audidave

Update courtesy of the Akron News Now.. aka Rubber City Radio.. http://www.akronnewsnow.com/business/itemdetail.asp?ID=24738&section=business&subsection=generalbusiness&title=AUDIO_Bridgestone_Firestone_CEO_Addresses_Akr Bridgestone-Firestone Americas President and CEO Mark Emkes was the keynote speaker today at the World Tire Conference in Akron. As for the Akron technical center, Emkes says negotiations are progressing smoothly to get the technical center built here in Akron and he says by the end of the year, the deal should be wrapped up. He says he's looking forward to developing the neighborhood around the technical center as well. Emkes revealed to Akron News Now that plans for the neighborhood include a retail complex of an undetermined amount of stores directly across the street from the new technical center, and development of a park and soccer fields. The Bridgestone Firestone CEO says there are currently no plans for a hotel as part of the development. He says that could change only if downtown and other area hotels were operating at their capacity and more hotel rooms were needed.

^I'll guess Canton. Thats the weirdest looking brick road ever! I'll also add to the mix the largest building in the world without internal supports-- the Goodyear Air Dock now called the Lockheed airdock? He didn't say how the architecture had to be significant..

Pittsburgh-to-Cleveland seems like a nice ambitious doable project. It would definitely give a reason for people to visit Y-town. My grandparents loved going to Cleveland from Pittsburgh on the train back in the 1930s-1950s to see shows. It seems like Pittsburgh institutions have been chomping at the bit to have rail go someplace fast over the last 30 years. Typically, I hear projects involving Maglevs. But really Cleveland is the closest most logical big city to have rail going to for Pittsburgh. Just like Cleveland sees an obvious connection rail to Chicago. If I have time, I'll try to get PA's take on this since it seems like they will be the ones leading the charge, not Y-town.

Very nice series of analysis. I never realized that Youngstown didn't have the steel mills. That goes to show the parochial nature of politics in Ohio, not that Youngstown could've done much. It would seem that world economics were at work here. It probably saved Cleveland and Pittsburgh from losing steel jobs during that period of time. Another thought I had is the ecological factor. So these steel plants in Mahoning county were using ancient technology and needed to upgrade anyways. It would appear that Pittsburgh would be downwind of Youngstown. My family is from Pittsburgh and we constantly were driving most weekends to visit through the 70s and 80s and I recall as soon as we got into Pennsylvania we could smell the sulfur. Sometime in the early 80s it became barely noticeable and in the 90s really having to take a whiff in to even smell any sulfur.

I'd say its fair to compare Indy to Columbus. I don't think its fair to make comparisons to Cleveland as far as historical buildings, the age of the infrastructure around tower city, the amount of land to build on, and last but not least the topography. The Indianapolis convention center may be a very elegant solution for Indianapolis. Its hardly going to be an elegant solution for Cleveland to slap it up against the underbelly of an 80 yr old complex overhanging a river.

Hopefully this thread doesn't hit 100 pages before a shovel enters the ground.. There are other companies in Cleveland that are big and growing besides publically traded companies..

Akron-Canton airport running counter to the New Republic vision... http://www.akronnewsnow.com/business/itemdetail.asp?ID=23921&section=business&subsection=generalbusiness&title=CAK_Has_Best_Month_Ever CAK Has Best Month Ever 8/25/2008 6:55:04 PM | Marcy Pappafava The Akron Canton Airport set a new passenger record in July. Although not exactly like the Olympics in Beijing, the Akron-Canton Airport (CAK) is on a medal stand of its own celebrating a new monthly record - with 149,757 passengers traveling to/from CAK in the month of July, crushing the old record by5,541 passengers (set in July 2005). Compared to the same month last year, the airport hosted 20,005 more passengers in July 2008; a 15.4% increase. Year-to-date more than 837,000 travelers have used the airport compared to 802,442 last year, a 4.3 percent increase. The monthly record marks the best month in our 62-year history. CHOPPED

Thats an excellent idea is to tack on expected future and potential revenues. There's not too much additional revenue going to the county if they throw everything to Forest City with the Medical Mart running the show. Including opportunity cost also helps tilt things towards the Malls.

The one story I hear the most in Akron is the beggar ran out of gas and needs money to get back to Canton never Cleveland or any other place in the area.. I've also heard a twist on that. They need money to call someone in Canton to pick them up because their car broke down or ran out of gas. On this particular occassion, I handed the guy my very easy to use, candybar style, cell phone. He was shocked that he had a phone in front of him and started punching a couple numbers. Then said he couldn't use my phone since it was too frustrating to him and he gave it back to me and asked for money so he could use a pay phone again. I told him I could make the call for him even though he pretty much had started dialing. He gave me a fictitious number to dial but no one picked up or it went to an answering machine. He then complained they wouldn't pick up anyways. Aggravated that I wouldn't give him money he had to walk away from me.

