Tanner Springs Park

Well before the Pearl District was littered with cranes developing new Pearl District lofts and condos and even before trains called this area home as a rail yard, the Pearl District was something entirely different, something very primitive; it was natural wetland. Frogs, blue herons and dragonflies made this area their home through an underground stream that climbed in to the hills of NW & SW Portland through Forest Park.

Tanner Springs Park is bordered by NW 11th and 12th and in between Marshall and Northrup and is also on the Portland Streetcar line.

Tanner Springs Park is not the energetic park that Jamison Square is. Tanner Springs Park is an ecological habitat that is designed to bring some of the natural aspects back to the Pearl District that existed here over 100 years ago. Dogs are not allowed in the park as they will disrupt the natural element. People are not allowed to enter the water.

When the architects started digging for the park they found many remnants of the old rail yard and incorporated them in to the design. Old tracks from the Burlington Rail Yard were found just below the surface. The old rails are now a fixed part of Tanner Springs Park as they are used on the East end of the park. Glass fragments show inlays of insects that formerly resided in the previous wetland.

Tanner Springs Park is a place to simply be; a place to block out everything and just relax with minimal sounds, in the middle of downtown Portland.

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