edale

"There's a lot of really great restaurants in Cleveland," he said. "We want to be part of it." In fact, he added, he also looked at downtown Cleveland for possible locations, including E. 4th Street. Expansion to downtown remains a possibility down the line, he said. Hope the food is better than the grammar.

^ That's.....a....thing? Transit-Oriented Teens?! LOL so I guess this is me realizing I'm old and out of touch.

what is a NUMTOT?

If the orange line isn't called the Doritos Locos line, it will be a travesty of justice.

I really am not fond of Aaron Renn or his blog these days. He seems to be quite critical, and often rehashes the same points over and over again. Also, I see that the famous troll Matthew67 is a PROLIFIC commentor on that site. He spams almost every article with his same old bullshit about Cincinnati and its dastardly elites. Guy is a total whack job, but people who are unfamiliar with his unhinged rants probably believe everything he posts. What an ass.

The fenestration pattern on the corner building is puzzling. You have extra tall narrow windows on 14th and then these giant monstrosities on Race. What the hell? Maybe one of the architects can offer an explanation, but to me it just looks dumb.

This comment from the article sums up my thoughts on this tower pretty well. Nice little simon and garfunkle nod to boot. "The building is a jarring jumble of unstable sloping diagonals at its base, with a couple of faux, ill-shaped & sterile columns of various heights thrown in for good (or bad) measure. Despite the transit enhancing crumbs that it offers, it’s an infrastructure-crippling behemoth, one that is totally out of place next to the staid symmetry and balanced beauty of its neighbor, Grand Central Station. Rather than enhancing and reinforcing its neighborinf icon, it detracts and destroys. For if it truly valued “unobstructed views of Grand Central”, then the building should have been set back on 42nd street. And rather than “aiming to invoke and rejuvenate the sensation of traditional New York skyscrapers”, the terra-cotta facade strips (again with those diagonals) look more like an el-cheapo rip-off, to use the technical term. Where have all the good architects gone, Joe DiMaggio? Have they left and gone away?"

Thank you jwulsin[/member]. I was also wondering about the fate of the lone remaining historic building in this part of Pleasant, as it was not included in the current rehab and infill work at Pleasant and 15th, so it was good to see that it will be rehabbed into 6 condos along with the 5 new townhomes. Other than the Over the Rhine Community Housing warehouse across the street from the new townhomes, Pleasant will be pretty much fully redeveloped south of Liberty! Great news!

There were much larger forces pushing for the MLK interchange than just Uptown Consortium. Widening MLK does not preclude it from being a BRT corridor, and in fact, it might actually make it easier to accommodate a dedicated transit lane in the future, assuming SORTA has the money and will to undertake such an endeavor. I think another access point from 71 to Uptown was sorely needed, and I'm glad they installed the interchange, even if it does feel grossly over engineered. It was ridiculous that there wasn't a northbound exit between Reading and Dana! That's like, 4-5 miles of the city that were totally sealed off from accessing 71- complete craziness. MLK is a collector street, and it has basically been designed as a boulevard to link 75 and 71, while serving as a primary access point for UC, the hospitals, EPA, and now the new offices being developed. Like I said in my last post, if this whole area can largely be built up, and a fairly dense streetwall can be established, I think it will be a positive thing for Uptown. There are plenty of neighborhood focused commercial areas in these neighborhoods, and MLK serves a totally different purpose. While it will never be built to this intensity, I think of MLK almost taking on a DC K St. type of vibe, just way less intense. Wide street (with perhaps some potential for dedicated transit lanes in the future) lined by mid-rise office. Fairly bland and dead at night, but serves an important role regardless.

