Astoria: From rock bottom to boom town

ASTORIA, Ore. — Visiting New Yorker Stephanie Baer took in the city sights. From Riverfront Trolley Old No. 300, she spied the ships floating on the Columbia and eyed the steep hillsides spotted with old Victorian houses. The views were phenomenal, the people friendly — just as Baer expected.

"But I didn't expect it to be so prosperous," Baer said. "And what really surprises me is how sophisticated it is."

Even a few years ago, "seamy" might have been a more apt description of the Astoria streetscape. Commercial vacancy rates downtown climbed as high as 40 percent. Old cannery buildings sat empty. Many of the city's prized Victorian homes and establishments languished in decay.

But in the past four years, Astoria has ridden a wave of revitalization so transforming that even locals are a little awed.

City and port officials count some $90 million in projects under way or on drawing boards, a boom that comes as Astoria prepares to host a showcase of Lewis and Clark Bicentennial events in 2005.

Events include a commemoration of the expedition's historic decision to winter near Astoria.

As Astoria moves toward that historic moment, however, some see a challenge of identity emerging: Can the city retain its historic character and blue-collar flavor, or will unfettered commercial progress and visits from behemoth tour boats turn it into just another cookie-cutter coastal town?

Astoria has always been a working-class place. Its heyday came in the late 19th century, when fishing, logging and shipping thrived. In 1945, some 30 canneries competed for business at the port. But by 1974, Bumblebee Seafood pulled its headquarters, starting an economic downturn that continued for years.

Mayor Willis Van Dusen left Astoria to go to college in 1970. "When I came back in 1975," he says, "Astoria looked like a different place."

In 1980, Bumblebee closed its last cannery there. "In my opinion that was rock bottom," says Van Dusen.

The Astoria Plywood Mill, the city's largest employer, shut down in 1989 as the Northwest timber wars peaked. In 1996, the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway announced it, too, was pulling out. But this time the departure carried the seeds of good news.

For years there had been talk of a river walk. A 1989 watercolor rendition of the riverfront shows a trolley, but the railroad, which had used the lines infrequently, was not cooperative.

Federal rail-banking legislation changed that. Designed to keep inactive railways intact for later use, the law made it possible to take ownership of the rails in 1996 and create a river trail.

"Right away, it seemed the city came together and discovered our riverfront," Van Dusen says.

Suddenly, people were enjoying the scenic beauty of the Columbia. New shops opened, and soon riverfront development kindled a surge in civic pride and projects.

By 1998, the city struck a deal with the San Antonio Museum of Art to lease a trolley found in a defunct Gales Creek museum for $1 a year. Volunteers in Astoria restored it.

Two years later, a nonprofit group took title of the Liberty Theater, originally opened in 1925, and launched a $5.5 million restoration. That same year, a group of investors led by former resident Chester Trabucco purchased the old Hotel Elliott at a time when rooms rented for $10 or $15 a night.

"It was generally considered a flophouse," Trabucco says. "Before the renovations of the Liberty Theater and the Hotel Elliott, Twelfth Street was a legitimately scary place to walk alone after dark. Now, we like to call Twelfth Street the Side Street of Dreams."

The hotel, with its handcrafted wood fireplace mantels, mosaic stonework and rooftop deck with Columbia views, landed on the National Trust for Historic Preservation's list of 200 historic hotels.

Recent years have brought a $6 million expansion to the Columbia River Maritime Museum and $1.5 million in renovations to the historic Astoria Column, the 125-foot-tall memorial to the town's history. A once-polluted field is now home to Mill Pond Village, an upscale riverfront neighborhood.

Now on the drawing board: more theaters, a new conference center, a waterfront pedestrian district and expansion of the river trail. A $6.3 million fish-processing plant is also under construction.

The latest bright spot for Astoria's economy has come floating in, just like Lewis and Clark.

In the early 1980s, cruise ships docked in Astoria so passengers could make shore excursions to view Mount St. Helens. But the interest was fleeting, and the cruise lines largely ignored Astoria until 1997, when Norwegian Cruise Lines came to call.

This year, eight ships will visit the city; 14 are scheduled to dock in 2005. Three will arrive at once next Monday, carrying nearly 6,000 passengers.

The visits, though brief, are lucrative. Bill Cook, deputy director of the Port of Astoria, says exit surveys show that the average passenger spends $150 a visit.

On shore, the passengers can opt for walking tours of the city, excursions to the Tillamook Cheese Factory or nearby Seaside and Cannon Beach.

"That's a key component to our success," Cook says. "The ships can be over the bar in an hour and a half, berth, deploy passengers on shore excursions, and have them back on board by 6 and be out of here."

Tourism in Astoria has increased by nearly 50 percent since 2002, according to Roger Rocka, executive director of the Astoria-Warrenton Chamber of Commerce, and although it is expected to peak with the Lewis and Clark events in 2005, Rocka expects new and repeat visitors will continue coming.

Astoria's rebirth as a tourist center has city-development director J. Todd Scott fielding calls from other towns looking for advice. But Scott says he recognized early on that change can bring good and bad.

His first week on the job, Scott taped an anonymous quote to his bulletin board: "Tourism is like fire. You can cook your supper with it, but it can also burn your house down."

Indeed, the rediscovery of Astoria has led to a doubling of housing prices over the past decade. Tourism-based jobs don't generally pay the high wages once widely earned in logging and fishing. Many say the loss of family-wage jobs is directly related to the declining population of young families.

That in turn has spelled bad news for schools, which have seen student populations — and the state aid that comes with them — plummet. Instead, retirees are moving in, lured by the quality of life.

For people such as fifth-generation Oregonian Peter Gearin, executive director of the Port of Astoria, the new Astoria is a mixed bag. The growth is exciting, he says, but the side effects can be a bummer.

"We're talking five major construction projects in Astoria next year," Gearin says. "That's a lot." Congestion and gentrification seem sure to accelerate, he says. "Different people come, they bring different thoughts, and it's not the same community it was."