The 1950s Vaughn Street Redevelopment Area’s project area included 44 blocks (35 whole blocks and 9 partial blocks details shown on map to the right). They spanned NW 18th to 27th and NW Savier to York. Three areas in the city of Portland were surveyed for urban renewal, and according to a Housing Authority of Portland report in August 1952 “the Vaughn Street area was most in need of such a plan”. Albina and South Portland were razed; Vaughn Street avoided Urban Renewal in 1952–53. While many Slabtown homes were lost to the Fremont Bridge anchors, the 1963 highway project, and the 1970s I-505 debacle, in the end rapid population growth and high land values sealed the fate of these “blighted” homes.
The Vaughn Street urban renewal area intended to maintain many commercial structures in good repair, “…but all residential structures will have to be removed because the area will be redeveloped for commercial and industrial purposes.” The redevelopment agency intended to help renters find other adequate housing within their means. Rental properties, such as the Fairmont Hotel at 26th and Upshur, would not have yet had landmark status and would have met the wrecking ball. Although the judges considered the area blighted, activist residents defeated the effort in the courts and they rallied—150 strong—and won at City Hall on May 26, 1953. Protecting the dwellings surveyed by HAP, housing 900 families (53% of whom owned their homes), the activists were described as having a “vindictive resistance toward the encroachment of industry”.
Sherlock Street is a short street in Northwest Portland named for an Irish immigrant. William Sherlock was born in Newross, Ireland, in 1817; he arrived in Portland, OR in March of 1850. This early Portland pioneer was a horse aficionado and operated a livery business (hackney cabs). His mansion was located on NW 21st in Nob Hill but the street named for him is close to the river, near the edge of his 45-acre site known as Sherlock’s Addition. He was often seen around town with one of his eleven children, and was able to retire in 1876 (died 1901, estate settled 1903). William Sherlock owned the land where the Sherlock Building stands today.
The variety of trees is not just the results of planting efforts by Portland’s elite. The exotic trees were planted as part of the marketing of the North Pacific Sanatorium (1901–10), an adaptive reuse effort that repurposed the Levi White residence. The facility was rebranded as the Portland Convalescent Home (1911–12). As the wealthy recovered in this post-hospital care facility with top doctors, the grounds were planted with amazing trees from around the world. The sanatorium (a sanitarium is a health resort) operated on two full city blocks. 
Sanatoriums advertised themselves in the Polk Directories (the old-fashioned version of the white and yellow pages); this one’s advertisement read: “Grounds covering nearly two blocks, beautifully adorned by more than a hundred varieties of ornamental trees and shrubs, gathered at great expense from every continent of the globe. Rugged and picturesque scenery with four eternally snow-capped mountains (Mts. Hood-Adams-Rainer and St. Helens), with the beautiful Willamette River and the busy harbor of Portland to claim attention and cheer the view presented from the Sanitarium, a private hospital owned and controlled by medical men.” Guest also sent out postcards with images of the facility much like one would expect of a hotel rather than an assisted care center. Interest in more history of Couch Park head over to 
Answer: “Fordham Heights is situated at the head of Lovejoy and Northrup streets”
