327

--RTA's TOD plans, including the tiny cottages they started building near W65th, also a recent plan featuring "cluster homes" that claimed on its face to be inspired by Mayfield Heights --Midtown Inc... see thread --Overtly suburban zoning citywide --Steelyard Commons, which the city pushed hard for, and which is a suburban plaza competing directly with its own downtown --HQ at 36th and Euclid, which was meant to go (as designed) in Strongsville, and which the city practically begged for --Recent city-supported developments in Hough, Central, and Fairfax --A reg stating that entertainment venues cannot be within X many feet of each other (see PHS thread) --Unchecked influence of anti-height activists in Little Italy and Hessler --A certain councilman (since reformed?) who blocked an apartment development near UC because he considered s-f homes more appropriate

There are many towns and cities in the Appalacians, and most are less dense than modern Cleveland. Meanwhile there are cities on flat land that are considerably more dense than modern Cleveland. No one forced Pittsburgh to be dense, it resulted from a series of policy choices. Cleveland actively thwarts density through its policies. I propose we change those policies. It would certainly be easier than hauling in a mountain range worth of fill dirt.

That is why I consider it the best model. I think I catch your meaning, but it isn't clear to me why policies toward buildings and businesses are dependent on topography or proximity to a lake. Culturally, Cleveland and Pittsburgh are practically one metro. While we can all see the differences, they're closer than anyone seems to want to admit. Grand Rapids, however, might as well be in the Bible Belt.

What's to be gained then? I was responding primarily to the bridge being characterized as a scar. Replace the elevated roadway with a surface roadway and it's still roadway, i.e. the land under the bridge doesn't suddenly become developable. I've never really seen the benefit of any aspect of this boulevard idea. Seems like the main drawback of having the current shoreway there could be eliminated with pedestrian bridges. Neighborhood access to the lake is thus easily obtainable, shoreway or no shoreway. But the Main Avenue bridge already solves that problem for its area-- it allows pedestrians to pass under commuter traffic without impeding either one. Eliminate the bridge and then they have to take turns using the same surface, making any number of fatal accidents possible for the first time in decades.

Here we have an iconic viaduct that plays an important role in thousands of lives each day, and people want it destroyed for aesthetic reasons alone. I'm not calling that a non-starter but I think the needs of those thousands of users are being swept under the rug a bit. Much like the diminutive Martian who would wipe out a planet just to get a better look at another planet. This is not to say that all highways must endure, but this one in particular serves an elevated peninsula that has a downtown on it. Probably not the first one we need to get rid of.

Cost: Sharply reduced access to downtown Benefit: Your view of Venus is unobstructed

Diverting all that commuter traffic down into the flats and back up again wouldn't be a scar so much as a festering wound.

At what price were they not interested?

One freeway crossing for the entire city? A city that's laid out laterally, due to the lake? Madness.

This is a great idea.

The new issue is Yes. How dare they ignore Yes!

Route 13 from Newark to Mansfield is awash with Mandel signs, moreso than Romney.

I'm talking about (regional) locals who have spent time in both cities, mostly from the Youngstown area. And when it comes time to visit a museum district, long-established Oakland tends to beat out work-in-progress University Circle. Think about it, in this age of LOTR/Harry Potter/Game of Thrones, how many commercials have you seen about Cleveland's massive medieval arms collection? The Carnegie's dinosaurs, meanwhile, are rather heavily promoted and are popular with kids. I guess what I'm getting at is that a ranking like this should surprise no one. And one idea immediately jumps out at me-- start promoting the CMA to children. We get a lot of see-and-be-seen martini events for local bigwigs, but we don't get nearly enough "hey kids, come look at swords."

I've had to pull out stats to convince people that Pittsburgh isn't the bigger of the two. To many casual observers, Cleveland looks and feels smaller. Press them for analysis and, without using the exact term, they describe an overall lack of density. And while Pittsburgh's downtown may lack ideal entertainment activity, it has no gaping holes at the skyline level or the street level.

That conversation never seems to get very far, as the vendors adamantly oppose any expansion of hours.

My understanding is that they're selling off all but their "core" Ohio holdings, like Columbiana and Carroll Counties. That may have changed though. Either way I would be surprised if all the due diligence has to be repeated. If so, how incredibly wasteful.

They lost their main industry, but that loss did not result in the devastation we've seen here. Cleveland still has steel mills but so what. It's not always about jobs, look at Portland.

Comparing just the cities proper, Cleveland is an absolute mess compared to Pittsburgh. And I say that as a homer, as a Cleveland partisan. We're trying to come back from a full scale collapse that's not even over yet. Pittsburgh never really did collapse. None of this has anything to do with hills. That's just an excuse for Cleveland's ridiculous policy of trying to remake itself as a suburb. Pittsburgh could have done that too, hills or no hills, but different choices were made. They preserved their built environment, accented it with appropriate infill, and supported urban retail at multiple levels. Cleveland could have done that too, with its flatter surface allowing for more density, not less.

Agreed all around.

My current 4-popper has 160 hp. Yeah, you kinda needed a 350/351 back in those days.

I loved the Top Gear assessment of an 80s Camaro... "Less power than Belgium." My friend once had a KITT style T/A and decided to show us how fast it went. He hit a bump, causing a hubcap to pop off and roll alongside the car. That hubcap beat him to the end of the block.

Not thrilled with the Pelli design at all... the second 2 from NBBJ are interesting... and I like the HOK design for using a color besides clear.

Awesome. I checked out Dayton last year for a job and the Oregon District impressed me. Nice to see new residential going in, although I kinda wish it were rentals.

Htsguy, you're more than welcome to go ahead and explain that. I backed myself up with data on this very page, and I've never told anyone here to hush because I think they're wrong. I do frequently ask people to explain, as I've done with you just now, even though your post adds nothing but personal animosity to this discussion. The devil face does soften it a bit, I guess. Nice work. Hts121, I think that's what we're all doing, for the most part. But you get a gold star too. I'm not one to play favorites.

MTS first of all, we are discussing Cleveland Retail News, in particular an item on the previous page. This is not a construction thread. Secondly, you keep referring to all the times your theory has been backed up, but in every case it's just the same repeated assertions. You use terms like "methodology" even though none has been presented. Then you tell everyone who disagrees with you to shut up.