A bike commuter rides between 5th and 6th avenues on Washington St. during Transit Mall construction.

Downtown Portland is the place to be.

The low vacancy rate and new construction surely prove it, and so do the ever-escalating real-estate prices for close-in neighborhoods. Everyone wants to be in -- or near -- downtown.

This, needless to say, hasn't always been the case. In the early 1970s, suburban flight and a struggling economy resulted in the dire deterioration of the central city. The New York Times' Ada Louise Huxtable lamented "the scattered, bomb-site look of downtown [Portland] parking lots made by demolishing older buildings that pay less than metered asphalt."

And the criticism wasn't just coming from snooty East Coast writers. The Oregonian called the heart of the Rose City "the pornography capital of the West Coast."

So downtown Portland in the 1970s was pockmarked with ugly surface parking lots and rundown blocks where crime was commonplace. Yet it still had its charms, including ornately designed theaters from the vaudeville days, an accessible vibe -- and dreams of what could be.

Below, we take a stroll through our Me Decade downtown.

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Photos: The Oregonian

A street scene looking west along Southwest Alder Street, where downtown office dwellers ran errands on their lunch breaks without the benefit of a shopping mall.

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"The scattered, bomb-site look of downtown parking lots," wrote The New York Times, "[annihilated] the cohesive character of the city as decisively as a charge of dynamite."

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Older buildings started coming down in the 1960s and '70s, often replaced by surface parking lots or nothing at all. As city leaders began considering how to revitalize downtown and Old Town, The Oregonian wrote that they "will have to decide what to do with open space if cars are deemed unworthy."

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Painter Bob Brown is at the center of a real-life Rube Goldberg scene. "Spoke by intricate spoke," The Oregonian wrote, "Brown makes his way down the fire escape on the Frederick & Nelson store in downtown Portland." The paint job was part of an extensive mid-1970s renovation, but the department-store chain's downward spiral couldn't be halted. The company's last Oregon store, at Washington Square, closed in 1990.

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Days after being attacked on "Portland's Skid Row" in 1977, Blaine Whaley (left) discusses downtown's increasing violence with local activist Mike Jones. The Oregonian wrote that, because of "rapacious suburbs," downtown streets after 5 p.m. "only carry those left behind: the old on pensions, derelicts of various kinds or youths furtive or bent on pleasure."

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Signage in downtown Portland became a kind of art form in the early 20th century as the city became electrified. The large signs poking out into streets remained common well into the 1970s until small businesses began to decline, replaced by mall-based national chains.

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One thing that hasn't changed about downtown since the 1970s: its popularity as a place to stage protests. More than 200 marchers in 1972 demonstrated against the Vietnam War, marching in showers and cold wind, chanting: "Peace now!" and "Out now!"

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Antiwar demonstrators marched through downtown Portland in 1972 as America's involvement in the Vietnam War continued. The building in the background served as R.W. deWeese's mayoral-campaign headquarters. The prominent businessman said "the property tax should be abandoned as the financial base for local education and the federal government should be required to pay 25 percent of local school support." City commissioner Neil Goldschmidt won the election.

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Two kids cast a line into the Willamette River at the city dock, south of the Hawthorne Bridge, before new development came to the area.

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Construction crews work on the "Transit Mall" in October of 1977. The bus lanes were part of an ambitious effort to ease car congestion in and around downtown.

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Vice President Walter Mondale toured downtown Portland in 1977. Mayor Neil Goldschmidt, who was disgraced years later with the public revelation of his sexual assault of a minor, and Gov. Robert Straub served as guides for the visitor.

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White Rose Festival banners wave from old-fashioned street lamps along downtown's SW Broadway at Taylor Street in 1978.

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Assaults were so common in downtown during the 1970s that many women, especially Portland State students, carried whistles to call for help.

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Barbara Pelett was an investigator for the Oregon Liquor Control Commission in the 1970s. Her "handwritten daily schedule," The Oregonian wrote in 1977, "included one stop to pick up some faked identification cards, a 'sanitation recheck' at a Southwest Portland tavern, two stops at liquor stores to discuss other faked ID, one 'undercover' job and two checks of remodeled downtown drinking spots."

