French Prairie Bridge Project
Imagine 1000 miles of regional, multi-use trails in the three county Portland region finally connecting to the 134-mile Willamette Valley scenic bikeway. From the sloughs of the Columbia River, through lush forests, to agricultural lands, shaped by historic floods from Portland to Eugene. A key link to this vision relies on crossing the Willamette River at Wilsonville.
The French Prairie Bridge Project, led by the City of Wilsonville, is in the process of planning and developing preliminary designs for a proposed bicycle/pedestrian/emergency-access bridge across the Willamette River. A new bridge would be built near the historic Boones Ferry location, between the I-5 Boone Bridge and the railroad bridge to the west.
The French Prairie Bridge would fill a critical gap in local and regional multi-modal transportation infrastructure, connecting the Portland metro area and the northern portion of the Willamette Valley, known as the French Prairie region.
Project Map
Key Project Benefits
Emergency Services
- Provide an alternate route for emergency services to access either side of communities along the Willamette River when I-5 is impeded.
- Provide a route for secondary responders working to clear accidents or other incidents on I-5 by reducing the time to clear disruptions and get traffic moving again.
- Provide a seismically resilient route to support post-earthquake responses and recovery efforts.
Healthy Communities
- Fill a gap in bicycle/pedestrian infrastructure, connecting communities south of the Willamette River with access to Wilsonville employers and SMART and Tri-Met WES commuter-rail transit options.
- Improve access to parks and natural areas.
- Connect the planned Portland metro-area Ice Age Tonquin Trail with the 132-mile Willamette Valley Scenic Bikeway that extends south to Eugene.
Economy
- Benefit southwest Portland metro suburbs by providing a connection with the Willamette Valley Scenic Bikeway, the most heavily trafficked bikeway in the state, which generated $3.14 million in bike tourism spending in 2014 (Source: Travel Oregon – July 2015)
- Fulfill a key strategy identified in the 2014 Wilsonville Tourism Development Strategy (Source: City of Wilsonville)
