jjakucyk

^ You're right that the old building didn't address the corner either, but I'd say because it was pretty tall and significantly set back from the street, it disassociated itself from the surroundings enough to be like an object in a park. At that point it doesn't matter so much what's happening around the perimeter of the property. That's not unlike some of the bigger mansions farther down either side of Observatory. In this case however, the building is getting close enough to the edges of the property that it's starting to communicate with the sidewalk and the street, and it's doing so uncomfortably. It's sort of like how the casino interacts with Reading Road and Court Street. It gets close, but it's completely disconnected visually and it just looks unresolved. It's like they took a building meant to be out in an open field, and pounded on it until it would fit into that particular available site. 2801 Erie doesn't come up to the sidewalks either, but it maintains a consistent setback. It's a rectangular building on a rectangular lot. The same is true of the new buildings in Mariemont, and that's a much more pleasing and urban (not to mention urbane) treatment. Here the lot comes to more of a point at the corner, so there was an opportunity to play up the angularity of the design with something equally pointed, to have the building take on the angled shape, or perhaps to soften it with a rounded element. Instead it's designed for a square site and the landscaping buffer is just leftover useless space. Even if they didn't do anything with the buildings themselves, they could carve out a little of that point into a public amenity, like put some paving stones out, a few benches, or make the retaining walls something people can sit on, even put in a little fountain to help counter some of the traffic noise. Instead of trying to make the corner a little better, the building is surrounded with sloping berms to the sidewalk and retaining walls above (an odd reversal of the usual trend on hilly sites where the retaining wall is at the sidewalk so there can be a flat lawn above), which only sends the signal "people do not go here, this is a buffer zone, keep out!" It's not as bad as the Drexel at Oakley, but it's definitely turning its back to the street, if not to all three streets. It's hard to tell, but it looks to me like the main entrance faces Knox Presbyterian's parking lot.

I have little doubt that they'll be pretty nice on the inside, but then most suburban mcmansions are pretty nice on the inside too, and they can easily get into that price range. Besides, they're paying a lot extra for being within walking distance to HP Square, as well as sizable underground parking garage. There's no doubt that they're big too. Does anyone know how many apartment units were torn down to make way for this? I assume the buildings on Linshaw had at least four apartments each, and maybe some had six. The building on the corner though had to have at least eight, but I don't really know for sure, those would be pretty big units. There's a definite loss of affordable units in the neighborhood with this project. Anyway, the trouble is that there's a quantity over quality preference, so the quality of the exterior is what usually suffers. I'm actually not particularly impressed with the quality of the building at Erie and Shaw, mainly because they left the spacers exposed between the stone (slate?) panels. That may just be an aesthetic decision, but it makes the building look unfinished. It is high quality, I'll grant that, but it's also a much smaller building so I think they could splurge just a little more. Roll your eyes if you want at the Panera comment, but that IS veneer stone in the renderings. It can't really be anything else nowadays, but the point is they chose a particular fieldstone look that's used all the time in strip-malls and suburban buildings. It's all over the new developments in Norwood, and that new UC Health building on I-71 near Kennedy Avenue. It's not something you see much in the city, let alone Hyde Park, even in new construction.

It looks like lick-and-stick veneer stone and some sort of wood to me. It's the kind of thing I'd expect to see on a Panera in Mason.

Damn, I was thinking it'd be more like the new buildings in Mariemont. This is the same old Banks, Delta Flats, Oakley Station, CR Architecture blandness that's been done to death. It makes no attempt to engage the street or to take advantage of a very prominent street corner. All I see are garage entrances and unresolved "green space." Is there any pedestrian entrance to the building that's not down some driveway?

Here's a relevant quote from the streetcar history on my website: http://www.jjakucyk.com/transit/streetcarinfo.html

Nothing about this makes sense. 55 feet is only three parallel parking spaces and maybe 6 or 7 perpendicular ones for one thing. So do they think they'll need two or three of these things? DC power can travel for miles at traction voltages, and it's not like feeders or substations have to be right on the route itself. I find it hard to believe there's a need for anything other than a single power source for the entire route to begin with. Besides, there's all sorts of parking lots and other city-owned vacant lots that could be used for such things instead, on top of space in the garages at The Banks, at the maintenance facility, or even in the subway tunnels.

^ Just mind boggling.

I thought Duke was paying for a lot (if not most) of that substation themselves.

^ Because they'd oppose the transit line even if it would ultimately be to their benefit. Noise! Blight! Traffic interference! Doesn't go where I want to go! And of course, it'll bring in "those people!"

^ The quote shows a complete misunderstanding of the value of on-street parking as a buffer, indicating that he probably heard it as a sound-byte and wants to use it to sound intelligent. The thing is, the lower the speeds the less parked cars are needed as a buffer. Also, and this is the critical one for Central Parkway, you don't need to use parked cars as a buffer if you have a planted buffer zone instead. There's already something like 12 to 15 feet of lawn/tree buffer between the roadway and the sidewalk. That's plenty. It's when the sidewalk is right up against the curb that those parked cars become critical.

^ You mean whack-a-Muriel?

^ But, but, they need to be able to park right in front of the door!

^ Exactly. I think the riverfront actually lost out when the railroad tracks were abandoned through Sawyer Point. Seriously, what self-respecting kid (or even adult) wouldn't love this?

