Moreover, there are a few good streets, especially Broadway between Oak and Pearl streets, and Willamette Street south of the Hilton. Street trees and good restaurants and stores, including the historic Smeed Hotel, give these places character. Views of both Skinner Butte and Spencer Butte at the north and south ends of Willamette provide downtown with a sense of physical enclosure, even though the former view has been disrupted by the Hilton Hotel and a retirement tower. The Fifth Street Market area, complete with a historic residential area and real trains, gives at least one corner of downtown a strong sense of place. There are relatively good connections to a variety of residential neighborhoods with a variety of social classes ranging from College Hill to Blair Boulevard to the near-university area.
People can get downtown easily on foot, bike, bus or car - if they choose to come.
Not only was the idea of a multiblock pedestrian mall a bad one, but the renewal agency demolished too many buildings that faced the mall and uprooted even more businesses. Worse, the mall was combined with shotgun revitalization that resulted in few if any new activities located anywhere near the mall. It subsequently became a dead zone, symbolic of what has gone wrong in downtown in the last 30 years. For starters, we contend that it is too large in area. It is the same size as downtown Pittsburgh or Cleveland, and much larger than downtown Providence or Hartford.