audidave

Understand that small batch breweries sometimes have problems keeping consistency. When I taste a beer thats off I try to understand why that beer is off. You may be very correct that the beer wasn't right when you tried it. That is the beauty of trying the beer in a brewery is you can question the brewer in what is going on with the beer. Maybe the brewer will say they screwed up the beer that time. Maybe the brewer will say they tried something different or had different yeast or couldn't get the correct hops they wanted at that time of the year. (We were in a hop shortage then) Not everyone's taste is the same and they are interested in hearing what other palates are tasting irregardless of whether it is liked or not. I wouldn't count out a brewery after one time going there and trying just 2 beers especially ones that are not producing at a consistent large volume or a narrow scope. Ohio Brewing has made at least 15 different types of beers in the past year. That truly is a craft brewery. If you try 5-8 beers and you're still not liking anything, then you may have some valid points.

I had never been to Dayton until visiting it just for the Air Force base on the way back from a family California trip in the 80s. I suppose I still really didn't visit Dayton at that point. My dad had told me its basically like Akron but maybe a little more industrial. So analyzing the demographics it roughly appears like that. My assumption was a low key city that is happy go lucky with very little crime and a well managed downtown that seemed inviting to all. My first few days I arrived in the middle of a bleak March day 5 years ago to work downtown, I was surprised at how flat it was and how old and rundown many of the buildings were - the Arcade area in particular. I was unimpressed with the sprawl and all the Malls. It took me awhile to get my bearings and reinterpret my expectations. I know better now. I've figured out most of the cool places to go and look forward to returning for some Marion's pizza and hitting up El Meson, and hanging out in Belmont and going to Dorothy Lane stores. Also Oregon District is pretty nice. Its definitely more like Akron in some ways than I was expecting. Akron is also known for visitors having a hard time to get around and unfold for them.

New restaurant on Main St. opening soon courtesy of Dayton's Thai 9 http://www.downtownakron.com/newsitem/cilantro-thai-to-open-at-former-piattos Cilantro Thai to open at former Piatto's Dayton man, mother are finalizing restaurant menu for September By Lisa Abraham Beacon Journal food writer Published on Wednesday, Jul 08, 2009 With all of the recent restaurant closings, it's nice to be able to report on an opening, even if it is several months away. The former Piatto restaurant, which has sat vacant on South Main Street in downtown Akron for the past three and a half years, is expected to open in September as Cilantro Thai and Sushi Restaurant. Building owner Jeff O'Neil said he will be in town this week to sign a lease with Charlie Somtrakool, a Dayton resident who will be relocating to Akron in the next few weeks to open the restaurant. CHOPPED

^It really depends on what one is looking for in their beer. If you are looking for something like a Natty light or even a shiner bock, you're probably not going to be too happy with the beer at Ohio Brewing. If you like Guinness, you'll likely appreciate the stout they have. If you like hoppy beers you'll probably like the twice bitten or the regular IPA they have. If you like Newcastle Browns, you'll probably really appreciate the Gold and the Cardinal Red. They do have seasonal beers that might not "hit the spot" but I don't begrudge them for trying and pushing the taste envelope.

I agree initially if Columbus to Cleve or Cinci is competitive with driving before any serious capital infusions take place it should be fine. The next goal will be to make with $100-200 million upgrades so that Cleveland to Cinci is competitive with driving. Cleveland to Cinci should still be competitive with driving 4 months of the year with winter weather and other holidays.

An update from Metro with public meetings... Summit, Ohio – METRO Regional Transit Authority, the public transportation provider for Summit County, will hold meetings presenting the final service recommendations for the next five years. The meetings will be held: Monday, July 27 - 6:30 pm, Transit Center, 631 S. Broadway, Akron Tuesday , July 28 - 10:00 am, Transit Center, 631 S. Broadway, Akron Tuesday, July 28 - 2:00 pm, Twinsburg City Hall, 10075 Ravenna Rd, Twinsburg Tuesday, July 28 - 6:30 pm, Cuyahoga Falls Library, 2015 Third St, Cuyahoga Falls Wednesday, July 29 - 10:00 am, Barberton Library, 602 W. Park Ave, Barberton Wednesday, July 29 - 6:30 pm, Stow City Hall, 3760 Darrow Rd, Stow The goal of the Transit Development Plan, is to examine METRO services that have been cut or reduced over the past decade; to look at current demographics and land use patterns to determine where new service and what type of service should be put in place; to identify efficiencies of the METRO SCAT service; and to examine possibilities for a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) in the East and West Market Street corridors. This is the third round of meetings in the TDP process which began in November 2008. Nearly 50 individual interviews, 600 passenger surveys, 500 mailed resident surveys, and 60 business contacts were made. The final plan will be presented to METRO’s board for consideration in August. METRO RTA is the public transportation provider for Summit County providing fixed route and paratransit service. In 2008, METRO transported more than 5.8 million passengers.

