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Toronto Ohio: Toronto, Ohio is located along the Ohio River in Jefferson County. It is a small city with a population of 5,091. It was founded in the mid-1800s as "Newburg Landing" and later as "Sloan Station." But in 1881, citizens voted to rename the city after Toronto, Ontario - a city that the mayor felt was worth emulating. The town became a large industrial and transportation hub due to its location on the river. Though most of the industry has left the city, TIMET (the world's largest titanium producer) remains as a major employer in the city and will even be expanding the plant in the coming years. Despite the Upper Ohio Valley's hardships, Toronto has remained in relatively good shape compared to many surrounding river towns. This thread will give a photo tour of the town and list off the current and recent developments within the Gem City! I hope you guys like the thread! I just thought I'd represent my hometown on UrbanOhio ;D

This thread hasn't been touched in a loooong time.... I'll try to update it for now on since I run a general Ohio Valley development thread over on Skyscraper Page. That thread mainly focuses on Wheeling, but it has a run-down of projects from cities such as Steubenville, Weirton, & East Liverpool. Franciscan Square Phase One Completed (Steubenville): Today I am going to cover Franciscan Square. This mixed-use development is located on University Boulevard down the hill from the Franciscan University of Steubenville campus. The university bought up most of the previously undeveloped land on the south side of University Boulevard in hopes of expanding their footprint and making the area more welcoming. The first phase of Franciscan Square is complete - it brought a new Best Western Plus hotel and two retail buildings, all centered around a greenspace or "square". A Bennigans is also currently being built and will open sometime in July. A rendering of phase one of Franciscan Square: The new Best Western Plus: Inn at Franciscan Square: This week, two restaurants opened in the square. Brooklyn Bagel on the Square serves coffee from La Prima (a Pittsburgh Strip District based coffee company) as well as bagels, bagel sandwiches, and more. Believe it or not, they are actually the first real coffee shop in the Steubenville area - needless to say I am excited that I now have more options that Tim Hortons when I'm in Steubenville. The second restaurant, Rubi's Pizza & Grill, is a new restaurant owned by the owners of the former Corrado's Pizza in the Fort Steuben Mall - They moved here and shut down their mall location due to the mall going through extremely rough times after losing two of their three anchor stores. The restaurant will be a casual restaurant for pizza, calzones, sandwiches, & more. The exterior of Brooklyn Bagel on the Square: The interior of Brooklyn Bagel: Future phases include the Bennigans (as I mentioned before), office space, and possibly more retail depending on the demand. I visited the development and it looks nicer than expected. There are still 3 or 4 retail spaces open. I like how everything is centered around the central grass "square" area - I can see that being a neat gathering space in the summertime.

Steelite Showroom Coming to Commerce Building: Source: Business Journal Daily Steelite International, one of the world's leading tableware manufacturers, will be opening a showroom in the fifth floor of Downtown's Commerce Building. It will occupy a 15,000 square foot part of the building that once housed The Fifth Floor Restaurant. The showroom will be one of their largest. It will feature a fully functioning bar in order for potential buyers to try out their products. Steelite sells over 40 different brands and is a popular supplier for restaurants, hotels, and more. The Commerce Building (Built in 1917): The New Castle company chose this building because of its historic character and location. They wanted to be in Downtown Youngstown due to the large amount of activity and redevelopment occurring there. They hope that their clients will take advantage of Downtown's new DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel and eat at the variety of restaurants in the surrounding area. This will be their flagship showroom. (They have showrooms in other cities such as Atlanta, New York, and Los Angeles.) Here is an example of what Steelite's showrooms typically look like: I think this will be great for Downtown. It will add a unique type of business that Downtown currently doesn't have, and this block of Downtown needs investments like this. Plus, their clients include some chain restaurants, hotels, ect - who knows, maybe some will be impressed and want to set up in Downtown! And speaking of chain restaurants, Donatos Pizza is looking to expand into the Youngstown-Warren area and open four locations. Downtown is one of the main areas they are looking at. One thing Downtown really needs is some fast-casual type restaurants like Donatos, Chipotle, Simple Greek, ect. I hope this deal works out.

Noble Creature Cask House: Source: Noble Creature Cask House A local couple, Ira & Marcy Gerhart purchased an abandoned church at 126 E. Rayen Ave. in Smoky Hollow. They spent around $150,000 on renovations. The brewery makes and bottles their craft beer in the basement of the church. The main floor is being used at the main taproom. Though the brewery has no food options at the moment, they plan to add lunch and other small food options very soon. I think this is a great project - it is in a very blighted section of the city, but is located within walking distance to YSU and Downtown. The exterior of Noble Creature Cask House: The interior of the Noble Creature Cask House:

New Michael Kusalaba Branch Library Opens in the West Side: The Michael Kusalaba Branch finally opened yesterday. It is located on Mahoning Avenue between Glenellen and Schenley Avenues in the Rocky Ridge neighborhood. The library replaced the old West Side Library which was located in the same location. The library features several modern amenities that will benefit the West Side's residents. In addition to books and computers, there is a sound studio, maker space complete with 3D printers, classrooms, a conference room, a children's area, and more. It also houses the garage for the city's mobile library program. The exterior of the library from the back side: This is a pretty important development for the West Side - the West Side is already considered to be the city's nicest "side" but it still needs a ton of work. This will hopefully spur some development in a neighborhood other than Downtown. The Rocky Ridge neighborhood, which the library is located in, has a great neighborhood association that is both marketing and beautifying the neighborhood. Mahoning Avenue in particular has been seeing some storefront improvements and landscaping. The block the library is located on even has a small business district - this could be a great walkable neighborhood in the future. The interior of the library: Click here for street view of the library. Also, if you want to get more updates on the Youngstown area, checkout the /r/Youngstown Sub-Reddit - we are trying to make it more active, so please check it out if you wish!

