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Visitors to Mount Tabor, Portland’s top-ranked sledding destination, will find major storm damage in their way.
At least a half-dozen full-size fir trees fell down there in Saturday morning’s snowstorm, taking out the picnic shelter that has been there for more than 50 years, according to Portland Parks & Recreation.
“The big news is that the top of Mount Tabor got destroyed,” says Vincent Moore, maintenance supervisor for the east service zone. “One tree went right through the middle of the picnic shelter.”
Nobody was hurt, as far as Moore knows, but “there were a lot of close calls.” The trees came down at the peak of the snow, sleet and windstorm that has knocked out power to more than 122,000 customers in the Portland metro area, according to Portland General Electric. At least two Portland residents have died as a result of the storm, which included wind gusts of 45 miles per hour and temperatures in the teens.
People who can make it safely to a sledding hill will be rewarded with speedy runs, Moore says: “It’s pretty solid, so it’s very fast snow—if there is enough of it and you can get to it. It’s mostly about access.”
Mt. Tabor Park’s gates are shut and park restrooms systemwide are closed due to the cold.
Dozens of neighbors had gathered on a sledding hill Sunday morning near Southeast 27th Avenue in Eastmoreland, parents clutching tumblers of coffee while their children bombed down the grassy hill on plastic sleds and discs.
Tax lawyer Eric Wieland watched his 13-year-old son try snowboarding for the first time on a board he got for Christmas. His 10-year-old daughter lamented that the snow came on a Saturday and didn’t cancel school (though Portland Public Schools students did get a three-hour early dismissal Friday).
Wieland’s snow report? “Not the greatest,” he says. “It’s more ice than snow, but at least the earth is still covered.”
See more photos of damage to Mount Tabor in the gallery below.
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