urbanlife

^ west side market also sells komijnekaas, kruidenmix and sambal oelek.

depending on your budget, work hours, weighting of commute vs. going out, you might consider renting a place near wellington, or your job. rents are generally very affordable (esp. compared to AMS). then, you could rent a room in a house or apartment downtown cleveland or near downtown cleveland, and you could plan on spending the weekends at that house/apt. you'd probably be able to share a house or apartment for a few hundred a month for something pretty nice. this might end up being cheaper in the end in saved gas, wear on your car, etc. and as long as you weren't set on going out on tuesday nights for instance, it would put you close to work during the week and close to entertainment on the weekends (or occassionally during the week). if you signed 6 month leases, you could re evaluate which area you like best, how bad the drive is, etc. and ultimately could choose 1 area. there is a fragmented dutch community, but it primarily seems to focus on events in eastern cuyahoga and summit counties for events (not very close to wellington). there seem to be more dutch companies / affiliated companies out that way (philips, some rubber company, manufacturing, etc.).

i was disappointed with no money for environmental impact studies, but then i read KJP's post over at gcbl.org, and it seems that all is not lost. apparently service could start on corridors that have existing rail traffic, up to 79mph, without any additional studies. that the studies are needed for higher speeds or corridors that don't currently have active rail service. is this accurate?

the good thing about the CLE focused threads is that there are a number of posters on a.net that work at hopkins for the city or the airlines, so it can be a good perspective. however, those posters are generally pro-cleveland, and haven't been that accurate with their predictions, even though they do a good job reporting developments that are actually happening (ie increased service to OKC).

the good thing is that this could be the start of additional feeder flights for international and connecting services, part of the "right sizing". nothing huge, but 4 additional flights into and out of CLE almost every day, so the potential to move 400 people. i'd rather see some more mainline service added, but if we can get some more non-stops until the 737-9s start arriving, it is a start.

you can monitor the jacobs field solar panel output online: http://www.greenenergyohio.org/indians/ i hope that the science center gets something like this for their solar and wind installations.

i'm not opposed to studies, especially when FED $$$ require them, however my questions are: What current studies are going on? And, do we always need federal $$? The Feds have shown preference to fund traffic congestion (and by proxy, air pollution) initiatives. Cleveland will rarely qualify on traffic congestion. So, how are we getting access to additional funds? Who is lobbying? I view the impact/environmental/ridership/feasibility type studies as a hedge bet to the future. will all of them come to fruition? no. but if we aren't continuously conducting studies (lets say 1 or 2 corridors or "big" ideas a year or 18 months), then i think we are letting ourselves down. does anyone have the list of CURRENT Federal studies that are going on for the rail projects? i know that there was no funding for ORDC. Is commuter rail study funded? Cuy Valley service to cleveland study funded? and when does a study done for federal funding expire?

i had a pretty good time on saturday. i thought the festival had quite a bit different feel than the first 2 though. the larger venues, imo, kind of hid some of the innovative displays and presentations. i was also a little disappointed that a few more of the buildings weren't opened up or that some of the spaces weren't used for performances - like the alleys behind playhouse square. i enjoyed the alley music around e4 last year. i also think that RTA missed an opportunity to have the ECP vehicle positioned in the middle of euclid, perhaps near CSU, and set up more as it is going to run. instead it was stuck at the north end of e17. also, i think RTA missed the boat by not highlighting the number of new innovations that are going into the bus, whether the hybrid engines, docking system, prototype fuel cell vehicle, etc. They could have used some big call out signs highlighting this. Instead, it was just the bus parked there. still nice to see it though.

^ did they clean or paint the outside first level? whatever they did, hopefully they will continue it on the rest of the building. i'm quite impressed at how fast this project has moved along, and it looks good from walking by as well.

the through service to shanghai is proposed on 2 different planes - a 737 from CLE to EWR and the 777 from EWR to Shanghai. the crazy part is the connect times are only scheduled at 90 minutes on the return. that is aggressive through EWR - especially when clearing customs and rechecking baggage as i'd assume you'd have to do with the plane change. roughly page 18 in this pdf: http://dmses.dot.gov/docimages/p101/476691.pdf

What type of services are these that warrant such a high monthly fee? For that price, someone better be cleaning my place, cooking all my meals, doing my laundry, etc. but it's also what happens when the original condo fees were not enough for repairs - ie new roof or elevator. someone has to pay, and since you own it collectively, most condo agreements spread the cost. same problem at grand arcade downtown. lots of units for sale after the maintenance fees went up for repairs.

zoning and overlays also play a role here. we'll see what euclid looks like in a few years and if that is effective enough to direct development without discouraging it. if i buy a lot and it requires a setback or parking spaces, then that's probably what i'll do, especially with past leadership in cleveland and the number of variances that would be necessary to accomplish simple building projects. it also seems that cleveland was happy to have any development for a long time, which is why some of these developments were built - providing essential services for mostly poorer, inner city residents. hopefully these days have passed as well, although the steelyard example suggests it may have not (although i view this more as a special case due to the location and site constraints).

