Everything posted by 327
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Greater Cleveland RTA News & Discussion
RTA got away with lying about the Euclid bus, which has emboldened it to make even goofier claims about the West 25th bus. At some point there has to be accountability. Up is up and down is down.
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Cleveland: Crime & Safety Discussion
Rolled through my neighborhood in the process. The PD should illustrate his travels, a la Family Circus.
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The Ohio State University Buckeyes Football Discussion
I felt terrible for that guy. Maybe one day they'll make a movie about him, like Sully the pilot.
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Cleveland: Slavic Village: Development and News
It's not too far off. Clark and 25th is the only example I can think of, and I'm not sure everything there is pre-WWI. That's an odd standard to use. A lot of similar stuff went up in the 1920s.
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Gentrification News & Discussion
The average for a Lakewood double was nearing $900 this past summer. I expect to see many asking over $1000 by next summer. This sounds like a bubble. There's been no corresponding gain in local jobs or wages. I suspect it's also a function of dwindling candidates for home ownership, which suggests not a bubble. At least some bathrooms are getting updated in the process, that's a community benefit.
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Cleveland: Crime & Safety Discussion
In fairness, there are plenty of heroin and opioid users with no legitimate excuse. That's just how they party. And they're idiots. But I still don't believe it should be treated as a crime. Mandatory treatment is a more effective and economical approach, even when most addicts need several rounds of it. And you can't expect to keep your kids around if you choose to live as an addict.
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Cleveland: Historic Photos
Still cannot get over the random, suburban style homes across the street from that Fannie's mansions Not just her. TJ Dow attacked a proposal for an ice cream shop outside League Park. Single family homes or nothing, that's the policy.
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Cleveland: Crime & Safety Discussion
The other problem with criminalizing drugs is that users get felony records and career options become scarce. Then they stop caring about civil society, because for them there's no way back into it. Then we have zombies running around.
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Walkable Communities
Sometimes it feels safer to cross mid-block. Walk signals often tell pedestrians to go at the same time they tell vehicles to turn through the crosswalk, and sometimes they just aren't looking. This is only a problem at intersections; mid-block traffic is more predictable due to fewer variables. On the other hand we have intersections with left turn arrows, where there's no walk signal until the full green, but pedestrians consistently choose to jaywalk at the worst possible time.
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Cleveland: Random Quick Questions
Transit oriented development!
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Cleveland: Shoreway Boulevard Conversion
Or it was an untenable idea advanced by the same cadre of decepticons who oppose all vertical development in the area.
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2018 Gubernatorial Election
That might be the worst statement I've ever seen from a politician. At first I thought it was a hack or something, but nobody has said so.
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Cleveland: Downtown: Convention Center Atrium & Expansion
Totally. Point is, this thing had no chance without the free rent. Even then it was dicey. There were already distributors in health care who offered one-stop shopping for purchasers. Their impact on convention generation was established and measurable. What's the point of having trade shows when that role is filled by existing showrooms? A solution in search of a problem. Of course the whole idea on our end was to get funding for the convention center renovation, which nobody wanted, so it was paired with a second thing nobody wanted and forced through. And then we ran away from the base concept of it, which, to be fair, probably wouldn't have worked anyway. And then we actually got ourselves a top-tier convention, but that was unrelated to health care and held at the Q, which itself was deemed inadequate right afterward.
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Cleveland: Downtown: Convention Center Atrium & Expansion
The interview with Kennedy includes a point rarely discussed, that the Medical Mart itself wasn't supposed to generate revenue. It was meant to be a loss leader, offering retailers free rent to mitigate any doubts they had about the concept and the city. Kennedy has a point. That's the same idea I've pushed for years in regard to general consumer retail, since it's proven to be effective in other cities. In the case of the Medical Mart, where the concept is a tough sell and the market is inherently limited, that financial inducement was especially important. If we're treating it as a regular office building that needs to be independently profitable, it can't succeed and the whole thing becomes a waste. Apparently that was never the plan. But how was this crucial aspect so quickly forgotten? Why wasn't it front and center in the first place?
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Yikes! Boom! Pow! Cincinnati's very own Superheroes
I guess Cleveland needs a guy named Cincinnati Jones.
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2018 Gubernatorial Election
Here we go. Cordray stepped down from his federal post and is expected to run. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/consumer-financial-watchdog-cordray-resigns-n821086
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Higher Education
Sometimes. Other times it's an Akron situation where the place nearly bankrupts itself. Even in the first instance, the school may be better off not accepting a strings-attached donation that will end up costing it money.
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Higher Education
What if tuition were still subsidized, but colleges weren't allowed to blow all the money on frivolous construction and president salaries? Those gateway poles along Euclid that say "CSU" cost over $100k apiece, just to tell people something they already know. Hard to blame runaway costs on tuition aid when the students receiving that aid have no say in its expenditure.
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Northeast Ohio: Regionalism News & Discussion
Here's a nice piece in the PD comparing Hamilton County's consolidated municipal court system with the bewildering patchwork in Cuyahoga. Not only does Hamilton's approach save money, which they spend on useful things like ankle bracelets to track people who are out on bond, it's easier for everyone to understand and deal with. I work in several municipal courts around here and each one is a different animal where people have different rights. http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2017/11/hamilton_county_municipal_cour_1.html#incart_m-rpt-1
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Let's Better Understand Cleveland Neighborhoods
I kind of agree, although many of these older houses have irreplaceable architectural details inside. The hardwoods used in their construction are not replaceable. Totally agree that the commercial stock and apartment buildings are the real treasures, but it can be tough to get people on board with preserving them. Some stand against anything that's recognizably urban, and can't picture these structures without a drug deal happening out front. Others just classify them as "old" and consider them no less disposable than the housing on the sidestreets. I think it's imperative to preserve the ones we have left. The amount we're spending on demo would be better spent on that.
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Let's Better Understand Cleveland Neighborhoods
On much of Cleveland's east side (and part of the west) the condition of the housing stock is just awful. And that includes occupied units. My work these days involves going in and checking them out. A lot of these tenants are not on leases, they just come and go as best they can, and the landlords maintain accordingly-- meaning they don't maintain at all. The lower-middle "working" class these neighborhoods were built for has been decimated and replaced by a huge underclass.
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Issue 1: Marsy's Law (2017)
Due process, and open discovery in particular, are not popular with judges and prosecutors in the Cleveland area. This is only going to make it worse. Doesn't an online docket solve the notification problem? Maybe not in rural counties.
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Ohio Intercity Rail (3C+D Line, etc)
They all pander and they all exaggerate, but at least he's on the right track. Wages drive the economy.
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Cleveland Browns Discussion
Dee Haslam supposedly "went nuclear" on the front office yesterday. They're done.
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Metro Cleveland: Road & Highway News
Or higher density and better transit, which make car-free living feasible. You're right, I should have said "Ohio cities" or something like that. As for people who choose to step right in front of traffic-- don't! That's true from Manhattan to Alaska.