tedders55

Those restaurant signs have been up for a while at Sushi 86 and For Goodness Jake's (deli next door) for a while now. I think it is more in relation to the vacant space between these two.

^ I agree completely, and I think many have been trying to get that point across. We need passionate people, but there is a fine line between passionate and fanatical.

Jerry, Is there any planned study of what effect the "Turn Announcements" have? Either currently or planned for the future. Thanks,

On behalf of the residents of Cleveland, I would like to apologize to the residents of Richmond. My advice for you: get some ear plugs. DocBroc, as a downtown resident do you hear the talking buses all the time when at your home? I ask because I am walking through public square twice a day and never hear these. I'm wondering if we are making mountains out of mole hills or if due to the bus routing PS doesn't get much of the announcements or if I am just getting lucky every single day. You must be getting rediculously lucky, because I do hear them every day, and I even live in the "quiet" part of downtown. Luckily we have really nice windows, so I don't hear them when I'm inside my house unless it's completely quiet (and even then they're not THAT loud), or when my windows are open. But the second I step outside that's all I hear. At lunch today I took a walk down 12th, across Superior, around the square, and back up euclid to 9th and only hear the announcement once. And even then it was not loud, mainly due to the bus turning across the street from where I was. I guess I am just getting lucky then. Or I am going deaf, at 27, I sure hope not.

On behalf of the residents of Cleveland, I would like to apologize to the residents of Richmond. My advice for you: get some ear plugs. DocBroc, as a downtown resident do you hear the talking buses all the time when at your home? I ask because I am walking through public square twice a day and never hear these. I'm wondering if we are making mountains out of mole hills or if due to the bus routing PS doesn't get much of the announcements or if I am just getting lucky every single day.

"Here's a nice side-by-side comparison and the Nokia N8 still comes out of top, spec-wise:" I think this is the biggest misnomer about what the media and everyone else is doing when they go looking for iPhone killers. The iPhone is not the best phone in any one area, but it is very user friendly and pretty darn good in a lot of areas. That ease of use and multitude of features is what really made and continues to make it such a game changer.

Amen brother!... I understand the expense of running Rapids 24 hours as well as the need for late night maintenance issues on tracks... But RTA did, before Joe C, offer late night Friday and Sat night service on the Rapid -- until about 2:30p. It was esp popular when the Flats was hot and the East Bank well served by the, then brand new Waterfront Line... Well, even though the Flats have seriously declined and the Waterfront Line (foolishly, I think) all but killed off, the growth of E. 4th/Gateway along with the continuing strength of nearby the Warehouse District more than justify the restoration of Friday/Sat late night trains... Tower City's platforms are a comfortable 4/5 min stroll from the heart of these 2 areas. There are few better justifications to public transit than to keep individuals who may have had a few too many off the road -- in addition to attracting even more people downtown: both would be served by adding this total of 5 hours of rail service. Heck, if RTA wanted to scale back the Red Line to half-hourly intervals for after-midnight runs, it would still be a great service (hell, the current 20-min non-rush intervals are practically the same!) ... To not have this late night service is penny-wise and pound foolish in addition to just being stubbornly ignorant/opposed to the riding needs of the public. I 100% agree, I have often lamented the fact that I have to drive DT to go out when I have a monthly pass. The pass is going to cost me the same no matter what, if I can use it for more than just commuting service then I am saving myself even more. I have used the rapid to go out to the WD on a Thursday, and it works ok for that. Reason being that I wont stay out all that late if I have to work in the morning. But for a Fri/Sat night it makes no sense. Then I end up having to pay $5-$8 to park and make sure that I don't have too much fun. It sounds like a no-brainer of service, just wonder if the labor costs are holding it back.

^ yes you do have Messi, but you also have crazy Maradona, who is not exactly a confidence builder as a coach.

Our little game of finding them a new home is getting though. I think I would like to see them remain relatively close to PS, moving up Euclid if possible. McCleve do you know if Tri-C will be using all the space on the first floor of the May Co building? All the way to Prospect? I was thinking that the Prospect side may make a good spot for them, seems to have plenty of frontage, just not sure on the depth. Also, I think the Halle building was brought up before. Is there any room on the first floor for a welcome center? I seem to recall that it is one big lobby.

Another thing, does the talking bus work better in the inner-ring suburbs where the sound isn't bouncing off the walls of the buildings surrounding PS. We all know it is loud enough down there, but the noise may be more diffused in say Tremont or another city street where the surrounding buildings aren't amplifying the sound. As RTA has a region wide network, what may work right in the heart of downtown may not work in other areas. So that brings us to where are most of the incidents with peds?

EC, I wasn't trying to downplay the issue. I agree that excessive noise can be a nuisance. I was trying to get across that maybe instead of outright saying this is a terrible idea we should look at ways to improve it. Whether that be shorter and more succinct announcements (which I think is a great idea for a multitude of reasons) to better training. It seems like this idea is what RTA is going with so we should try to make it better.

Bang and Clatter; or the dilapidated storefront next door. I'm sure that they want something they can just move right into though so maybe that wont work so well, but B&C would still be close to their current location and near e4th. Also the Halle building by Playhouse could be good too. I was going to say further up on Euclid, across from Statler, but I think that would be too far removed from the entertainment core areas where visitors are likely to congregate and use them. GCP could move into one of those storefronts though.

Agreed, there are too many useful and much needed aspects of this to let it wither on the vine due to the speed. the road was designed for 50 MPH and for the most part it appears to be staying that way. Plus there are plenty of other examples of 45-50 MPH roads with intersections.

