audidave

I agree as well. I've been generally positive on this as a Summit County resident it won't affect me too much. Adding sound walls is a deal killer. They might as well put the road in the trench and take the train out with that logic.

The two lane bottleneck remains if you are getting on 480, yes. This will help rush hours on 271. They will be doing the same thing on 77 expanding from 4 to 6 lane highways.

^^Gondolas aren't that affected by wind. Their typical environment is near the top of mountains. A little more wind at higher speeds than typically seen in Cleveland. There usually are anemometers at crucial/high points and can automatically slow down the cable. I would guesstimate the upper level winds to keep the gondolas from running would be around 50mph. For safety, there would simply be delays until the wind died down to under 40mph. Its typically a $5-10 million proposition to set one of these up. But maybe because its way out of the way and going up a mountain. Perhaps in a flatish environment with plenty of workers and cranes available in a city that can actually produce the towers maybe the price is halved.

It looks like a fairly solid map. I'm not sure the edgewater connection is doable. If they can get a good spot to connect to ohio city or tremont then i think this may be viable.

I'm going to agree, this is fairly uninspiring. I don't feel there needed to be a super inpressive facility attached to the greystone, just not one so blah. It looks very utilitarian. I would think a hampton inn style would suffice. With a potential marriott at northside and who knows what going on at the mayflower this plan could easily be a mere memory very soon.

Well its not huge. 160 rooms. $40 mil. http://akronnewsnow.com/news/local/item/95594-new-hotel-planned-for-akrons-greystone-hall

The article above has been adjusted and updated a few times today. Also made mention is the Northside hotel that Testa says is still alive but slowly moving due to design issues. Also, this was really a place-keeper and background article for the real announcement that will be made on Tuesday. I would wonder how many hotel rooms they are really talking for the greystone. I would think maybe 40-60 hotel rooms could be created in that building. Gut feeling is they'll go for 3-4 floors and 30+ rooms and it will be connected to a new building with the bulk of the rooms. I guess we'll have more details soon. At the moment it seems like a fairly smallish deal. With the church property near by vacant and the rumors floating of that being in the mix this could be a much bigger deal.

Only buildings i would expect to be torn down are the ones closer to the Mayfower. I feel there is plenty of space for an arena on those parking lots. Perhaps the Primos bar could stay. But everything up to that should be knocked down. There probably needs to be a point person assigned to get all the parties involved to coordinate this. This sounds like a job for dave liebereth, since he's now retired from city gov but has all the important connections to move this forward.

Akron is a fairly sprawled out city and there has been varying important foci over the last 30 years. Initially it was keeping jobs. Then it dawned on city leaders that with the department stores of O'neils and Polsky's gone along with the various theaters on Main St shutting down that downtown turned into a dead zone after 5pm. The city has spent a lot money trying to get projects going downtown. I remember the city being active with the housing development on the canal south of BF Goodrich complex. A lot renovating and knocking down buildings went on downtown over last 30 years. The city owns most of O'neils and lock 3 and 4. Helped with Canal Park financing and getting convention center built as well as bringing in Inventure Place. City's been dealing with old infrastructure in roads, bridges, canals, sewers, steam pipes, and water system. 15 years ago you really could throw a bowling ball down main st at 7pm and not hit a car. You cannot say that any more. Downtown is active now. People aren't afraid to come downtown. Next goals they are wanting is to have enough residency downtown to have a grocery store. Also to get a new hotel downtown. Hard to say how that works with the Goodyear push. Also potentially still an arena downtown which could tie into a hotel and the convention center. Otherwise, the city is watching its money due to the sewer system that needs updated. They'll be spending over a billion over next 30 years making improvements so that no sewage gets in the Cuyahoga.

Downtown Akron is fairly boxed in by the Cuyahoga Valley, UA, and hospital campuses. Only direction to expand is South or up, or perhaps over to the east end with good connections. I'm not a fan of the BRT idea either. My understanding is that metro rta route happens to have the highest or second highest usage. I would think express service would prob be good enough. Then adding a rail link as well.

Keep in mind, there is expected to be improvement along market st with transportation in one fashion or another. I think the brt thing will likely be a go. I hope that a train will also enhance that. Placing a hotel and new housing options in area with "rapid" service to downtown and other points perhaps the valley and airport will make this area a nice urban area place to live without being downtown.

Hopefully with their little village coffers flush they'll allow the main drag of route 8 to move up to 35 mph... I avoid Northfield as much as possible because of that and I live very close.