I haven't been keeping up with this story very much, because I'm only a casual fan of OSU, and don't really care about this stuff, but I don't understand why there's an expectation that someone's boss would get involved in domestic affairs of one of his underlings. I have no idea what goes on in the home life of my coworkers, and I don't really care because it's not my business. It sounds like Smith was a bit of a dick (surprise, surprise a football guy is a dick...) and had a volatile relationship with his wife. Unless abuse was happening at OSU facilities, or there were criminal charges pressed against Smith and the university tried to cover it up, I don't understand what the big issue is. Getting the 'life coach' to talk to the wife about not pressing charges is kind of messed up, but I could definitely see a situation where people knew Smith and his wife had a volatile relationship (not knowing the full extent of whether abuse was occurring or not) and they sent the life coach to try to smooth some of the marital problems out. As for NCAA having it out for OSU? Maybe a bit, given the absurdity of the tattoo scandal. But they damn near killed USC's program for a rich booster buying stuff for Reggie Bush's family. Penn State had coaches raping kids in the locker rooms, and comparatively got a slap on the wrist. UNC was found to be totally fraudulent with their student athletes, and nothing happened. Louisville was hiring strippers and prostitutes for players and nothing really happened to them, either. The NCAA is a complete joke.

3CDC is working in areas that already have established street grids, and most of their work is historic renovation and strategic infill, so it's not really an apples to apples comparison to brown/greenfield development. I don't think the site plan posted above is all that bad. You're not going to have a fine grained urban neighborhood constructed right next to the freeway and along MLK, which at this point is basically freeway-lite. About the best you can do along this stretch of MLK is build up a consistent streetwall with some height to it, to help make the street width feel slightly more appropriate, which I think this plan attempts to do. Along University you have an opportunity to connect with the surrounding neighborhood, and that is where the residential component is planned to go. Same thing on the NE portion along Whittier. The most troubling part of this plan, to me, is the NIOSH component. Look at that moat of 'green space'. Yuck.

I don't see anything about Pleasant St in the 8/20 HCB packet. Can anyone provide a link?

Ah, how could I have forgotten those beauties by Eden Park? Those are all seriously swoon worthy. A friend of mine lived in the first example you posted, and the interior layouts are pretty nice, too!

My favorite rows in Cincinnati are: 1) OTR https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1106408,-84.5194829,3a,75y,201.57h,91.4t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1suKHJGe1uLQzPEnxz9U4A8w!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 2) W. Clifton Ave https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1190528,-84.5181284,3a,75y,185.45h,93.96t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNICBg1B8dHL9hM_wnf1baQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 3) Clifton Heights/ Mt. Auburn https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1270688,-84.5078035,3a,72.2y,36.07h,95.27t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sBRuiRiTGXGNxifQgS2o47Q!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 4) Liberty Hill https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1134044,-84.5093518,3a,75y,222.45h,91.38t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sv4wm6-J9nc8ACVqkHDts-Q!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 Bonus: Suburban rowhouses in Mariemont https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1468118,-84.3835551,3a,70.6y,98.66h,84.09t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1scZePeq8g8JkOI0KERj9Org!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

For some reason, it seems like everything in Clifton is so...'home grown' for lack of a better term. I love that the residents of the neighborhood are so involved and willing to invest their own time and money into the business district, but I think it would benefit the neighborhood if some outsiders also were able to come in and shake things up a bit. You see Senate opening in Blue Ash, A Tavola in Madeira, Nation in Westwood, Urbana Cafe in EWH, even the owners of Kaze are opening a concept in College Hill of all places. But for some reason, it's always the same cast of characters in Clifton, and most of the new concepts up there haven't been all that exciting. It'd be nice to get a little chef/operator driven buzz going on Ludlow.

The east side of Cleveland (minus University Circle and Little Italy) and the city of East Cleveland appear to be headed the direction of the north side of St. Louis or parts of east Detroit. Huge swaths of urban prairie with barely sign of the neighborhoods that once stood there. Very sad indeed.

I appreciate all your photo updates!

