Page:Final Report - The Columbia River Interstate Bridge.pdf/21

 of the State was to act with the County Commissioners for certain purposes. The two Boards of County Commissioners met in joint session November 29, 1913, and for convenience of action organized themselves into the Columbia River Interstate Bridge Commission, with Rufus C. Holman as permanent chairman, and with VV. N. Marshall, auditor of Clarke County, as seeretary. A simple arrangement that all acts of the joint Commission would be ratiﬁed in due order by each separate Board made it possible for the two Boards to act in unison. The personnel of the Commission throughout the whole work is given on a preceding page.

The Commission took up as its first action the selection of engineers for the work, and, after a month of investigation and consideration, on December 29, 1913, your Engineers were chosen from the dozen or more applicants. This prompt and timely action in employing engineers had much to do with the success of the work. for the Engineers found the Commission with open minds, without preconceived ideas or set notions, and were able to undertake the solution of the problems from a purely scientiﬁc standpoint. The Commission directed the Engineers to proceed immediately with the necessary surveys and studies, and to make a report recommending a location of the bridge over the river and for an approach in Vancouver and one on the Portland si(le. After two and a half months spent in making surveys, studies of traffic, estimates of cost, actively assisting in securing options for rights-of-way for each location, and after considering in every way four possible approaches on the Portland side and four in Vancouver, your Engineers reported their ﬁndings and recommended locations on March 26, 1914. In order to determine deﬁnitely the costs of right-of-way for each approach the Commissioners in Clarke County and Mr. J. Fred Larson, acting for Multnomah County, had secured written options on the lands required for all approaches at deﬁnite prices. Deﬁnite and complete cost comparisons could thus be made. After a few days of consideration, with public hearings for citizens who wished to be heard concerning approaches, your Commission adopted the Engineers' recommendations and ﬁxed the bridge approaches to be at Union Avenue on the Portland side and at 'Washington Street on the Vancouver side, subject to the conditions that the city of Portland should extend Union Avenue to the city limits and also should secure from the Portland Railway Light and Power Company an adequate relcase'of their exclusive rights over a certain strip of land which that company owned in the street, and to provide for "common user" over