j73

From the look of this site map on the Cleveland Heights city website, the new parking deck will cover part of the existing lot behind the movie theather (from about the Pub on Lee or so) southward across Tullamore (which will no longer go through to Lee) and onto part of the future site of the Terraces. I remember the city saying the plan was to block off Tullamore even when it was Domain on Lee. http://www.clevelandheights.com/PDFS/CedarLeeParking.pdf

Map Boy's right - the ground floor was regular retail and the upstairs was for deals/outlet.

Ugh... what an utter waste of time that was. Mingling from 6-7:35, then the guy from Nat'l City gets up there b/c they helped sponsor the thing and gives a 5 minute speech including the details of how great their free checking and debit cards are! The panel itself lasted no more than an hour, although, as others have mentioned it was hard to hear above the din. Would have been much better, too, if the moderator had done more than just pass the mic around. Have someone up there who actually knew something and could moderate the discussion by asking good questions and leading a discussion instead of relying on whichever self-serving wacko grabbed the mic. Stark was very unimpressive to me. Lots of trite blabber. At first he came off as provocative, but when just about every comment was in the same generic, over-the-top vein, he ended up just sounding like a blowhard. Doug Price and Ari Maron were the most impressive of the bunch.

I'm w/MTS, although for a hub, I believe Cleveland has relatively little connecting traffic which makes the retail a bit less impt. Still, what's there is generally crap. Also, can we get some natural light in terminal C???

Was playing around on the Avenue District website... Don't know how up-to-date the info is, but it looks like they sold 27 of the 58 units in the 1st building (lofts & penthouses) and 6 of the 30 townhouses.

Speaking of Little Italy, Il Bacio has a website with a menu posted: http://ilbaciorestaurant.com/default.aspx This is the new restaurant that went in across Murray Hill Ave from Baricelli Inn, where Tutto Giorno and before that Salvatore's used to be.

I plan to be there.

BTW - I've never been to AJ Rocco's - is it going to be packed on Thursday b/c of the opening night of the NCAA's?

6:30's tough, although I think I can make it too. Anyway, as for a discussion agenda, here are a few starting thoughts. Basic idea presented has been to explore forming some sort of non-profit to promote urban issues. So, things to discuss would seem to include: - What's the group's actual mission/purpose? - What guiding principles can we agree on? - What kind of activities would this organization undertake? What kind of activities wouldn't it undertake? - next steps Other stuff?

One other kind of odd aspect of the rendering is that the whole thing is raised off the street level... In the print edition you can see a small flight of maybe 5-6 steps to get up into the courtyard. A don't hate courtyards in general (as someone else noted there are tons of bldgs like w/courtyards in places like Cle Hts, which is still pretty urban), but the problem I have with this one is that it looks so wide - the rendering has trees in it for crying out loud. The Cle Hts-style buildings all have relatively narrow courtyards between the wings. This one seems more like a plaza. And the brick wall and raised level (if the rendering is accurate) add insult to injury.

^Throw out a day...

For the Clevelanders, how about we plan for Thursday, March 29 at 7:30? This should give those folks who're interested some time to plan. Would Great Lakes be too noisy on a Thursday?

^Good to see they're really taking care of the neighborhood! :-( Sheesh...

^^Maybe I'm blind, but I've never been at all afraid in Little Italy. Granted, I've mainly stayed on Murray Hill Ave, Mayfield & Random, but never noticed anything the least bit suspicious, let alone scary. Are the problems you're talking about along those streets or more on the back streets? As for the retail, I agree the strip across from Guarino's is a bit shabby at the moment, but the rest of Mayfield and much of the parts of Murray Hill w/retail looks pretty good, as do the new storefronts for Battuto and the wine bar (although losing Gilly's was a shame...)

Sounds like somethingof a consensus to wait until next week, location TBD, although I'm all in favor of including beer. Only consideration for next Thurs is that it's the 1st night of the NCAA tournament...which means (a) many of us would want to see the game and (b) most places w/beer and tvs will be packed. I'll poke my head in downtown tonight in case someone shows b/c they didn't get this msg in time. I'll have to make sure I check the board at work next time... oh well.

^^Here's their website: http://www.lightbistro.com/

^MayDay - did you move? I thought you lived in Edgewater?

^Hope you can make it. Hope the kids are alright.

For those of you interested, it seems like it might be easier to flesh out in person some of the details of what a pro-urban non-profit organization might do and how it might work. I realize this only works for the Clevelanders, but how about trying to get together at 7:30 pm this Thursday at the Starbucks on W 6th and seeing what happens? For those who can't make it, we'll post what comes out of it on this thread. (The Starbucks seems like a central and reasonably quiet location, although alternate suggestions welcome...) If you can let me know if you plan on attending, that would be helpful so we know to look for you.

Re:DC - having lived in DC for 3 yrs, my opinion is similar to several others: It's clean and easy to understand but there are large sections of the city that it's simply hard to get to via rail (try getting to the Lincoln Memorial or anything anywhere near the west end of the mall without a long schlep, along w/Georgetown). Bus transfers (10 yrs ago anyway) were a bit cumbersome and the fare structure, while equitable, is a bit of a pain if you're going outside of DC proper (not a big deal...) Despite some warts, I'd take NY's functionality over DC. That said, DC & the VA suburbs (don't know as much about MD) have done a great job with TOD. A lot of those stations along the orange line in VA weren't really near much when they were built, but are now semi-destinations in their own right (thinking Clarendon, Court House, Ballston).

Great pics! Where are they taken from? You seem to be pretty high up...

^If you read the article more closely, you'll see that Eaerthlink charges $9.99 for low-income residents and $21.95 for everyone else. In any case, cheap wifi is great, but do lots of low income people have computers with wireless cards in the first place?

Wordnick - Shaker Square definitely sounds like a good fit for you. I don't think anyone's actually described it to you - Shaker Square itself is actually a shopping center modeled after those you find in Germany. Instead of a row of stores along a single street, there's a blvd (in the middle of which runs a train) that cuts through a ring road. Around the ring are all the stores. It was built back in the 20s/30s, and is very quaint. Several very good restaurants and some more family-oriented restaurants. Lots of shops, a movie theater, coffee shop, pharmacy, dry cleaner and a grocery store. Essentially most everything you'd need in a neighborhood all within walking distance. Also, they close down the main blvd every Sat morning and host a good farmer's market. So, to your question re:Shaker Heights vs. Shaker Square. Shaker Square means the shopping center or the neighborhood surrounding it and is technically in the city of Cleveland proper. Shaker Heights is a city unto itself with many neighborhoods within it. If you don't end up in Shaker Square, Cleveland Hts (where I live) is a good choice too. Unless you live in the far west edge near the Cedar-Fairmount neighborhood, rail transit into downtown isn't realistic, although I believe there are buses that run downtown from many parts of Cle Hts. School system doesn't have as good of a reputation as Shaker Hts, although everyone I know with kids in Cle Hts schools loves them. The population is very diverse (ethnically, economically, etc.) which tends to depress standardized test scores. So it's not clear if the schools aren't doing a good job or if it's just that a higher % of the students are coming from more disadvantaged backgrounds. Several decent neighborhoods to live in, although no one has the full range of amenities that Shaker Square offers (although the main neighborhoods are very close to one another and, in fact, only a 5-10 min drive to Shaker Square, too).

Was in the neighborhood so drive by it today. They did have the sewer connections in, but there was no above ground construction. Didn't notice anyone there working, but didn't have too much time to look.

^Haven't been - how is it different/similar better/worse than the RRHOF?