thebillshark

^looks great, good project. Appreciate the granularity. The one thing about it is that the uniform height along Race does stick out a little bit- it seems a variation in heights between buildings is a defining feature of Over the Rhine.

If they end up leveling everything in sight I do wish they would have gone to Oakley

I readily admit I don’t know what the needs of the church & Bible college are here, but it seems to me rehabbing their existing structures and adding a new building would be an easier project, rather than demoing everything and building all new. But, I really don’t know anything about the building conditions or the financing part either.

I remember back in college days-ish going to a party on Hollister St. and at some point during it hiking directly up the hill through woods for the fun of it and ending up on what i thought was a pretty fancy street. Was that something that was replaced by the apartments, did I end up somewhere else altogether or am I making it up?

Dang. How many middle class income tax bills have to add up to produce that amount of money?

I think if it doesn’t block the view of the Bell Event center steeple from the west looking across OTR then it is OK. It’s pretty tall but there is also an elevation difference between the two so it might be OK.

I get that the Ballet wants their facility to be close to the Aronoff and Music Hall (since that's where they perform). It's also important for image/prestige to be in a high visibility location, and near the other performing arts groups. My ideal would be if they could team up with a developer to do a mixed-use project at the CMHA site on Central Parkway. That would be a great location for it jwulsin[/member]. Good idea!

Yea but MLS folks saw that and said no way. Surely Berding and his crew realize that the MLS wants urbanism. thats assuming they all have a nuanced understanding of what urbanism is. They might (likely) just look around and say “we’re in the city, so it’s urban, right?”

But what we’re taking about at Liberty and John is a beautiful historic church that might get torn down now. Moreover, it’s a link to the community FCC says they want to be a part of. I understand buying out a used tire place but this is entirely different! Re: the surface lot, maybe they could have worked a deal for garage parking? If not big whoop, I’d rather have the church & parking lot than no church. (Even IF the church is excited about selling I’d prefer the historic part of the building be preserved.)

^thats disturbing if the rumor about the church all the way at Liberty and John is true. That is WAY too heavy handed and disruptive to the neighborhood and taking up an unnecessarily huge footprint. Bull in a china shop. Wade and Bauer right there AREN’T blighted, (in contrast to what I would consider blight, around Oliver and Poplar streets to the north,) with good buildings and good urbanism, just in need of some infill structures to become the equal of any street in Over the Rhine. If FCC can’t do this with finesse and respect for what’s already there in the neighborhood I don’t think I can remain a fan.

I agree the interchange is great for Uptown and also East Walnut Hills and Evanston. But I do think the “quadrant” plans could be a little better. What are those things providing access to the interiors of the quadrant? Streets? Driveways? Parking lots? A street is unambiguous public space but those other forms leave a pedestrian to wonder if they’re really supposed to be there or not. Then if your building entrances are facing driveways or parking lots and have their backs turned to the street you’re really closing yourself off from the city and creating a “dead zone” on the street.

For true walkability, not just walkability as a buzzword, you have to start with streets. Then, the building entrances must face the street. It’s pretty simple but rarely done

That’s strange because there was a drawing for a garage that included some kind of transit center for busses and Uptown shuttles right where the “smart center” (whatever that is) is. Doesn’t show up as a garage here. I thought it had already gottten some funding. (Not sure if that is a logical place for a transit center anyway)

It’s either an extortion or a disaster waiting to happen. We are in a ridiculously fragile position.

Continue southward to Covington. A bridge in this location was fully funded around 1994 before it was diverted to build the cable-stayed bridge in Maysville. Maybe the cul de sac would be a good spot for an air gondola/tram across the river. Heck of a view alongside the suspension bridge for the whole ride. Would connect NKY convention center to the Banks.

I still think the planned Race St cul de sac is awkward as heck. Race Street should at least jog over to Elm St.

Agree. The footprint here is slightly bigger than 8th and Sycamore so there is plenty of room for probably 5-6 stories of mixed-use and maybe 2-3 stories of structured parking. I don’t think we should go that tall (if I’m reading your comment correctly- 7 to 9 stories total?) The east-west view of the church steeples across OTR is pretty iconic and the Bell Center is an exclamation point to that. A taller building on the pendleton lots would threaten that.

I hope whatever it is preserves Grear alley. It’s a long, brick, great historic alley with some building entrances fronting it and a connection to the little pocket park & Pendleton businesses. I’d actually like to see townhomes fronting the alley. Would be unique to Cincinnati if they did something like that & be like the screenshots of the narrow streets in Philadelphia that someone posted awhile back.

EMC is a big loss. The proprietors really stuck their neck out creating an independent concept unique to Cincinnati. But in the end there were not enough bodies walking through their store. I could see it every time I went by. Because for all the urban living and streetcar hype we are not adding population fast enough. There are real world consequences to NIMBYism and maybe this store could have held on a little longer if the Elm and Liberty project wasn’t halted. Could have had ~150 or more potential customers living nearby. Also when they opened they had to deal with some arcane law where they couldn’t sell wine on Sundays. We need to prep the ground in the urban core to make sure our policies are more business friendly and pro-growth. We haven’t done it.

Blog post about the Kroger site: https://cincinnatiideas.com/turner-street-new-street-in-otr/

Not sure if that means MLK is getting wider. The action along MLK could be reserving ROW for a shared use path on the north side of the street. (I don’t think light rail is on their radar.)

This was discussed in council today along with a debate about parking spots in Washington Park garage for SCPA teachers. 3CDC wanted to move those spots to the Town Center garage. Contrary to popular assumption during the FCC Stadium debate, it was stated there are no current plans to redevelop the Town Center garage into a larger parking/mixed use structure! New theory: maybe the FCC garage is going in the West End NORTH of Liberty Street somewhere between Central Avenue and Linn Street? In the vicinity of Oliver and Poplar Streets? There's some vacant land over there and FCC could have taken a look when looking for alternate West End stadium sites (I remember reading they looked at several sites.) Maybe that's how the stadium is related to the Liberty Street project? Even if true, that's not a good reason to stop the Liberty Street Safety Improvement Project. EDIT: It was suggested as a stadium site: https://local12.com/news/local/west-end-businessman-proposes-alternate-location-for-fc-cincinnati-stadium

Studies, studies, always need more studies, does this mean the results of the downtown traffic study they’ve been working on for three years now will be null and void? What a joke

^you take the River Road Exit and turn right on Linn St. (from there you could take Ezzard Charles or Liberty to the stadium.) it’s pretty easy and how I would usually come home to OTR driving north on I-75. Agree on the second point- even after the road diet all you would have to do is put up “no parking” signs on game day and you’d have the same capacity as you do today. Doesn’t make sense to use the stadium as an excuse to stop the project.

California high speed rail article: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2018/07/30/us/california-high-speed-rail.amp.html It’s funny- people will say they supported spending unfathomable-sum-of-money-that-they-have-no-intuitive-concept-of $X for a project but then they say they don’t support it when they are told the cost has increased to unfathomable-sum-of-money-that-they-have-no-intuitive-concept-of $Y. For maintaining suppport for projects like these, it seems it’s more about managing expectations than the real world cost.