LifeLongClevelander

This is the mess that Bibb inherited. Jackson's pitch to get the income tax increase passed in 2016 was basically a pack of lies. When it was announced in 2016, it was stated that the increase was going to bring in an extra $83 million per year in tax revenue. With the governor's order stating that people who worked at home instead of working in their Cleveland offices and the relief funds from the Federal government, the department heads under Jackson cannot use the pandemic as an excuse. Since the extra 0.5% started to be collected at the start of 2017, well over $400 million should have been brought in. Cleveland shouldn't have Crown Victorias in service that are well over 10 years old. The EMS fleet shouldn't mostly consist of units that would be too old and worn out to even serve in backup capacities in other cities. There aren't even enough fire trucks to cover for repairs and breakdowns of front-line units. During the recent snowstorm, only 48 regular trucks were available (plus 12 road graders and 13 small trucks) to clear streets. For people to expect that after being in office for less than 3 weeks, the deplorable state of Cleveland's equipment cannot be corrected basically overnight. Even in a normal world, equipment cannot be procured in such a short period of time. With supply chain issues, it will take months longer. Now, if progress doesn't start being achieved by next fall and the same problems exist when things hopefully start returning to normal, that would be another story. What is aggravating in this state of affairs, is that it has been going on for years. How could Jackson even consider in good conscience make a prolonged pitch to spend $2.5 million on a dirt bike park with all of these equipment problems facing the city? At least that foolish thinking came to an end. The 48 regular trucks to clear snow from streets has been an on-going problem for decades. When Kucinich was mayor in the late 1970's, Cleveland had a similar number of trucks to clear streets. Even in the depths of default, he was able to lease, then purchase 50 Unimog mid-size trucks to help clear streets. When Voinovich became mayor, he re-instituted a policy last used in the 1950's where garbage trucks were outfitted with plow equipment to assist when weather got bad. After White became mayor, he ended the use of garbage trucks to clear snow. Since then, over the last 32 years under 3 different mayors, every year it is announced that Cleveland has about 50 trucks to clear snow to start off the winter season. The default is ancient history and even then it was worked around. What happened to the increased revenue from the tax increase? Why wasn't Jackson ever pressed on providing answers?

McDowell has had quite a few problems in his past. The ATV incident was one thing, but he also committed assault, resisted arrest, received stolen property and had an OVI. Those are the known incidents. These problems led to him serving 11 months in jail. Collectively, Watson has more incidents and is a predator, but McDowell has a pattern as well. Resisting arrest, assault and causing significant injury to a police officer coupled with a past history that included jail time will weigh heavily with his case as it advances through the legal system. Wouldn't be surprised if he does serve some substantial jail time. If the legal proceedings are concluded by next summer and by some wild chance McDowell avoids jail time, he most certainly will face a suspension (perhaps a lengthy one) by the NFL. Based on history and the nature of what Watson did, he will be facing a lengthy suspension as well. Don't expect either one to play in the NFL for the 2022 season.

Yet, there are going to be people who are going to be all-in keeping McDowell on the team and/or bring aboard Deshaun Watson.

The "best" candidate for county executive is someone who has large tax bills go unpaid to the tune of nearly $16,000 and finally gets things paid up is when he is ready to file the campaign. In addition, this "best" candidate signs the legislation that grants him a tax abatement. Amazing. All this county needs is another scandal of its leadership. Hasn't there been enough of these "outstanding" candidates who cannot keep their own situations clean, are inept, incapable of management or outright thieves? It has been decades of scandals. The names change and the nature of the scandals are different, but in the end is more of the same. Inept and corrupt leadership for the county is helping to drive down the county. At least in case of Sellers, this comes to light before the campaign season ramps up or even worse, gets discovered after he could have reached office. If this is what the "best" candidate has to bring to the table, don't want to know what the lesser and worst candidates have.

When the rail line was proposed along Euclid Avenue, there were plans to build the line so that it would diverge from the Blue/Green joint tracks to run on Euclid. It was also proposed that at Euclid and E.120th, the Red Line tracks would come down from the rapid transit right-of-way for street running. Opposition to that routing grew from the reasoning that if the tracks would diverge at that point, it would mean the loss of the Free Clinic building on Euclid Avenue (nobody brought up that it could have meant a new, bigger and better location). The operation on Euclid Avenue would have been provided with the Breda LRVs. Mayor Mike White's opposition helped kill the Euclid Avenue rail line. There was also a proposal to run electric trackless trolleys (the ones that run from overhead wires) on Euclid Avenue. When Hayden Bus Garage was rebuilt during the 1990's, provisions were included that would have permitted overhead wires to be installed.