I have a bit of a first mile/last mile problem with my transit commute. I rely on a circulator bus to get to the metro station closest to my place, but it is pretty infrequent, stops running at 7pm, and doesn't have weekend service. It's about a mile and a half walk, which I have done plenty of times, but in work clothes and with a somewhat heavy/bulky shoulder bag, walking is very unappealing on the way home (plus there's a bit of an incline the whole way). Yesterday, there was a Lime scooter in the plaza in front of the metro, and I seriously thought about trying it out to get home, but I just had too many questions and decided against it. It says you're supposed to ride on the street, but some of the streets I'd be riding on are very busy and it would be quite scary to be on a scooter in mixed traffic. I also had slip on shoes on, and I thought my bag also could present some problems. Idk, I want these to be viable alternatives for my commute, but there are some major hurdles involved with turning these into true transit alternatives.

I know it was an innocent mistake, but it's 1 T and 2 Ns in Cincinnati. If you have trouble remembering, you can think of the public anti-litter campaign "don't trash the 'Nati."

I agree that the architecture leaves a lot to be desired, but I am thrilled this project is moving forward. It's a pretty challenging site, and it's one of the last remaining sites for infill in Mt. Adams. Given the struggles Mt. Adams has been having with its business district, increasing the residential base is about the best thing the neighborhood can do. From a design perspective, I'm not sure what's going on with the little two story stone bit tacked on to the front facade, and I wish they could use brick instead of EIFS or stucco or whatever for the rear portions, but I suppose those will not be very visible at least. It's definitely not ideal, but the fact that no buildings were removed to accommodate this one, and the new residents this will bring to Mt. Adams far outweigh the design shortcomings, imo. I used to live on the west side of Ida St., and I could not hear the freeway noise from my apartment. If I stepped out to the balcony, then I could hear the noise, but even then it wasn't terrible. I had the best view of OTR and the hills of Mt. Auburn and Price Hill, I could watch storms moving in from the west, and I had the most amazing sunset views. Man, I miss that apartment.

A couple summers ago I did a solo trip throughout Europe, and I purposefully kept each stop to no more than 3 days, as I wanted to see a number of places I had not been before and was tight on time and money. I flew from Cincy to Paris, and then hopped on a short flight to Geneva, Switzerland. It was an amazing small city, and was the perfect way to start my trip. It's very clean and relaxed, and there was just enough to do for a few days before I headed out for my next destination. I'd recommend it if you've never been. Amazing natural setting, great restaurants and shopping, friendly locals, and much less stressful than a place like Paris or Rome.

According to the planning packet, they will demolish those buildings. I couldn't visualize them, so I took a look on streetview and they are some fairly ugly, vinyl siding clad structures. No real loss, especially since the site will see an increase of ~180 units once they're removed.

Yeah, LA has a lot of what I'd call 'hidden density'. From the street, many of the neighborhoods look somewhat suburban or not all that dense due to the front setbacks that are so prevalent in the city. But you have a lot of apartment buildings that are oriented perpendicular to the street, and buildings (like you said) go to the rear lot line or very close to it. This is close to where I live. Check the difference between the view from the street vs the aeiral: Street: https://www.google.com/maps/@34.109982,-118.2863212,3a,75y,36.04h,91.03t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sAhYqLoml7cIRwhVd8OYfzA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 Aerial: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Hollywood,+Los+Angeles,+CA/@34.1102277,-118.2862596,196m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80c2bf07045279bf:0xf67a9a6797bdfae4!8m2!3d34.0928092!4d-118.3286614

I agree with what you're saying neilworms[/member], and I similarly think that the new development on Calhoun and McMillan could have accommodated at least some of the more impressive historic buildings that were on the site. The example you provided of the diner in Chicago is a bit of a weird one, though, as the building that was saved is a simple one story structure, with no obvious historic value. Unless there is some sort of cultural or historical importance to this diner, it seems like this might be more of a NIMBY victory than a preservation one. Also, based on this thread on SSP, it looks like Chicago has a pretty massive problem of their own when it comes to preservation: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=233475

There is a really interesting youtube series called Defunctland about attractions at theme parks that no longer exist. Most of the episodes are about rides from Disney or Universal, but they have done a couple on Kings Island, including the Son of Beast and the Tomb Raider ride. Worth a watch if you're interested.