TROLLEYS TO NOWHERE

I’ve called streetcars in Portland a giant leap to 1938, and that’s not really fair. There was a time when even horsedrawn trolleys made vital sense for a nation on the rise, so I guess I should show a little more respect for the legitimacy of the past. That’s what bothers me about this whole artificial age we’re living in, where civic developments aren’t a result of some bursting need, but are more like knickknacks in a boutique that might sell if they’re put on display. I’m pretty sure the early baseball stadiums weren’t built because franchises were struggling elsewhere, and needed some refuge where perhaps the local populace would defy the statistics and show up. Early baseball stadiums were built because the game’s popularity demanded it. People were playing in the streets, and hanging out the windows to watch.
Bridges were built back then, too, not because some Congressman wanted a pork project, but because the people were going to cross that damn river one way or another.
It strikes me that Portland has succumbed to phoniness, where things are built in the hopes that a need will show up later. It's not driven by demand. Things these days are built because they look cute. It’s superficial and that’s the danger we face here: If we do too many fake things in a row, we’ll collapse in a pile of our own phoniness.
Walk by PGE park and think back to the days when Babe Ruth and the Yankees would go on exhibition tours and face some small town squad in a game they talked about forever. It was vital and it was real. Back then ideas came about because of obvious gigantic forces welling up from a magnificent young nation - not because some ego-tripping politicians would rather play visionary than take care of the real stuff. Not only are we cheapening the memory of those legitimate days and vital projects but we’re ignoring our genuine needs. This situation is screwed up. It’s not just the trolleys. Portland politicians are putting the trolley in front of the horse.