Tryon Life Community Farm is located at:
11640 SW Boones Ferry Road
Portland, OR 97219

Note: Google Maps gives misleading directions for the #35 bus and other routes; and Apple Maps and others may give poor directions for driving. Please check the directions on this page for best ways here.

Getting to the Farm is quicker than is often thought!  It's just 30-45 minutes by bike from central Portland, and by car it's just 10-20 minutes to anywhere the freeway goes.  (Without traffic.)

Please note that we have limited parking at the farm and encourage folks to carpool or use other forms of transportation. The lot at the top of the driveway is for visitors to Tryon Creek State Park, not people coming to TLC Farm (also, theft of goods left in cars is very common from the Park's lot!).

Our solutions:

• Bike!  It's easier than you may think.
• Bus!  The #38 and #39 run during rush hours right to our driveway, and the #35 gets you within a beautiful walk through the State Park -- hourly, 7 days a week, early till late.
• And for our bigger events, we run a shuttle, usually to one or more of Riverdale HS, Barbur Transit Center, or Peoples Food Coop. Check event details.

By car -- see below or try the mapped directions from downtown or your ZIP code:

From I-5 headed South:
Take the Terwilliger exit #297. Make a right off the off-ramp onto SW Barbur Boulevard and then another quick right at the light onto SW Terwilliger. Pass over the I-5 overpass heading towards Lewis & Clark College and Tryon Creek State Park. Continue straight through 2 lights on Terwilliger, the 2nd being SW Taylor's Ferry Road. Pass Riverdale High School on your right. At the next light (the 3rd on Terwilliger), take a slight right onto SW Boone's Ferry Road. You'll head down a hill. Halfway up the other side of the hill look for the Sturdi-Built Greenhouses sign on the left and then Coronado St. on the right. The next turnoff you can make on the left after Coronado St is a parking lot and trailhead for Tryon Creek State Park. Turn into this lot. Our longish dirt driveway is on the far (south) end of the little lot.

From downtown or central Portland:
Head South on SW Barbur Boulevard. About 3 miles from downtown, take a left at a light onto SW Terwilliger (A-Boy Hardware is on the right, Kaady Car Wash on the left, before you get to Fred Meyer's). Follow the directions above from Terwilliger.

If you're coming from south of Powell in Southeast Portland, you may prefer the Sellwood Bridge. Once on the west side of the river, turn right onto Macadam going north to the light at Taylor's Ferry Rd. Turn left onto Taylors Ferry and head up the hill to Terwilliger. Take a left onto Taylors Ferry. Pass Riverdale High School on your right. At the next light, take a slight right onto SW Boone's Ferry Road. You'll head down a hill. Halfway up the other side of the hill look for the Sturdi-Built Greenhouses sign on the left and then Coronado St. on the right. The next turnoff you can make on the left after Coronado St is a parking lot and trailhead for Tryon Creek State Park. Turn into this lot. Our longish dirt driveway is on the far (south) end of the little lot. then take a left and follow directions above. (Note: do not illegally turn left onto Boone's Ferry from Taylor's Ferry. Or better, for more peaceful biking, have someone show you how to bike through the cemetary from the bridge!)

From Lake Oswego:
Take Country Club Rd west till it meets Boones Ferry Rd, and bear right onto it. After two or so miles you will go through an intersection with Stevenson Rd at a flashing yellow light. About 200 ft afterwards, after a curve, there will be a small dirt parking lot on the right. Beware, it comes quickly; don't speed! Our longish dirt driveway is on the south (near) end, so turn around in the lot.

From I-5 headed North: From I-5 N take the Kruse Way exit (#292B), turn left (that's east) onto Kruse Way, and continue till you dead end onto Boone's Ferry Rd. Turn left onto Boone's Ferry and continue straight through the Country Club Rd intersection. Follow directions from Lake Oswego above.

By Bike

There are two main ways to come from central Portland by bike: the fast way, and the scenic route. Click on the links below for customized bike maps.

• Barbur: the easy way. Barbur is a gentle incline with a bike lane all the way from downtown to Terwilliger. With practice, you'll be cruising uphill thinking deep thoughts and breathing strongly, making sure to check out the gorgeous views of Wy'east (Mt. Hood) on the bridges. At the intersection with Terwilliger, get in the left turning lane. Cross the bridge over the freeway and continue straight through 2 lights on Terwilliger, the 2nd being SW Taylor's Ferry Road. Pass Riverdale High School on your right. At the next light (the 3rd on Terwilliger), take a slight right onto SW Boone's Ferry Road. You'll head down a hill. Halfway up the other side of the hill look for the Sturdi-Built Greenhouses sign on the left and then Coronado St. on the right. The next turnoff you can make on the left after Coronado St is a parking lot and trailhead for Tryon Creek State Park. Turn into this lot. Our longish dirt driveway is on the far (south) end of the little lot.
• Springwater Corridor: the beautiful and challenging. A long flat and gorgeous track along the river and Oaks Bottom takes you from the Hawthorne Bridge (and points north) to the Sellwood Bridge. Walk or bike (carefully) across the bridge, and then follow the car traffic as if you were going south on Macadam. Instead, at the light you'll cross directly to the entrance to the Riverview Cemetery. There are now well marked bike directions all the way through to the top of the hill. Note that it's a fairly steep incline throughout, with sections that are downright hard. Some people dismount and smell the flowers; others ramp up their cardiovascular powerhouses. At the top, take a right on Palatine and then a left onto Boones Ferry, doglegging left on Terwilliger to bear right back onto Boones Ferry and into one of the more exhilirating downhills in town. Then a short steep uphill section to keep you warmed up, and you're here!