but i think that corner alley has backed out (or declined to renew) for future sponsorship. so, who knows what will happen in the future. corner alley already had sponsored the trolleys for a while, so hopefully someone steps up.

the bottom line has been that RTA seems solely concerned about costs. it is certainly good to balance a budget and live within your means, but you also don't want to lose the occassional or new rider b/c of that tunnel vision. i believe it roughly costs RTA roughly $100 in labor to operate each vehicle for 1 hour. there are other costs that aren't included (fuel, electricity, maintenance, additional police, etc.). So, to run the rail lines at 1/2 hour headways through the night, you'd need at least 4 or 6 trains operating on the red line, and perhaps 4 or 6 more on blue/green lines, so you're close to $1200/hr to operate the service, not including additional costs. $1200/hr, for roughly 4 hours a night (additional service) = $4800/day so, weekend only expansion to 24 hour service would be between $400-500,000 a year. 365 day, all night expansion would be roughly $1.8 million. knowing these numbers (whatever the exact ones may be), then it becomes easier to either ask for sponsorship (MADD sponsers the late night trains on 4th of july, new years, etc. for $4800 each night, for example, and then also promote the service through advertisements). i don't have ridership numbers for the former late night trains, but i would like RTA / the community explore ways to make this happen (at least on certain nights, or for the summer). we've seen how downtown businesses/csu/the city has worked to expand trolley service to 11pm, for instance.

i'd like to see your plan for winning the election though. ideas are only a small part of running for mayor (or any other major office in cuyahoga county).

good news about hotel. does anyone know what is beling built along the shoreway after the turn when heading east into dowtown (on the south side of the shoreway)? there is a cinderblock foundation coming out of the old grass/tree hillside.

they will also install the first 2 stations in the next few weeks. one will be at e40 and euclid and one will be a sidewalk boarding area in east cleveland. i feel somewhat better after seeing how the e30-e55 section has turned out, and RTA required that the people doing signal priority to build out a complete test system before any installation (they are also using the latest technology SONET - which was a change order from the original system specified). biggest problem i have is timing. should be at least 2 shifts as i don't think the RTA cost analysis could have possibly included all of the delayed traffic, lost business, increased pollution, etc.

well, in light of the new state regulations on these clubs, it seems that will limit the hours of operation, as well as potential clients. the downtown clubs (from the outside), seem to draw a very different demographic than brookpark or w25 or some of the other "districts". i also think this is one of the "city" problems. in a suburb, it might not fly, but if you draw a 1 mile radius around a typical suburban house, there is nothing but other houses. draw a 1 mile radius around any of the downtown residences, and you are likely to have some lingering manufacturing, lots of bars and restaurants, some gay focused bars and restaurants, lots of independent retail, some adult stores, some strip clubs, a homeless shelter or soup kitchen, lots of bus stops, etc. basically all sorts of potentially NIMBY type activities. ultimately, that is what makes the fabric of the city, imo.

apparently the RTA is close to finalizing the commercialization of the silver line. so the final package will likely be branded as the Cleveland Clinic Line or Key Bank Line or something, which may change the colors and styling. the vehicle that was displayed was silver and had a wavy white line down the side with the names of the different stops/key intersections. it looks pretty good, but still not quite as funtional as 1 redline car due to smaller aisle widths, bumpouts for the tires, etc.

not completely out of the box in europe and some us cities, but none around here. something that i think cleveland sorely needs at a few key locations - rock hall, star plaza, public square, settlers landing, mall b. .50 to use, self cleaning. shelters and churches give out tokens for homeless to use.

what i like is how fast these projects happened. i know they wanted them finished by the solar conference, but i'm extremely impressed about how fast this happened. they were installing the first solar panels at the GLSC this afternoon. imo, we need this sense of urgency to carry over to other projects and ideas.

or it is occupying a nearly ready space (aka 515 euclid?). we've heard about people having leases on some of this empty space, so maybe they are finally ready to make a move. any hints on the type of retail?

i hope they can develop different "road closed" signs at either end. i understand they need movable signs to allow emergency equipment through and to communicate that the road is closed, but perhaps a swinging-arm gate with a nicely placed "road closed" or "pedestrians only" sign or something. perhaps something like this painted green: as is, the large construction style signs take away a litte from the really nice outdoor spaces.

could also be an option to buy based on zoning changes, inspections, etc. this type of option exists all over town, but doesn't show up on the books until the sale occurs and thr property transfers.

it looks really tight in the middle where pickwick's new patio area and HOB's pati area collide - there is only a narrow through passage. will be interesing to see how this handles heavy ped traffic. i had kind of hoped since they were closing the street, it would be an open drinking zone and that the individual establishments wouldn't have to put up fences. it seems like overkill to close the street and still require fencing.