If there are winds from the north, it will open up water along the Canadian shoreline. If the winds turn and are from a southerly direction, open water will form along the southern shores. This is the sort of thing that gets the ice fishers in trouble on the Great Lakes. Ice starts getting pushed apart due to wind shifts. It would take a sustained cold stretch with either little wind or wind out of one direction for a longer period of time. It also helps if the ice breakers aren't sent out. Don't think the ice breakers get sent out for no reason, but if there are ships that get caught trying to get those extra loads delivered before the lakes freeze over, they may need to be dispatched to free them up. That winter of 1977-78 was so cold for an extended period of time and winds out of the north/northwest that allowed it to happen.

RTA only has two active bus garages: Triskett on the west side of Cleveland and Hayden in East Cleveland. Not many buses are out on the road during the overnight hours. If bus drivers could not get to the garages in the first place or they could get to the garage, but then got stuck after pulling out, that would be the basis for issues throughout the system. I never recall RTA ever having a system-wide shut down due to weather, either. In years past, RTA had far more snow-fighting equipment on the rail lines and would run extra rail cars to keep the lines open.

One strategically placed rock (as long as it was hard enough and not prone to fracturing) or piece of metal would be enough to restrict movement of the switch points (the special pieces of track that create the diverging route) so they could not properly travel. It is only a matter of a few inches of "travel" of the ends of the switch points between having the wheels take the through route or diverging route.

RTA' problems are compounded by multiple factors. For one, they are forced to operate two-car trains practically all the time. After the morning rush hour, the number of riders drops off significantly and doesn't pick up until the afternoon rush hour. With rider levels that RTA has, single-unit operation is warranted. Over 35 years ago when RTA operated the Airporters, all of which were single-unit rail cars, single-unit operation was the normal mode of operation in off-peak service and this was when RTA had much higher rider numbers. When peak periods kicked in, the Airporters were coupled into trains and the older Bluebirds (the majority were married-pairs) were put into service. During weekends, single-unit operation was the norm. Operating two-car trains when rider numbers don't support them is a major factor in causing quicker deterioration. At least the Breda LRVs are designed to operate as single units. Without turning loops, if the LRVs had controls at one end and needing to run as two-car trains, they would be deteriorating just as fast as their heavy rail counterparts. Another factor is the are no LRVs currently in production that are as wide as RTA's HRVs. As it is, RTA is having trouble even gathering interest in prospective bidders. Since RTA's rail car order, if they go down the dead-end track of being a custom, highly specialized one-off order (making the same foolish mistakes over and over again), current experienced rail car builders of reliable, well-designed equipment aren't interested in getting into the custom-run business. They have their current production line models that have been engineered and the bugs have been worked out. Even if RTA decides to order the maximum number of replacements they have projected, that will be it for this custom run. There may be talk that RTA could plan extensions and new rail lines, but the management of these rail car builders know the reality of the situation. If ever RTA decides to order more rail cars in the future, the history of foot-dragging will put this possibility so far into the future that whatever is developed now will be obsolete. Despite RTA's management thinking otherwise, in the minds of the managers of rail car builders RTA is viewed as a small-time operator. Worse yet, they know that they will be dealing with RTA's leaders who think they are far more important than they are. The rigidness of the initial bidding process regarding the short bidding window and limited time to gather shop facility information proves RTA's vision of self importance. For rail car builders with full production schedules, a small and unique order that will cause them great difficulty in navigating obstacles that RTA will throw in their way will not be worth it. Unfortunately, the well-regarded builders with excellent products will show little interest in the order. What could be left is some inexperienced builder may be drawn into the process. They will offer an unproven design with no historical experience in building this type of equipment. If this type of builder ends up being the winner of the bidding process, the end result will see long delays in deliveries, massive numbers of problems, unreliability and failures. This will then become the next generation of failed equipment in history like the Boeing LRV's of the mid/late 1970's and multiple failures from Breda. Boeing never built anything after the joint order for Boston and San Francisco. Breda's poor equipment has caused them to be forbidden from bidding on replacements for their failed LRVs in Boston and San Francisco. Those systems were forced to replace their Breda rail cars prematurely and even cancel the deliveries of their last units because they were so bad. We don't need a repeat of these scenarios in Cleveland.

