​Welcome Neighbors!

Sullivan’s Gulch is the neighborhood in Northeast Portland between I-84 ("the gulch") and NE Broadway St. and from NE 15th to 33rd Ave.  We're named after Timothy Sullivan, an early farmer in the area, who settled his donation land claim on January 27, 1851.​ The Sullivan’s Gulch Neighborhood Association works to make our neighborhood more livable through various committees, information and referral.  Meetings are open to all.

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Upcoming SGNA Activities

Board meetings are first Tuesday o each month.  The beginning of every SGNA meeting starts with a public comment period to share your ideas and concerns about the neighborhood or email us here.

​SGNA Land Use & Transportation Committee Meeting
May 4,  6:00 - 7:30 pm
Visitors welcome.  Zoom/phone connection info here.

May  SGNA Board of Directors Meeting
May 4,  7:30 - 9 pm
Visitors welcome.   Zoom/phone connection info here.

1903 Panoramic Photo of NE Portland

The panoramic photograph below is of NE Portland in 1903.  It was taken just before the Sullivan's Gulch and Irvington were developed.  The view is east-northeast.    It's part of a bigger panorama of Portland taken by courtesy of local historian Doug Decker.

First a little orientation: 
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• Point 1 is Rocky Butte
• Point 2 is on the Alameda Ridge, with just a few structures on it — probably farms
• Point 3. This open area is farm land that was on a trajectory to be part of the broader Irvinginton development, but not yet subdivided on the ground. Doug Decker says,  it's bordered by today’s NE Thompson-Fremont between 7th and 15th.  This may have been used by the Multnomah Fair Association for various activities.

A higher resolution version of the image, without the circles, can be found here.  Smaller images of the full panorama are here.

The Gulch Gets a Spring Cleaning

Thanks to the 40 people of all ages who came out on Saturday morning, April 17 to clean up every corner of Sullivan’s Gulch — from 11th to 33rd,  along Broadway and the gold mine area for debris — the slopes of the gulch itself off  NE 16th Ave!

 We couldn’t have asked for better weather.  And it wasn’t just Gulchers, I spoke to a gentleman from SW Portland who just loves picking up litter!  And, I agree, I’m kind of hooked myself — it’s such a good feeling when you can turn around and see you’ve made a difference. (Plus  we collected 3 Sharps containers worth of used hypodermic needles from Holladay Park, the gulch slopes and even a few in the neighborhood.)

Special thanks for Lloyd Center management for make their dumpster available to us.  We ended up collecting FAR MORE STUFF than Dan, Michael and I imagined when we were planning the event.   

And additional thanks to SOLVE.org for providng the tools of the trade!  

Below — the dumpster before and after 

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Are you interested in participating in future clean ups?   If so, contact Dan Lerch-Walters or David Brook and we'll add you to our Clean Up Crew list.

— Dave Brook​

A North-South Bus on 20th-21ST?
​MAYBE  SOME DAY...

Trimet provides really good transit service to Sullivan’s Gulch.  It’s easy to get downtown, NW Portland, Hollywood and beyond. And we’ve got several lines that go north to Alberta, Woodlawn Concordia, as well as along 11th & 12th to Sellwood.

One area that’s hard to get to on public transportation is due south on 21st/20th Ave.  Imagine being able to take a bus to Revolution Hall, get to Cleveland High School (the neighborhood high school for Gulch students) without changing, eat at Castagna on Hawthorne or even go to a concert (or class) at Reed College?  That’s the possibility sketched out by Trimet — a new north-south bus line on 20th-21st — Line Y.

• North from the Gulch Line Y would travel on NE 21st and then up 24th-27th (in place of the existing #17, which would be re-routed to 33rd) all the way to Concordia College.
• South from the Gulch Line Y travels on 20th, jogs over to 26th past Cleveland High School, then past Reed College, swing thru Eastmoreland and on Bybee to 13th in Sellwood.  In the concept maps (below) the #70 would end in Lloyd District (as it used to).

 The proposed route is shown on the maps below.  Note that Line Y is shown as an orange line in the NE map and a light blue line in the SE map.  The route is easier to see in Trimet's long range Service Enhancement plan (click on North/Central and Southeast to see the maps in detail.  (Text continues below.)

Last year SGNA Land Use Chair, DJ Heffernan, and I met with the head of Trimet Service Planning to learn more about what it would take to make Line Y a reality.  We were told that even with all the expansion and improvements that Trimet is currently implementing it appears promising that Line Y could happen in the 5+ year time frame.  But we were cautioned that there are some competing interests for the estimated $4 million it would take to operate Line Y.  This includes the possible conversion to electric buses or making all of Trimet free!  Since Trimet is a public agency they have an open process in setting the priorities each year.  It’s guided by a Citizens Advisory Committee and, ultimately, the Trimet Board of Directors.

Given COVID-19, Trimet will certainly put this kind of service enhancement on hold, probably for several years.  If you think it’s a good idea and would like to spend time trying to move this forward, we need help contacting neighborhood associations along the route to alert them to the possibility of N-S bus service on 20th-21st and work together to rally support to move it up Trimet's priority list for future investments.  But it’s going to take regular attendance at the Citizens Advisory Committee and later Board meeting to move the project along.  We’ll post new information as we get it.  If you want to help out, get in touch with Dave or DJ directly or via the Contact box on this page.   

Source of information and maps 
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North/NE
https://trimet.org/future/northcentral.htm
https://trimet.org/future/pdf/north-central-final-map.pdf

SE
https://trimet.org/future/southeast.htm
https://trimet.org/future/pdf/southeast-final-report-map.pdf

Current bus routes map
https://trimet.org/maps/img/trimetsystem.png

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