^ EC your "Noise Off" posts are almost as bad as some of the Announcements that RTA makes (see what I did there :D). I, and probably many otheres, have stopped paying attention to them and these. While the point you are getting at is valid about excess noise I think at this point a simple reference to the website would be sufficient. As to the talking buses, are we sure that they are a terrible and ineffective idea? No one on this board is a transportation engineer, at least that I know. While these don't pass a general public smell test, maybe we are not approaching from the right perspective. The crosswalks downtown beep at you as you cross. Is that a bad thing to have, alerting the visually impaired that it is safe to cross. And if Left Hand Turns are the problem that Jerry states they are across the nation then maybe this really is a helpful tool. Instead of outright bashing we should aim to improve, such as shorter and more pointed announcements.

I think that 100K is in relation to their "Founders Club" and they are just now starting the grant writing process. Which I've heard can be quite a task. Regardless in the short time that it seems this project has been seeking funding 100 members have contributed $1,000. Not a small feat I would say, especially in these economic times.

Plans for indoor cycling facility in Cleveland are on the right track By Diane DiPiero, Associated Content When it comes to plans for a new indoor cycling facility in Cleveland, no brakes are allowed. Since announcing in January that it had entered a real estate purchase option agreement to build a 150,000-square-foot velodrome in Slavic Village, Fast Track Cycling has moved full speed ahead with acquiring funds for the project. Following an initial grant from the Civic Innovation Lab, Fast Track began a fundraising campaign that so far has brought in about $100,000 toward the $6.5 million that will be needed to build the facility. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ac_clevela/ac_clevela_ts2333

^ I agree there are more pressing needs for funds than the immediate redevelopment of PS. However, we should plan and come to a consensus on the best option so that if funding were to come available suddenly, a la 3C funding, we could take advantage of it.

Well, they dont have a "fat" body on the wrap, but they do have them in various athletic poses so they may at least be thinking of how to burn off those nachos.

Obviously, foretelling the future is something that no one can do much better than the oddly-dressed lady in the hotel lobby with her crystal ball and tarot cards, but I actually think Europe will regret their premature building of their next-generation energy infrastructure. Obviously, what really matters here is how you believe America *will* react to the gradually increasing supply pressures on conventional fuels over the next few decades, but I believe that we *will* respond with appropriate vigor when the time is right ... which means that our next-generation energy infrastructure will be built with the technology of 2020 and 2030, whereas Europe will be dealing with the same problems we're dealing with now with some of our own transportation infrastructure. We're stuck with aging physical capital because we built so much so early (i.e., starting in the Eisenhower administration for the interstate highway system), which means that for the moment, China actually has a more modern physical infrastructure than us (at least in the geographic areas that matter to its central government). The year 2035 is still a quarter-century away. Consider how much of the interstate highway system was built just in the first ten years of the program. Consider that we are wealthier and more productive now than we were then, and we will be even wealthier and even more productive by the third decade of this century (2020-2030). Then consider how much cheaper and more efficient solar tech is now than it was just ten years ago, and consider where that trajectory is headed--that paradigm acceleration shows no sign of slowing down yet. We're seeing similar (not quite as rapid, but still impressive) improvements in storage and portability technologies. In other words, we will very likely get a lot more bang for our buck by waiting another decade or two before putting a massive amount of federal dollars in play, and we *do* have enough oil to last that long, to say nothing of coal and natural gas, which will last us even longer. +1 Do we need a crash course of research where everything is happening much too quick to make informed decesions with? No. Do we need to shift a greater focus to alternatives that are showing fruit and have potential to alleviate our reliance on oil? Yes!

^ all the window wrap is up and they looked to be finishing painting this morning. Literally went from white renovation paint on the windows to looking ready to open in a week. Pretty crazy, but they look like they have been working straight through for two weeks. There every morning and into the evening. Feels pretty good that most of lower Euclid seems to be filling up.

I'm aware. I've been to Europe many times, both east and west of the old iron curtain. They are driven more by simple pleasures and less by materialistic interests. The older I get, the more I like that laid-back appropach. And their sense of time is much more healthy -- if something goes wrong, no problem. They seem to ask: In 500 years what difference will it really make? Perhaps a downturn will breed more poets and painters. Either way, Europe will still be here. Within 500 years the oil from Deepwater Horizon will have stopped gushing; in fact we may have run out of oil by that point. So what difference does it really make? The Earth, Europe, North America will likely still be here (I do hold out in case a meteorite, aliens, or other wacky disaster comes along). "over a long enough period of time, the life expectancy for everything is zero" - Fight Club

Not sure we want to know what makes it your "lucky" swim suit. :-o :wink:

A good secondary post about OpenTable's costs with info from their IPO. References the blog post that RnR did, with regards to different costs. Actually makes a case that it is more expensive than $1.25 per diner. http://blog.jwegener.com/2009/02/03/opentable-ipo-analysis-restaurant-marketing/ And after this we should probably get back to the topic on hand as this has veered too far away

Couldn't OpenTable be considered a cost of doing business in this new wired world? A using a credit card carries a simmial usage charge and many restaurants would not open with out the service as they know they probably won't get as many customers. I doubt that the set up fee for CC service is as steep, and that seems really expensive for something that likely doesnt need a physical hardware on site. So OpenTable is providing a service and, much like CC's were not universially accepted(and still are not universally accepted), is getting some push back.

^ that's more what I was getting at. If you aren't aware then you may not consider looking for "off-campus" properties.