The Willamette River flows through the Willamette Valley of western Oregon and splits Portland into east and west sections. The river waterfront is so interesting because of the remnants of Portland's heavy industrial and transportation infrastructure as well as new gentrification. On a wet June (2026) morning, I passed through Portland and stopped at the riverfront to take some pictures.
Steel Bridge
One of the historic bridges over the Willamatte is the famous Steel Bridge, first opened in 1912. This was superb early 20th century engineering because it is a double-deck vertical-lift structure. The upper deck carries Pacific Highway West (formerly Oregon Route 99W) and MAX light rail tracks, while the lower deck carries heavy rail and a bicycle trail. The upper deck formerly carried streetcars until 1948.
You can see the railroad tracks curving and continuing onto the lower level of the bridge.
Louis Dreyfus Terminal
The agricultural commodities company, Louis Dreyfus Co., built these towering grain silos along the banks of the Willamette River in 1914. They may have been the only privately-owned deep draft (meaning, suitable for ocean-going ships) docks on the Columbia River system. Until around 2013, the terminals shipped US grain around the world. Afterwards, the enormous facility went through several owners.
One article states that the terminal became functionally crippled when Union Pacific concluded that the railroad tracks on the property no longer met Union Pacific safety standards. There is obviously more to this story. Regardless, the silos are an example of early 20th century mega-construction and are a fascinating industrial photographic topic.
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| Willamette River and water side of Louis Dreyfus terminal |
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| East (land) side of terminal |
It would be fun to take some pictures from the sheds way up on the steel framework.
The tracks on the east side of the property appear to be in regular use. I assume the tracks that were considered to not be up to current safety standards were the ones that curve around the terminal and continue over the water on pilings.
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| Aegean Parking Lot view south |
Broadway Bridge
The Broadway Bridge is another early 20th century engineering success. Built in 1913, it is a bascule design, where the center span splits in two and each section pivot upwards. I need to bicycle on these bridges and take more photographs.
I took these photographs with Kodak Gold 200 film using my Rolleiflex 3.5E camera with its 75mm ƒ/3.5 Xenotar lens. The light was gloomy and soft, and I used a tripod for all exposures. Glazer's Camera in Seattle developed the film and scanned the frames with a Noritsu system. The Noritsu produces scans that are warm tone. I corrected the color with the auto color function in Photoshop Elements 2014.
I tried 35mm Gold 200 two years ago, and thought it was too grainy. But in medium format, it is much more successful. But still, I will go back to using Portra 160 film or, for conditions in soft light, Ektar 100.
I wish Kodak would reintroduce their superb Gold 100 film from the 1990s and early 2000s. I only used 120 Gold 100 once, long after it had been discontinued. I did not know that Kodak packaged it in 120. One day, I need to post some of my 1990s New York City Gold 100 frames (one day.....).
