Ram23

As recently as this past winter I used the Skywalk weekly to get from my office at 3rd and Plum to the Westin/US Bank tower for a project I had there. I found the Saks window displays to be one of the saddest places, because they were really well done and frequently updated, yet hardly ever seen. At some point, the southwest-most entrance, in the garage where "Budget" car rental is, was locked and had a badge reader added. With Convention Place on the chopping block, that shortcut is short-lived, anyway. Here's a good post about the building that was demolished at 5th and Race - it had a retail/dining mezzanine at the Skywalk level, and this guy was really mad they tore it down: https://forum.urbanohio.com/topic/15000-cincinnati-in-the-1980s/?do=findComment&comment=908630 It looks like the south tower used to be the Sheraton: https://www.emporis.com/buildings/122084/four-points-by-sheraton-cincinnati-downtown-cincinnati-oh-usa I always thought it was odd that the Millennium had two separate towers, it makes sense it used to be two distinct hotels.

The mugshot newspaper/website industry has a lot of extortion, blackmail, etc. I have some stories to tell about it but I'm still too afraid to publicly comment. On a related note, in Hamilton County you can view the mugshots and info of everyone arrested/housed in the county jail here - just click on "View All" : http://apps.hcso.org/inmates.aspx

Like a UDF? I don't know if the one on Chase has any produce, the one in Clifton does. The "bodega" definition can turn pedantic pretty quickly. CUF is able to support a handful of what I'd consider to count as bodegas in the east coast sense: Ravine St. Market, E&G Mart, and Riddle Road Market. These are distinct from convenience stores for only a handful of reasons - mostly because they're not chains and don't have much parking (if any). Riddle Road Market may be more of a "deli" because it sells hot meals. And then there are pony kegs, like the place on the corner of Colerain and Virginia. The defining characteristic of pony keg being a focus on beer, liquor, and lottery tickets. Contrary to popular belief, you don't have to be able to drive through a pony keg. I'd consider a pony keg and a drive-thru to be completely different types of businesses.

Seelbach wants to cancel the Capitoline Wolf statue in Eden Park: https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2020/01/06/should-statue-gift-mussolini-removed-eden-park-cincinnati/2829704001/ Of all the recent big stretches people have been making to seek out things to be offended by, this seems like the biggest. I've always thought this statue and its history were among the best hidden gems in Cincinnati.

The "Chinatown Bus" that provides service from Cincinnati to NYC, via Dayton and Columbus, was the bus that crashed this weekend on the Pennsylvania turnpike, killing 5 and injuring 60+ https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/05/us/Pennsylvania-Turnpike-accident.html

^ That's disingenuous. That's a parking garage under a park, and it was taken on a cold December morning the weekend after Christmas, while it was pouring down rain. That garage is full whenever the weather is nice, or if there's an event at Washington Park or Music Hall. The problem (and it's in no way unique to OTR) is accommodating peak demand while accounting for residents who by and large refuse to live car free.

There are ways to dry out the soil if schedule is tight, such as mixing in lime. I think it's also easier to haul dirt away when it's wet than it is to try to move it around and compact it, which is what it looks like they might be doing at the Artistry. Being at a low elevation right by the river also helps keep the soil wet for much longer than at higher elevations. I've worked on a few projects at elevations near the low point in Hamilton County and it seemed like they never dried out, even in the summer. Pendleton is a bit higher, but it might not make much of a difference because it's still in a valley.

Site work usually slows down during the winter months. The soil is either frozen or, more often, saturated and won't dry because a combo of cool temperatures, lack of sunlight, and humidity. It does look like they've been able to move some dirt around with the spurts of good weather we've been having.

I've walked by these signs 1000 times and never understood why the "Begin" signs are there: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1204369,-84.5199931,3a,48.9y,299.07h,92.99t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sVM2AQVn9oNdCYRojaYYa5w!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 My best guess was that they denoted the address block jump from the 100 block to the 2000 block at that point. But I'm not sure that's right - it's little confusing because one of the signs just says "Clifton Av" and the other says "W Clifton Av," implying "W Clifton" ends and "Clifton" begins. This is further confounded as you move up the hill from this point - at various intersections, the street is signed as "Clifton Av," without the directional designation, until it reaches McMicken at the top of the hill, where it is signed as "Clifton Av W," and "W Clifton Av." The auditor has some addresses on this stretch listed as "W Clifton" and some as just "Clifton," to add to the confusion (for example, 2103 and 2109 are officially described as "Clifton" but 2105 and 2107, right next door, are "W Clifton." I imagine this all works itself out because E Clifton doesn't have addresses in the 2000s.

A 2" line one the streetcar route is $6,080 - GCWW has fixed rates for these: https://www.cincinnati-oh.gov/water/water-sewer-service-charges/rates-for-installation-of-water-service-branches/ If it is a 4" or larger line (usually for sprinklers) then it's a different story - but $100,000 seems high.

