seanian

What public money was spent on QCS besides the $3.7M for streetscape improvements? Out of the $322 million for the project, American Financial contributed $318. There were TIF bonds that were issued by the port, but besides the $3.7M the city paid out for the streetscape improvements, the city has gotten that back in just 6 months after opening due to the $7.7M in annual tax revenue. http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/stories/2008/05/26/daily31.html http://urbanup.net/cities/ohio/cincinnati-ohio/downtown/queen-city-square/ https://cincyopolis.wordpress.com/2014/11/14/wtf-hamilton-county-board-of-revision-the-real-cost-of-30-year-abatements/ Ok PAlexander, I went to the web address supplied and it's a blog where somebody appears to be ranting. There is the portion what I think the person in the blog referred to as subsidies or what is commonly known as a TIF (Tax Increment Financing) which is $54M. The TIF bonds in the case of QCS are from the taxes that would've gone to the city coffers, but instead go towards repaying bonds. No money is coming from the city and going to the QCS project. It's just deferring city taxes on the tower for a period of time in the beginning. So in the beginning when the city taxes are paid on the building it gets re-routed to repaying the TIF bonds. The TIF bonds are essentially borrowing against future increases in real estate taxes. You can see the financing details broken out here: http://www.eaglerealtygroup.com/pdf/052808QCSPortAuthorityApproval.pdf

What public money was spent on QCS besides the $3.7M for streetscape improvements? Out of the $322 million for the project, American Financial contributed $318. There were TIF bonds that were issued by the port, but besides the $3.7M the city paid out for the streetscape improvements, the city has gotten that back in just 6 months after opening due to the $7.7M in annual tax revenue. http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/stories/2008/05/26/daily31.html http://urbanup.net/cities/ohio/cincinnati-ohio/downtown/queen-city-square/

What is amazing is that there are 12 states that have zero fortune 500 companies which says a lot for Ohio having as many as it does. I also noticed that there are a lot of other companies in the general Ohio area that are listed in the 1000 list. Some just out of reach sitting in the 500's like KeyCorp and many others.

I actually saw that article in the bizjournal Columbus but it left out what the bizjournal Cincinnati had, that article leaves out 2 companies in the Cincinnati metro that are located just across the river in KY. That is a problem when they base reports just giving Ohio data because Cincinnati's metro spans across the river, its metro area is in 3 states where as all other large cities in Ohio are only in Ohio.

Thanks for the info ColDayMan. I did not know that about the Orrville area being part of Wooster as well. Like you said, Akron is so close and I just assumed it was part of Akron because of that and you know what they say about people that assume :oops:

Here is the 2015 Fortune 500 list, sorted by each metro area. Wasn't sure if Findlay would be considered part of the Toledo metro or not. If it is then Toledo has 4 from the list and not 3. Akron (2): 166 Goodyear 206 First Energy Cincinnati (10): 20 Kroger 32 Proctor & Gamble 105 Macy's 371 Ashland Inc 414 Omnicare 415 AK Steel Holdings 416 Fifth Third Bancorp 443 General Cable 459 American Financial Group 481 Western & Southern Financial Group Cleveland (4): 153 Progressive 230 Parker-Hannifin 266 Sherwin-Williams 365 Travel Centers of America Columbus (4): 26 Cardinal Health 85 Nationwide 184 American Electric Power 262 L Brands Findlay (1): 25 Marathon Petroleum Toledo (3): 399 Owens-Illinois 410 Dana Holding 498 Owens Corning Wooster (1): 467 JM Smucker Edit: Correction to ranking of Ashland Inc.

I read that article and it looks like we'll hear about some new condo towers going up. According to the article we should hear something soon.

The GE HQ is currently located in Fairfield CT which means that it isn't anywhere near a major international airport that offers the options you are referring to. LaGuardia Airport in NY would be the nearest major airport which is well over an hour away on a good day. That would not be considered convenient, so I'm thinking it's a non issue. When they mentioned the threat to relocate they never mentioned transportation as an issue, only the taxes.

This is another reason why we not only have to work on the street car connecting downtown to uptown (which is very important), but also connect Covington and Newport via the same streetcar system. The Newport destination is different from OTR and The Banks and the streetcar making the connections to the many areas would make it very convenient for visitors whether you are local or out-of-town visitors. I'm sure there would be many people that find it much more convenient to float around to the many different areas via streetcar, but instead just visit one area or the other and leave.

Why would the intention for the Freedom Center to be able to look over buildings? If it was a river view it was supposed to have, then it should've been built next to the park so there would be nothing to block its view of the river. The Freedom Center is not a tall building, it's actually very small and anything you build would block its view. Therefore anything that is built South of the Freedom Center could be any size.