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The Laurel Hotel, at 728 S.W. Second Ave., was saved from closure in the 1970s after city officials negotiated with the building owner over violations of fire prevention codes. The reprieve proved temporary.

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Buses on 6th Avenue during construction of the Transit Mall.

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Southwest Harbor Drive in January 1971, just a few years before it was removed and replaced by Waterfront Park.

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Waterfront Park opened in 1978. Wrote The Oregonian a week before the park's official debut: "These new platforms, including one that floats, are at the north end of the park between the Willamette River and Front Avenue. Fishermen and water lovers already use the viewing platform and sitting areas at the north end of the development, to be officially named Downtown Waterfront Park in a ceremony scheduled July 16th."

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Construction of the Nordstrom in downtown Portland in the 1970s helped kickstart a much-needed retail revitalization.

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Portland's Southwest 6th Avenue.

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A religious, Christmastime parade in downtown Portland.

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Trail Blazers fans celebrate the team's NBA championship in 1977.

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Photo courtesy City Club

Gretchen Kafoury, wearing a "Director of Security" helmet and carrying a rolling pin, during protests outside the Benson Hotel in downtown Portland in October 1972. Kafoury, who died in 2015, would go on to serve in the Oregon House, on the Portland City Council and as Multnomah County Commissioner.

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Mounted police patrol clops along Southwest Broadway. "Saddle sentries" began patrolling downtown in July 1979.

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French mime Marcel Marceau became a world phenomenon in the 1970s, including a tour of the U.S. At the same time, an invisible railing appeared in Portland's Park Blocks.

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"Meter maid" Gerry Davis places a parking citation on a downtown vehicle.

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This photograph, taken long before the existence of the Pearl District, looks toward downtown from the Fremont Bridge.

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Members of Hare Krishna, "clanging their cymbals and beating a triangle, attract an interested onlooker" in downtown Portland.

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Portland area youngsters line up at the ornate Oriental Theater shortly before it closed and was demolished in 1970.

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In 1980 organist Don Feeley surveyed some of the exotic carvings and decorations from the old Oriental Theater in the lobby of the Sherwood Theater.

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The 1970s saw many older downtown buildings come down. Wrote The Oregonian: "Iron columns salvaged when the Berkshire Hotel was torn down to make room for the Portland General Electric complex in downtown Portland are examined by Robert Stark, administrator of Oregon Historical Society Museum, which is displaying the columns in a lot at SW Park Avenue and Main Street."

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The new Fremont Bridge leading to downtown Portland in the 1970s.

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The beginnings of what would become the South Waterfront neighborhood. Wrote The Oregonian in the late 1970s: "Vacant downtown waterfront land in the back half of the picture may be developed into housing, offices, restaurants, shops, a marina and other uses over the next five years. The Portland Development Commission approved a development plan for the 73-acre parcel. The land is on the Willamette River between the Hawthorne and Marquam bridges."

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In 1976, Commissioner Frank Ivancie, in his effort to stamp out Portland's vice district, "apparently has struck a nerve in his bid to have sex-oriented shops and theaters fall under zoning rather than anti-obscenity laws," The Oregonian wrote. Ivancie would serve as the city's mayor from 1980 to 1985.

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A tugboat heads down the Willamette River as clouds form a textured pattern over the Portland skyline.

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The view from the top of First National Bank of Oregon's headquarters tower offered an unparalleled vista of downtown Portland in the 1970s. Wrote The Oregonian: "Forty floors high and the tallest building in the state, the structure casts its mid-winter shadow over the nearby Standard Plaza Building, one of the highest in the city. Georgia-Pacific building (center) previously had the top rating. The photograph was taken looking north."

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Summertime in the late 1970s, and Portlanders once again found fun in their downtown. Wrote The Oregonian: "Neighborfair draws a big crowd. Billowing hot-air balloons lifted passengers high into balmy skies above Waterfront Park for a birds-eye view of the thousands of visitors and hundreds of vendors at the annual event."

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Now home to homemade trinkets and corn dogs, the Saturday Market in the 1970s was populated by produce growers.

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Portland has been attracting young "creative types" for decades. Here, a would-be TV star shows his talent on a downtown street.

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A photo of downtown Portland, taken from Southwest's Vista Avenue Bridge.

-- The Oregonian