At some point we have to remember that the river does have other uses besides recreation. Yes water-based shipping and industrial uses have been significantly marginalized, but it would be just as naive to dedicate all the riverfront to parks now as it was to dedicate it all to "business" uses in the past. In a post-peak-oil society many cities could find themselves in trouble after converting all their ports, docks, piers, harbors, and riverfronts to recreational and residential uses. They may find that they actually need at least some of those original facilities back, and that secondary facilities several miles away from downtown aren't of much use. Besides, big parks need big populations to keep them activated. The worst thing that can happen to a park is that it's underutilized, because that makes it unsafe (whether actually unsafe or just in perception) and leads to deferred maintenance and something of a downward spiral. We don't want to see the pool of park users spread too thin.

Have you ever seen just how little traffic there really is north of Dayton our south of the I-71/75 split in Kentucky? The amount of actual through traffic on this supposed spine of economic vitality is barely a rounding error in the suburban commuter traffic that swamps the bridge and adjacent interstate highways. You are repeating the oft-cited but discredited notion that it's worth spending billions of dollars for highway and other road infrastructure to subsidize a few trucking companies, gas stations, and fast food joints that don't return even single-digit percentages to the government to pay for that infrastructure because...reasons.

^ It's not really about "preserving the skyline" it's about neighboring tenants and building owners not wanting their view of the river obstructed. I believe that's a big reason nothing's happened in the empty lots near the Purple People Bridge. Neighbors complain, they swamp zoning hearings, they say "we were here first so we're more important" etc. to try to maintain the status quo.

Those small towns need tons of state and federal subsidies just to stay afloat. More so than even suburbs. They have absolutely no ability even to maintain all the infrastructure that they've built in the post-war era (sewers, water systems, roads and bypasses, etc.), let alone repay their construction or replacement. So as downtrodden as many of those places are, they're actually receiving a disproportionate amount of aid.

^ It shocks most people. The misunderstanding of what areas are most productive is why many of our economic and governmental policies are so screwed up.

Preferred vs. common stock comes up a lot in the history of railroad and interurban railway financing. Especially with the interurbans, the actual financiers of the project would get preferred stock and a seat on the board of directors. All the farmers and other small-town investors usually got common stock as an added incentive to buying the mortgage bonds used to finance construction. Since preferred stockholders have claims on liquidation proceeds if the company goes under, they got to soak up what was left after abandonment of operations while the common stockholders were left with useless paper.

Suburban campus-style facilities NEED to have things like cafeterias, fitness centers, spas, libraries, and such because they have no other choice, especially if they're employing white-collar office workers as GE is doing with this facility (it's not a "factory" or "manufacturing facility"). If employees can't go out to lunch without driving for half the time, or take care of any other basic needs due to their long commute or isolated location, then they need to have an alternative. If you have to brown-bag it every day or go without, that's a pretty low quality of life and few people would opt to work there, so the employers have to provide those services at great expense. It gets old quickly too. Large downtown corporate headquarters usually have a cafeteria too, but it's one of a myriad of choices for a quick cheap lunch. It's not a choice in the suburban campus so much as it's a consolation.

^ Hillside stability is a concern for sure, maybe requiring piers or retaining walls, which drives up cost a lot. Nevertheless, it could still be less expensive than in-street tracks and dealing with all the existing utilities that will need adjusting. My question is how to get the line started from McMicken. I don't think you can just run the streetcar up that existing short bit of Ohio Avenue next to the church and then start tunneling under West Clifton. The grade of Ohio next to the church is 12.4% which is double the slope on Vine and what the streetcars can handle. It keeps going up from there too, so it seems like you never make up enough ground to keep the grade under control.

Looks like a temporary traffic signal setup, though they poured the new concrete around it so I dunno.

I think as particular neighborhoods get more desirable then there will be more demand for accessory dwellings. As it is, you can get a whole house for pretty cheap in most neighborhoods, and apartment rents are quite reasonable too. Of course there's exceptions, but it's not as if there's mile after mile of completely unaffordable housing here.

The short answer appears to be "maybe." Cincinnati allows two accessory structures of a maximum 800 square feet in area and 15 feet in height in just about every residential zoning category. Side and rear setbacks are also limited to three feet in most cases. However, the zoning code does not appear to have any provisions for accessory dwelling units, it's not even in the definitions. All but the least dense single-family zones allow two "rooming units" but they do not have kitchens or necessarily separate entries. In general it doesn't seem like there's any provision for multiple dwelling units on a single lot. That said, there doesn't seem to be any specific ban on them either, as most zones have a somewhat vague provision for accessory uses not listed in the tables. It really depends largely on what zoning classification your house is in. You'll probably have more luck in some of the higher-density residential/mixed zones than any of the single-family ones. There are provisions for accessory dwelling units in some of the form-based codes, but I haven't looked into those. They only apply to College Hill, Madisonville, Walnut Hills, and Westwood so far, and I don't know if any of the neighborhoods other than Madisonville have adopted the new code yet. I know Cranley isn't going to help further that project. You can read the existing zoning code here: http://library.municode.com/HTML/19996/level1/TIXIZOCOCI.html You might also have better luck contacting Alex Peppers with the city planning department: [email protected]

I also recall Cranley saying no to any new bike lanes (they take space away from cars!) but that he was supportive of separate paths. Apparently construction work on Delta Avenue has started with signs to pay attention as a new traffic pattern is coming (bike lanes). I wonder if Cranley has tried to put the kibosh on this or if he's leaving it alone since it's already been designed and approved by both the Mt. Lookout and Columbia-Tusculum community councils, on top of receiving overwhelmingly positive feedback through the city's outreach program. Of course that hasn't stopped a few vocal busy-bodies from opposing bike lane projects in Hyde Park and other neighborhoods. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Cranley didn't even know about this project, and a few of those cantankerous types like Carl Uebelacker will come out of the woodwork in opposition to this project and get Cranley's full ear while the rest of the process is ignored. This is one to stay on top of and be vigilant about.