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Not to get too far off topic and I know East Cleveland is a disaster, but Cleveland itself isn’t necessarily a symbol of “competent, trustworthy leadership”!

I hear you but that’s a good way to guarantee nothing ever gets built. As for retail, it’s hard enough filling new retail spaces in developments in active areas. It would be d@mn near impossible here.

I don’t think we need any more underused green space added to the group plan. And yes, downtown’s grid and traffic patterns are a complete mess. Causes a lot of unnecessary congestion and carbon emissions. It seems like it’s just pieced together with no real thought to the entire downtown road network.

I think this is testing the market so I don’t blame them for trying to keep costs down through material choice. If these do well and the area continues to build up I could see future projects incorporating brick and other higher cost materials.

Imagine walking on the north side of Detroit through this intersection/circle. I can see how it's an improvement for drivers, but as a pedestrian it's a nightmare.

Looks to have more to do with the reduction of lanes, introduction of a median, on street parking buffer, and a ton of landscaping. All of this could have still been achieved without the traffic circles. The article mentions that pedestrians have to cross less pavement now. While this is somewhat true, thanks to islands and the reduction of lanes, it's referring specifically to drivable pavement. Pedestrians actually have to travel a further distance and more complicated route now.

Traffic circles have a car first mentality. I often hear fans of traffic circles state that traffic circles are statistically safer for pedestrians. While this may be true, so are pedestrian bridges. I wouldn't call either convenient, urban, or pedestrian friendly though. They are also terrible for the visually impaired.

Downtown Cleveland isn’t the lower east side. We’re not even sure if Heinens is profitable yet. Any competition or duplication of services will probably hurt. If Target was actually a possibility I’d take it any day over Heinens. Ideally both would be able to survive though.

Just remember that the 20,000 population figure does not hold true for retail. Stores will not open once we reach that number, so don't get too excited. For example there is one Target serving over 125,000 residents in the heights. Lakewood has 50,000 residents and a vibrant bar and restaurant scene but very little national retail. Downtown is disconnected from the neighborhoods and borders a lake, so its not a natural retail center. And in todays world of cars and free parking lots, and Steelyard Commons funneling away shoppers, it will be that much harder for a retail scene to develop. Go to googlemaps and type in any major retail store, I think I remember reading Marshalls or Old Navy earlier in this thread. Look how spread out they are and how large of a population they serve. They are also all located in retail hubs, surrounded by other major retailers. Nationally retail is struggling. Getting a store to locate almost alone in a current retail space isn't going to happen. You need something like a massive warehouse district project bringing retailers in all at once, and even then the market is still not great for it. Tower City tried it in the 90's and it failed. I know many of you will say that the market is better now, that there are more residents downtown. While there are more downtown residents compared to when the Avenue at Tower City opened, there are far less workers, way more competition with new major retail malls and centers, population has continued to sprawl out of the county, and nationally the retail scene is much worse off now that we have online shopping. Plus the current 17,500 population figure is inflated.

I easily would if we could have guaranteed that the entire neighborhood would still be intact. Most likely it would have been demolished for parking or other less iconic buildings though.

I think the difference between the garage and tower looks a bit odd. The panels somewhat remind me of the paneling from the 1960/70s that didn’t age well. I fear the same thing happening here. Glad to have the building though!

^ they were part of the neighborhood that was cleared for the terminal tower project

If you wanted to do anything I would suggest reducing the amount of pavement on the intersection. Reduce Lake to 25ft, one lane in each direction. On the south side of the street create a two way 10 ft bike lane with a 5ft landscaped buffer from traffic.

Agreed. There isn’t even a traffic argument for this. A traffic circle would add a lot of pavement to this intersection, as well as eat up a lot of the developable land. The interiors are generally rather inaccessible and unpleasant, becoming more of a driver amenity (something interesting to look at), rather than a pedestrian amenity or neighborhood asset. I agree with @Mendo and would much rather see a pedestrian friendly urban intersection similar to East 55th and Broadway.

Winking lizard used to occupy all the way to the point. I’m surprised to see they downsized.

Cleveland has never been dense, at least not on a large scale. Have there been a few block sections of higher density, of course, but most of the city is, and always has been detached single family and 2 family homes. The city was however overcrowded (different than high density) and people did understandably want to escape that. Don’t view that as an escape from density though, as it was not.

^ hard to make claims about the neighborhood and it’s residents when you don’t even recognize that as the farmers market. How much time do you actually spend there?

It's not surprising this area lacks any vibrancy and is not top on the list of development sites. The area around the station is cut up by the railroad tracks, lacks any sort of grid, and is filled with sprawling industrial uses and some big box retail. Residential use is almost non existent. These are not the ingredients for a successful urban neighborhood. Anything built here would be on an island by itself.

I’m personally not a fan of the modern white look and think they age poorly, but I hope these get built.

I think some suburban consolidation could be good, but I do fear that a full city/county consolidation will cause a population that is already declining to decline even further/faster.

The neighborhood will never be what the old timers remember because they and their families all moved out. Will the commercial spaces remain heavily Italian? Who knows, several are owned by non Italians but the business works. The Italian theme is part of the charm and draw so I would think business owners will continue to play to that. It will not become uptown though and face those same issues unless they demolish all of Mayfield Rd and rebuild new. The neighborhood needs a diversity of housing stock and commercial spaces and they are heading in the right direction.

Dollar Tree and Dollar General are not even the same concept! I have never been in Family Dollar so I’m not too familiar with them. This ban makes no sense. These stores aren’t putting grocery stores out of business, they are filling a retail need that was not being fulfilled previously. Are they fine with convenient stores and drug stores selling similar products at inflated prices?

^ I agree. We should do a meetup at a meeting all in support. I fear that the NIMBY crowd is always louder and more active. Would be nice if we could fill the room with supporters.

Thats from a center point (which includes downtown). I’m talking about adjacent neighborhoods, not a set radius. It’s probably more accurate to say Columbus outperforms Cincinnati and destroys Cleveland.

In my opinion as a Clevelander, there are several ways to look at this question which causes the debate. Each city has something that makes it feel denser, more urban, bigger city etc in its own way. Over the Rhine in Cincinnati is the structurally densist and most classically east coast urban neighborhood in the state of Ohio. You won’t be able to find anything else like it. North High Street and surrounding neighborhoods in Columbus offers the largest contiguous Midwest dense area in the state. Centered by a commercial corridor that activity extends for several miles. You won’t be able to find anything else like it in Ohio. Columbus also has German Village, a structurally dense neighborhood with brick homes and buildings, brick streets, as well as brick sidewalks creating a physicaly unique historic urban neighborhood for the state. Columbus destroys Cleveland and Cincinnati when it comes to downtown adjacent neighborhood density, activity, and stability. Cleveland’s inner ring suburbs is where it shines. Mainly Lakewood, Cleveland Heights, and Shaker Heights. Cleveland has Shaker Square, a unique transit oriented historic neighborhood with a rail line running through its center. Again, unique in the state. Cleveland also has medium density suburbs that extend for miles outside of the city, causing it to be “denser” on a regional level. Obviously each city has things, places, and neighborhoods it can call unique and be proud of, but I tried to keep this strictly about density, both population and structural.