Tom McCall Waterfront Park

Tom McCall Waterfront Park runs for nearly 3 km along the west bank of the Willamette River, from the Marquam Bridge in the south to the Steel Bridge in the north. Where a four-lane highway once ran, there is now a broad riverside promenade with grass lawns, cherry trees (spectacular in late March), and direct access to the river.

The park hosts most of Portland's large outdoor events — Waterfront Blues Festival, Oregon Brewers Festival, and the Rose Festival activities. The Japanese-American Historical Plaza at the north end of the park commemorates the World War II incarceration of Oregon's Japanese-American community. Hawthorne Bridge, Steel Bridge, and Morrison Bridge all have pedestrian paths and cross directly to the east bank's Eastbank Esplanade, making it easy to do a loop along both riverbanks.

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The park is named after Tom McCall, Oregon's governor from 1967 to 1975, who championed the removal of Harbor Drive — a four-lane highway that had run along the Willamette riverfront since the 1930s. The freeway was torn out in 1974 in what was then a radical act of urban de-motoring. Portland became one of the first American cities to voluntarily remove urban freeway capacity in favour of a public park, a decision that influenced urban planning thinking nationally.

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