Updated: March 14, 2018

The Portland bureaus of Environmental Services and Transportation have completed construction of the Residential Street and Stormwater Improvement Project for SW 19th Avenue between SW Taylors Ferry Road and SW Marigold Street. This project paved a dirt and gravel street, enhanced an important pedestrian route, and will improve water quality in Tryon Creek.

Schedule

Construction is now complete. Environmental Services Watershed Revegetation team will plant the rain garden with low growing plants in early spring. The plants in combination with the soil will slow, filter, and cleanse stormwater from the SW 19^th area before it reaches Tryon Creek.

Transportation Improvements

_{Using new street standards for improving dirt and gravel streets, the Portland Bureau of Transportation paved SW 19th Avenue from SW Marigold Street to south of SW Orchid Street. SW 19th is an important pedestrian route, a designated Safe Route to School for Capitol Hill Elementary, and part of the regional Metro Hillsdale to Lake Oswego Trail and SW Urban Trail #6.}

Before the project, SW 19th Avenue was an unimproved street covered with a mix of gravel, dirt and pavement. 

Residential streets with lower traffic volumes can occupy a smaller portion of the public right-of-way and have a smaller footprint, less impervious surface and fewer impacts to streams and other natural features.

Environmental Improvements

Tryon Creek, where endangered steelhead trout and Chinook and coho salmon live, is just downhill of SW 19th Avenue. Rain can wash sediment and other pollutants off dirt and gravel streets and into streams.

To improve water quality in Tryon Creek, Environmental Services constructed a rain garden near SW Taylors Ferry Road at SW 19th Avenue. The storm drains and pipe recently installed on SW 19^th will direct stormwater from the paved street surface to the rain garden to improve water quality before the stormwater flows to Tryon Creek.

For More Information

Please call Lisa Moscinski at 503-823-3663 or email lisa.moscinski@portlandoregon.gov if you have questions or concerns.