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Expertise: Civil Engineering

Block 49/Gray’s Landing

Gray’s Landing is the first affordable housing project in Portland’s South Waterfront District. Otak provided civil engineering and landscape architectural design for a 44,682-square-foot mixed-use development that includes residences, underground parking, and retail/office space with a courtyard. Portlanders understand how important it is to remain cheerful during the long wet season, so our design team found playful ways to engage the rain.

Sustainable Design Meets Affordable Housing Goals

Designed with sustainability in mind, both the courtyard and pedestrian areas consist of surfaces that are largely pervious—sand-set pavers, decking, metal grates, flow-through planters, and landscaping. Stormwater runoff from the rooftop is conveyed through a series of playful in-wall and overhead weirs that distribute the rainwater into the courtyard flow-through planters, eventually dropping the treated water into an artistic stormwater feature at grade level. Portland’s significant investment in the project, valued at $28 million, is solid proof of the community’s commitment to providing affordable homes for our lowest-income neighbors. Forty-two of the 209 apartments are targeted to veterans, especially those who have experienced chronic homelessness. The project earned LEED Platinum certification.

Columbia Palisades Subdivision

On a prime piece of 90-acre property overlooking the Columbia River, The Washington State Department of Transportation planned for an exclusive lifestyle community. The resulting Columbia Palisades Subdivision contains luxury residences, offices, parks and open space, a hotel, commercial buildings, and an open-air amphitheater.

A Public-Private Master Plan for Underused Lands While Maintaining Natural Resource Mitigation

Located on a historic rock quarry, the site has a 180-foot elevation change. At least 180,000 cubic yards of rocks and boulders were excavated to clear the way for 8,500 linear feet of roads, including a roundabout for efficient traffic flow. The complex stormwater design includes right-of-way catch basins, conveyance piping, and mechanical stormwater treatment and regional detention/discharge facilities. Close coordination with the City of Vancouver to create a subarea plan led to the Columbia Palisades Master Plan. Working with The Washington State Department of Natural Resources, planning included preparation of a quarry reclamation plan and natural resources mitigation plan. A successful public-private partnership, this important project is a prime example of redeveloping underused lands. Otak led various facets of master planning as well as land use permitting and infrastructure design in making this community a reality.

Residents Weigh-In on Mountlake Terrace’s New Gateway Plaza

It’s the future. Throughout the Puget Sound region, light rail carries residents and commuters on their daily commute. The morning is brisk and unseasonably bright. You find yourself in Mountlake Terrace, walking down the station steps. What do you see?

On Tuesday, December 11, the City of Mountlake Terrace and Otak met with residents to answer that question, sharing initial design concepts for a new pedestrian plaza outside of the City’s upcoming Sound Transit light rail station. The aptly named “Gateway Plaza” is intended not only to be visitors’ first impression of the city, but also an entrance to Snohomish County itself.

“It gives an identity to the area,” said Curtis LaPierre, Otak’s senior landscape architect for the project. Already heavily traveled, the plaza will add “a nice place for pedestrians to sit, meet up, and even to stroll through.” Listen to Curtis talking about this exciting project.

The meeting was a success, according to LaPierre. He and Jeff Betz, City of Mountlake Terrace’s Recreation and Parks Director, spent more than an hour with residents, taking questions and receiving ideas around the three preliminary focal concepts: waterfall, lighted, and community tree.

LaPierre explained that the biggest challenge for residents at these kinds of meetings is getting away from the placement of individual objects—like trees and paved paths—and explaining what they want to experience. This wasn’t the case for the December 11th meeting. “There was good communication and they had lots of good and useful ideas.”

The next community meeting will take place in January. Residents are encouraged to attend and comment through the City’s project web page, where they can find more information, including illustrations of the proposed concepts.

Check out MLTnews detailed reporting of the meeting here.

Improving the Streets of Tillamook

Otak, in partnership with the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) and Quincy Engineering, provided design and construction management for this $25 million roadway improvement in the heart of Tillamook. The project made significant improvements to both US101 and OR6 and the intersection between the two highways, and it included reconstruction of the US101 bridge over Hoquarton Slough.

Otak designed the one-way couplet through downtown Tillamook and provided stormwater treatment and landscape architecture services throughout the project. With construction starting in summer 2016, we provided construction management and inspection to oversee work progress. The project was substantially completed in October 2018, a success story for both ODOT and the City of Tillamook.

On October 31, 2018, the City and ODOT held a ribbon-cutting ceremony in the 2nd Street plaza, a festival street that will be used for farmers markets and other outdoor festivities to bring the community together. Members of the local community shared stories, along with ODOT and state representatives such as Senator Betsy Johnson and Congressman Kurt Schrader.

This project provides great value to the Tillamook community through improved traffic flow, pedestrian connectivity, and safety improvements, and it continues downtown revitalization with the new streetscape and aesthetics.

The Otak team is excited for ODOT, the City of Tillamook and its citizens, and the road users who will experience this great project!

Cooper’s View Park

A park master plan, construction documents development, and construction observation allowed for the development of a 2.5-acre parcel on a sloping site in the Drewf’s Farm Neighborhood above Fallen Leaf Lake in Camas, Washington.

A Park Master Plan for a Complex Site

Objectives included developing a neighborhood park plan with community input, seeking approval through the City’s design review process, and seeing the project through construction. In engaging the community, the Otak team gathered public comment on concerns and preferred amenities through neighborhood meetings and presented them to the Parks Commission for the land use review process. We also solved drainage issues from nearby properties and provided site analysis and site design, sustainable design, and cost estimating.