thebillshark

Yes, looks like an excellent site plan. Way better than the site plan for the citirama that was proposed for the West End before the FC Cincinnati stadium project.

Why on earth wouldn’t they? Wouldn’t that directly increase their revenues? Or does it have to do with the crazy Stadium lease?

I think it’s garbage. They’re building a 280 car garage on top of an 8,000 car garage. We’re never getting anywhere with this type of thinking. (Here were my thoughts): https://cincinnatiideas.com/the-banks-phase-3/

Well, there’s finally a proposal for Phase 3: https://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2018/06/01/townhomes-250-apartments-including-micro-units.html

Not to my knowledge- but it may be a concept waiting for several techs to come together like LED lighting and solar panels. (Looking ahead, a changeover to an electric vehicle fleet could even change the ventilation requirements and thus the canopy design.) Like bikeshare was made possible by GPS tech, wireless communication, computer technologies, and bikes coming together. Or, it could just be unfeasible for other reasons.

It’s not socialist or communist to point out that surface parking lots are bad for cities. It’s a tragedy of the commons problem. Yes the owners of the lots are going to make money but if everyone wrecked down their buildings for lots there wouldn’t be a city left to drive to. Hundreds of cities and towns have committed suicide in this way.

^if they are more profitable as lots that’s a huge problem for the city. Parking lots are HORRIBLE for the vibrancy of the Street, neighborhood and city. You don’t have to read this in a book, take a walk around (there, or the northwest part of Downtown) at different times of day and night, weekdays and weekends to see what I mean. Furthermore they are preventing much needed growth of people and jobs in our city. I touch in this here: https://cincinnatiideas.com/2017/04/20/cincinnati-needs-people-vision-10000/

^yes the lot was presented as temporary. They are spending $400-$500k on it as i recall so they will probably want to make that back at least. Which (me speculating) they might be able to do in 2-3 years which is probably how long it would that to get a new plan for the site going anyway depending on what happens to Liberty Street. If we don’t have action (project put out for bid) on Liberty Street by this fall I think the Liberty Street Safety Improvement project is in jeopardy.

Had an idea while stuck on I-75 for a sun delay the other day: highway canopies. For high volume highways a simple hard canopy structure could provide several benefits: Alleviate traffic congestion caused by sun delays Alleviate traffic congestion caused by rain (hard rainfall) Prevent traffic accidents caused by rain (roads are slick when it rains the first time in awhile) Alleviate traffic congestion and prevent traffic accidents caused by snow and ice Reduce the need for salt to be applied thus extending the lifespan of the road Eliminate potholes and the damage they cause to cars Could reduce noise pollution by installing sound absorbing tiles on the underside of the canopy Could reduce light pollution by having LED lighting under the canopy instead of huge light poles Could install solar panels on top (a much better place for them than the “solar roads” concept that keeps getting floated about) Challenges: Exhaust- You could have gaps in them with staggered overhangs to deal with the exhaust (and possibly fans.) Lighting- in addition to LED lighting you could have light diffusing skylights to let light in during the day. Would need street cleaning- but could be done during low volume times. The billboard lobby wouldn’t be happy. Forming a continuous canopy with existing overpasses would be challenging. High costs would be the biggest challenge. The economic benefits to users, highway maintenance, and police and fire would be spread out and hard to capture. This is where solar panels could help.

Not at all the same situation Ohio cities are facing, but this could be filed here: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/may/29/skyscrapers-wrecks-cities-luxury-towers-ugly-greed

I think Piston Society is more a destination retailer for people who are into motorcycles/motorbikes than a store you buy stuff at because you’re just walking by. I think they are moving because they wanted room for more bikes.

Someone still has their “Neue Freunde” textbook!

^That’s a lot better! You’d still have to make sure there’s be stores and entrances facing the Fourth street and Plum Street sides of it though. If there’s a need for a “transitional area” as you put it it’s because we’ve been getting the way our buildings interact with our streets wrong for decades now.