I'm pretty sure wallhaven would be out of scope for rail service. They really are looking at some brt for w. market. I think that will be fine. Use that as the east-west and again use the train for some north-south travel. I guess part of the reason that Metro hasn't sought to spur a train to the valley is they don't own the tracks. I'm thinking they should go ahead and buy the tracks to the merriman valley. They own up to the Northside station.

This is another big project a few blocks down from the other $50-60 million project that was announced a month ago. I wonder how the Odd Corner will react this time. Or maybe they will grab the taco bell and gas station corner. Love the lack of detail in the article.

Hold on for more information still to come. The rail is going to be general a north to south piece with a bit of a jog east to goodyear area. What they were discussing is how to best handle east-west travel mainly along market. Certainly the train could handle a portion of it but it won't be taking anyone to west akron. Not to say it couldn't be done but they would have to make a dramatic crossover to connect to the w&le tracks that do roll through into west akron and would only get to wallhaven area. That would, as far as a regional train, be fine. But only 1 stop in west akron is not worth the effort for the discussion at hand.

I'm happy for the project. It is serious investment that will benefit students, residents, other businesses in the area. This is going from a block with current value of maybe a half mil to one with over $40 million. This gets rid of lower end retail space. That is not a bad thing. It makes other retail space that is left more valuable. This will improve the general safety and quality of life of that area. This will spur other land-owners in the area to step up their investment in their properties. I'm not sure what blocks that have been leveled could be reused. In that immediate area I cannot think of any blocks like that. There are some by Market by the highway but I believe there is already construction going on there. There isn't really much vacant land in the university or downtown area to build on.

Not to say there wasn't some demolition of especially older, run down tire factories and warehouses, I don't think there were that many tire factories in the downtown area. BF Goodrich was pretty much the only one I'm aware of. I'm not sure about any of the other tire companies. I don't think rubber plants would make especially good "loft spaces". I like to think that lot of the buildings that were in worse shape perhaps used the most were knocked down. Others became Spaghetti warehouse or the Akron Incubator space. There is a lot of potential loft space as one looks around downtown Akron. I had a friend live in one I guess by the Cotter building many years back.. Not much money had been put into it. It was still a pretty sweet layout. There are many types of examples of that throughout Akron its just that there isn't the money or vision to develop these things. I have other friends that live in an old factory near Elizabeth Valley. They insist its absolutely amazing loft space. By them is the ice house lofts too. Its not because these warehouses were knocked down as much as Akron was so spread out even during the tire boom. Both Goodyear and Firestone created their own communities for workers in their parts of Akron. Maybe "downtown" will encroach onto the Firestone HQ property and it will get repurposed for housing. Think of Goodyear Hall that has pretty much been empty for 30-40 years looking for a new purpose. Who knows what will happen to the old Goodyear HQ when that gets cleared out in the next few months. How Akron grew in the 1800s, as in the oldest manufacturing buildings are by the canal and by the railroads. One of those types of buildings was recently purchased and is being turned into loft space right next to the canal across from the Mustill Store. http://nohoakronlofts.com/ Akron I don't think ever had massive urban warehouse space since it wasn't a major city. But there are hundreds of machine shops, manufacturing, and warehouse spaces that are all over Akron that are and can still be turned into 2-4 story lofts.

Thanks for allaying my fears. I was hoping this was just conceptual surmising in trying to find the worst case scenario cost expectation. There were definitely some nice things in the report that I think they were able to get from AMATS like future demographic concepts to take into consideration. I'd lean more towards a hybrid of back to the city and suburban TOD for Summit Co. as being most likely in the cards. I believe the rail bridges are scheduled to be replaced very soon if we're talking the one(s) over the Little Cuyahoga river. That could be another reason why the CVSR isn't running south to Canton currently.. (It was to be replaced this past winter. Not sure that happened) Interesting the report also had a quote in the 2nd section from the interviews with local organizations that there is no service to Gilchrist rd. Well guess what the train runs right through there. Also there were quotes saying how it would be nice for better service to CAK and also UofA. Interestingly, they didn't interview people directly associated with Goodyear, UofA, or Parta for this study. Nice they spoke with reps from CAK though but train service would be pretty pie in the sky for them since they know Metro doesn't even have a train and weren't even hinting one would come along in the next 20 years. So, yes, more buses! Also, they discussed putting up a tax or levy in the quotes with movers and shakers. I would think an increased sales tax would be commensurate with the goals trying to be achieved. Improvement of tracks to Canton and Kent shouldn't be shouldered by Summit County alone. The other counties I think should be included. In that regard, its not a burden that only Metro alone would have to carry without even contemplating having to push a new tax. It would be truly improved regional service and I would think a cost savings.

