cadmen

You make some good points originaljbw. Building on Chester would enhance that neighborhood but that neighborhood is different than Playhouse Square. Even though it's just a block away Chester looks north as you said. It connects more with the Greyhound property and Perk Park/9-12. The reason l like a Prospect building is that would directly help Playhouse Square. And that's the asset l want to see developed. But it's all good. You'll probably get your wish before me lol.

The Luman leasing up that fast (especially in the pandemic) is great, great news. Now we anticipate Act Il. The article speculates on a location with the likelihood it will be on Chester, although building on Prospect may be in the running. As long as we're speculating here my preference is Prospect. Sure, Playhouse Square already owns the Chester site but that location seems to me to have very little to do with Playhouse Square. Even though it's only a block away it's the wrong block. The Prospect site on the other hand is visually connected to the Square. And even though the Square gets more than a million visitors a year it appears awfully quiet. Not much street life. A building on Chester isn't going to add to that. BUT a building on Prospect would lengthen the Square's footprint because you will be able to see it unlike a building on Chester. Right now Playhouse Square ends abruptly at Prospect. There is Playhouse Square and then there is...Siberia. If you build on Prospect you add another high rise and more street life. That life may even encourage a few more storefronts to open. Maybe the little park on Euclid actually gets some use. My amateur urban planner brain says building on Prospect gets you more bang for your buck than Chester.

Thanks Ken. I always wondered who bought the property, spent money to cut down quite a number of very large trees BEFORE they determined that the land was unstable and too expensive to build on. Just have to wait and see if those "permits" lead to anything.

Hey Ken, since you live in Lakewood l wonder if you have any info on a potential development there? l live in the old "Pink Hotel" on the rocky river. A couple of months ago on the Lakewood hillside next to the river a guy spent two days cutting down most of the second growth trees there. As if that wasn't bad enough he just left them. The hillside looks like a tornado swept through. Today l noticed a large board was put up with a bunch of what look like city permits on it. It's on the northwest corner of the Detroit and Sloan intersection near the hill. Just to add to the mystery about twenty years ago l had a friend who kept a boat at a marina there. All the tenants were told to vacate the marina because the property was sold to a developer who was going to build a multistory residential building on the hillside. After the marina was removed all the old growth trees were cut down and then..nothing. Years later l was told by some locals that after cutting the trees down it was determined that the hillside was too unstable to build on. But now there is this recent activity. Do you know anything about what is happening there?

Weird if they were forced out unless Gilbert has some amazing plan for Tower City which l doubt. And if there is some amazing plan it's gonna take quite awhile to implement. So why kick out a rent paying foot trafficking business now? Just weird.

One would assume that is the case. The navy and probably a couple dozen other federal, state and local government entities would have to sign off. Not to mention Canadian interests. So yeah, we're just speculating here. I jumped in when a couple of posters questioned whether the subs could run under the ice or just under water period. There seems too be two ways to get the subs here. Either under their own power or on a barge. Bottom line: If the entire water passage from the Atlantic to Lorain is doable THEN we begin the next phase which is competing with other cities for the business. Whether Lorain wins that competition or not depends on the influence Ohio politicians and business leaders have. This game is just beginning.

BTW if the subs, resting on top of a barge can fit through the Seawsay locks and Welland Canal then they can make it to Lorain. If that is the case then at least we have the opening of a negotiation.

Of course parts of the middle of Lake Erie may be deep enough (just) and most of eastern Lake Erie is plenty deep enough not to mention all of Lake Ontario is fine. I was referring to a couple of posts that wondered about the efficacy of the subs moving underwater along the route from the Atlantic. Plus, IF the subs need to use an underwater trial to test a repair then the depth immediately outside of the Lorain harbor may be problematic. That limited depth may be enough for the navy to say it's not a feasible location. I'm just speculating here but when you consider this would be a new facility in a shallow great lake...well those could be deal breakers. Just sayin'

It would be great news and all if anything close to the proposal happens but l'll believe it when l see it. That being said, it's one thing to build a large repair facility but it's quite another to expect giant nuclear subs to navigate underwater in these parts. I'm pretty sure most of the St. Lawrence Seaway, the various locks and connecting bodies of water as well as the middle and western part of Lake Erie is too shallow for a modern US naval sub to operate underwater. So even if repair facilities are built in Lorain the only part of the lake deep enough to test things underwater is the eastern part of the lake. Because of that limitation l find it hard to believe Lorain will get the facility. I hope I'm wrong though.

Such a great asset to the neighborhood! That's how you do it.

Wow, that church would have made for a cool re-hab. Too bad its not feasible. But, from the article, at least they tried.

I spent 5 years doing research at the Cole Eye. I have to say at the time (early 2000's) the space was adequate, especially when talking with people who pre-dated me and had come from the old facility. But at every annual Clinic up-date one number kept going up; the patient count. I've been retired for 4 years now and the most recent report was of an even larger than expected patient count. So I'm sure an expanded building will be greatly appreciated. While I always felt like a very small cog in a very large machine the Clinic never failed to amaze me. It's quite insular. I often felt like I was working on an aircraft carrier. So many departments, so many people. And like a carrier at sea we seemed immune and cut off from our surroundings. BUT we were big and powerful offering opportunity and protection to many.

mrnyc you question if Lake Erie is too shallow? If the Subs are transported here on barges then it doesn't matter what depth the lake is. Plus I assume any repairs will include a drydock so again, depth will not be a problem.