I hope not! That would be such a travesty. They should create publically accessible stairs/elevators (maybe inside one of the tanks?) and put an observation deck on top. One of the highest points in the county (~960 Ft.)

^only if you count surface parking lots as “development”! Doesn’t pass the smell test

Oh no!!! I think the tanks should be preserved and be used as a centerpiece for a great new public space that could create some momentum for the neighborhood

I almost rented the apartment above the Plum St. Cafe back in 2011 or 2012. It was a pretty crappy apartment, with the back bedroom's windows maybe 18" from the building behind it. So like zero light got in there. Also, I take my cat to Dr. Bob next door. My cat's recurring nightmares are all set there, I suspect. This is what I mean. Here you have a street with what is probably from your description naturally occurring affordable market rate housing, a cafe, a vet who lives above his practice, and even some high end development going in down the street. It’s the kind of mix that we should be trying to emulate elsewhere when we spend redevelopment dollars.

E I don't know how to us this blog, but 1. the sidewalks will still be functional (you can walk on them). Some will be inside out of the weather (24/7/365). Sounds attractive to some walkers. 2. Leave all the "beautiful historic buildings" in place. There is existing retail and apartments. Attach the glass cap to the historic buildings. Or, just leave the facades. 3. Only closing one block; Plum, a useless street at present. Tearing down the Albee was necessary. Since Cincinnatians seem to want to live in some idealistic past, not only can they stare at the real facade of the old Albee they can stare at colorful lighted LED Albee facades.... think Blink. Now we have a beautiful new convention hotel, an enclosed air conditioned walkable park/exibition space and beautiful preserved historic buildings. A street is the basic building block of a city, in a way a mall enclosure is not. A street is a fundamental element that people have tried and failed with gimmicks to replace (think skywalks.) Psychology your proposal, if it was not someone’s destination, would be seen as one big superblock to walk around, not through. That you describe that section of Plum Street as “useless” suggests we have irreconcilable differences. I would grade the west side of Plum an “A” for strength of building form and diversity of uses. There is even a new condo project underway on the south end of the block that will combine old & new construction. The parking lot on the east side of the street obviously needs to be redeveloped though. Additionally we had a mall in Carew Tower and it failed and had to be redeveloped, and Columbus had a mall downtown that was razed and redeveloped, so a downtown mall is not the kind of project that has been historically successful. This would be taking bunch of separate buildings with different owners that can reinvent themselves over time (a robust configuration) and combining them into one big fragile project probably getting government aid. The kind of project that in ten years headline writers will be writing things like “What’s the matter with convention place mall?” And “Convention place mall fails to attract tenants” similar to the problems we’ve seen at the Banks or Newport on the Levee. So, our historic buildings are not just about living in an idealized past, they are about maintaining a robust urban form that we know can stand the test of time. (Also, welcome to the forum... hope you don’t mind the vigorous debate right off the bat! You’re quite skilled with the graphics)

No one knows or cares about Blink outside of the region. Its a pretty awesome thing you've got, but doubt anyone even from Indy would know about it ;). Even when Cincy does stuff well it undersells itself. To be fair, it has only happened once so far. I believe I saw it mentioned in one or two national publications. I'm not saying all is being done that could be to sell the city (far from it). But it seems like that is something that would have been easy for those championing the status quo to hold back -- something that is really world class, new, and requires public cooperation and approval. It's one thing to say things could & should be done more competently, and another to charge a grand conspiracy to keep people away. Blink was a local event. There were few people from beyond a 60 mile radius. It was BY Cincinnatians FOR Cincinnatians. https://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2017/09/27/international-artists-to-create-eight-new-otr.html

I’m sorry RJohnson[/member] but that plan has WAY too much “urban renewal” going on. It looks like you would tear down all the historic buildings west of Plum. It makes no sense to knock down a bunch of beautiful historic buildings to put up a speculative shopping mall in any era, let alone one where retail is dieing off and Macy’s left downtown. You’d be replacing productive private properties with something that would require massive government expenses. Closing in the streets would be terrible for walkability of the area. Finally, reproducing the Albee facade (a historic building that got torn down) on something that itself replaces historic buildings would be insult to injury.

