NE 7th at NE Russell

The first really cold day of the season, everything was sparkling with frost and ice this morning and the water in the bird bath has been frozen solid all day.

Had a delightful conversation with a man in line at the Post Office this afternoon.  I exclaimed out loud at the state of the line, he laughed and the conversation went from there... he told me he remembered when the Post Office had been built and then about his boyhood paper route in the Lloyd neighborhood before the mall had been built...  I said he needed to write all this stuff down.  It was a fascinating and lively conversation, I love random encounters like that, and I kind of wished the line had been longer so I could have heard more.  

This conversation put in my mind the big build up on NE 7th and Russell that I have been documenting on and off since 2014.  With my time in Portland winding down I figured I'd best stop by and close the loop on how it has progressed, so I bopped up here after I left the Post Office.

For those of you that have been following my journal for a while, you can see the difference is pretty enormous - I can't even fit the building into one shot.  Here's my first blip of the site, the derelict service station had been a nuisance for its immediate neighbors for some time, but then came the behemoth build and even more unhappiness for the neighbors.  (If you're interested in reading more click on the the tag NE7th, it'll take you to all the blips in the series.)

The impact the giant building will have on the surroundings remains to be seen but its presence will certainly be felt.  There was a piece in our neighborhood newspaper a little while back about introducing permit parking in because things are already becoming so congested.  Things are changing...

As I was taking pictures I was heckled by a couple of construction workers.