I drive by that house a few times a week - it's one of my favorite houses in Cincinnati. I've worked on properties that had high tension power lines like these on them and power companies won't let you put anything within 40' of them. Not even things like fences, sidewalks, gravel parking lots, planters, etc. Yet somehow this entire house remains directly below one - almost close enough you could reach out and touch the tower from the bedroom windows.

Committing a second degree misdemeanor is fairly nefarious. They were meeting as a majority, via text, to conduct official business - they came to a consensus on votes, discussed council business, confirmed they were all "on the same page," etc. In that regard, it's a fairly open and shut case. There's no legal requirement that they have to try to "cover their tracks" (which, by the way, Young did do), or that they had to think our sunshine laws are a "big deal." Luckily a few of these folks are term limited. For the others, even if you want to vote a straight ticket for Democrats, remember there will probably be about 15 other Democrats on the ballot who haven't completely betrayed the people of Cincinnati.

Bengals secured the #1 draft pick in the most dramatic way possible. They were down 35-19 with 30 seconds left, and managed to score 16 points, including a laser of a hail mary as time expired, to send the game to OT, where they lost.

A couple shots below from Lotte Tower in Seoul. I have to agree with some earlier posts that the low rise neighborhoods in the foreground of each of these shots feel much denser than the high-rise apartment/tower in the park neighborhoods.

It's a second degree misdemeanor - they'd face a maximum $750 fine and/or 90 days in jail. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out if there's a grand jury investigation resulting in charges filed. Would they plead out and pay a fine? Or would admitting guilt for dereliction of duty be a career ending move? If they fight it and are found guilty in a jury trial - they might actually end up in jail like Tracy Hunter. It's is especially dumb when there could have just used WhatsApp or any of a number of apps that allow encrypted messaging and/or messages that expire automatically. People like Bill Clinton are smart enough to have their people handle the shady business for them. These council members could have just had their interns go on a coffee run and cover all this business for them and they would have been completely in the clear.

The ironic part about this proposed street renaming is that McMicken, particularly stretches of W. McMicken, is the last real remaining example of "rough" OTR. I take W. McMicken every day of the week to get from my home to OTR/downtown, and it's still riddled with drug users, dealers, prostitutes, and other various vagrants. Not to mention the litter and general state of disrepair. There are serious problems with stretches of this street. Maybe the city can put those prostitution barricades back up for a few months before they bring out the cameras for the renaming ceremony? They may as well compound the silliness.

Maybe in 75 years Pastor Avenue will have a sign put up reading something along the lines of "Formerly McMicken Avenue. Renamed in 2020 because of cancel culture hysteria." OTR might as well have mass street renaming for silly reasons once every century.

Facing a possible 90 day jail sentence for "dereliction of duty" isn't exactly a great way to get a mayoral election campaign off the ground.

The battlefield of music is one upon which the War on Christmas has been wildly successful.

If UC doesn't return the money and land he donated, this seems like an incredibly empty gesture.

I think "Business owners" in that quote should be "elected officials?" Obviously business owners can decide for themselves if they want to use plastic bags or not. What this "ban" effectively does is preserve the right of the business owner to make that decision for themselves - it prevents the government (state or local) from taking that right away.

According to this research, only one company offers a product that satisfies all the requirements of the proposal - and, not surprisingly, it's the company that Sittenfeld worked with to come up with the proposal. Several companies offer similar products, but none of them are compliant. That link also has some great info about the proposal. The more I read about this, the more it seems like a big scam - just like a payday loan, but for security deposits. https://www.cincinnatireia.com/Page.aspx?ID=Legislative-Updates Here's a link to a PDF of the actual ordinance: https://www.cincinnati-oh.gov/council/meeting-agendas-minutes/education-innovation-growth-committee/

This is an absolutely horrible idea that is presented as if it's helping out low income folks, but is really more like a payday loan. They can keep a little bit of cash up front, but are instead subjected to a monthly fee in perpetuity. Cui bono? A handful of insurance companies who get to pocket the monthly premiums. On the other end, landlords will hate it because the paperwork involved to get $200 out of the insurance company to clean a mess, $25 to replace unreturned keys, etc. would be overly burdensome and not worth it. Instead, rents will just inch up for everyone to cover the costs that would have otherwise been covered by the responsible parties' deposits.

We'll see. The downtown Snappy Tomato announced they'd be reopening at a to-be-determined location in October, 2018. I'm still waiting.

Spygate is back - and it looks like the Patriots were spying on the Bengals in Cleveland last week: Patriots video reportedly focused on Bengals sideline for 8 minutes https://sports.yahoo.com/patriots-video-reportedly-focused-on-bengals-sideline-for-8-minutes-165756729.html The New England Patriots are in the middle of a hot mess right now concerning one of their video crews filming the sideline of the Cincinnati Bengals game on Sunday. The news broke on Monday afternoon and things have only gotten messier and more suspicious since. According to Paul Dehner Jr. of The Athletic, the tape from the Patriots’ film crew contains eight minutes of direct Bengals sideline footage. Sources who viewed the recording told Dehner that it shows Bengals players running on and off the field as well as coaches calling plays. If the Bengals lost to the Patriots this weekend, it will almost certainly be entirely due to this cheating.