Skyline & Aerial photos | Portland

MarkHB said:
BIW had a ship repair facility here from roughly the mid-80's to 2000 or so. In that era, Thames St. and the Eastern Prom Trail didn't exist, and Commercial ended at a hard right turn onto India St. I remember, walking to work at Auto Europe from the parking lot we were using (I wish I had known then that the weird concrete slabs in the ground were the old Grand Trunk boarding platforms), hearing the loudspeakers from a docked Navy ship giving leave orders, saying "the area bounded by Union St., Middle St., Pearl St., Commercial St.... I want you to stay out of that area!" The dredged area for the drydock was repurposed for the Megaberth (Pier 2 Berth 2, I believe the proper name is... where the largest cruise ships now tie up).

(Their ship repair business was moved up to Bath around the time they introduced level launches and got rid of the slanted launch ways.)

I notice the Norstar Bank signage on One City Center! That didn't last long... Norstar had purchased Northeast Bank (based in Westbrook), and then they were bought by Fleet which wound up absorbing several other large banks in the 80's. One side effect of that... thanks to the chain of mergers, Bank of America thinks I've been a customer for 47 years, going back to my school banking account with the original Maine Savings Bank! (Shoutout to that photo from the roof of 511 :LOL: )
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The view from Thames St. I’ll try to get a few more angles later today. Harbor shot is from last week, view into downtown is from this AM.
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cranewatch said:
Is Thames Street pronounced like the River Thames in London? “Tems “?
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That's how I pronounce it; it hasn't existed long enough for a historic-type weird pronunciation (it was built around 2000, and the name came from a similarly-named street in the early Colonial era).
 
I wish the city would have made the "Thames" stretch a continuation of Commercial Street instead of coming up with a new name. Tends to be confusing for visitors and it could have been named East Commercial for simplicity which would be consistent with West Commercial on the other end.
 
I have seen some maps where East Commercial actually exists (or existed)... as the road that goes to the sewage treatment plant at the other end of the Prom!

But I agree that the Thames St. nomenclature seemingly came out of nowhere. I would have supported honoring the man who started the whole redevelopment process off, and calling it Ganley St.

(Honestly, the only two city managers I can think of who IMO would deserve some kind of monument are him and John Menario.)
 
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