Not sure if everything was answered. DH is keeping the original location (headquarters), what about the sale of the rest of DH, is that still happening? Are they good with the outlook of continued growth?

I remember the same article about the new tallest going up. Never heard of anything the size of P&G. When they build their new headquarters it would definitly be built larger than what they need. W&S was set to occupy 530,000 sq ft in their new digs. So it is typical for a new headquartered tenant to only occupy only 50% of a new tower sometimes much less, it all depends on them. W&S moved over 2,000 employees, the same as what is planned for the new GE building. So Also remember the many articles mentioning a parking garage and residential. Parking with residential on top could easily be the size of the Scripps tower (or larger) or as small as 7 & Broadway, which I'm sure they would never build a small amount of residential.

A while back there was talk about a tower going up on Covington's riverfront. It was either going to be for condos or apartments. It looked like a sail and was 30 stories tall. Then Corporex had an issue with it blocking part of their view and the developer quickly decided not to do it. Then they decided on some other designs, but not directly on the river. Haven't heard anything about those either. There was also talk about the IRS wanting to use a smaller footprint where the existing facility is and wanted to build a tower. Then they were going to let the city have the rest of the land for a convention center expansion. Anybody heard any articles relating to any of these. It's like they fell off of the face of the earth never to be talked about again.

That article mentioned that a number of firms already located downtown are looking to expand, which could result in a new tower. However they also mentioned that some companies are looking to move downtown, so that might keep demand high for the existing buildings as well. I have heard over the years of towers consisting of not strictly just office use, but instead mixed use. So instead of building one residential tower in one section and an office tower in another, it could be beneficial to spread the use. Therefore you could have not just one office tower and this way the dominating tenant can have their name on the building. So each building could have 25-30 floors of residential and the other 25-30 floors would be class A office space. This would also make it easier for other tenants to come downtown and make their mark on the skyline.

I have already read that even Cranley said that if it was necessary, that we could do what we did with Krogers and build them a garage. Therefore, since everything points to them wanting to be in downtown, a tower can be built anywhere in downtown with plenty of exposure, have plenty of parking and be in the core of downtown. They do not have to be in "The Banks". They could be anywhere in the CBD. I would actually prefer that, because a developer could actual have a tower built and give them prominence in the skyline. If they want to be on the edge of the skyline, there are still many places a tower can be built and give maximum exposure for GE. A developer would have the ability to build a nice tower beyond the 400K sq ft to accommodate others until GE fills more of the space. Similar to how Queen Tower got built. A developer only needs a certain percentage to build a tower. Building in "The Banks" could limit that exposure by coming in too small.

Reported in the Business Courier, Western and Southern is looking for investors to take a minority stake in Queen City Tower to free up capital to continue new development. Looks like something might be on the horizon.

What was the Edge?

So Cool. This will be very nice.

Great that this hotel is going in, but I thought that it might've been a different type of mixed use project. Apartments are still planned and I thought the hotel and apartments would've been one building instead of two smaller ones.

This part in the article had me curious: “We realize the potential 309 Vine holds, it’s a golden opportunity among the Cincinnati skyline,” Gates, managing partner, said in a news release. “We are excited to deliver a product that’s not currently in the market at competitive rates.” The part where it is an opportunity among the skyline has me curious. Right now it doesn't have any impact, so does that mean they plan on building something else there? The phrase where it is said they are excited to deliver a product that's not currently on the market also has me very curious. I guess it will be a wait and see. I'm sure we will be seeing something in the news down the road.

Agreed, municipal business should be located in one area. Why spread it throughout the city? I very much like the idea of converting some of those buildings into apartments or condos, but I think it's silly taking county administrative services out of downtown.

Did anybody see the survey in the Cincinnati Business Courier. I have been checking it for the past hour now and while many more people have voted in the survey, the percentages have stayed the same. What should the city do with the streetcar project? Finish it: 83% Kill it: 16% I don't care: 1% Votes cast: 690

I wouldn't be surprised if Kasish doesn't try to lure them to Columbus either. He is not for Ohio, he is for Columbus only. Kasich is a douche. Then we will now have Cranley that works off of his ego and doesn't care about the city of Cincinnati. Cranley was a council member and afterwards worked to get a company (Paycor) moved to another city (Norwood), yet people in Cincinnati don't get it. He is not for the City, he is for his own political gain. It's just like when he went to all of the "Republican" based people and company parties, just so he could get elected. He is a worm.

All looks good :lol: With Catholic Health Partners looking for 350,000sf of office space to be built for their new headquarters as stated in the Cincinnati Business Courier, it would be nice if they decided on downtown and adding a new HQ building in the CBD.