NEW BOOKS

Portlandness: This Is Not Your Grandpa's Cultural Atlas

A new book from two PSU geographers maps redlining and city chickens, strip clubs and street emotions.

By Ramona DeNies November 17, 2015

Islands of Diversity

Bathymetry—the study of underwater depths—meets Beaverton in this map of racial diversity. Here, white water runs deepest along the "Milwaukie Trench," while high ground is found on islands along the city's periphery. "That's where you have the most ethnic diversity," says co-author Hunter Shobe. "Meanwhile the core of what we call 'Portlandness' is not." (Image credit: Jon Franczyk)

Stop! Writing on Stop Signs

Early in the book's scoping process, Shobe and co-author David Banis enlisted a student cartographer to log graffitied stop signs within a square mile or so in Sunnyside. (Found near Couch and SE 20th: "Stop! Shaving"; just west of Laurelhurst Park: "Stop! Collaborate and Listen.") "The Department of Transportation was asking for this map for years," chuckles Banis. (Image credit: Dan Coe)

The City That Never Was

If the 1903 Olmsted Plan had gone through, much of North Interstate would be a park. If the Rose City had welcomed the 1962 Olympics, the Columbia Slough would be a massive sports arena. We'd have a system of cross-river water taxis, if 1988's Central City Plan had been implemented. And then, notoriously, there's the spoke-like highway network, proposed in 1955, that would have turned Portland into a very different kind of transportation star, with fourteen freeways radiating outward from city center. (Image credit: Corinna Kimball-Brown and David Banis)

Mission Invisible

To trace a path of least surveillance through downtown, Shobe and Banis trained themselves and a team of students to identify the cameras that dot bus stops, parking garages, rooftops, even street lamps. "A lot of them look like light bulbs," says Banis. "They're easy to ignore. " The team mapped over 400 cameras in the stretch from PSU's Cramer Hall north to Union Station. Says Shobe on this very modern tension: "With surveillance cameras, yes, you can research crime. But also, people don't want to be watched all the time." (Image credit: Kirk McEwen)

Third Graders Illustrate the City

"This is probably the best of our psychogeography maps," says Banis. "Unlike adults, kids aren't hung up on being 'right.'' The result here, a compilation of 57 hand-drawn mental maps from students at NE Portland's Jason Lee K–8, gives priority of place to 82nd Avenue, pizza joints, skate parks, and Grandma's house. (Image credit: Nicole Penoncello and David Banis)

City smells. Urban nutria. Phantom streams. Hauntings. Each gets its own map in Portlandness: A Cultural Atlas—a brand-new book from two master geographers at Portland State University.

David Banis is Associate Director of PSU's Center for Spatial Analysis and Research. His co-author, Hunter Shobe, is a geography professor with a focus on cultural cartography. Together, these two academics—in concert with legions of students over the past six years—have produced a decidedly approachable tome for the data-minded Cascadian.

"We have the analogy of a tourist, who is hyperaware, noticing every little thing," says Shobe. "In some ways, it would behoove people to behave that way at home. Things suddenly become far more interesting."

Shobe and Banis read at Powell's City of Books on Monday, Nov 23, at 7:30 pm

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