natininja

Unlike a mega mall, which serves one purpose (shopping), an urban area contains a variety of uses in close proximity. I can walk from my office to a restaurant for lunch. I can walk from a downtown condo to a shop of some kind. Yes, I'm probably not usually going to walk from one shop to another one a mile away (I think that's your point). This would only apply if you find yourself downtown already, either living or working there. Once there is a critical mass for it, any type of retail could thrive downtown. The contingency is getting enough residents living nearby to support X type of store. Today there aren't even enough housing options downtown to support some types of retail. In the meantime, however, the retail market than can thrive needs to wake up a bit..restaurants and bars can only go so far. Apple Store and H&M are examples of retail outlets I think would be successful in the current state of downtown.

Just like the fortifications of our airports and closing Pennsylvania Avenue to cars were moves to cover up the fact that no one wants to live or work in cities anymore. :roll:

I agree it is paranoid, but I recognize that is the way our government thinks nowadays. They can't go too far from population centers or finding talent becomes a big problem.

Oddly, Lothar's accent sounds more like he is from NYC region. Maybe he's from the Catskills?

Yep, it's a major missed opportunity. Unfortunately, even a major overhaul of the zoning code (e.g. to a form-based code) probably wouldn't do much to force better, more urban development in this area. The only way for Hyde Park to become a center for urban-style development is for Hyde Parkers to demand it. They do not seem to be as interested as residents in the center core neighborhoods. Since there's so much money floating around Hyde Park, there could feasibly be some rapid urbanization of land, relative to other neighborhoods. It seems like the Hyde Parkers who are really interested in living in an urban environment (primarily young professionals) end up moving to Mt. Adams or OTR instead of pushing for change in their 'hood.

The drawback of Belgian blocks is that, as bad as they might be for motorists, they're a hundred times worse for cyclists! There are much better choices for traffic calming pavers. Including ones which aren't so loud. Unfortunately, given what was claimed about the price of using the existing bricks (or Belgian blocks), I hold little hope for any of those to be implemented.

^ What do you suspect Duke's motives are?

If you round 6.52 to the nearest quadrillion you get one quadrillion.

So are you telling me the current location of the FBI regional office is primarily because they can secure the periphery in good old Kenwood? I am sure the local residents were aware of this at the time? Come on, find some other objectives. If I was a resident anywhere close to this Kenwood location and felt it was chosen because of a defendable periphery I would be screaming to High Heaven. The way you dismiss the security concept baffles me. Do you live in post-9/11 America?

The difference is that work crews on the New York City subway and other heavy rail systems are employed by the same entity as the driver of the train. That is, the rules can be laid out and both the construction crew and the driver will follow them. Put yourself in the position of a work crew superintendant. What if the streetcar doesn't stop, and a Duke employee gets killed? Better have some legal recourse ahead of time to protect oneself. In the case of the streetcar, the Duke employees have no guarantee that the streetcar will actually stop. You may think that this is a silly argument, but gas and electric employees have extremely strict safety procedures, to the point where devising a safety plan to perform some task often takes longer than performing the task itself. In practice, this idea would probably require a legal agreement between Duke and the streetcar operator, and that agreement itself could take a year or more to draft, considering all the beauracracy on both sides. Railroad rights-of-way are strictly controlled. Work crews are often protected by a derail device, which will throw the train off the track if its gets too close. By comparison, streets are a free-for-all. So what you're saying is they should be given 20 feet instead of eight. (Or some other arbitrarily large number.)

But the federal government has money to burn, right? ;-)

Kenwood is not trying to procure a vibrant pedestrian environment. I guess they could put it in Queensgate with minimal negative impact. Putting it squarely in a potentially vibrant pedestrian district, which would include all of the CBD, would be counterproductive.

Security is a reason to locate there. They can control not only the building but also the grounds around the building. If they want a fortress-style development, then I'd frankly prefer it not be downtown. If, on the other hand, they felt they could create a secure building which interacts well with the street and doesn't exhibit any "moat" features, I'd be happy with it downtown, for the reasons you state. A big guarded fortress would not be harmonious with a vibrant city center.

kjbrill said he was an engineer, so I'd assume he went to school. But being a a former engineer explains a lot. I've met some enlightened engineers (in terms of urban issues), but most of them are stuck in stone age thinking, e.g. "the best street is the widest and straightest". Likewise, I find many left brain types think they are being practical when they value function to the extreme detriment of form, thereby ignoring the function OF form. E.g. the very real psychological effects aesthetics can have. I used to not really value aesthetics until I realized there are very real scientific/psychological and economic effects. We are people, and we do ourselves no good pretending we are robots that don't respond in tangible ways to the aesthetics of our environment. That position is untenable in the face of facts.

^^ The genius of that idea is that people will look at pictures. Linking to articles and wordy data stuff does no good, because people would rather not look into anything that deeply.

Duke Energy bought Cincinnati Gas and Electric a few years ago. They are the company at the center of this conflict. So we are talking above and below ground electric lines as well a gas lines (obviously below ground).

Um that was stupid and more like a caricature of what conservatives imagine liberals to say. Some were accurate but not many.

"Sohydro" lol

Duke is, because the Brent Spence supplement benefits everyo-- I mean exurban Kentuckians.

^ Exactly. Duke just sees the opportunity to play the streetcar-obsessed press and suburban opposition against the city in order to spend less money. If the project weren't such a media darling, this would be a non-issue, as it is with innumerable road projects, including the Brent Spence.

So what you are saying is people don't like the shopping mall model anymore because it forces them to burn some calories. The horror! I agree that downtown doesn't have the critical mass of residents for a lot of things. I think certain things could work well, though. An Apple store at the Banks comes to mind. It's a destination store that caters to a young demographic that would appreciate the urban environment. As for the skywalk coming down slowly, like mentioned above, demolition costs money, so it hasn't been a great priority. Call it fiscal restraint.

Who are "you people"? I don't see anyone calling this a great, green development. At best, people are saying it's a little better than average for a suburban development, due to its density. Which does make it a bit more green than usual, but I see a lot of talk here about it being auto-oriented. Basically, I think people agree with your assessment. The LEED certification criteria have a lot of blind spots. "You people" sounds antagonistic, which is especially weird when you don't seem to be disagreeing with anyone.

$400,000,000 four-hundred million dollars eight zeroes swirl, swish, glug

And yet Duke has no problem with ratepayers along the streetcar line, where the ratio of customers to powerlines is huge, subsidizing their suburban infrastructure where the customer to powerline ratio is tiny by comparison.

^ That would be weird. And cool. I'd be pleasantly surprised if the price is reasonable enough to implement.