Foraker

It's hardly surprising, is it? With the lower density and worse public transit in the 'burbs, it is much harder for the working suburban poor to get to work, recover from a job loss, personal vehicle breakdowns or medical emergency. In my own experience, you also know and are socially close to far fewer neighbors, meaning less community support as well.

I'm no expert but that seems strange since many downtown buildings have retail/restaurant space on the ground floor and probably have Class A office space on the upper floors. I agree that there are few office-only buildings in CH. Most of the office space in CH and UH and to some extent SH seems to be in buildings that only have one to three floors and no main atrium-type main entrance for upper-floor offices. And much of that office space lacks grounded outlets or building-wide air conditioning (using window air conditioners instead) -- which were some of the specific complaints that I heard about what office space there was. I suspect there is more room for infill in these neighborhoods than is readily apparent at first glance. Lack of highway access probably does mean that the office space would be occupied by more local businesses. But there are a lot of small businesses (insurance, legal, accounting, etc.) that do not require a storefront or a huge amount of space that COULD locate there to serve the Heights communities instead of somewhere further away, if there was high quality office space available. Mixed-use buildings and mixed-use communities would seem to be more sustainable in the long term than single-use buildings or residential-only communities.

I know two people who were looking for office space in the Heights and told me they were disappointed in what they found. One set up an office in Beachwood and the other went to Rocky River, I think. How much demand there is, I don't know. Do we have any realtors here who would know how much interest has been expressed in locating offices in Cleveland Heights?

I agree that more restaurant and retail business storefronts without more residents and workers in the area seems silly. How about some residential on top of that retail? Also, one thing that seems to be missing from the Heights area seems to be Class A office space -- how about some offices above the retail as well.

What "new schedule" would this be? Nothing's been published, or even decided, yet. Please don't make judgments based on supposition until the facts are available. My source is Google Maps' public transit calculator. Neat trick, considering that data hasn't been provided to Google SINCE IT DOESN'T YET EXIST. Currently, attempting to plan a trip after April 3, 2010 properly results in the message "Sorry, we don't have transit schedule data for " your trip. During rush hour (westbound in the morning, eastbound in the evening), the trip between Cedar-Lee and Chester-E 17 on the #32, a good approximation of the "Heights-CSU" leg, is scheduled at a 30-34 minute run time. Outside of that time frame, transfers are necessary, and have been for some time. Extrapolating the current system state to the future, outside of the time and date range for which data is currently available, is not necessarily an accurate reflection of what the reality will be at that time. I wasn't be clear, I'm sorry. I didn't extrapolate anything and I wasn't trying to pull a trick on anyone. I just checked with Google Transit and it spit out a 50 minute trip that did not include the 32 route. Coincidence, and outside the rush-hour timeframe apparently. The point I was trying to make is that fifty minutes for a six-mile ride is nowhere near convenient enough to get me onto RTA when I can (and do) make the drive in less than 20. When I did ride the 32x, even though the trip itself took about 30 minutes, the bus was never on time. So my "planned" 30-minute trip was closer to 40 or 45 minutes (not including walking to and from stops at each end). When my circumstances changed, I went back to driving. Hopefully even if the new route requires a transfer RTA can maintain similar travel times and not lose too many riders during this difficult economy. If the travel time can be reduced a little, and on-time-ness or frequency increased a lot, then I think RTA would pick up a lot of riders.

What "new schedule" would this be? Nothing's been published, or even decided, yet. Please don't make judgments based on supposition until the facts are available. My source is Google Maps' public transit calculator.

With the old 32x, I could get from Cleveland Heights to CSU in about half an hour. According to the new schedule, I'm looking at at least 50 minutes for the same trip. Of course, I can drive it in about 20 minutes at my own convenience -- any time I like, listening to my own radio station, straight from my back door. I live in the Heights because I wanted to avoid hour-long commutes from the outer suburbs, among other reasons. I'm certainly NOT going to be taking the bus if it is going to take 50 minutes to go six miles! Oh, how I wish for a rail line from University Circle up Cedar to the Beachwood Mall!

I hereby second the motion to move the transit hub off Public Square. As an aside, how will the new Tubbs-Jones transit center at CSU/E22nd impact the Public Square hub?

I saw an interesting article (from 2004!) about a "mesh" network in Portsmouth, UK that is used to track the buses in the system. http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2004/10/26/206197/Portsmouth-shows-bus-times-in-real-time.htm Seems like something RTA should look into. Even if the money isn't in the budget NOW, perhaps funding for it can be pursued with the Feds. And given the advances in technology since 2004, such a system probably works better and is cheaper than it was in 2004.

