I was surprised to read the May 21 article announcing that the Portland City Council is again considering renaming Franklin Street after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

I just don’t understand. How does it “honor” Martin Luther King Jr. to rename our city’s worst street after him?

Franklin Street was created by bulldozing an entire residential neighborhood, evicting immigrant and poor families against their will.

Franklin Street drove a highway-shaped wedge down the middle of the peninsula, forever creating an artificial separation and a pedestrian no-man’s-land between Munjoy Hill and the rest of the city. Some cross streets now dead end at Franklin.

Franklin Street will soon become the site of the worst traffic jams Portland has ever seen, as more offices, shops, hotels and condos are built on the eastern waterfront. Imagine rush-hour traffic: People will be parked at the lights, honking at one another, cursing themselves for having taken “MLK Boulevard.” What an honor, indeed.

Is Franklin being reconsidered because it’s “easy”? Is it being considered because hardly anyone would have to change their address – because hardly anyone actually lives on Franklin? I hope not. Dr. King would have wanted something like this to have significance and impact, and choosing the path of least resistance is neither significant nor impactful.

We should find a way to honor Dr. King that actually does him honor – and there’s no honor in Franklin Street.

Joey Brunelle

at-large candidate, Portland City Council

Portland

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