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Then maybe these buildings should no longer be located in downtown cores. If they're targets of such magnitude that it affects the architecture, perhaps the chance for collateral damage is too high and they should be built in less dense areas.

It looks like a rolodex from 80s. Or maybe a lampshade that's trying too hard. And half the damn model is wasted space-- wide berth, no sense of context, just endless plazas with sickly little trees. Who puts dead trees in their model? This guy. Agreed that $96 million could do wonders for Toledo and spending it on this is insane. It's not that there's no money around here, it's that our leadership squanders fortunes left and right on awful projects. This really needs to stop.

I'm not clear on what purpose this bridge would serve, but it still sounds pretty awesome.

Only if they have no employees, which means no not really. The ban was portrayed as having significant exemptions, even in its ballot language, but that portrayal was not accurate. This bait & switch probably got a lot of people to vote for it who otherwise wouldn't have. And contrary to what a lot of signs claim, the statute contains no "20 foot rule" or any distance rule at all. It just says that smoke can't come indoors.

Yowza!

Policy recommendation #1 seems to call for regionalism. I've got no problem with that. Not sure what they mean about reforming eminent domain, at least with regard to business friendliness... eminent domain is frequently used to get businesses the land they want, and most reforms (including Norwood) involve curtailing that. Specifics would be nice, as to what makes Indiana so great.

Right. I made that point above. But regardless of the exact sequence of things, the planning has been disjointed to say the least. We built a new transit line on a street that's increasingly set up as anti-TOD. Some of that took place before the transit line, some since. That once-planned mental hospital, for example, was decidedly not TOD. If that's TOD then so is the entire CCF campus. But the city pushed hard for it and considered it a centerpiece of the street's redevelopment post-ECP. And no, Hts121, I don't think they were gonna tear down their new mental hospital if someone decided there was housing demand for that site 5 years later. To a large extent, for purposes of our functional lives, what's done is done. I do not subscribe to the idea that bad planning is an effectve placeholder for good planning. We do not have to build bad things in order to build good things. And developers always prefer open lots. That's a big reason why we have sprawl. So no, I really don't think we should just throw up whatever for the sake of doing so.

Good call on the RMc House. Most of the corridor frontage is either lawn or fence, which is a travesty. And whle I understand that anything could eventually come down, many of the offending structures here are relatively recent and not likely to disappear in the foreseeable future. I do recall RTA saying they'd move one or both of those garages... the sooner the better. And it shouldn't take a fancy zoning overlay to prevent things like that 79th St CVS from happening. Lakewood has done a good job integrating those into their streetscapes. Why can't Cleveland? Everything from 79th east is a joke-- a suburban plaza with adjacent tract housing that fronts Euclid with a linear parking lot. All of it pretty much new. Block after block of fences and parking along Main Street. There's no excuse for it. City leaders tout these developments as signs of rebirth. To me they're abortions, wiping out pedestrian street life for a generation. Sometimes nothing is better than something, if that something is just plain wrong.

I wouldn't say anyone was duped. Nothing secretive has taken place. But there have been some debatable decisions made in planning out the revitalization of this corridor, going back well before the BRT project began. And many of those decisions have been made not by private developers but by entities answerable to the public. Even private development decisions are steered by public policies-- from zoning codes to financial incentives to infrastructure-- and we may want to look over these policies before Euclid Avenue has been completely filled in. And I would suggest we're already a lot closer to that filled-in point than some may assume.

I'm guessing they close it off from the public, the theater becomes a private indoor cafeteria for some tech firm, and the marquee goes into storage alongside Chief Wahoo. The lot next to it never gets developed because that's parking for the tech firm.

I wonder what the plan for the Agora building is. From the article: "A second phase means that the MidTown Tech Park project is a success in only one year," said Executive Director James Haviland. "We're going to create additional renovated research and office space in what is becoming a campus on Euclid Ave." I don't think anyone had the term "campus" in mind when we invested so much in the Euclid Corridor. Unless you were actually in charge of it, in which case that's what you've had in mind all along.