I somehow missed this final master plan from Metro RTA that was published at the end of May. http://www.akronmetro.org/SharedFiles/Download.aspx?pageid=44&fileid=699&mid=95 Definitely a lot of interesting ideas. The cost estimates seem fairly high in everything. For passenger rail, they felt that it would cost almost $40million to set up using the train from the Merriman Valley to Goodyear. I could see that if they are adding a second train track. It practically sounds like that from reading their estimates. We're talking 8 miles of track that was just updated by the CVSR to welded track. Definitely a lot of assumptions in the study like that the train wouldn't be extended further south to Canton. That is definitely the big picture to me for this. Yes its probably not worth the expenditure if it will only ever roll 8 miles back and forth from Goodyear to the valley and will receive a major upgrade in track just to do that. 40mph avg speed is plenty since its more direct than by car. My feel was they needed to replace a bridge or two. Upgrade some track here and there. Add improved crossing gates and buy a few DMUs. My ball park guess was $10-12 million for startup service. My vision was a slicker version than what the CVSR is already providing to get the thing rolling. For part of the study linking the train to Kent, I would think PARTA would be a little more of a participant in that. Perhaps that would save them tens of thousands of dollars by not sending 3-5 buses to Akron every day. I guess they would've had to cough up a few thousand to be part of the study too.. Anything in transportation in isolation looks expensive. Once a network is linked up and is able to be used in multiple places I think it will be worth it for passenger and freight. Hopefully this is part of a preliminary study and they will have a more detailed study with start-up options and realizing improvements that are needed regardless and for moving freight.

Well its pretty much 3 highways with 2 lanes each coming together in 3 available lanes is the problem. I'd like to see an exit lane from 271 n to 480 east if there is ever an update. That could probably take some strain off of rt 82. 3 miles of express lanes would work wonders.

I thought I'd dust off this topic since it wasn't heard from in quite a while. The real reason though is I was watching Feagler on the boob tube and a journalistic buddy of his greg saber mentioned very off cuff when discussing the innerbelt story with kasich coming to town to get that project done, that the Rt 8 project was a massive waste of money and didn't solve anything. That is the first time I've heard that opinion. Certainly people are entitled to their opinions but he said it so non-chalantly that i wondered if it was more than that. My opinion is it was absolutely needed. There has been zero negative feedback in Summit Co that I've seen. The only negative is that it was a pain to have to commute through the construction. Its not perfect now but only because that stretch of 271 needs widened before it hits 480. I'm not a huge proponent of highway spending but when it becomes dangerous like old rt 8 was with the lights stoppng people or the cops, i can't imagine someone belittling a solid, needed project like that.

Great pics! A little tlc and massive power wash would do wonders for that building

Well a reprieve for now for North Randall. It doesn't mean Thistledown won't pack up and leave in a year or 2. Thistledown owner announces $88 million investment By Rick Armon Beacon Journal staff writer Published: August 22, 2012 - 11:36 PM A Thistledown horse track and video slots parlor won’t be coming to the Akron-Canton area anytime soon. Rock Ohio Caesars said Wednesday it will spend $88 million to update and transform the existing thoroughbred track in North Randall into a racino, the industry term for a combined track and slots parlor. http://www.ohio.com/news/local/thistledown-owner-announces-88-million-investment-1.328971

KJP, i would think warrensville heights would be very interested in a merger since they would finally have control of seemless zoning. A much better chance to control their destiny. Whereas if the Village has a pig farmer buy Thistledown they wouldn't have much say.

You probably need to look at where mergers have actually happened in Ohio to understand what it really takes for one to come to fruition. Cuyahoga Falls merged with a township in the 1980s. It was a methodical, transparent process. The urgency was that Akron was constantly biting off chunks in annexing bit by bit. It was decided it would be better to control the fate of the township than let Akron grab all the tax-producing pieces of land. A merger study was implemented and voted on by voters. A year or 2 later a vote was held again in both communities on whether to merge. The study explained ramifications and educated the voters in a series of community meetings. It passed in both communities and Cuyahoga Falls doubled in size but only added a few thousand people but plenty of land to grow. Money was saved. New zoning rules implemented to preserve character of township. I'd say it was a success. My understanding is there has been less than a handful of mergers in Ohio. Annexations aplenty of course. The most logical place for a merger at grassroots is n. randall as they are about to lose their reason for being(thistledown) to Summit County. I haven't heard anything yet as part of a merger study to begin. Maybe they are waiting until when it is officially announced.