LlamaLawyer

@KJP Any idea who was at the party? Seems to me that could be a pretty good indication, because if this is to celebrate a closing, it would be weird to not invite some of the people (i.e. lawyers, brokers) who actually closed the deal for Stark. All of Stark Enterprises doesn’t add up to 100 people. Also does NuCLEus actually have design approval yet?

Lol at this gem: “Unfortunately, as disconcerting as the student may have found this, lettuce and other produce does come from a farm,” Graves said in his emailed response. “And farms do have insects — organic farms perhaps more than others.” $15 a pound for butter sounds kind of ambitious. Hopefully this location is not that bad.

Thanks, I hate it.

Awesome news, @KJP. I wonder if Uveye’s warehousing needs could have any relationship to Walton Hills or Brook Park.

The new place sounds like it may have a broader geographic appeal though. Constantinos was always just a convenience place, and unless you lived right in UC, there was no reason to ever go there. If you’re downtown you can just go to Heinens or the other Constantinos. If you’re in the heights, you can just go to Zagaras or some Heinens. As someone living in Cleveland Heights near UC, I had zero reason to ever shop at that Constantinos, but I probably will go to the new place. I bet some people downtown will too.

To add to the observational, anecdotal license plate data, the near east suburbs (CLE Hts, S Euclid, Univ Hts, etc) have been just crawling with out-of-state plates for the last couple weeks in a way they never have been in my memory (which admittedly only goes back a few years). Lots of New York and Illinois, but you could play the license plate game because they’re from all over. I’ve seen ones you don’t expect to see like Idaho, Arkansas, and New Hampshire. Not sure that any of this is meaningful; just consider it my contribution to the quasi-data garbage heap.

But the figures aren't up. "The Cleveland-based paint company now forecasts second-quarter sales to decrease year-over-year at a percentage rate in the middle single digits. It had previously forecast a decrease in the low to middle teens." They're just down less.

I heard a rumor a couple days ago that Nighttown in Cleveland Heights is closing permanently. I feel like that doesn't make any sense in light of recent comments the owner has made about the nearby Top of the Hill development. But the rumor came from someone who is pretty well connected in real estate circles and that I would think might know... Anybody able to rule this out? It would be a huge loss.

https://www.bls.gov/regions/midwest/oh_cleveland_msa.htm BLS data shows Cleveland-Elyria labor force way up in May. In fact, it appears to be the largest monthly labor force increase on record (back to 1990). It obviously also comes on the heels of a massive labor force loss, but it's good to see a quick, complete rebound. The total number is also the highest May labor force since 2010 other than 2017, which barely eeks out May 2020. Not sure what you can read into all these numbers, but they strike me as more positive than negative. On a negative note (but one less closely related to population trends), unemployment is well above the national average.

"Start to move quickly" What have the last few weeks been then, lol? In any event, hats off to Panzica.

I think they look cool (although some of that playground equipment looks dangerous as rendered LOL). These aren't exactly the kind of permanent installations that would be hard to take down and replace later. We need more interesting fixtures and playgrounds downtown, and I for one basically don't care at all what they look like. Statue of a golden pile of poop? Cool, people will come look at it and climb on it. What a photo op! Statue of a giant spider? Cool, people will come look at it. What a photo op! I mean we already have a giant rubber stamp. How does that mesh with the surrounding area? It's weird and in theory a super dumb idea, and I wouldn't have it any other way! These kinds of installations (particularly playgrounds) are the kind of easy, inexpensive addition that makes an area way more liveable. Have you ever heard of someone saying, "Oh, I would move there, but their public art installations are too modern and weird for my Victorian era sensibilities." No, but lots of people say the opposite and talk about how cool, weird, and unique an area is. Think about University Circle. There's some weird stuff there. There's a giant silver hand statue. It's really weird. But there's no way in which it's a net negative. Let them build their weird modern installations!

It appears from some of the O-Zone sites that Cleveland Cyclewerks is pivoting into the e-bike arena and is trying to build a new HQ in midtown (may technically be Hough, so I apologize if this is the wrong thread). Anybody have more information on this?

Glad to hear this is moving forward. The new design is an upgrade. Depending on how the cladding materials translate from the drawing, this building could be quite attractive. Fingers crossed we have a crane next year!

When you look at the revised, it makes you wonder why on earth they would ever have tried to do the original plan. Any idea what the price point will be on these?

The High Poverty Map is cool, but I'm not sure what useful story it tells. If you look at Cleveland in isolation it looks bad, but if you compare to most other cities, you simply realize that most cities have not reduced poverty since 1980 in a way that would show up on this map. Cleveland at least has a few "blue" areas. Nashville doesn't even have any! Nashville! Neither does Phoenix! So I'm not sure what the map has to do with population or economic growth other than perhaps to suggest the U.S. as a whole is doing a poor job of raising people in urban areas out of poverty.

They made quick work of the site prep.

Wow, it's barely even a mansard roof (I mean, c'mon, there's a balcony), but that slight angle and faux shingling really gives that building a DC/European look. I've always been mostly content with the quasi bauhaus developments that Cleveland seems to produce, but now I would love to see more stuff like the above, particularly in the eastern neighborhoods where it would blend well.

Absolutely! Anybody who’s been to Edgewater on the weekend in recent years knows that Cleveland NEEDS another beach.

This is a good argument against consolidation that I had never heard or considered before your post. I'd still love to see more consolidation, and you could probably do that without significant racial dilution by just absorbing some inner-belt suburbs (perhaps, Cleveland Heights, Euclid, Euclid Heights, University Heights, Shaker Heights, East Cleveland, Lakewood, Brooklyn, Linnfield, Newburgh Heights, Cuyahoga Heights, Maple Heights, North Randall, Warrensville Heights).

The framework for annexation under Ohio law makes it very challenging in a region like NEO with developed city governments. It will always be very hard to achieve consolidation, because city councils and mayors will look to micro-level fixes for budget shortfalls (e.g., Cleveland Heights FINALLY joining Cleveland Water recently). We need a push for consolidation so powerful that it results in legislative change at the Ohio statehouse. I think if economic turmoil were enough to do the trick we would have seen a movement toward that in 2009.

Is there actually an east side suburb that could satisfy BOTH of these criteria though? ?

Now THAT is a gorgeous rendering. Awesome scoop @KJP. This has got to be hands down the most exciting proposal east of the CBD.

It's a very nice design with a nice color scheme. At a high level, it's similar to One University Circle, which is an attractive building. I appreciate what @KJP said about now being the time for critiques. Personally, I assume there's enough criticism to go around without finding things to nit and pick about. The design is very Miami-esque, which would be a concern if there were two ounces of overlap between the issues Miami currently faces as a city and the issues Cleveland currently faces as a city. Let's get a few more Miami-style buildings first, and then I'll start complaining about them.

I actually think the CH nimbyism is a lot worse than the Flats folks opposing 2208 Superior Viaduct so as to hardly be comparable. Some of the folks in the flats are going to have a lake view blocked, even if it's not a good lake view. The CH nimbyism is very different. A Cleveland.com article came out months ago talking about lackluster design and making a contrasting comparison to the Flatiron Building in NYC. In the follow up, I saw a number of people on the CH Nextdoor forums seriously arguing that the top of the hill development should have the same architectural impact as the Flatiron Building. It's just beyond me that there are actually people in CH who think their little inner ring suburb that's barely paying its own bills should reject new development unless it would appear on the front cover of Architect Magazine. Anyway, thankfully this thing is actually going forward notwithstanding the opposition. /end rant