Proposed MAX stop troubles local leader

Neighborhood group official says station near Bybee overpass unsafe

By Jim Redden

The Portland Tribune, Dec 4, 2007, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (18 Reader comments)

JIM CLARK / TRIBUNE PHOTO

Theresa Pucik of the Sellwood-Moreland Improvement League, a Southeast Portland neighborhood association, believes a planned MAX stop near the Bybee overpass is too dangerous.

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Add Sellwood neighborhood official Theresa Pucik to the growing list of TriMet critics.

Pucik, the vice chairwoman of the Sellwood-Moreland Improvement League, cannot understand why the regional transit agency is considering building a MAX stop in the gulley under the Southeast Bybee Boulevard overpass as part of its coming light-rail line between Portland and Milwaukie.

As Pucik sees it, a station in that location can never be safe. It would be squeezed between busy Southeast McLoughlin Boulevard and the Union Pacific railroad tracks, where trains frequently are parked next to the Eastmoreland Golf Course.

She compares it with the Northeast 82nd Avenue station, which TriMet General Manager Fred Hansen admits is too isolated because it was built below street level next to the busy Banfield Freeway.

“If something bad happens, there’s no way to get an ambulance or police car there quickly,” Pucik said standing on the overpass between the Westmoreland and Eastmoreland neighborhoods late last week. “It just doesn’t make any sense to me.”

Hansen concedes the site poses serious design challenges. But according to Hansen, nearby residents have asked for a station at that location as part of the line expected to be built over the next 10 years.

Although the entire line still is in the early planning stages, Hansen promises it will be built to be as safe as possible, using the newest design standards.

“It will be built the best it can,” Hansen said.

Worries part of safety debate

Pucik is just one of many recently second-guessing TriMet’s commitment to safety, however. Many of the most recent criticisms have focused on the agency’s ability to control crime along its light-rail lines — especially after the widely publicized Nov. 3 beating of 71-year-old Laurie Lee Chilcote at a Gresham MAX station.

TriMet currently patrols the system with a 36-member Transit Police Division, supplemented by 44 Wackenhut private security guards.

But the effectiveness of that force repeatedly was challenged by regional elected and law enforcement officials at two TriMet-sponsored safety summits last week.

Speaking at the west-side summit held in Hillsboro on Friday, Beaverton Police Chief David Bishop said that 36 sworn officers were not enough to even patrol the portion of the MAX line within the Portland city limits, let alone the entire Hillsboro to Gresham route that includes a spur to the Portland International Airport.

“It’s just not enough for Washington County,” said Bishop, who has proposed creating a new Interagency Westside Transit Police Division to patrol the line west of the Vista Tunnel.

The day before, Gresham Mayor Shane Bemis dismissed the effectiveness of the Wackenhut guards at the summit held in his city. Noting that they are not authorized to arrest anyone or even ask to see passenger tickets, Bemis said the public considers them “worthless.”

Beaverton City Attorney Alan Rappleyea even questioned whether TriMet had the right internal policies for fighting crime on the line. Speaking at the Hillsboro summit, he noted it was difficult to penalize passengers for riding without tickets.

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