I agree with Ken on this. ALL of the features in his first paragraph bring a great synergy. The whole IS greater than the parts. There has been talk periodically about what to do with the Browns stadium. I love the idea of building a new one around the East 20's and St. Clair. Especially if it comes with a RTA Downtown Loop. I would rather see a Loop than a new stadium but I digress. The only problem with this wonderful (and grandiose) plan is money. We still haven't figured out how to pay for a new Justice Center and that project appears to be on the same timeline as this one. Adding a new stadium seems to me one project too many. We can do these things. We can connect the Lakefront to the city. We can build a new stadium and we can build a new Justice Center. We just can't do them at the same time. If anyone on this forum can show me how to pull off that trifecta I welcome your thoughts.

(Inaction) Jackson was so intent on keeping the city from falling backward that he forgot it's possible to move forward. We really needed a fresh look at what's possible. Bibb is very young and inexperienced as well. He will make mistakes but at least he appears to be trying. I'm very hopeful that this young man can open us up to possibilities rather the tunnel vision we had been getting.

Yes, l was just about to make the point and gruver best me to it. Love the Main Avenue Bridge driving into the city especially but also it is visually stimulating from below. And as l've said before, it does a great job connecting both sides of the river literally and visually. I get wanting to make the Shoreway a boulevard but even if that were to occur you still need a way to cross the river. Funneling all that Shoreway traffic to the Detroit Avenue Bridge is not a great idea as things will really back up. I'm not a big car guy. Nevertheless you do have to take into consideration that a permanent traffic slowdown will occur when you replace the seamless movement of cars along the present Bridge/Shoreway and replace it with driving through downtown and across the Detroit bridge. That will piss a lot of people off. So we will either need to replace or repair the Main Avenue Bridge. I really don't see an alternative. A new landbridge and a boulevard shouldn't impact that. I think there is enough land to connect a boulevard to the bridge. Isn't it possible to connect them without needing the present looong ramp?

It seems there is a fortuitous set of timely circumstances at work here. There has been a movement around the country to remove highways that cut through the downtowns of many cities across the US. There is the proposal by the Haslem's to connect the waterfront with the Mall. An idea that has the support of the new mayor and the downtown councilman. Finally, the Main Avenue Bridge is coming to the end of its projected lifetime. On the flipside there is the long-standing tradition of traffic engineers both locally and maybe even more importantly those coming from the state (ODOT) to focus only on the fastest and cheapest way to move cars. There is inertia to deal with. There is the the status-quo. And finally, there is that old bug-abo, lack of funding. So we're at a cross-roads. We've been here before. We're still here. I think the only way out of this dilemma is to form a commission (I know that can be a dirty word) that can marshal the resources of those who want change vs. the status quo. This may be the moment when just enough leadership can break through. Having the Mayor, City Council, the Haslem's, perhaps NOACA, the County and RTA/Amtrak might be just enough to force through a project that finally creates a downtown/lakefront that focuses on people and not the movement of cars. The right kind of leadership with financial backing has been hard to come by in these parts. Gateway was one example of success so maybe a new commission can start by examining how that project was pulled off. It can be done. It just takes the right kind of leadership. Fingers crossed.

Holy sh*t! Are those pics real? If so, what a beautiful addition to the neighborhood. It's projects like that that give hope to people and in times like these hope is very important.

Adding bike lanes on Lorain and Detroit is all well and good but a bike lane on Superior is what excites me. The first two streets are relatively narrow so, sure we can squeeze them in and that's fine but Superior... Superior is wide enough for car lanes, bike lanes and TREES. We can put bike lanes in the center flanked but large trees and additional streetscaping. If done right we get the best of both worlds. Bike lanes and beauty. Best of all it's not even that expensive so for once money shouldn't be a deal breaker. So let's get it started!

We are used to Megaprojects being announced with great fanfare in Cleveland only to quietly disappear over time. To me the most hopeful news, aside from the project itself, is that the people behind it are heavy hitters. And they have a track record of getting things done. While Ken's article is focused on real estate those of us who care about the future of the baseball team can take solace in knowing that the organization behind the Baseball Village is on track to become first a needed minority owner and ultimately the majority owner of the team. The Dolan family have been wonderful owners but they don't seem to be able to financially compete with the other owners to our detriment. The (probable) new owners appear to have deeper pockets and if the Ballpark Village is any indication, they have the willingness to spend too. Here's hoping for a more vibrant neighborhood outside the stadium and a more competitive team inside the stadium.

I don't think Councilman Slife will be winning over the NIMBY crowd with that attitude. Who does he think he works for anyway?

My money's on Public Square. It's centrally located and all. Plus we won't have to tear down any buildings unless you count Rebol.

Thanks for the link Pugu. I'm always interested in lists/rankings showing economic activity even though they seem to show conflicting data. I can't make any sense of how we're doing as a state or region. On one hand Ohio is dropping nationally in per capita income and has been for decades. I think we're now in the bottom 25 states and still falling. Anecdotally, whenever I read about a large investment being made invariably it's not in Ohio, albeit the news of a massive new chip factory is phenomenal even if it is Columbus and not Cleveland. But whenever I read an article about Venture Capital investment its always the same half dozen states on the coasts so it appears Ohio is not doing so well. On the other hand Site magazine always seems to list Ohio as one of the top states for new business investment. And now this link showing we have two of the top ten cities for entrepreneurs. How does that equate? Maybe the truth is somewhere in the middle and we're doing just ok at best.

In retrospect looks like we got fleeced.

Excellent!!