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I used to love those bridge lights and I'm glad they're coming back. Even if other cities light their bridges (I don't know), our arrangement is utterly unique.

I guess I'm confused as to what's organic and what's not. The banks' actions are artificially restricting supply in an effort to artificially raise prices. Without such activity, those prices would surely plummet. To me, "organic" would mean unfettered supply and demand. The current glut isn't an "organic" or "natural" state; it was caused by similar efforts to artificially raise prices during the bubble. The bubble wouldn't have happened naturally because supply kept outpacing wage growth, and demand is ultimately tied to income. High supply + low demand = falling prices, per the invisible hand. But prices ignored these downward pressures due to bank-ordered fraudulent appraisals and ridiculous financing schemes, many of which also involved fraud. The only way to get back to a natural state, one that doesn't include the economic waste of all these empty houses, is to let supply and demand bring prices back down. The natural organic state of the market is wherever it ends up... sans intervention.

But the natural state would be a glut in supply so huge it brings housing costs back in line with wages. Banks are preventing that by hoarding supply.

I want to say Ohio gets a pretty respectable slice of the defense budget itself, too. Also, Ohio is a fair distance above the national median in terms of population age, too. All other things equal, that means that we're getting a hefty chunk of the old-age entitlement stream, too, which is significantly larger than the defense budget. Yes, but wouldn't you say the Sun Belt does fairly well in that category too? Our population isn't aging because old people are moving in, it's because young people are leaving. That seems to support the quality of life theory. These young people are probably not leaving due to tax rates. They may be leaving for opportunity, but many end up going to higher-tax states on the coasts. And these higher-tax states still have an overabundance of wealthy people, which leads to their federal donor status. So while I believe that low taxes do help, and I was generally supportive of Taft cutting the state's business taxes, I just don't think it's that big of a deal in terms of growth.

That's why "making the numbers work" can involve more public aid than just free land.

Buzzwords run amok.

Yes, yes, and yes... but our purpose here is to seek out improvements. If neighboring metros are getting a better result in some way or another, that seems like the lowest of low hanging fruit. We may be getting a better result in other areas, like populating downtown, but that's not the point here.

The shopping I spoke of in Indy is downtown. Pittsburgh has that too, in addition to suburban malls. Our situations are not equivalent. The debate here is usually how or why Pittsburgh's in better shape, not whether. That ship sailed years ago. We're certainly not going to become a high growth state by telling ourselves we already are one. If other cities and states want to copy us, they're more than welcome to.

The article leaves one wondering how these machines ever got purchased in the first place, if RTA is so acutely aware of their flaws.

Actually, yes. Older people too.

I don't disagree that lower taxes lead to growth, but looking at it state-by-state, many of the "low tax" states are supported by federal revenues provided by donor states that typically have higher taxes themselves. No analysis is complete without considering that inequity in distributing federal funds. Texas, for example, gets a large amount of personal income from military spending... including Ohio's military spending. That makes their budget a lot easier to balance. No need to thank us, Texas. You're welcome. Just keep stealing our industries with your artificially low taxes.

I know people from Ohio who consider Indy a shopping mecca, who make field trips there just for that purpose. I'm not personally familiar with Indy though. As for Pittsburgh, it's a lot more intact than any Ohio city. Instead of striving to become a viable destination, their university area already is one, and it's surrounded by well-kept and functional urban neighborhoods. Rather than getting defensive, I think we should examine the policy choices that have led to the current discrepancy, and find ways to adapt their more successful approaches here.

The LeBron situation was unique as he was homegrown talent, a local-boy-done-good, and he made such a big production of leaving. Boston doesn't complain about that because people don't do that to Boston. Also, we do have that long term title drought, something no other major-leage city is dealing with. There was even a popular movie about it, and that was over 20 years ago. The story is there because it's there... people aren't making up things to complain about, nor are they blowing everyday issues out of proportion. They're just sick of getting screwed.

Wow, this is awesome. Can't wait to see the finished interior.