I was driving up Jennings last night on my way to a show at the Matinee in OC and its just very impressive seeing how lit up SYC is with the steel mills surrounding it and the nifty marketing of the logo right up to the freeway. I'm now intrigued that I'll have to check it out in the next couple months. Its nice they don't use billboards that obstruct the view or if they do I didn't notice. It truly looks like a destination maybe like a tower city annex for big boxes. The other thing it reminds me of is Valley view but bigger and better planned. They really did a masterful job with the theme.

I've been noticing a lot of Fieros on the road lately. It would appear the reason is because they really do get decent gas mileage even though they are like 20 year old cars and they've held up. The main reason for this is because they are light in weight because they were the first plastic body paneled production car. I don't think there have been too many more cars that have used as much plastic as this car. This is basically what A. Schulman does. It makes plastic parts and they do make some bumpers and some plastic body panels. It would seem to be the right time for this company to start making serious inroads into the automotive industry when cars should be getting designed with lower weight again.

well hopefully it wouldn't come down to annexing. I'm saying merge since a city can't annex a village. The village must be unincorporated in order to annex.

I think a growing city of 16,000 has better capabilities to handle these properties than a shrinking village of under 1000.

They gain control over zoning the land and some control over policing the neighborhood. They would gain tax dollars from Thistledown. It would lower the income tax rates of the people in North Randall. Probably have a chance of raising their home values since they don't have the name North Randall stuck to the house anymore.

I'm sure David Smith is a fine humble ego-less public servant with nothing but generosity in his heart.. So are you saying you don't see this as a battle over turf? Do you feel "regionalism" is for wackos? Do you think that the decisions this mayor makes for the 850 souls is going to be superior to a decision someone else might make in the neighboring community? I never said he's a bad guy. I didn't say he's being bribed. He just has a vested interest to be the top political dog in his yard. Welcome to Cuyahoga County politics. I have no doubt he's going to try to "save" his community because it also saves his job. The community may even really appreciate all his hard work. Maybe he will pull it out. But I would wonder why put the community through that stress when it seems like such an obvious decision to just start talks with the community thats surrounding you.

Well KJP, that about covers it as far as right of way issues. It would seem rather futile to attempt to drive a passenger train through the Cuyahoga Valley to Cleveland. Its taking what 15-20 years to put the towpath through from its Northern Terminus? I see no point in trying to push through rail right of ways to Cleveland if its just going to be an excursion endpoint like Canton. That would indeed be an amusement ride.

Its clear the Mayor has no interest in losing his $50k part time job and his ride. There's now 850 people they figure living in that community. I bet the citizens aren't the highest taxable income earners in Cleveland. Yea they draw some $ from Thistledown and various dollar stores and gas stations. The obvious right move is to merge with Warrensville Heights. How odd though that a North Randall cop was arrested the night before that story came out.

I agree. The CVSR's goal should continue to be the preservation of their inventory and providing tours of the Cuyahoga Valley. But just as passenger trains must sometimes defer to freight trains, I can't see why a scenic rr schedule wouldn't defer to commuter trains. I'm hoping to finally get on the train this weekend to go to Akron.. Last time I tried to get on the train at Northside it was going to be an hour late because of some stupid hobo program they were running. Lesson learned, I'm getting on the train first, then biking back.

