Grumpy

^Sorry, no pictures. My cell phone's memory is full with pictures of my kids.

I'm generally not the kind of person that likes to laugh at the misfortune of others. But that being said, I needed a laught this week. Yesterday evening on the way out of work I could not help but laugh at what I saw on the waterfront line. It looked to me like a tractor trailer was driving east on the south marginal, decided he was going the wrong way, so he tried to do a U-turn and somehow ended up with half his truck up on the waterfront line tracks between the Muni lot and E 9th. There were half a dozen cops standing around giving dirty looks to the truck driver who had to have felt like the biggest schmuck.

Not too wild but incorrect. I realize its not the best picture, but it was the best I could find that isn't blocked by the firewall here at work. To give a couple a small hint it is a capital city.

Well the file name says La Paz in it, so I'm claiming this one. Here's my submission.

Winner If you say so.

Have you ever been to Shedd Aquarium in Chicago? I haven't, but I hear it's amazing. :) And it's a huge tourist draw. I'm sure an aquarium would draw some tourists all year round, but there was plenty to do and see around downtown Cleveland without it last weekend.

It really looks like La Paz, but if you say its not I'll believe you.

La Paz?

A couple buildings look familiar. Is that Mexico City?

Just set up a toll booth at the city limits on each freeway. Charge an even dollar amount so it doesn't slow traffic down too much. 1 or 2 dollars ought to be enough and wouldn't cause people to throw too big a fit about it. Split the money between highway maintenance and RTA. But of course leave a separate lane open just for busses so that it becomes a little faster to ride in than to drive and get stuck in traffic at this everyday.

Yes, I was kidding about that site as I'm still hoping deep down that the elected leadership won't let the CC get put over at Tower City. That being said, we could come up with a much worse place for the aquarium than this, and it's certainly one of the better locations available downtown. I personnally would prefer to see the aquarium end up back at Gordon Park and the Waterfront Line extended out to it. The old aquarium's buildings are still there, so some of them might be able to be rehabbed and save some money. To echo above, if you were bored in downtown over labor day weekend than I'm not sure a few fish swimming under the mall would really help much.

I'd call it a tougher schedule because 6 of the games are against teams that made the playoffs last year, the bye week is earlier in the season than it was last year, and I can't imagine any of these teams coming too close to matching what Miami did last year. So yes I'd say I'm judging partly at least based on what they did last year. I don't get betting on games either. I get mad enough watching the Browns play with nothing on the line but pride.

^Yeah, I was kidding about the CC site. It would be really foolish in my opinion not to have open water visable from this thing if it ever gets built.

I went with 8-8. They just got lucky too many times last year and I don't think they have the advantage of being a surprisingly good team this year. Plus they have a tougher schedule. In addition I still think DA is overrated.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26413026/

^Well if the Convention Center ends up at Tower City, there's going to be plenty of empty space under the mall. I would really prefer a better use for that space, but we could do worse than using it as an aquarium. And hey, no worries about the water table leaking in then! JK

^ I noticed that too, but I'm hoping it won't have much effect on this project.

I know no one has posted in here in a while but it looks like work is getting going on this project. Scaffolding was up around the first floor and a really big DAS construction banner is hanging on the building. Work may have been going on for a while but I just noticed this morning on my bus ride past. And a quick google turned up http://www.dasconstruction.com/projectsunder/pva.htm

I spent about a month in Charleston last fall for work and thought it was a nice little city. There were so many excellent seafood places I wouldn't know where to get started, but after a few weeks I needed a break from seafood and on a tip from locals found a steakhouse called Brecks on Rivers Ave in Goose Creek that looked like a dive but had some outrageously good food at great prices. Oh and I can't forget Matthews sports bar in Mt Pleasant, we found it accidentally, but its the home of the Charleston chapter of the Browns backers.

Or may it is just about 14 years before its time. 14 years of wasted opportunity, that's what I meant.

I agree with most everything in the article except the comments on the Waterfront line too. I think of the Waterfront line as big wasted opportunity rather than wasted money.

When considering transit it would make sense to consider that a significant portion of that Medina county population probably uses RTA more than MCPT. After all lots of people, like me, live in other counties but work in Cuyahoga. I have a couple of coworkers that live out in that direction and take the bus from the Strongsville park-n-ride.

I would consider Wi-Fi on a bus to be an unnecisary extravagance. A cleaner more comfortable seat though always be nice, though lately on the RTA busses I've ridden I'd be happy to just have room to stand.

OK, I'm a regular rider of Laketran (and occasionally RTA) so I'd love to see the outlying counties' transit agencies get more money, but I sure as hell know that RTA is more important to Northeast Ohio. An economically healthy, environmentally conscious, and socially responsible Cleveland is critical to the future success of the region, and I feel that RTA is an integral part of that. Dividing excess money between transit agencies based solely upon population rather than transit use is ridiculous. Medina county doesn't have a good transit system with significant usage compared to its population (and probably never will) because it's so spread out. The same applies to most of the other counties around Cuyahoga. Besides that this funding is coming from federal Congestion Mitigation Air Quality money, and as far as I can tell Cuyahoga county has much worse congestion and air quality issues than most of the area. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'd love to someday see a truly regional transit system in Northeast Ohio, and if RTA collapses into a shell of its former (or current) self than that truly regional transit system would be that much harder to get off the ground.

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2008/08/forest_city_officials_support.html