for low income elderly and disabled persons.   To the east of the site lies the Benson Tower, a 26 story glass residential tower located on the site of the Simon Benson House (which was relocated to the Portland State University Park Blocks.  These two towers create the opportunity for a tower in that section of the site that would mesh nicely with the surroundings.   On the west side of 12th Avenue two apartment building in the five to six story height range present the opportunity to match their heights on that Avenue to create a very well-defined urban block with great proportions.

(Click on a building to see a close-up of that structure)

Site Observations

Rain fell intermittently during this observation, leaving the observer to seek refuge under one of the trees in the Portland State campus site to the south. 

Although Highway 26 deposits vehicles onto Market, and Clay serves as a feeder to the highway, the traffic did not seem overwhelming or too fast moving.  One reason for this may be that 11th Avenue ends at Market, and the street is reduced down to one lane for cars approaching Market.  Although the streetcar is still present, it creates a sense that 11th Avenue is very manageable and crossable. 

Buildings on the northeast corner of 11th and Clay, and on the southwest corner of 12th and Market speak to the history of the location.  The Calvary Presbyterian (Old) Church on Clay is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is considered a fine example of High Victorian Gothic architecture.  It stands upon land donated by William Ladd (of Ladd’s Addition).  The Helen Gordon Child Development Center, on 12th and Market, is a PSU building that houses a childcare center for children of staff, faculty and students.  Built in 1928, it was originally the Portland Fruit and Flower Mission, organized around the premise of having youngsters deliver flowers to hospital patients and shut-ins.