First off, I believe that there are light rail vehicles that currently in production (like by Siemens) that are about the same dimension in length as RTA's Breda LRV's. Basically the shop could service those models as is with the only modifications need for the portion of the shop that services the heavy rail vehicles be modified to support the LRV equipment. The ones being retired by San Diego are nearly identical in length with RTA's Breda LRV's. San Diego's newest LRV's are the Siemens S70 Ultra Short is 81 feet 4 inches long as compared to the Breda LRV being 77 feet 2 inches long. For San Francisco, the Siemens S00 SF is currently being built and it is 75 feet long. I am in agreement with raising the track level to accommodate the new LRV-based equipment. That is not an expensive proposition at most of the heavy rail stations. As you mentioned at Tower City, the new LRV's just could use the current Blue/Green/Waterfront facilities. At the Airport, one track could be modified while the other remained in service. There have been multiple times due to repairs that the Airport station used one one track for extended periods of time. Plus, the service levels aren't such that both tracks aren't a necessity where taking one out of service won't cause undo operational hardship. If RTA decides to use cost-saving "logic", panel track (full-sized sections of pre-assembled track (with concrete ties) could be used place new track over existing track. Railroads do this sort of thing all the time. With the need to conform to the Americans With Disabilities Act, maintaining the high platforms allows them to do this. As I mentioned, in cities like San Francisco, their LRV's have doorways that can service both high and low platforms. If the platforms are designed for wider rail cars, there are two solutions: Make the platforms wider or have extensions at the carbody doors. In Philadelphia about 30 years ago, the Norristown High Speed line suffered serious equipment shortages (old, worn out equipment and several wrecks that destroyed equipment). To temporarily resolve the problem, SEPTA purchased 7 married-pair sets from Chicago (plus another 3 sets for parts). The former EL cars were narrower than the platforms on the line, so extensions were added to the carbodies at the doorways to fill in the gap.

Guessing that Sellers came to the realization that having multiple large late back tax payment issues and signing the legislation as mayor that granted himself tax abatement on his property wasn't going to play over very well with the voters.

There are numerous systems that operate light rail vehicles that serve both high and low platforms. This is definitely not unique and has been successfully operated on these systems for decades. The biggest system constraint is the Central Rail Maintenance Facility. Inside the facility is a transfer table that shifts rail cars from one track to another. Some tracks are only accessible via this table. This is the greatest limitation in rail car length by constraining them to around 80 feet. The current "standard" of heavy rail equipment is to operate two cars in semi-permanently coupled married pairs. To separate and re-join sets is extremely labor-intensive. I was told that the old Bluebirds that consisted of mostly married pairs took about 6 to 8 hours to separate and the same number of hours to re-join. The married pairs were about 96 feet long, but were never serviced out of Central Rail. The current Tokyu heavy rail cars are 75 feet long. When delivered, there were 40 300-series cars (301-340) with normal operator controls at one end and 20 (181-200) single units with controls at both ends. The 300-series are always operated in trains of 2 or 3 cars so that control cabs are at either end of a train. This train can be comprised with either group, just as long as the normal controls are at the end of each train. Furthermore, the hydraulic jacks to lift rail cars are embedded in concrete in the shop floor of Central Rail. These are specifically spaced to line up to the reinforced lifting points of the rail car bodies. The four jacks used to lift Tokyu rail cars are spaced differently than the six used for the Bread LRVs. If different length rail cars were acquired, portable jacks can be a temporary solution, but long-term, the jacks need to be re-positioned in the floors. RTA got around the issue of operating 150-foot long pairs by having each rail car with standard couplers and train wiring for connections. To break apart or re-join sets takes minutes. Unfortunately, the industry standard is for the semi-permanently joined pairs and RTA is such a "minor" system to rail manufacturers. Their needs are too unique to design and build what would comprise a "tiny" order that would have only one customer. It may be cost-prohibitive to modify the building to accommodate a transfer table to handle 150-foot long pairs. RTA simply does not have the ridership numbers to call for married-pair rail car set operation. Unfortunately, the system doesn't have enough of operational single units to run them alone. So, basically around the clock, RTA is forced to operate 2-car trains even though a fewer than 10 people maybe riding in the train. Each of the Tokyu rail cars can seat about 80 people. To operate 2-car trains is extremely wasteful in power consumption and only causes unnecessary wear-and-tear/maintenance on rail cars that are already way past due for retirement. The design of the CTS rapid transit was done in the days when high-platform operations were the vogue and projections for ridership were sky-high. Those extremely lofty rider counts were never reached and plummeting ridership does not support true heavy-rail/high platform operation in Cleveland (even if ridership significantly increased, maintaining the current set-up is unjustified). Instead of doing the order "piecemeal" in groups of 15 to 20 each time, RTA needs to do one order of common rail vehicles for the entire system. Other systems routinely order rail cars in numbers of 100 or more units. Some systems will collaborate to go with one design further lower costs. To set up fabrication for tiny unique orders will increase the per-unit cost. RTA also needs to go with STANDARD designs, even if it entails bringing a test set from another system to the system to evaluate the units. In RTA's "plans", one called for small orders of 8 heavy rail cars and 8 light rail cars to "evaluate" the designs. No wonder this didn't gain any interest from potential builders. Eight-unit orders are unheard of and raises the per-unit design/engineering/construction exponentially higher as the initial costs are spread out on fewer units. Also, what happens if RTA deems what they uniquely want as unacceptable for future orders? Do these units become "oddballs" that don't fit in with future operations and worse yet, get prematurely retired so more of the final design get purchased (ultimately wasting them)? In the past, new rail cars were temporarily routed from the builder to a system to how they operate for a potential buyer. Cleveland Railway (predecessor to CTS and RTA) once operated a Pittsburgh PCC as a test for a month on Cleveland streets and the Shaker Rapid brought in a test Boston PCC to operate prior to its ordering new PCC's of its own. Other systems have done this as well. Standard rail cars will utilize equipment that has had all the "bugs" worked out and later on will have replacement parts readily available. Currently, the unique fleets in Cleveland never had counterparts anywhere in the world. When parts are needed, expensive custom orders are forced to be procured instead of purchasing standard "off the shelf" (and less expensive) available replacements. Fortunately, RTA appears to be going in the direction of one common rail vehicle, but until the bids are in and order placed, the system's management cannot be trusted to do the right, common sense and logical thing. I was the one that initially suggested acquiring the units from San Diego. Though it would be a stopgap, at least it would allow RTA to get the eventual replacement order correct and enable the system to provide more reliable operation than the significantly older equipment they currently operate provides. If all of the available San Diego units were acquired, they may not be enough to equip the whole system, but they would allow retirement of all of the heavy rail cars on the Red line and supplement the similarly sized light rail cars on the Blue/Green/Waterfront lines. Immediately after acquisition was completed, the maintenance costs would drop and the need to run 2-car Red line trains around-the-clock would end, reducing operating costs. Sounds win-win to me.