I mentioned in particular a pair of RTA facilities. One just west of 55th and one east, both on the north side of Euclid. I don't think the gyro place or the bunker-like deserted mini-plaza immedately west of 55th are all that old either. There are also a couple of recently-built religious institutions that seem out of place, scale wise, compared to the more historical ones nearby. I also mentioned the Red Cross facility. It's closer to 36th and is more than two stories tall, but it has a huge setback and most of its footprint is a surface lot for truck storage. Looks like it belongs on Richmond or Rockside.

Agreed. Various stakeholders and decision-makers have seemed determined to "fill it in" ASAP at all costs, with no regard to its supposed status as the main street of a major city. The worst part is that so many of these inappropriate buildings were put there by government agencies and non-profits, who should be expected to show more concern for the present and future well being of their city. You don't see this sort of thing happening on High Street, Woodward Ave, or any equivalent anywhere. And we can't blame developers here when they're not the culprits. It's not clear to me how RTA putting pair of bus garages on Euclid, and Red Cross doing likewise, is in any way helpful to street activity. For that matter, the same could be said for the Pierre's ice cream expansion. Certainly not a bad thing, but unrelated to creating street activity because it's industrial rather than mixed-use. Thousands work at the Brook Park Ford complex, yet street actvity nearby hasn't picked up one bit. Street activity is generated in relation to the nature and purpose of a building... not all buildings are equal in this regard.

Wow that's ugly, and not even a little bit urban. That roof has to be a joke. It just has to.

Right. And young people don't tend to get into power around here. I'd love to hear Julian Rogers come out in favor of CH and EC merging with Cleveland. They're all in his county council district, and he's one of the few young officeholders we have around here. Cimperman seems more concerned with controlling people's diets. Leadership is lacking, and I don't think we'll see much movement on this until that changes. Contact the Young Democrats. Contact the Young Republicans. I really couldn't tell you which would bite first on this issue.

Tying into this was something I recently read that stated "full employment" used to be 3%. That was a different era however when there were alot of manual labor jobs, more tellers, cashiers, etc. So much has been replaced by technology, perhaps the new "full employment" rate is 5 or 6%. I don't know. If full employment is now 6%, what exactly is that 6% supposed to do? 6% of 300 million is 18 millon people. I guess they all need to start a computer company in their garage, every last one of them. What will they eat in the meantime? Bootstraps. Or nothing. If you want actual food, you gotta win big.

I love your optimism, and it'll be needed if we're going to convince enough people. The main obstacle is race & class divisions. Too many locals don't want their affairs mingled with those of less fortunate neighbors. Whatever we choose to call the new subdivisions, or lack thereof, isn't going to matter if voters believe they'll have a new deduction on their paycheck marked "Poor People."

The key is to convince the voters of each city. Ultimately they're the ones who decide it. To me that suggests a broad (and expensive) PR campaign. Convincing a few public officials to openly support it would help, but that would be a significant political risk for them and there might not be many takers.

My info about the 3rd book split was from a second hand account of GRRM's blog. So take it with a grain of salt, it's just internet chatter from another board and I'm no expert or insider. I'm just really glad the show's popular, and I hope those who haven't seen it yet can keep away from spoilers till they do.

Maybe MTS has info I don't. There are only 4 books right now and I'm pretty sure Game of Thrones was the shortest. Book 5 is supposedly due out next month.

I hear they're casting the second season/book right now. Then the third book is supposed to be split into two seasons.

59 munis in one county is not good for jobs. The cost positions us poorly against consolidated metros, while our tangled web of 59 different sets of regulations compounds that problem. We don't need 59 different regimes controlling elevator safety or trans fats. One will do.

There's no sense in supporting "anyone but" because "anyone but" can't run for office. Pick somebody. How many people here voted for Jackson's opponent in the last primary? I did, in part because I liked his approach of campaigning in person at transit stations.

Did anyone watch South Park last night? I'm still messed up over it.

On mine it was Akron.