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Somebody above said that Midtown is likely to develop from the outsides in. I agree that's most likely, but not necessarily best for Midtown or for the city. That's an awful long stretch to just "fill in" as the thread title indicates. But "fill in" is exactly what we've done, and now half of these new BRT stops exist only to serve whoever works at the recently-built private thing on either side of the street. And these private things tend to have private parking and hire from the burbs, so it's not like a whole lot of these individuals are using these shiny new bus stops. I would hesitate to put any more private workplaces on Euclid, any at all. I don't care if there's 10,000 people working there, none of them are ever going to be outside, and there's already too much of that on Euclid as it is. We're going for street life on Euclid, so it needs to be open for visitors. My main concern is that I'm not sure how well major biotech operations fit in with what we understand as mixed use. I mean I don't see them sharing a site, let alone a structure, with dense residential or with anything we understand as night life. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think one area is really marketable as both, and for this one I have a preference. This area around 55th presents our only opportunity to get a cool new neighborhood out of the Euclid Corridor project. I'm not counting the Uptown project because, though it's awesome, UC is already a going concern and we're talking about redeveloping empty space. This empty space is close enough to a major nightlife anchor to support additional after-5 businesses, and to entice certain classes of residents. It already has a thrift store and a grocery store, both right there on Euclid, both right by this site. In addition to UC and downtown workers, there are two universities nearby, both on the new bus line, which lack student neighborhoods. Case has some, needs more; CSU has none and really wants it. Finishing out the core of Midtown like a Coventry or a denser Waterloo would fill a glaring need for two universities, it would make the BRT investment seem a lot more worthwhile, and it would give Midtown a solid identity of its own. It would also create some entry-level jobs so lacking in this part of town. Cleveland Clininc provides tons of employment, but not necessarily for people currently living near it. Plus, building a happy fun district here does nothing to preclude us from clustering the hi-tech installations anywhere else we want, while the happy fun district isn't nearly as suitable for any other open site in town. I'm saying let's have both. Isn't that the best possible outcome?

So true. And then we complain about brain drain.

Fear not. I'm on it. You're absolutely right about how the letters should look. I'm hoping that my commentary here results in at least one more letter besides my own. It sounds like now would be a good time to seriously discuss, as a city and a region, what our plans for Euclid Avenue ought to be... we seem to have two mutually exclusive options on the table. I find it odd that so little of this discussion has taken place so far. We have the 3-year road project finished and we're still shooting wildly in the dark. For the record, the intersection of 55th and Euclid already has a "World Famous" entertainment venue as well as successful market-rate housing. So if we're questioning whether these things would work there, the answer is they have already worked there for a very long time, and they're suddenly being treated like chopped liver, in our mad rush to build anything we can preface with Bio. I don't see a situation where additional employment centers are needed in the Euclid Corridor. That's because going 2 miles in either direction from 55th puts you in one of the region's two largest employment centers, both of which notably lack appropriate housing. So the need in that particular area would seem to be housing, of the type that might attract the thousands of people already employed nearby in both directions, and the immediate answer to "what do we have to work with here?" would seem to be entertainment. As far as Bio-Clustering, there are 3 major streets running parallel to Euclid, as well as the proposed Opportunity Corridor, to put that along. Basically, put that stuff anywhere except on Euclid. The delivery drivers serving all the Bio-stuff will thank us for it, because Euclid is not set up for them. Euclid has been redesigned, at great cost, for pedestrian-friendly TOD. Please let's do that. If it means a few more years of vacant lots, I would call that a small price to pay.

This passage from University Circle's website answers a number of my questions. Midtown Inc and UCI only provide "assistance" to City Planning. This indicates that the Midtown Master Plan has zero teeth and is really just a suggestion. Thus, nobody at city hall is bound by anything, except a municipal zoning code designed for the anti-urban era we're trying to leave behind. http://www.universitycircle.org/uci.aspx?page=28 "Beginning in February, 2009, the City of Cleveland has determined that the 18 local design review committees will be consolidated into 6 new regions, plus a 7th for Downtown and the Airport. The University Circle Design District will be merged with the Midtown Business Revitalization District and will be referred to as the Euclid Corridor Design Review Region. The new region will be managed by the City Planning Department, with assistance from UCI and Midtown. The new coverage area will also include land between E. 79th and E. 105th, along Cedar, Carnegie, Euclid, and Chester Avenues that was not previously covered by a design review body." We need major government reform in this city and we need it yesterday. Not only are the wrong people running the show, they're using the wrong rules to do it.

^ hahahahahaha! hahahahahaha! Welcome to life, kiddies.

Another way of looking at the impact of a hospital on that site... Lutheran. It's not a mental facility, it carries no stigma at all, but everyone here recognizes the chilling effect it has on W 25th. That same stretch of road also tells us something about public housing placement. There can and will be a market for market-rate housing on Euclid, but that market is dependent on neighborhood amenities. Fill in all the spaces with dead zones, like Applied HQ or the Red Cross motor pool, and our chance to build those amenities evaporates. If any kind of new destination neighborhood is to develop along Euclid in Midtown, it probably needs to happen in that 50s-60s area. At 71st you're practically in Fairfax, which has already been developed as a suburb. The stuff around 71st (Baker, Victory, the mosque) should serve as a buffer between suburban Fairfax and all the new Midtown development-- which needs to be 100% urban.