Adding to the thought on Peninsula... You can rent bikes there and throw them on the train for $2 one way to Akron and then eat at Vegeterranean which is next to the station in Akron. You're pretty much downtown so you can explore Akron on your bikes. Main St. is pretty quiet on the weekends unless there is a festival. Then ride back to Peninsula on the towpath about 12 miles away.

I'm not sure there is space for a decent arena by all the athletic fields unless the JAR is torn down. That means putting the arena someplace other than campus since free campus acreage is pretty filled up. The advantage to an arena on South Main is multi-use, like CSU has with the convocation center. An arena is still in Akron whether its on campus or not. We're not talking the rubber bowl situation where it was not easy for fans to get to. An arena could be 2 blocks from the campus. By pooling resources of the city, county, St. V?, convention center, and whoever else, an arena can be made bigger and nicer than an exclusively UA arena. I don't want to see UA build an arena that holds only 2x more people than the JAR on campus. That to me sounds boring.

I don't really care about the architectural details about this bridge. The pertinent thing about it to me is path of the bridge. Most of the people that have been following this thread for a while understand that a southern alignment will add many potentially valuable acres to downtown Cleveland that is currently inaccessible right now due to all the concrete blocking downtown from the innerbelt access ramps. A southern alignment can be a very elegant solution to a very complicated problem and ODOT has said they have picked the path and they are going more northerly..

Oh, Forest City reps were there too.. :wink2:

OR you could save yourself the aggravation and just move to Akron. I just looked up on realtor.com, you can buy a nice 2100sq foot house by Highland Sq. for $5000 down and a monthly mortgage on a 15yr fixed for around $600/mo. Its a $72,000 house. Highland square is a miniature version of Coventry. A good way to get your bearings of what Akron has to offer is www.downtownakron.com. They just updated the site this week. And of course there is the www.northsidelofts.com but it sounds a bit out of your price range but they are pretty sick..

I can't see that many people working in this building. My understanding is the building had at most 80-100 people working in it originally when it was a bank. I can see maybe 200-300 people working there and if in 2 shifts they can double that. Beyond that, it will be a workforce taking calls remotely or one hell of a cramped boiler room..

KJP, I would wonder how accurate those numbers are now. There is constant maintenance and upgrades to various parts of the tracks throughout Summit Co. Would some of the costs not be tied to the new bridges and grade crossing lane separations that are now in place? For example the new NS bridge over route 82 is pretty much complete, that was a huge expense and likely would've been part of this study. Also up next is a new bridge further south on Highland Rd allowing that traffic to keep rolling irregardless. Then there's some new quiet zones further south of that..

My friend's band played at the Jigsaw the previous Memorial day and they also didn't get paid. Maybe the Lara guy has something against Akron bands. He just shut down the HiFi club in Lakewood too. So this great empire of rock clubs has come crashing down. Too bad the Agora had anything to do with it. Pretty much once bands find out that clubs are screwing over bands by not paying them, the clubs cease to exist. Thats pretty idiotic not to pay the Black Keys.

^ Right by the new housing for students on S. Main St. Cool pics of the building in the article. http://www.ohio.com/business/47636312.html Landmark rescued By Betty Lin-Fisher Beacon Journal staff writer POSTED: 06:22 p.m. EDT, Jun 10, 2009 A downtown Akron building whose last owner lost it to foreclosure after a failed attempt to sell it on eBay is getting new life under the eye of historic building renovator Tony Troppe. Plans call for the Kaiser Building, across from Canal Park on South Main Street, to have a cafe or store in two slots on the first floor, offices on the second floor and a mix of offices and loft apartments on the third floor. CHOPPED

Gildone, there are 5 Northcoast Express buses a day that go to Cleveland from downtown Akron. Most of the buses are packed. Akron Metro is getting 6 new buses this summer to replace their current Northcoast express fleet. Here's the pdf from Metro: http://www.akronmetro.org/NewslettersNCXPDF.html Also there is crude excursion train service connecting Akron and Canton during the Summer on Wed-Sundays for $15 rd trip, I think, basing that on the "all day pass". Here's the timetable: Leave Canton 9am Get to Akron at 10:10. Depart Akron at 10:45 to Canton at 12PM Leave Canton 3:45 Get to Akron at 5pm. Depart Akron at 5:40 to Canton at 6:55pm I'm not impressed with the CVSR website. I think they are in serious need of some interns. www.cvsr.com

mrnyc, I just recall it was high level discussions about what merging ksu and UA would look like or even joint cooperation and trying to think outside the box. It seemed pretty pie in the sky then. But you look at how many buses both campuses have, plus all of the other parking facilities they manage, and its not so crazy thinking a light rail shuttle that runs on track owned by Metro could link the 2 campuses. There's probably more reason today to consider this given the NEOUCOM focus to Akron. I believe the period of time this was being considered was the "span the tracks" period. This is when UA started their move into downtown Akron and they were contemplating what the new assets could mean. So there is now a Metro Transportation center next to the tracks that has been hinted at being used for rail. Its obviously super easy to tie that in from there to the UA campus bus system. No cost there. Perhaps the trolleys that have to be moved out of Cleveland could be used? Call it the Zipflash express. It would end up at Pufferbelly's in Kent I would imagine. Plenty of Kent students manage to find their way to that area and again it shouldn't cost much to tie that in to the Kent campus bus system.

