How Portland Sold Its Banks on Walkable Development

Finding financing is one of the biggest challenges for transit-oriented development. How did Portland convince its lenders to get on board?

1 minute read

May 25, 2010, 2:00 PM PDT

By Tim Halbur

Noah Kazis looks at how Portland, Oregon overcame the resistance of lenders to new forms of development:

"Megan Gibb runs Metro's transit-oriented development program, which works with developers and offers financial incentives for TOD. The Crossings, for example, received discounted land, tax breaks, and other financial incentives from Metro. "Our whole program is to build more market-comparables," said Gibb. "The more TOD projects there are, the more it builds on itself." Each project that gets built makes the next one easier to finance."

Kazis says that cities often need to "double down" on new projects, offering considerable incentives to break through the inertia and create new models.

Thanks to Noah Kazis

FULL STORY: How Portland Sold Its Banks on Walkable Development

Tuesday, May 25, 2010 in Streetsblog

Community / Economic Development Land Use Transportation Urban Development New York Oregon Transit-Oriented Development New York City Financing New York Portland Lenders Banks Development View More

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