If the idea is to bring in additional people, a goal I think the thread title presumes, then benchmarks and comparisons start to matter more. At that point you're competing with pretty much everywhere. If we want to grow, we can't have any glaring deficiencies that people can avoid by avoiding Ohio. From what I've seen, most states keep up their downtowns and their neighborhood commercial districts a lot better than we do. Yes we have malls & such, but so do they, and they manage to keep old storefronts open too. They also have a lot less traffic patrols. Someone from elsewhere logged in here just to point that out, last week. Predatory cops all over the roads is a QoL issue to many people. One may not agree with this sentiment, but at least recognize that a lot of people do, and that the situation here is objectively not normal. It's like Dukes of Hazzard. There is a cost involved in treating people this way. We can't be behind the curve anymore. Casinos should have happened years ago, we're still waiting on intercity rail, and our social policies are ancient and backward. Ohio stopped being a leader after locking itself in the steampunk era. We can still claim that as a style going forward, it's cool and all, but it's time to start living like modern people. No more byzantine license requirements and no more gay marriage ban. No more patchwork fiefdoms and no more corruption. All that stuff is unbecoming, and all of it affects quality of life.

Point is-- nobody knows, not me, not Ron Tober, not Aubrey McClendon. Given that we don't know the future, locking into any one price is boneheaded. The whole idea of hedging is to give oneself as many future choices as possible, to protect against market changes in either direction. In this case, we would have been better off with no contract at all. Inaction would have produced a more favorable result. Therefore, Calabrese could have been outperformed in this negotiation by a scarecrow, a Barbie doll, or a piece of pie.

What he did with that fuel purchase was not a hedge. It was the exact opposite of a hedge. It was a boneheaded maneuver. Hedging would have meant locking in multiple price options, in case the market fell... not committing 100% to the highest possible price. Again, that is the opposite of hedging. Shelving rail extensions in favor of BRT was another boneheaded maneuver. But what's really troubling is the continued effort to expand BRT, as if he really believes it's been a popular success. And most of the TOD plans we've seen are barely recognizable as TOD, as though the base concept is getting ignored or is deeply misunderstood. Calabrese can pull this out, but we need to see the BRT function as promised, and we need these fare machines dealt with. Both represent inexcusable fumbles that are still just sitting there on the field. Someone please pick up the ball.

Yes, the fuel purchase and the fare machines, and the aforementioned poor planning for crowds. While the trolleys are an unqualified success, success is kind of expected. It's his job. Failures aren't so easy to write off. And continuing to counter with inevitable ridership gains whenever someone criticizes the BRT project suggests that nothing has been learned, that RTA is more concerned with defending bad decisions than making good ones.

There is, to the extent that they have different uses. Demand for transportation fuel didn't decrease due to the mild winter but demand for heating did. Also, they're finding more gas than oil in these plays, so the supply of gas is rising faster. One thing they're trying to do, McClendon or otherwise, is to build new markets for gas. It makes sense now to shift from coal to gas power plants, although the coal lobby might have something to say about that. As such I do think it's time for him to step aside. His value as a face of the industry has been greatly diminished, and Ohio has a lot riding on that industry now. Cheap and clean local energy is a major boon to industrial development, i.e. jobs.

The extension they just gave him doesn't make sense to me. Too many debacles, not enough vision.

^^ Based on poor reception of his most notable initiatives. The people, not the board, set his objectives. We set the board's objectives too.

Very good point, although I wouldn't mind Ohio attracting some immigrants. We do have some areas, particularly urban ones, that have infrastructure for a lot more people than currently live there. It's not easy for smaller populations in these places to maintain such systems, nor is it easy to just remove them as Youngstown is doing. Sprawl issues aside, I think adding some new population would help advance Ohio's QoL. There is a limit to that of course. And it doesn't mean we shouldn't work on QoL immediately, because you're right, that's our deficiency and that's where we stand to make the most progress.

A great many people feel that he hasn't performed well, and that's putting it mildly. Obviously RTA's board contains none of those people.

Just call it Tower City Mall. That accomplishes everything a name needs to accomplish... it conveys to everyone what you're talking about. Calling it "The Avenue" is indistinct at best, and it doesn't help that now there's an area using that same name next to a different mall on the other side of downtown.

Unless you are having a natural gas boom, which is Kasich's modus operandi. Depends. If we really have as much as they think we do, it'll cover 2 or 3 generations of people. That should help us get back on our feet, whichever way we end up going.