jborger

Welcome to Downtown Cleveland. We have a casino. That is all. Oh, and Tower City.

But what does that mean? Just hand your parking ticket to someone who works at the casino? Easy enough for someone who works at Tower City and isn't even spending any money at the casino.

I would love to see that treehouse.

The casino being open 24 hours has been referenced in multiple news articles. Also, the casino is not outside the law and Ohio law (currently) prohibits giving away alcohol for free (ever wonder why you have to pay a quarter to get a sample at a supermarket? It's not the supermarket trying to turn a profit) and prohibits bars being open past 2:30 - even bars in the casino. What I think hasn't been covered is the parking pricing. Will it be free? If not, is that a deterrent to patrons? And if so, won't everyone just park there, not just casino customers?

Wow, I just drove by the casino and saw the new lighting for the first time. It looks AMAZING! Coming off the highway down Ontario, you can see the Ontario/Prospect corner sticking up above the other buildings. Driving down Ontario with the casino on your side is awesome. The view of the casino from Public Square rocks. It's amazing what a feeling of vitality lighting can create. The Higbee building looks absolutely beautiful. All buildings downtown should be lit up like this.

Two points about the May Company building from a recent Crain's article at http://www.crainscleveland.com/article/20120416/SUB1/304169987&template=mobile entitled "Changes ahead for already-remade downtown real estate": - The owner of the May Company building is deciding on whether to create apartments or a hotel on the empty upper floors of the building. - There's a number of interested parties for retail spaces along Prospect in the May Company building, mostly convenience and food-store operators.

To summarize some of the article's key points: - 310 Prospect (the building across from Flannery's between Family Sportswear) as well as its 16 space parking lot (next to Harry Buffalo) has two prospective developers interested. The owner is deciding whether to sell that separately from the parking lot and deck at 413-611 Huron. (yes, this is the huge surface lot across from The Q. Please someone buy that and put a large building on it...) - The owner of the May Company building is deciding on whether to create apartments or a hotel on the empty upper floors of the building. - There's a number of interested parties for retail spaces along Prospect in the May Company building, mostly convenience and food-store operators. - Owner of the Southworth building on Ontario (across from the casino) is negotiating with some small grab and go restaurants and is hoping to land a retailer for a very small 700 sq ft storefront. I like this quote from the president and COO of Rock Gaming: "When you start seeing all those people walking around on the street, you can see boutique retailers who can make it that couldn't when cars zoomed by." I know not all of Rock's actions seem to support urban design (like tearing down the Columbia building) but at least they're saying the right things. I think their motives are in the right place, but their execution might not be 100% flawless. Also from the article: "[Rock Gaming president and COO] said he and partner Dan Gilbert do not believe they need to own nearby properties if their owners are taking steps the two men believe are good. However, one area Mr. Gilbert and his partners might pursue is adding apartments downtown." Yes, please. How about on that big lot for sale at 413-611 Huron?

In the Ideacenter - 1375 Euclid #350. oneeasybuy.com They have offices all around the region for paying your bill or getting a new cable box or something. They have a few ad sales offices and the regional one is in PlayhouseSquare. It's a cool space with a warehouse loft feel to it.

Well, I'm sure everyone coming to these new restaurants will need somewhere to park. ;)

The last restaurant that was there was Frank and Pauly's. Closed a few years back. Seems like a weird location for a restaurant today, the way it fronts on Superior like that. It also had an internal entrance that was probably popular for business lunches/dinners when that building was first constructed.

So which restaurant(s) is part of Phase 1?

My first thought was how are they going to put five restaurants in the current tower? Now that I look at the renderings, it looks like at least one of the restaurants will be housed in a separate building. It looks like Toby Keith's I Love This Bar and Grill is in a separate building to the left on the rendering.

So build a hotel where the current county headquarters are. All problems solved.

The curtains look awesome and the glow from the casino is pretty impressive. My only small gripe is that the curtains don't appear to be quite as transparent as I was originally led to believe. In the beginning, they really made it sound like you would be able to see the casino patrons from street level through the curtains. Now I'm not so sure that will be the case. I think they're a tad too thick. Still, I like the glow and I think they make the Higbee building really look cool.

??? Is that tilted kilt?

Time Warner has ad sales down there already.

I would expect more people would enter from Prospect and Ontario because that's where the parking garage/valet is.

This isn't as big of a deal as Eaton. Eaton was downtown and moved. Parker Hannifin is just buying more land near their current headquarters. Makes sense. But imagine if Eaton, Parker Hannifin, American Greetings and Progressive all had their headquarters downtown. Game changer.

Talked to Alan Glazen at Erie Island Coffee today about the pending opening of the new ABC Tavern. He said he's really excited to be able to open up another place in the city of Cleveland and that the "Uptown alley" where he'll be located is just going to be an awesome spot. They'll have "picnic" seating there and hope to open in August.

#4 has a lot to do with #1.

How do you know the multiplier effect of the Medcart or casino when neither have been built yet?

They even went upscale with the lanes in the parking garage. It's like inset stone or something instead of just plain concrete with painted lines. The fanciest parking garage I've seen (at least around here, anyway).

I wonder why Forest City hasn't made some of the Tower City complex into apartments? I would think a lot of people would be interested in being connected to all of that. Plus, it could help their retail business.

That's why government money is needed to subsidize the gap between market rate rents and rents needed for construction to make sense. "But there's no government money..." $450 million from a county sales tax increase to fund the medical mart/convention center, $100 million in the county's economic development fund, millions in new tax dollars from the casino. The money is there, it's just a question of how our leaders are choosing to allocate it.

K&D should move their offices downtown from Willoughby. I'm sure they don't have very many employees, but c'mon guys... This is where most of your investments are.