This exodus of companies to the south brought to you by... you. Through your federal taxes, you have helped make the southern climate seem so much more hospitable that it really is. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31163994/ Stimulus funds spent to keep Sun Belt cool

I've noticed that too, that the much-heralded "smart" intersections don't appear to have been turned on yet. E9th is the one intersection where I wouldn't expect this to help much, due to the volume of N/S traffic on that street. But I ride this route frequently, and the BRT signal priority system has no observable effect anywhere. BRTs sit for long periods at intersections where there is no other traffic... almost as if the lights were run off a simple timer device.

I can't solve the money problem, but I understand where you're coming from AMN. I've been considering a move to Shaker Square, but lack of 24-hr transit access is an absolute dealbreaker. Take away its transit and Shaker Square becomes remarkably isolated. This is something I investigated on foot over the weekend. It's a neighborhood which, by design and by placement, sinks or swims based on its transit access.

The Midtown Master Plan does not call for industrial parks on Euclid Avenue. (EDIT: The plan is ambiguous with regard to the NE corner of Euclid at 55th. The diagram shows a "tech center" fronting and spanning Euclid Ave there, while the street-specific guidelines for Euclid seem to limit it to pedestrian-oriented developments.) A 24-hour transit line is superfluous if everything it serves is specialized, secured, 9-5, and closed to the public. I know it may seem like urban planning pornography to consider the core of Midtown for residential/mixed development, but that pipe dream is precisely why the BRT wasn't built as an express from downtown to UC. It has stations in the middle on purpose. It only pays off if we get human activity along Euclid Avenue. Otherwise we could have built a rush-hour-express system, like the 55F, and saved tons of money. Our investment in the EC project, as designed, renders industrial/institutional construction on Euclid Avenue completely out of the question. So does the Midtown zoning overlay, supposedly. Was that just a proposal? Has the Jackson administration officially disowned it? If not, I would assume we have some incentive to follow it, if for no other reason than the appearance it creates that we can "plan" beyond this afternoon. Sorry... I'm very upset about this, alarmed and disappointed. I see a once in a generation opportunity that is about to blow up.

DocBroc you said it yourself, the variance is larger than the desired interval. It is what it is. One thing they could do is let the first bus in the bunch blow by, while the second or third hangs back to pick people up. Stinks because that first bus is presumably late, but the only way to even things out is to let it go. Currently that doesn't happen... instead, the first bus stops to load/unload a ton of people while the other ones are stuck behind it.

The issue for me isn't stigma but opportunity cost. A mental hospital takes up a lot of space without contributing anything to street life. There's no reason a Midtown resident or visitor would ever want to stop in and check it out. It'll just be one more 500' fence to walk past. Plus, hospitals tend to have cafeterias on site to keep their workers safely indoors. It's in every way the opposite of what the BRT and Midtown Master Plan were created to encourage. A mental hospital would be great at Madison & Berea. Or the Trinity site on Detroit Ave near the rapid tracks. Or in the 55th/Woodland/Kinsman area... anywhere along Kinsman, for that matter. Or the former St. Michael's hospital site. Or built as a hi-rise atop the FBI's Lakeside Ave structure. Or at 55th & I-90, the Howard Johnson site. Or anywhere in the Randall Park area, including where the mall currently sits. Someone mentioned Chagrin Highlands, a marvelous idea. Hospital landscaping will fit right in there. Each of these locations, other than maybe the last one, could really use the inflow of jobs. And none of them just got a billion-dollar makeover.

I'm currently in legal, previously in government, formerly in manufacturing and logistics.

This is a vivid illustration of just how serious our leadership problem is. Watch these people squander the entire Euclid Corridor investment with one stroke of a pen. They also came within moments of running the MM/CC out of town, if you recall. It is imperative that Frank Jackson and his crew not be re-elected. In the meantime, we need to identify a suitable alternative. I will vote for any UO member who runs. Midtown needs our help, and it appears to be an emergency.

I'm probably moving back to Midtown soon and I admit having some NIMBY interest in this. But part of my doing so is in hopes of getting involved with its revitalization. These developments would make the task more difficult, maybe pointless because the neighborhood's character will already be locked into "things that scare or sadden people." Not quite the character I or anyone else who lives there has had in mind. The area around 55th should be developed to complement the Agora, with a small entertainment district that could serve as an inner-city welcome center for young people-- perfectly situated between two universities notorious for not having much campus life. Or, we could put something on a new transit line that's filled with people who can't even leave the building. Stupendous. I'm certainly not against social services, and I support building more mental hospitals. But right there? Please tell me they're joking.