And that is why I refuse to wait at a bus stop that either could be or is affected by a re-route. The drivers take things into their own hands all the time, unfortunately. Pass this along to anyone who says buses can spur TOD as well as rail systems. (of course, in this case if the bus had taken its regular route, you would be stuck in traffic like every other highway commuter was last night)

Someone else might be more eloquent, but think about that for a moment. Fuel costs might not be the biggest expense. How much does a bus cost? $120,000? How long does it last, 10 years? Some portion of that cost (including any interest if bought on credit, plus maintenance costs - cleaning personnel and mechanics and shop and nighttime parking included) have to come from the fares. I imagine brakes and tires don't last as long on a bus as on your car, given the extra weight and constant start/stop operation. Plus your driver gets what, $10 an hour, plus some retirement, health insurance, employment tax, etc. that work out to actual costs over $20 per hour just for the driver. Your 60+ riders, even at $3 per trip, only bring in $180 per trip. The bus might be full on the way downtown in the morning, but practically empty on its way back out of downtown. And how many full trips will you get in 24 hours, even on a busy route? So your average revenue on your best lines might only be $90 an hour. What about advertising, printing schedules and tickets, maintaining bus stops, maintaining ticket machines, maintaining capacity for special events, etc.? It seems like there are a lot of "hidden" expenses in running a transit system, and I'm probably missing some important ones. I don't have all the information but the numbers don't seem to add up to fares alone covering all the necessary expenses.

Perhaps implement the idea in each individual county in the 16-county region first?

I would agree that reaching out to organizations that younger people already belong to would be beneficial, both in terms of recruitment and in terms of educating the next generation.

Maybe they should take some of that $210 billion in unspent TARP funds (apparently not enough shovel-ready projects?), maybe $50 billion, and put it toward rail projects, even though they're not quite shovel ready some (like the 3C corridor) are pretty far along. Here's one story about the unspent TARP funds. Seems like this story has been in the news all week. http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/67597-obama-administration-may-eye-using-tarp-for-deficit-reduction

No new news, but for anyone (like me) wondering where this project was on the proposed schedule, this is from page 29 of the February 2009 presentation referenced above. http://www.riderta.com/pdf/presentations/2009-02-03-UniversityCedar.pdf •Complete Design 3/2010 •Award Construction 9/2010 •Complete Construction 12/2012 * Depending upon funding As far as I know from the posts above and the RTA website the project is on track and at least the current design phase is funded. No further news is expected until March 2010.

Good points Grumpy. With CSU transforming itself to a more traditional residential campus I still would prefer the E17th route. I would hope that having light rail/streetcars on E17th would spur development in the same way that streetcars have spurred development in other cities, like Portland, OR. Perhaps KJP can comment on the connection costs and difficulties of the Lakeside/13th vs. Lakeside/E17th. The other thing I'd like everyone to consider in our transportation wishes for the future is a rail connection to Tri-C. Maybe the Waterfront line loop isn't he best way (the Innerbelt might be a near-impossible barrier), but with all the money the public puts into it and with the advantages that a highly-educated population would bring to the whole region, I believe that it is imperative that we make transportation access to the Tri-C campus (campuses?) easy, frequent, and as convenient as possible. Small change to the Red-line when the Opportunity Corridor is designed? Other thoughts?

Well said. Thanks!

I think there is something to that. Just random speculation, but if a city gets too big, citizens probably start to feel like they don't matter to the big bureaucratic city departments, which in turn reduces citizen participation in the city and its governance. So even when we have big cities like the 3C's, each neighborhood probably should have it's own "downtown" or central gathering point, and some form of local government that the citizens can participate in and feel like they can make a difference. Does that make sense to the urban planners and other experts on this site?

I thought it was interesting that Hunter suggested that Ashtabula was a better port for this anyway, that is a deeper port and already has road and rail connections. I imagine that the Cuyahoga River channel would still have to be dredged for the ships/barges going upriver, but is the really a need for the port to remain in Cleveland? And even if there is a need for a port in Cleveland, does it really make sense to expand it to include container-handling abilities if Ashtabula's port already has the better road and rail connections? KJP, or any other more knowledgeable folks, do you agree with Hunter -- does Ashtabula's port make more sense for containers?

Hunter Morrison, former director of Cleveland city planning, says the Cuyahoga Port Authority should be thinking regionally and move sooner rather than later. http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2009/10/why_not_take_a_regional_approa.html

Hunter Morrison, former director of Cleveland city planning, says the Cuyahoga Port Authority should be thinking regionally and move sooner rather than later. http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2009/10/why_not_take_a_regional_approa.html

Hunter Morrison, former director of Cleveland city planning, says the Cuyahoga Port Authority should be thinking regionally and move sooner rather than later. http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2009/10/why_not_take_a_regional_approa.html

In an emergency, certainly some limited amount of luggage can be carried on-board without separate loading. Not that loading luggage really takes that long anyway. In a real emergency you don't have time to pack much anyway. Pets in carriers are not too much of a problem if you're only going eight hours away, or less. I wouldn't expect trains to be the only way to evacuate a city, but it certainly can add a lot of capacity, which would free up a lot of space on the roads, which in turn means that everyone gets out of the city that much faster. And if a main road is washed out it would be even more helpful to have an alternative to driving. Plan for the worst, hope for the best -- it certainly seems to be prudent to have multiple transportation options for an emergency (bus, rail, private vehicles, etc.)

Where are the food kitchens in downtown Cleveland? I had some guy bugging me the other day that he hadn't eaten all day. Said that he couldn't eat at the Salvation Army because you had to live there to eat there -- is that true?

Lots of good ideas. Mine overlap many of those above, but of course lack of infinite resources means these dreams will be a long time coming -- Extensive subway lines within the city; ban driving in the city core and remake all the streets extending out from public square to be like E4th; move the port now; build rail station connected to new convention center; redirect I-90 onto I-490; complete the Emerald Necklace park system; preserve and create farmland belt outside the Emerald Necklace; make Clevelanders the best-educated population in the world....