The garage is on the smallish side so the construction cost per space would probably be high. If you flipped it 90 degrees, it’s longer so you may be able to fit more spaces, but then the entrances would get complicated as well as possibly having more complications supporting the buildings above (that’s my guess at least, I’m not that kind of engineer, but as pictured the garage columns would line up with the walls of the buildings for the most part.) They only have one shot at this block for the next 50-100 years, so might as well spend the money on an option that builds on the neighborhood’s natural scale and walkability by opening up the interior of the block. EDIT: another thing I like about it is there could be 4 other stand alone infill structures on the block that aren’t tied to the fate of the parking garage. That’s good for granularity. (As opposed to all the new buildings serving as parking garage wrap)

I made some diagrams for the OTR Kroger Block featuring a new east-west cross street and an underground garage. The block is quite large for OTR, 400' east-west and 350' north-south, so bisecting it with a cross street as jmecklenborg[/member] suggested would work rather well. A 40' wide street (enough for a two way with parking on one side and 6' sidewalks) could be added yielding a 150'x 400' block and a 160'x 400' block (for comparison the block of 14th, 15th, Republic and Vine is about 175' x 380', oriented in the other direction.) The new street could be named Turner Street in a nod to Turner Hall which used to stand on this block as cincity[/member] stated above. (14.5 Street could be an alternate name if you wanted to make it sound "high-tech" for start-ups.) A three bay, 180'x200' underground garage could fit in the middle of the block under the new street and two new office buildings. I estimate a this could fit about a hundred cars per level, so a three level garage would yield about 300 spaces. A new alley to 15th street could provide access from the garage to the new 3CDC office development on the corner and future development on 15th and Moore streets. There would be space along Walnut as well as on 15th for residential infill. Finally, there would also be space for a beer garden in back of Wielert's in a nod to the impact that establishment had on our city's history. (In my plan, I did not make it a huge space like it was historically, I think it would be rather risky to do that and compete against other establishments that are already providing outdoor beergarden-like space.) Thanks taestell[/member] for letting me use his pictures as a basis for these diagrams. Underground garage outline: Potential Infill: [/url]

Hopefully, but that’s the kind of thing that’s hard to tell from a rendering. At the 84.51 building you can easily tell the difference between the two halves because there is a huge difference in the quality of lighting they used for the garage (lower quality) and the inhabited space. I still haven’t seen any mid-block renderings of this project just these views from the street corners.

Actually I wonder if they have given any thought to putting the outdoor stage at the other end of the “Festival Park” (Lot 23)? It would have be following advantages: 1. could potentially fit more people by taking advantage of area behind stage as it’s drawn now and also what’s labeled “Transitional Park” (Lot 28) 2. Specatators would be more facing Roebling bridge as a backdrop 3. Music wouldn’t be pointed directly at the buildings of the Banks development (Lot 24), but out towards the park and river 4. Would be pointed towards Bengals tailgaters on stadium side and they could see what’s going on as they’re walking over from the stadium or from the stadium concourse itself (entertainment before Bengals games has been part of these proposals) 5. Maintain right of way for Race-Madison Bridge The question definitely should be asked & addresssed if MEMI is chosen.

Yeah that whole thing will have to be redesigned! The way it’s pictured now someone could drive right up and shine their headlights on the stage, or ramp their car onto the lawn. They should probably eliminate the cul de sac entirely, perhaps have Race culminate into an alley or street that cuts over to Elm. I wonder if it’s any master plan anywhere to keep a ROW open for a Race St. - Madison St. bridge? Also does this preclude residential or hotel on Lot 24 immediately to the north on the side facing the festival lawn due to noise concerns and force that to be office?