It only seems like everybody and your brother has a 4yr degree because you're in college and most of your friends are all either going to college or just got out. Like mrnyc noted, only about a quarter of the population, if that, has a 4yr degree. I don't think Ohio runs the risk of having too educated of a population. There are changes coming to reduce the hurdles by making it easier to pretty much take the needed classes at almost any university in Ohio in order to finish up degrees. Hence the announced changes of OSU to Semesters. Back to the topic. I wonder when the next 10 yr vision from Proenza is going to be announced. I remember back when I was going there the UA or maybe it was the KSU president threw out there a rail link between KSU and Akron. I think that would be highly doable these days.

^ I have to disagree with that opinion. Its really not that easy to get a 4-yr degree at least it wasn't when I was going to the UofA. Yes it is easy to get in. Its a whole different story in getting out with a degree. I felt there were tremendous hoops because of the timing of classes that are needed to graduate. It was almost impossible to graduate in 4 years let alone 5. I understand things have definitely changed in the freshman and sophomore classes in the last 10 years. I still think its difficult to get a degree in 4 years unless you're in such a common track like Marketing. Because of the difficulty, I don't think there are that many people running around with 4yr degrees. Also, the people that do graduate, many still will leave Ohio once they get their degrees. I have many friends that have 4yr degrees from Ohio schools and in particular Akron that live throughout the US. So I totally dispute that there is a degradation in the value of a 4 year degree. I can see your point if you mean that because so many gen Y students have Marketing degrees its degraded their value. Overall, a 4yr degree is far, far better to have than not.

So I'm expecting Don to come out on Monday with guns ablazing. I don't think he's going to be happy until he has 90% of the vote behind him which is almost doable. My wild guess is somewherre around 80,000 to 8000.

I see multiple reasons for future growth of Akron. 1. UofA is the most likely reason with their nursing and engineering programs perhaps sports teams too that attract students. There seem to be many students from PA actually at both KSU and UA. 2. a 24yr old international ambassador in LBJ and any buzz he creates when he's in town. 3. strong, diverse regional industries in banking, legal, utilities, healthcare, service, and mainly unique manufacturing companies including food manufacturing, polymers, and metals. 4. Very low cost of living with a diverse and strong housing stock from urban to suburban to lakefront or backyard park. 5. New/renovated schools and libraries throughout Akron and multitude of quality educational options available for parents to consider. 6. Incredibly easy access to travel via still growing CAK or CLE. 7. Three growing breweries in Akron- Thirsty Dog, Ohio Brewing, and Hoppin Frog where there were none 3-4 years ago and the entertainment district(20+ extra liquor licenses) still yet to be started. 8. Construction continuing throughout urban neighborhoods of Akron. Its hard to go a block and not see construction going on someplace. 9. Rich and diverse arts and community scene like zoo, parks, and museums as well as charitable organizations. -hmm where's the promised city-wide free wifi from Knight foundation??? 10. Summit County government acts as partner with city. This keeps the billion dollar+ deal alive with Goodyear and the quarter billion $ deal alive with Bridgestone among many other things.

Similar idea from the PD from May 1st that nobody posted here... So yes, absolutely there will be many wind turbines throughout downtown Cleveland and other cities in the coming years. They just won't look like the massive one at the Great Lakes Science Center. http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2009/05/demand_for_smallscale_wind_tur.html Demand for small-scale wind turbines growing among Ohio businesses by John Funk/Plain Dealer Reporter Friday May 01, 2009, 8:14 PM Green Energy TechnologiesGreen Energy Technologies of Akron is marketing its WindCube, a wind turbine designed for urban and suburban locations. The company's first cubes were made in Eastlake and Euclid. Final assembly now is planned for Youngstown. While the effort to attract manufacturers of giant wind turbines to Ohio continues, smaller, more affordable, commercial wind generators are already selling. CHOPPED

Similar thoughts except I think a Wellington stop since its such a cool town and a Gallion stop to appease the Mansfield/Gallion politicians would be good. It also would be doable to catch the train there from an Akron/Canton perspective to Columbus and more likely Cinci from Gallion if need be.

My thoughts are anti-fence for the Y-bridge.. Maybe because I like the song Y-bridge too much by Akron punk band CD Truth. Have a listen at their myspace.com/cdtruth its a bit low-fi than I recall but I think it should be on their newest cd. Very clever sardonic lyrics. "Make your mark on Elizabeth Park" What would be sweet if that song would play anytime anyone came to this thread..

Will the port redevelopment have anything to do with the Amtrak station redevelopment? I'm thinking transportation infrastructure links and access should be a major factor in developing the north coast since its been mainly cut off by highway and rails. For a revamped/revitalized waterfront line combined with potentially the Ohio Hub, this would seem be the basis of a vital "gold coast" community.