I hope Midtown is able to prevent this stuff from going up. Euclid Ave already has an abundance of poorly sited social services. The lessons of the lakefront are very clear. I cannot believe the city would want to put a mental hospital on Euclid. Impeach these people. What a shockingly destructive move. It isn't clear why the Midtown folks are equivocating, because this would indeed end any hope of Midtown becoming a desirable address. I also cannot believe the homeless agency would behave like this. The points they're denying are beyond obvious. In a city full of empty spaces, why relegate the new Euclid to institutional uses? This is insanity. I shall barf now.

I'm with you. These aren't as bad as some others we've seen, but they're hardly anything a less deprived city would be excited about. This kind of thing appears so dated precisely because of its effort to look modern. Is there an ironic component to the aesthetic that us fogies are missing? I've started judging new local architecture on a "well, it is Cleveland" scale because the stuff we tend to get is so infested with Zeerust. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Zeerust

Once those planters are filled it will add a lot of color to the street. I think they're going to look very nice. I'm glad there are so many of them too. While we're talking about plants, many of the treelawns are not holding up well. A large number of the trees have dead sections, while others have pretty much expired. A lot of the grass is either dead or overgrown like a vacant lot. This is hardly what I was expecting our new showpiece to look like after less than one year of use. Given that so little care is being taken of so many of the landscaping installations, it is more confusing than ever why the planters near CSU and Playhouse Square are filled with ugly grey dust. My understanding was that these particular property owners had refused to accept maintenance obligations from RTA, so they got grey dust. But now we just have prominent troughs of grey dust, to go along with landscaped troughs elsewhere that nobody is taking care of. If that was going to be the case all along, I'd prefer to have tall grass and weeds in the CSU treelawns, because that still looks better than grey dust where there are clearly supposed to be plants. Is there a solution to any of this? I worry about installing dozens of new planters if we are already unable to keep the landscaping in order. I don't want additional dead vegetation lining Euclid, nor do I want these planters given up on in a year's time and converted to trash cans. On an unrelated note, the history kiosks are up and running at select stations, and everyone should check them out. I had expected really basic info targeted at visitors, but instead I found the content to be highly detailed and informative.

HJG you didn't blow it at all. That was a good piece. I think most people here are mad at Kotz, not you. I found it interesting that the TN people would say something like "there can be only one" if they're that far behind us in getting underway. They're pushing a premise that doesn't, on the surface, seem to be in their favor at all. Or is it? I hope they're full of crap, but their posturing gives me pause. Public-private projects like ours have many advantages, like the aforementioned easy capital, but operational speed is major drawback. It can be done much quicker than this though. This is ridiculous. We need pressure and we need urgency. We need to leverage the momentary advantage our financing gave us, because once we're beyond the point of no return it will be harder for Nashville to get their private money. Theirs would be a clear #2 if ours was already a certainty. They need to be first, and so do we. My concern is that a private sector project could easily blow past us as soon as they got their financing together. And "site selection" is not typically the drawn-out maelstrom it was here. I wish we'd get digging.

I too am offended by the "incompetent" line as written, although if the statement had been better targeted I would pretty much agree with it. Incompetence has gotten us to this point in this project. Had we started digging sooner, there is a good chance that no southern competitor would have emerged. Now that they have, it's something we need to take very seriously. Nashville's potential investors might be scared off if we can show a quick burst of progress. We aren't scaring anyone right now.

^ That was thorough, and quite fair overall.

I like the station design a lot. It conveys that trains are nice, perhaps luxurious, yet they fit in with our everyday lives. That's a great vibe for RTA to have. I especially like the prominent RTA sign. Those help new people and recent converts find the stations at a distance through clutter. Some of the older stations lack this feature.

http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/4301.69 ORC 4301.69 (E)(1) No underage person shall knowingly order, pay for, share the cost of, attempt to purchase, possess, or consume any beer or intoxicating liquor in any public or private place. No underage person shall knowingly be under the influence of any beer or intoxicating liquor in any public place. The prohibitions set forth in division (E)(1) of this section against an underage person knowingly possessing, consuming, or being under the influence of any beer or intoxicating liquor shall not apply if the underage person is supervised by a parent, spouse who is not an underage person, or legal guardian, or the beer or intoxicating liquor is given by a physician in the regular line of the physician’s practice or given for established religious purposes.

If we set multiple arbitrary age requirements, it may better reflect reality, but it also may reflect poorly on our ability to determine for each other when this or that is OK. Each separate age limit calls into question the validity of the others. The idea of having people fight for freedoms they can't enjoy is dark, very dark. That irony is just crushing. That irony is what drives the connection between the drinking age and the military age. Either we stand for the dignity of the individual or we don't. Draconian and puritanical standards for social behavior do not comport with how our nation presents itself.

Well, yes, that's how it will work if we want a semi-medieval system to develop. There is at least one class of people (those sitting on cash right now) for whom that development would be most beneficial. Thus, it may develop on its own if it isn't stopped. When the 1990s Russian economy collapsed, it took very VERY little time for ownership of most national assets to be consolidated.