September 12, 1998
In the Portland metropolitan area of Oregon, a light rail station in the Quatama area of the city of Hillsboro was officially opened. Originally known as Quatama/NW 205th Avenue Station, this facility is part of the regional light rail system known as the Metropolitan Area Express (MAX). This station is the eighth one eastbound on the MAX Blue Line and the fourth station eastbound on that system’s Red Line. In 2017, the name of the station was formally shortened to Quatama.
One of the distinguishing features of Quatama station is the nature-themed public art on display there. A key example of this artwork is a large weathervane that is titled “Cattail Tunes” and was created by Michael Oppenheimer. This weathervane, which owes its name to a plant that can be found in abundance in nearby wetlands, consists of five stainless streel rods measuring 24 feet (7.3 meters) in height and standing six feet (1.8 meters) apart from each other. Each rod is crowned with a metal cattail head.
MAX, which began operations in 1986, has a total length of 59.7 miles (96.1 kilometers). There are five lines and 93 stations altogether within this transit network. (The accompanying photo of the facility now called Quatama station was taken in 2011.)
Photo Credit: M.O. Stevens (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Aboutmovies) – licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en
For more information on Quatama station, please check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quatama_station
Transportation History 
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