Portland is getting close to a decision on a major zoning update for its downtown and close-in neighborhoods.
The City Council held a public hearing Oct. 14 on the Central City Code Amendments Project, a broad update to zoning rules and maps across the Central City. Public testimony is now closed, and the council is set to continue deliberations on possible amendments on Thursday, Oct. 29, at 2:30 p.m., according to the city's project page.
If approved, the changes would take effect March 1, 2027, KPTV reported. The city says the update would increase housing opportunities and make it easier to reuse vacant office buildings and ground floors.
The Planning Commission voted July 14 to recommend that the council adopt the package. City staff held more than 25 meetings with neighborhood, business and development groups while drafting it, and the commission's April 28 hearing drew more than 42 pieces of written testimony.
Taller buildings and more housing
The housing changes are the part builders will care about most. According to the city's presentation to the council:
- Housing where it's banned now. The plan would remove the housing prohibition in parts of the EX zone, including along North Russell Street, south and southeast of the OMSI master plan site, and north of Southeast Powell Boulevard.
- Two ways to go taller. Under the first, the city keeps its current base and bonus height system but raises the maximum bonus height in strategic spots when a floor area bonus is also earned. Under the second, a project could request unlimited height if at least 75% of its floor area is residential and its floor plates above 100 feet are no larger than 12,500 square feet. Designated public view corridors, historic districts, the South Waterfront subdistrict and the RiverPlace and North Pearl height opportunity areas are excluded. Shadow analysis would be required near residential zones outside the Central City, Tom McCall Waterfront Park and public open spaces.
- More floor area. The maximum floor area ratio that can be earned through a bonus would rise from 3:1 to 4:1, and a new 1:1 bonus would reward family-sized two- and three-bedroom units.
- Ground-floor homes. The plan would cut the number of streets where ground-floor apartments are banned. Ground-floor units would need either an elevated entrance or a set-back entrance with landscaping, plus a patio or porch of at least 36 square feet.
The package also rezones some parcels. Land in Goose Hollow would change from a multi-dwelling zone to Central Commercial. In Lower Albina, a limited number of industrial parcels along North Russell Street and near the Albina station area, plus a key waterfront site, would be rezoned for mixed use. In the Central Eastside, main streets along Northeast Couch and Southeast Belmont would be rezoned for transit-oriented residential mixed use, along with the last vacant industrial parcel at the OMSI station area. Amendments to approved Central City master plans would also face a lighter level of review.
Business and industry
Not everything is about housing. The plan would allow up to 20,000 square feet of retail in industrial areas of the Central Eastside, expand manufacturing uses in the Central Commercial zone and allow small "micro delivery hubs." It also loosens food cart rules, allows some temporary surface parking and lets more visitor-serving uses into Waterfront Park, where the river setback would shrink from 50 feet to 25 feet. Another change would let buildings combine solar panels and ecoroofs.
The plan has drawn concerns about protecting industrial businesses and jobs, infrastructure capacity and the effects of taller buildings, KPTV reported. In the Central Eastside, planners said existing zoning already allows more than 15,000 potential housing units and declined requests to rezone more industrial land.
Why it matters for Contractors
Zoning changes don't build anything on their own, but they decide what can get built. If the council approves this package, developers in the Central City would get more room to go tall, more floor area and fewer barriers to housing on the ground floor and in former industrial zones. That could mean more high-rise residential and office-to-housing conversion work in the years ahead, especially for structural, MEP, envelope and fire protection trades. The family-sized unit bonus and ground-floor standards would also shape how buildings are laid out. Mark Oct. 29 on your calendar, and if the package passes, March 1, 2027, is when the new rules would kick in.