WILLAMETTE FALLS LEGACY PROJECT- VISIONING AND MASTER PLANNING

Partners invite Oregonians to help craft a vision for Willamette Falls

Planning will help spark economic redevelopment and shape a public destination Oregon City will lead a public visioning, master planning and rezoning process designed to help transform a former paper mill alongside Willamette Falls into a regionally significant economic redevelopment project and visitor destination.

Oregonians will be invited to shape the historic 23-acre site in collaboration with Oregon City, Metro, the State of Oregon and Clackamas County. The resulting vision could reconnect Oregonians with North America’s second largest waterfall, as well as an important cultural site for native tribes and significant fish and wildlife habitat along the Willamette River. It will also support Oregon City’s vision for the future and reinvigorate the downtown as a hub of employment, shopping, business, tourism and housing. Public and stakeholder dialog could begin as soon as May.

The Willamette Falls Legacy Project site’s dynamic location immediately adjacent to Willamette Falls and the Oregon City bluffs and its notable role in Oregon’s history make this 23 acre, single-owner property a truly unique and regionally-significant development opportunity. In early 2011, after over 100 years of paper manufacturing on the site, the Blue Heron Paper Company ceased operations and permanently closed its paper manufacturing facility on the site. Since that time, the property has gone into receivership and is currently for sale. It is being managed by the lender’s Trustee. The City of Oregon City, Metro, Clackamas County and the State of Oregon have deemed the site to be a “legacy opportunity”

The purpose of this Request for Proposals is to select a Consulting Team to assist the City of Oregon City, in cooperation with the bankruptcy trustee, in completing a Master Plan and Rezoning of the former Blue Heron Paper Mill Site. This planning project will create a vision for the site through a robust public process that respects the history and nature of the land and provides needed certainty to the development community by removing or reducing barriers to site redevelopment.

Please note:

The RFP interviews have been moved back 1 week to May 2nd and 3rd. Previous draft versions of the RFP had a different interview date.

The tour waiver form has been uploaded. Tour participants please read it over and send Christina Robertson-Gardiner a scanned signed copy by March 26, 2013. Only two people per RFP submittal will be allowed on the tour. We are limiting the tour group for size and logistics reasons.

4/7/2013 Update on Pre-proposal Conference Video.

Unfortunately, the sound quality was to low to upload to the city's video website. The PowerPoint, however,  has been added to the plan holder files.

(4/4/13) New item uploaded:
'Metro retained Greenworks to provide a site assessment and access study on the Blue Heron Paper Mill site in August 2011. The study included the development of conceptual illustrations showing potential redevelopment of the site. This scope of work was paid for by Metro to provide a better understanding of what potential site access to Willamette Falls might look like. The cost of the study was $7,500.' The boards have been uploaded to the planholder document list.