2910.It's been a long time in coming, I suppose. Its sister down at SE 82nd and Foster closed about three years back, leaving the locals with the choice between Fred Meyer and Fred Meyer, the Albertsons at Eastport Plaza closing sometime before.
The closing of a Safeway seems to have bound into it the idea of a surrender, a giving-up. If Safeway can't make it in your neighborhood, there's not much money to be had from the locals. If business is good, fortune passes everywhere, so they say.
They say E. 82nd Avenue is 'distressed'. This in and of itself is worrisome; distressed can mean many things to many people, but when they start using it on a public policy level, that always seems to be code for here comes the developers and the gentrification. And if they aren't just down the road, well, hold on tight. They'll get there eventually.
The sign boasts that Safeway's been serving Portland since 1921. Whether it's this particular Safeway, at 101 SE 82nd Avenue, or Safeways in general, is unclear. And now we may never know.
Architecture matters. It lends character and form to a neighborhood, and in cases where it's unrelentingly commercial, soothes the eye if it's done right. The design of Safeway stores, the standard look … which is this:
Is a welcome cool drink of water, visually speaking. Truth be told, SE 82nd Avenue gets fairly bleak south of here; there's aLutheran Episcopal church (Sts. Peter and Paul) and then it's a succession of shabby used car lots and stores-that-had-seen-better-days until … well, on SE 82nd, it never really does end. Clackamas Town Center is about six miles away to your left as you look at the above picture and it's unrelenting commerce all the way. But I do not condemn it here, understand; I merely state it for the record. I make no judgements. It does not bother me as such; people live here. It is what it is.
The grace of the the wave-form roof has always been a beauty to me. Not so much a roofline as wings that are just waiting to take off from the top of the building. Gave the standard Safeway design a nice symmetry, even if the building is ultimately asymmetrical the curving roof is a dominant element that the entire design revolves around.
And, like other well-done designs of the 20th Century, in its way, timeless.
During the administration of Sam Adams, there was a big deal made about food deserts. Regardless of the press TriMet is peddling these days, it ain't what it once was; it's more expensive, less frequent, and goes fewer places. Along 82nd, now, there used to be four or five supermarkets: There was once an Albertson's at 82nd and Holgate, two Safeways (82nd and Foster and 82nd and Burnside), and a Food 4 Less (82nd and Powell). And, over the last decade, they have slowly, one-by-one, died. The Albertsons was the first to go, followed by the Foster Safeway; the Food 4 Less closed suddenly, with no advance warning, just last month.
The 82nd and Burnside Safeway was the sole survivor, and as though it heard its last comrade died, gave up the ghost almost in sympathy. Now, the Adams administration seemed to be saying if you didn't have a grocery store in walking distance, or within, say, half-a-mile, that made your nabe less livable, and going to the grocery store is like a trek to the nearest oasis. A food desert. And with the closing of the 82nd and Burnside Safeway, the nearest supermarket is the Fred Meyer on 82nd and Foster (about 2 and a half miles south). The next one is yet another Fred Meyer, 82nd and Johnson Creek Blvd, about 2 more miles beyond that. The next reasonably price food store is still over a mile south of that, the WinCo at 82nd and Causey. And Fred Meyer is not really a great choice when it comes to prices.
There are no food stores except a Plaid Pantry and a 7-Eleven on NE 82nd.
Food desert? Sure, why not? This is a regular food al-Rub-al-Khali. Checking the nearest Safeways they recommend (helpfully tacked to the door):
Those are reasonably reached in a tolerable time only if you have a car. TriMet rides to these stores, with the fewer routes and reduced service, have become an ordeal for some.
If shopping for a family, using the city bus for transportation, seems a reasonable concept then, sirra, I would respectfully submit you have never actually done it.
Not one to waste an opportunity, I looked into the market with fascination. I've never seen a supermarket, much less a Safeway, look so danged empty before.
Pallets of bottled water stood in front of shelves as bare as the videos I remember of Russians desperately looking for food during food shortages back when there was a USSR back in the 70s and 80s. In a land of plenty, plenty of space. And it looked as though things were getting packaged up for shipment to … where? Who knows?
The meat and dairy section, pictured above, seemed most folorn. So brightly lit, and so empty. The left over beverages, the ones that didn't get bought in the clearance sale, futures uncertain, sit waiting. The shelves in cooler cases always struck me as funny … no matter how clean the store kept them, when empty, they always looked overworn and abused.
Thronging with customers, serving a neighborhood … well, that was then. This is now. God only knows what that store will become … either it will get pulled down and developed, or some appalling retailer will take up that space, one can only guess.
