Bragdon links New York, Portland as green cities

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David Bragdon says Portland's fingerprints are all over New York's green plans.

As a child growing up in New York City, David Bragdon fell asleep to the sound of freight trains passing on the nearby High Line. The elevated section of railroad track serving city’s meat packing district ran through the neighborhood.

The Bragdon family moved to Portland in 1971, trading one fading city for another.

New York famously was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy; Portland was a sleepy western town with nary a bagel in sight.

Or so Bragdon recalled.

The former Metro Council president returned to Portland this week for the annual Better Bricks celebration of sustainable construction, a topic dear to both cities as they pursue ambitious goals to reduce carbon emissions.

Bragdon left Portland in 2010 when New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg recruited him to lead the city’s green makeover. From new parks and bike ways to green streets and transit investments, New York’s experience reflects Portland’s in many ways.

Bragdon said both cities are reviving thanks to forward-thinking leaders to attend to the basics — public safety, education, infrastructure.

“Cities are very delicate things and need to be tended to,” he said.

The High Line offers an apt metaphor for New York’s transition from gritty industrial hub to a green city.

The trains that once rumbled past the Bragdon home disappeared in the early 1980s. The abandoned and elevated track became an eyesore. Many wanted it removed.

Instead, New York reclaimed it as a park, turning the derelict structure into a highly prized amenity on Manhattan’s west side. It’s a new symbol of economic might. Google notably moved to the neighborhood, Bragdon said, because it’s such a cool place.

Converting the High Line into a linear public park is one of 132 initiatives driving Bloomberg’s vision of New York, circa 2030. Bragdon said Portland’s fingerprints are evident in many.

Like Portland, New York has an ancient wastewater system that combines stormwater and sewage. It overflows when it rains, as runoff from roofs and buildings speeds through streets and into the harbor.

New York is borrowing the green streets concept from Portland, designing streets with bioswales and other features to slow down the progress of water and treat before it reaches the system.

The city committed $1.6 billion to green streets. Along the way, it added 250 miles of bike lanes, resulting in a 40 percent reduction in bike-related fatalities between 2001 and 2011.

More recently, the city adopted rules to require owners of buildings with 50,000 square feet or more to report their energy use to the city. The city has no plans to use the information, but hopes the data compels owners to invest in energy efficiency.

“Part of the challenge of energy efficiency is making people realize what their self interest is,” Bragdon said.

Bragdon said the benchmarking exercise fits the mayor’s pattern of providing people with information to make informed decisions, whether it is calorie information at restaurants, energy consumption, school performance or local crime statistics.

Bragdon said local leaders, political and private, must make decisions now about the future rather than waiting for Congress to act.

“We ought not to wait for that,” he said.