Portland, Maine At A Crossroads – Housing imbalance may hurt city – (First in a multi-part series)

The first article in a week-long series examines how Portland, Maine’s growing reputation as one of the most livable cities in the United States is quickly altering the social demographics of a once working and middle class city.

Portland is on the threshold of its biggest development boom in more than a century.

Across Maine’s largest city, whole tracts of land are poised to be transformed in the next few years. More than $800 million in major projects are planned or anticipated on the downtown peninsula alone, from the $110 million Westin Hotel and condominium project on the eastern waterfront to the $161 million Mercy Hospital campus on the Fore River.

Those are impressive numbers for a city that has teetered on the edge of success since the 1970s, when Portland’s status as a shipping, fishing and railroad hub started to slip.

Much of the development is driven by Portland’s growing national reputation as a "cool" place to live, work and play. It’s attracting a variety of young, creative professionals, baby-boomers and empty-nesters, many of whom are escaping the stress and congestion of larger cities across the United States.

by Kelley Bouchard
Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram

Full Story: http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/specialrpts/portlandatacrossroads/1.html

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How should the city of Kalispell look?

By JOHN STANG
The Daily Inter Lake

City Council wrestles with architectural, landscape standards
Hard-and-fast rules? Or flexible guidelines?

Or both?

The Kalispell City Council wrestled with those distinctions last Monday as its looked over a proposed set of architectural and landscaping standards for new commercial and multiple-family development projects.

The proposed standards are a combination of existing city laws, a few minor changes to those laws, and strong suggestions on how developers are to deal with parking, sidewalks, landscaping, lighting, sign, public spaces and building exteriors on commercial and multifamily complexes to be built in Kalispell.

Full Story: http://www.dailyinterlake.com/articles/2005/11/21/business/bus01.txt

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Working Families Pushed Out Of Town, Into Debt
Long commutes no easy route to affordable homes

By Carolyn Kelly
Great Lakes Bulletin News Service

A local housing agency helped Jimmy and Stacey McKenna close the gap between affordable home prices and rising energy costs by selling them a new home in Traverse City close to their jobs.

With two steady jobs and good credit, Jimmy and Stacey McKenna qualified for a $108,000, 30-year mortgage for their three bedroom house in Traverse City.

Since moving in four years ago, they built a picket fence and covered bulletin boards with photographs of their two children, Ethan, 5, and Riley, 2. And, somehow, they managed to keep the white carpet in the living room clean while raising two preschoolers. Downtown Traverse City is just two miles away, and the nearby TART trail makes biking there safe and convenient.

Full Story: http://www.mlui.org/growthmanagement/fullarticle.asp?fileid=16963

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‘Sleeper’ towns offer affordable housing near Billings

By LINDA HALSTEAD-ACHARYA
Of The Gazette Staff

Monty Sealey has a habit of counting cars. The numbers he’s tallied as he drives between Roundup and Billings suggest more and more people are making the commute.

Some are Hi-Line residents heading home after a trip to Billings. But many, said Sealey, the coordinator for Central Montana’s Resource, Conservation and Development Office in Roundup, are new residents who have decided the savings in land and housing prices north of Billings are worth the commute.

There are vacant lots in out-of-the-way places that are begging to be built upon, and usually at a fraction of the cost of the Billings’ market, said Al Jones, regional development officer with the Montana Department of Commerce.

People tend to eye Billings’ West End when considering a move, he said, "but, what about north, south and east? The roads go the other way, too."

Full Story: http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php?id=1&tts=1&display=rednews/2005/11/22/build/local/25-towns.inc