BigDipper 80

That's another great instance of relocating a street for no apparent reason instead of just building a bridge over the road.

^I've often said that it would have been really innovative if in the 70s and 80s, the Cleveland Clinic had renovated the "second downtown" area around Euclid and E 105th into doctor offices and the like, effectively creating a little "medical-oriented downtown" kind of like what the Mayo Clinic has done with most of Rochester MN. I'm sure Christ could have also done something unique with Glencoe Place, but when you know you're not going to get any community pushback whatsoever, it's so much easier to just keep doing what you've always done.

The same thing is happening right now in Toledo, where ProMedica tore down half of a relatively healthy neighborhood and is relocating a road that was literally opened in 2013, because it’s fine to not plan ahead when it comes to roads and hospital expansions. I know it’s nearly impossible to make a political case for forcing hospitals to get creative with their sites, but Lord knows I’m sick of watching them build these inhospitable fortresses. Does this happen in every “eds and meds” town or is it a uniquely Ohio phenomenon at this point?

I'm looking at the menu for the Indianapolis location and the only Tex-Mex thing on the menu is some weird "Tex Mex Roll" appetizer. Not a single taco to be had!

If Cedar Point's roller coaster hills were actually skyscrapers, its "skyline" would be comparable to that of one of Ohio's second-tier cities, and Top Thrill Dragster is actually taller than the tallest buildings in Akron, Toledo, or Dayton.

Media Day for Steel Vengeance was early this morning, and it looks as crazy as expected. New POV video from Cedar Point below: It looks like something out of a cartoon!

Literal anti-rail hitmen.

^It's especially annoying since both Cleveland and Columbus have free circulators while Cincinnati does not. Even Dayton will run special free RTA buses during certain events, although not on a daily basis like the C-Bus and the Cleveland trolleys.

I had a similar experience on Saturday. A group of four guys got on at Washington Park - it appeared only one of them had ever ridden it as he bought the tickets for everyone and showed them how everything work. I eavesdropped for a while and they were all very impressed with how easy it was to use and how cheap it is compared to taking an Uber or something around the core, and how it would be incredibly useful on game days than trying to fight traffic for the privilege to pay $30 to park at the Banks. Getting people on the thing is such an easy way to change peoples' minds. ---- I don't understand old peoples' obsession with those stupid Southbank Shuttle style fake trolleys. If you propose an actual streetcar and they'll oppose it, and if you were to just propose more frequent bus service along that line they'd also cry foul because "normal" people don't commute to their hospital jobs by bus, or something. But apparently putting a Spaghetti Warehouse body on a bus frame will make it a huge magnet for people who turn their noses up at normal buses.

^My general rule of thumb is to not get sushi from places that sell things other than sushi (or at least not getting sushi from places that have anything other than Japanese food on the menu), but that can be a tall order in the Midwest.

I wonder if this'll hasten the death of the Sears at both of the malls; I guess Sears at least still has appliances going for it but both of the Dayton-area stores have been looking pretty sad.

The death of retail continues: REPORT: Elder-Beerman going out of business; all stores to close in 10 to 12 weeks — As Bon-Ton Stores Inc. heads for liquidation, local officials are bracing for employment loss and empty tenant spaces at Elder-Beerman locations at area malls and shopping centers. Only two bids from liquidators were submitted at the bankruptcy auction Tuesday for Bon-Ton Stores Inc., the parent company of Elder-Beerman, according to Reuters. Elder-Beerman employs hundreds in the Dayton region, with stores at multiple shopping centers and a distribution center in Fairborn. Seeking Alpha, an investment analyst website, reported Bon-Ton CEO William Tracy sent a letter to employees late Tuesday that said the company will begin an orderly wind-down of operations following the liquidation process. https://www.whio.com/business/breaking-elder-beerman-likely-going-out-business-without-bid-from-buyer/FVmHrBWUUqjjebo25sGzJM/ It's sad to see one of the few remaining regional department store brands kicking the bucket.

^Marble Hill is particularly interesting, and not only because it's part of the mainland after the old riverbed got filled in.

It's weird to me that Ohio's tallest is bigger than Jersey's tallest despite, you know, being super close to NYC!

^I'm still disappointed they ran out of money to finish up the spire. The Willis Tower still has a higher roof than 1WTC, doesn't it?