But the party's over, folks. East Portland, you face the future thus, wandering in the food desert, wondering why the rest of the city disrespects you so.
'S'okay. Don't fret it. I'm sure it was nothing personal.
It was only business.
(NB: Thank you, Laura C. Minnick, for pointing out that Saints Peter and Paul is an Episcopal Church, not a Lutheran one. The Times regrets the error.)
The closing of a Safeway seems to have bound into it the idea of a surrender, a giving-up. If Safeway can't make it in your neighborhood, there's not much money to be had from the locals. If business is good, fortune passes everywhere, so they say.
They say E. 82nd Avenue is 'distressed'. This in and of itself is worrisome; distressed can mean many things to many people, but when they start using it on a public policy level, that always seems to be code for here comes the developers and the gentrification. And if they aren't just down the road, well, hold on tight. They'll get there eventually.
The sign boasts that Safeway's been serving Portland since 1921. Whether it's this particular Safeway, at 101 SE 82nd Avenue, or Safeways in general, is unclear. And now we may never know.
Architecture matters. It lends character and form to a neighborhood, and in cases where it's unrelentingly commercial, soothes the eye if it's done right. The design of Safeway stores, the standard look … which is this:
Is a welcome cool drink of water, visually speaking. Truth be told, SE 82nd Avenue gets fairly bleak south of here; there's a
The grace of the the wave-form roof has always been a beauty to me. Not so much a roofline as wings that are just waiting to take off from the top of the building. Gave the standard Safeway design a nice symmetry, even if the building is ultimately asymmetrical the curving roof is a dominant element that the entire design revolves around.
And, like other well-done designs of the 20th Century, in its way, timeless.
During the administration of Sam Adams, there was a big deal made about food deserts. Regardless of the press TriMet is peddling these days, it ain't what it once was; it's more expensive, less frequent, and goes fewer places. Along 82nd, now, there used to be four or five supermarkets: There was once an Albertson's at 82nd and Holgate, two Safeways (82nd and Foster and 82nd and Burnside), and a Food 4 Less (82nd and Powell). And, over the last decade, they have slowly, one-by-one, died. The Albertsons was the first to go, followed by the Foster Safeway; the Food 4 Less closed suddenly, with no advance warning, just last month.
The 82nd and Burnside Safeway was the sole survivor, and as though it heard its last comrade died, gave up the ghost almost in sympathy. Now, the Adams administration seemed to be saying if you didn't have a grocery store in walking distance, or within, say, half-a-mile, that made your nabe less livable, and going to the grocery store is like a trek to the nearest oasis. A food desert. And with the closing of the 82nd and Burnside Safeway, the nearest supermarket is the Fred Meyer on 82nd and Foster (about 2 and a half miles south). The next one is yet another Fred Meyer, 82nd and Johnson Creek Blvd, about 2 more miles beyond that. The next reasonably price food store is still over a mile south of that, the WinCo at 82nd and Causey. And Fred Meyer is not really a great choice when it comes to prices.
There are no food stores except a Plaid Pantry and a 7-Eleven on NE 82nd.
Food desert? Sure, why not? This is a regular food al-Rub-al-Khali. Checking the nearest Safeways they recommend (helpfully tacked to the door):
Those are reasonably reached in a tolerable time only if you have a car. TriMet rides to these stores, with the fewer routes and reduced service, have become an ordeal for some.
If shopping for a family, using the city bus for transportation, seems a reasonable concept then, sirra, I would respectfully submit you have never actually done it.
Not one to waste an opportunity, I looked into the market with fascination. I've never seen a supermarket, much less a Safeway, look so danged empty before.
Pallets of bottled water stood in front of shelves as bare as the videos I remember of Russians desperately looking for food during food shortages back when there was a USSR back in the 70s and 80s. In a land of plenty, plenty of space. And it looked as though things were getting packaged up for shipment to … where? Who knows?
The meat and dairy section, pictured above, seemed most folorn. So brightly lit, and so empty. The left over beverages, the ones that didn't get bought in the clearance sale, futures uncertain, sit waiting. The shelves in cooler cases always struck me as funny … no matter how clean the store kept them, when empty, they always looked overworn and abused.
Thronging with customers, serving a neighborhood … well, that was then. This is now. God only knows what that store will become … either it will get pulled down and developed, or some appalling retailer will take up that space, one can only guess.
But the party's over, folks. East Portland, you face the future thus, wandering in the food desert, wondering why the rest of the city disrespects you so.
'S'okay. Don't fret it. I'm sure it was nothing personal.
It was only business.
(NB: Thank you, Laura C. Minnick, for pointing out that Saints Peter and Paul is an Episcopal Church, not a Lutheran one. The Times regrets the error.)