Well, it's not just an idea - it's under construction as we speak. It's been planned since around 2013 but construction began late 2017. The first phase is set to be completed in spring 2019. Downtown is seeing a lot of development - the new hotel project in the historic Stambaugh Building will be done next month. Here are some renderings of the amphitheater park:

Hey UrbanOhio! I manage a large Youngstown Warren Area Development Thread over on Skyscraper Page Forums. Someone recommended that I start posting here also, so hopefully you guys are interested! Also, if there is a way to edit the first post of this thread, I'd love to add a detailed list of current and recent Youngstown projects. Link to my Skyscraper Page thread: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=230471 Downtown Amphitheater Master Plan Released: Link to plan: http://www.eagworks.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/16-0226_Park-and-Amphitheater-Master-Plan.pdf MKSK has released a detailed master plan for the Downtown amphitheater project. This plan gives us a lot of details about the project. A main focus of the plan is to find ways to integrate the new park with the YSU campus and Mill Creek Park. The main proposal that MKSK gives is to improve Phelps and Hazel Streets in Downtown - they are the two main roads that will be used by YSU students to get to the park. Their plan for Phelps Street has been initiated this week (see post on Skyscraper Page) but it is unknown if they will make it pedestrian only or not. A diagram showing Phelps & Hazel Streets and possible infill opportunities on each: They then go on to give ideas for future development related to the park. They highlight the possibility of developing apartments along Front Street where surface lots are currently: The next photo shows a very detailed master plan. If this is indeed the plan they are going with, I am quite happy with it. Some things on the plan are named incorrectly for some reason, but I'll ignore that. What I like most is that the surface lot buffer between Downtown and the park will be gone. In fact the only surface lots remaining will be around the Covelli Center and a few near the Market Street Bridge. I wish they would just build a parking garage, but oh well. Interestingly, this plan calls for tearing down multiple one story buildings along Front Street near the Covelli Center - I'm all for this as they are almost all eyesores. They will replace them with a restaurant space and a small plaza/parklet on the corner of Market and Front. It appears they want to get rid of the west parking lots at the Covelli Center, but expand them on the east side. They will replace those lots with a dog park, bocce courts, and basketball courts. The master plan: The amphitheater itself will be the first phase. It will have 3250 seats, 1000 of which will be VIP. Future plans could add two buildings on either side of the amphitheater with an extended canopy (renderings of this are in the plan.) The promenade, as seen in the master plan, will connect the Covelli Center to the amphitheater and the rest of the park. It will have space for food truck vendors and will be wide enough for emergency vehicle access. The parking lots will be reduced to 719 spaces, including planned on street parking that comes with a potential Front Street streetscaping project. Speaking of streetscaping, they have renderings for both Phelps and Hazel Streets. Interestingly, they call for the Gallagher Building's empty parking lot to be used as a movie viewing plaza - this is a neat proposal, and I will share a rendering of that made by a Kent State University student in another post. Unfortunately, it looks like the first phase, which costs an estimated $6.6 million, will not include the "urban plaza" which will add more park amenities along Front Street. That phase will end up costing around $1.2 million. Phase B will include the other park amenities and it is unknown when development for that will occur. Sadly there is no mention of what they will do with the space under the Market Street Bridge. There have been some cool proposals to turn it into an informal music venue or art space.

Yes and no. I personally moved out of there when I was very young, so I don't really have any accent at all. But it seems like the high school age group just has a hell of an accent. Some are super thick, almost Pittsburghese, others just have a slight Appalachian twang to it. But my point is, even the smart educated people in the younger generation have it whereas most of the older people only slightly have it (though some have thick accents for sure). But, oddly enough, I notice that 10 minutes away in Steubenville and Wintersville, very few young people have the accent.... I guess it just has to do with it being a "bigger" town. But then again, Wheeling, the biggest town in the area, has a very thick accent.

Since people were talking about Appalachian accents, I'd argue that some areas of Ohio have actually gotten a thicker Appalachian accent with the younger generation. I grew up near Steubenville, and I've noticed that in my old small town, the high school and college aged people have much thicker accents than their parents. Granted, about 30% don't have an accent at all, but I feel like you can really notice the accent more than you could years ago. I'm not sure why this would be, considering most places in America are actually losing their accents. But somehow, a lot of my younger relatives sound like they are from the middle of West Virginia while most of the older people sound like they are from Cleveland or something. It's also always been in the part of Columbiana County around the river (East Liverpool) but I'm noticing that its spreading farther north into the county it seems. Then all of a sudden in Mahoning County, its gone. Strange.