Isn't the Quartieri Spagnoli the densest neighborhood in Europe, or at least it was at one point? I've heard it called the European Kowloon Walled City, although that's still not a really fair comparison given how impossibly dense Kowloon Walled City was.

Incredible! It's still kind of shocking to me how small the Chrysler Building looks these days on the skyline.

I think a lot of "grass is greener" types see homeless camps in cities like Cincinnati or Detroit and it confirms their bias that "of course these places have lots of homeless people, these cities are poor and terrible; I can't wait to get away to a 'rich city' that isn't so broke" and don't stop to think that it's an even bigger problem in more successful coastal cities, especially the west coast where the climate makes living on the street moderately more tolerable, coupled with side effects of the housing crisis out there.

Beer garden, new crossings and more: Big ideas for Dayton’s riverfront Dayton’s riverbanks could look a lot more like Cincinnati’s in coming years, if things go according to plan. The thriving Banks redevelopment that transformed a large section of Cincinnati grew out of a strategic development plan unveiled in the 1990s. Dayton is in the process of getting a riverfront master plan of its own. Dayton’s river banks already have welcomed some new apartment buildings, enhanced access points and outdoor restaurant space. Investments in downtown and the riverfront have exceeded $1 billion since 2010, officials have said. More below: https://www.mydaytondailynews.com/news/breaking-news/beer-garden-new-crossings-and-more-big-ideas-for-dayton-riverfront/5bmxn0JZ7U0XjCYMTZQR1J/ One other comment of note: "The realignment of Interstate 75 opened up new riverfront space on west bank of downtown, but the project also has created barriers blocking direct and easy access to the waterway, White said. “Quite frankly, we think they did a poor job on some of the on and off ramps,” White said." Why didn't anyone have this conversation with ODOT a decade ago when the I-75 plans were being drawn up? I know Dayton was a bit more of a hot mess in the early 2000s than it is now, but it would have been hugely beneficial to have had a voice in the room thinking about things like riverfront connectivity back then. The area around the First Street ramps is a pedestrian disaster.

Yeah DTLA gets much better from a fine-grained urbanism standpoint the closer you are to Broadway. The closer you get to the 110 the more it drifts into your typical Sun Belt CBD territory, but I've found that even in places like Houston and Atlanta the downtowns are surprisingly lively despite their fairly poor street interactions in many cases.

Vine needs to get rid of peak lane restrictions all the way to Mitchell Avenue, although I don't know if that would mean completely removing on-street parking or permanently making Vine one lane and one parking lane each direction on the northern stretch through Avondale. That area gets pretty gnarly during rush hour, especially when someone inevitably leaves their car in the right lane and almost crashes into it.

It looks like Dayton lost that annexation case too. Interesting loophole, for sure. I wonder if Hopkins was a similar situation before the land swap with Brook Park to make the airport contiguous with the city of Cleveland or if it was always just located in Brook Park.

^Because Dayton invented airplanes so we're just allowed to annex anything aviation related ;) More seriously, I've wondered this as well. Riverside and Trotwood, both Dayton suburbs, also have weird exclaves completely surrounded by Dayton, but I think that's just a result of the entire township (including all the random "islands" surrounded by Dayton) deciding to incorporate. Which, admittedly, is still weird, and it's also a little weird that it didn't happen to any other townships-turned-cities in Ohio, as far as I'm aware. It would be like the remaining parts of Columbia Township deciding to incorporate despite being made up of 8 small chunks of land scattered around eastern Hamilton County. As far as for the Dayton Airport land, I have yet to see a good explanation for how they managed to pull that off.

Detroit to reduce lanes, make room for cyclists on East Jefferson The city of Detroit plans to start changing lane markings along East Jefferson Avenue in early May, adding protected bike lanes and reducing traffic from three to two lanes each way. http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20180409/news/657481/detroit-to-reduce-lanes-make-room-for-cyclists-on-east-jefferson Unsurprisingly, the comments have people freaking out about how horrible traffic is going to get, plus some other nonsense about how bike lanes are racist. Never mind that Jefferson is already overbuilt to begin with and there are plenty of other roads on the east side that are devoid of traffic (or houses, or people...).

$250k seems really high for a starter home. I'd think the $100-200k range better captures both what single and dual-income families would expect to pay for their first house. On the other hand, I also know a number of young married couples who want to skip the whole "starter home" thing altogether and straight-up buy a $300-350k new build somewhere and (theoretically) be done with looking for housing for a very long time, if ever.