By Bus
The Tri-Met #38 (schedule) runs past our driveway to and from downtown, only during rush hours. During rush hours, the #39 (schedule) meets the #12 (schedule) from downtown near the Fred Meyer by Terwilliger and Barbur; ask the driver. It also drops off right near the driveway.

At other times, including weekends, and leaving downtown from 5:30 am to 11:30 pm daily, the #35 bus (schedule) runs along Terwilliger just through the Park from us. The quickest way is to get off at the Nature Center main Park entrance -- not the intersection of Boones Ferry and Terwilliger as recommended by some apps. It's then just a 15-20 minute walk down to High Bridge up back up to the Farm.

Alteratively, for a bit more time in the firest you can get off at the Law School; see map at right.

By foot, through the park
Maps with trails marked: see map at right, or in the PDF file attached below. It might help if you can print out the map and bring it with you.

The entrance to our land is on the West Horse Loop trail, just west of the cutoff to the Boone's Ferry parking lot.

• From the Law School, take the bike path until you see the sign for the Lewis & Clark trail on the right.
• Take it all the way to the High Bridge.
• Cross High Bridge and bear slightly left towards the West Horse Loop.
• Follow signs to turn right onto the West Horse loop (towards Engelwood Drive), ie. counter-clockwise.
• Go past the turn-off for Boones Ferry Rd parking on the right (that is, don't turn right).
• About 150' after this Boones Ferry fork, you will see a cedar tree with a right-angled bough on the left, and a medium-sized trail off to the right; you will notice a small sign welcoming you to TLC Farm a little ways down this path.
• Take this trail and enter this magic realm!

And if you're desperately lost, call us at 503-245-3847.

Learn more about Recode!

Launched by TLC Farm in 2007, Recode is now an autonomous project with its own website:http://recodenow.org, office space, and director Melora Golden who can be reached at: info at recodenow dot org

Read on for a brief summary of Recode's goals, and see bottom of page to sign up for email announcement list, and download relevant files.

Recode is an organization that brings together citizens, planners, builders, activists, and other stakeholders in developing, coordinating, and building the movement for regulations that support grassroots sustainability.

Recode:

·       facilitates collaboration among the existing organizations and people doing various aspects of the work;

·       creates space for grassroots groups in the discussion; and

·       specifically advocates for acting within a strategy of systemic change.

Sign Up for Recode’s newsletter: http://www.recodenow.org/newsletter-signup

At TLC Farm, Portland's sustainability movements are creating one example of how urban density human habitat can coexist with thriving food systems and native ecologies. Our demonstration projects, all of which are workshopped and volunteer-run, illustrate how specific technologies and practices work, and how they can interconnect.
You're welcome to come and walk through the land, learning from the signs along the self-guided tour. But the best way to get involved and learn about what it's like to build a new world, is to help create it alongside the rest of us!
The areas we're focused on are:

Gardening

Primarily focused on food production using standard organic and permaculture techniques: sheet mulching for weed control, interplanting, insectivories, etc. Primarily annuals and small perennials. Coordinated through the Garden working group, which has regular meetings.

Food Forests

Planning and implementing multi-story food forests both within existing native forest and orchard areas, and from scratch. In the medium-term we intend to establish a Food Forest Research Center in collaboration with local permaculturists, educational institutions, and urban policy planners. The purpose will be to develop experimental trials of various micro-habitat configurations and assess human food productivity, native habitat suitability, and human habitat usability. The goal will be to identify combinations that can be used on both public and private land to create corridors of stacked habitat and function.

Building

Working with volunteer professional architects, designers, and builders, TLC Farm pushes the envelope for regenerative design in Portland: built environments that are fully integrated into energy, water, food ("waste"), and habitat cycles with the rest of the local ecology. This includes a wide variety of demonstration natural building techniques (strawbale infill, cob, light straw/clay, earthen plaster, earthen paint, poured earth, earthbag, etc.). Saturday work parties frequently include a building element.

The easiest way to get connected is to come out to a workparty.
Or contact us: farm@tryonfarm.org
Together, we're building a better world!