^^KJP, I would agree 15-30mph through the entire valley would be too slow of a speed to go. Its 24 miles to drive from Peninsula to downtown Cleveland I would guess it would be in that range probably a little less in miles by train. I can't see why a train getting outside the unsignaled zones couldn't hit 50-60mph or obviously more in the industrial part of the valley. I wouldn't want nor expect a train coming from Akron to Peninula to be hitting over 50mph. Say a train leaves Northside station going 30mph all the way to Peninsula. Thats probably a 20 minute ride. It shouldn't take much more than a half hour to get to downtown Cleveland averaging 50mph the rest of the way. I don't see an issue with the tracks being used as commuter rail 5 days a week. There are hardly any crossings in the valley north of Peninsula. The only 2 I can think of are at Boston Mills and the other on Highland road 3 miles north of that. Its pretty clear the rest of the way north as far as I can tell. You say its unrealistic to expect people to drive 5-10 minutes to a park and ride to hop on a train. They currently do that for a bus in Akron for the NorthCoast Express to downtown Cleveland. The buses are packed. It takes 45-50 minutes to get to downtown cleveland from Ghent according to the Metro timetable. But being how unpredictable I-77 is, I'm sure that trip can take an extra half hour. The CVNP is a working park and is all about being the contrast to the environment just outside of it. But it can't help but be affected by all the outside forces. Why are they bothering to bring back a steam train next month if its such a tranquil place. Blossom can have crazy traffic jams coming into the valley. The ski resorts get packed in the winter with plenty of cars. Constantly there are people just touring around via bike, motorcycle, or car. It would not be possible to use the CVSR to do this. You can't use a volunteer force for serious commuter service. It would have to be a METRO-RTA alliance likely building off the Northcoast Express success. I seem to recall that Metro owns the rail line. Local funding would come from Summit County government and Metro in Summit County and Cuyahoga County and RTA in Cuyahoga.

^^ I can agree with that. America has historically had people on the move. I'm sure there's a ton of people leaving Chicago every year however they are easily replaced. Dayton needs to address the issue of what it can do attract people. Also, I think its also common for young people in rural areas to move into their closest big city. A lot of that isn't happening for Dayton maybe they're going to Columbus instead now.

Nice work Jeffrey. What about adding Dayton's statistical twin Akron to your charts. They have a great many similarities in size and growth and being in the shadow of bigger Ohio cities.

I will be shocked and amazed if the state of Ohio has that much will-power and $$$$ to have passenger rail running through almost half the counties in Ohio. Honestly I'm surprised Medina isn't on that list. I don't even know where half those other counties are.. I feel I'm a realist with an idealist streak. Therefore I see way too many Nimby's in all those other counties. The other thing is if this is a "High Speed Train" how will there be that many stops in all those other counties?

There are a significant amount of people that live in Summit Co. in particular Bath, Richfield, Hudson, Stow, Cuyahoga Falls, and Akron that commute to Cleveland. A central location for all these people if not downtown Akron is Peninsula and there should be plenty of parking available there on weekdays. Should there prove to be overwhelming amounts of people wanting to park and ride there they could easily open up the Ira Rd/Hale Farm lots. Otherwise there's Botzum lot further down or even Boston Mills lots further North. I don't see any "development" restrictions holding the CVSR line back. Yes it can't build a TOD on its own. But I've said before there's an instant TOD in the Merriman Valley if the CVSR opens its eyes.

^Thats quite the damning table there KJP. Its obviously the wacky politics of Ohio that can't make it happen. Forget the fact that ODOT pretty much focuses on roads. Intercity means you have to get one place to another and we already have highways to do that is the logic the state reps can use. Any train system will likely only have stops in maybe 6-10 counties out of 88. How do politicians vote for something like that when it will only help the big city counties. Add in the political party polar opposites of Cleveland and Cinci and the fact that this would be no minor undertaking. Then it will be 8-10 years probably before a rail system is realized which is many political lives. Finally without an obvious place to start and finish, it amounts to another hot potato to determine places a train might run from and to and the route along the way. With that said there are 2 cities in Ohio that have rail connecting their downtowns with almost daily passenger train service although its obviously not state sponsered. Akron and Canton. I think the state should try to use this line as a test bed of how it could work in the rest of Ohio. It would meet many of ODOT's strategic goals of being intermodal(rail service stop at the fastest growing airport in Ohio), moving people safely, easing traffic, and being green in both re-use of old equipment and using less fossil fuels in polluting the air. Denote ODOT district #4 as a "Inter-City Rail district". Otherwise ODOT doesn't see its function as anything to do with passenger rail because where the rubber meets the road literally is at the district level.

Double whoa! I paid $31.09 in combined electric and gas last month. I felt my gas was a little too high for summer but I think they raised the rates on their transportation charges or something. I'm going to work on reducing that by working on building or buying a solar oven/grill because my back deck has a great western view. I have all energy star appliances but have only moved over 2-3 bulbs to compact flourescent. Otherwise 30+ incandescent bulbs I seldom use. Also have a 42" plasma and a couple of computers I never turn off, although they sleep a lot. Only used a couple overhead fans this summer. I'm in a townhouse development and its fun going to the side of my house to compare me and my neighbor's electric meters. One nice June Saturday I look at it and his is spinning like a roulette wheel and mine is just tiredly creeping along. I come around front and see he's pulling into his driveway. He wasn't even home but his house was going full tilt.