Saturday morning on the way into the office to do some work, the kind of work you can only do on the weekends, when offices are empty and updates to applications, software and/or systems can be made without disrupting users, or without asking users to outright stop working, I took a detour across the Casco Bay Bridge to South Portland.

The Casco Bay Bridge, or “CBB” as no one but myself in this explanation for what you’re about to see over the course of the next 5 day visual tour call it, is sometimes mistakenly referred to as the Million Dollar Bridge. I discovered this morning, thanks to the Internet, Google and Wikipedia, this isn’t correct. CBB replaced the Million Dollar Bridge, or “MDB.” MDB spanned the Fore River, joining Portland with South Portland. It was a bascule drawbridge. (Yes, that is a nice animation!) CBD, also a bascule drawbridge, replaced MDB in 1997.

Anyway, earlier last week I was driving into Portland across CBB, and I was thinking how ugly it is, and I guess I was imagining what the Fore River and Portland waterfront might look with something more like Budapest’s Chain Bridge, Istanbul’s Galata Bridge across the Golden Horn, or any of the utilitarian iron bridges spanning the Chicago River. But that’s silly; I live in Portland, Maine; I like the city a lot; and CBB is what we’ve got here.

Anyway, I crossed the bridge, and I drove up to where the excellent bike/pedestrian walkway descends from the roadway, and I looked, and I took a bunch of pictures. The first batch I did with my Canon one-shot digital camera. I did 2 rolls of back-and-white 35mm stuff, which when I have developed I’ll share. At least the better pictures I’ll share.

So, get ready for a tiny bit of repetition this week. Monday-Friday are dedicated to CBB. I hope it’s enjoyable. Thanks!

A reminder that galleries in Portland’s Arts District are open all month long. Some are even air conditioned!

Yellahoose has photography in its suites (#405 and 407). Just called 207.838.8678 beforehand to make certain someone’s there. We have AC too.

And yes I have in fact been getting lots of unprocessed film done at Black and White Photo Lab. Thanks Dierdre!

Cleverer title might have been “Cloudy Water Beneath Commercial St. Wharf.”

Taken from Flatbread’s “holding pen” on deck for people waiting to eat.

(Flatbread’s got good pizza — I mean that!)

This was taken in same series of brownfield pictures I did behind Morrill’s Corner.

Morrill’s is notorious, I suppose, for it’s traffic bottleneck, especially after 4 PM when a freight train usually cuts off traffic at Forest Ave. Walton St. and Allen Ave. for 10-15 minutes. People want to speed to/from Windham and other towns off of Route 302. It would be nicer if there were a plan to do a kind of small town center at Morrill’s. Granted, that would do much for the traffic here.

There are big warehouse spaces, looks to me like they’re underused if used at all, off Read Street.

There was to be a Stop & Shop and condo development at Morrill’s, off Allen Avenue. But my understand was that Stop & Shop had pulled out of the state. If anyone knows more about this project, email.

Concord and Nevens Streets behind Woodford’s Corner.