Time to get out of the 1940s and 1950s. Population density-wise, western Lake County is basically the same as northeastern Cuyahoga County. The extension of the Red Line is NOT a new idea. The Tokyu heavy rail cars that are nearing 40 years old (delivered by the mid- 1980's) had destination signs stating "MENTOR" when they were delivered new to RTA. At least Lake County has found itself a very successful commuter operation to downtown Cleveland. One cannot say that about RTA.

Frequency, convenience, reduce travel time and security are all factors when it comes to the desirability of transit service. My employer (as do others) has a program to fully pay for mass transit usage. So where I work, RTA essentially has free fares since the fares are already paid. Yet, even with having free mass transit, the vast majority would rather pay for parking, gas, wear-and-tear and all the other associated costs to commute with their own cars instead of using RTA. As time has gone on, more decided give up free mass transit and use their cars. It is direct commentary on the desirability (or lack thereof) of using RTA. Free transit fares didn't matter.

My point was, unless Stefanski had doubts about McLaughlin due to what he saw in practice, he passed on going for field goals when the kicker had given no indication of troubles kicking during game time up to that point. In some cases, those field goals would have been shorter than extra point attempts. Even when McLaughlin was having problems with mid-range field goals, he bypassed them on what would be short attempts. If he lacked that sort of confidence in him, then he shouldn't have been the kicker, period. Perhaps he had an overconfidence on his offense scoring more, but when the conservative nature of the play calling came into play, scoring went way down. Sometimes, a coach gets fixated on a certain strategy. Don't know if it will ultimately cost the Ravens this season, but too many time Harbaugh went for the 2-point conversion and got burned.

The problem with Stefanski's decision-making is even when the kicker had yet to miss any kicks (outside of the first one being blocked--not the kicker's fault), Stefanski still went with the "go for a touchdown" thinking, even when it was a bigger distance to score or get a first down. Not taking opportunities to score 3 points, sometimes more than once, would have turned multiple games that the Browns needed to score twice or get a win by being within a field goal as the game was ending made a world of difference. It would have given the Browns a much better chance of winning more games, if flat-out winning them. Who knows what might have happened if the "Scottish Hammer (hands)" didn't fumble against K.C. There is no way that Mayfield can be blamed for these calls.

There has been some serious questioning on the play-calling and personnel on the field throughout the season. There have been many ultra-conservative calls made leading to the team not being able to convert crucial first downs to run out the clock. Quite a few "going for it on 4th down" calls where ultimately a short field goal is not called, the first down/touchdown doesn't happen and it meant a big difference late in the game. I would also like to see how some of these so-called experts can manipulate a narrative on conservative play-calling or personnel when Mayfield didn't even appear in some of the games. The next thing that will be brought up that if Watson won't be available (due to pending legal actions, league suspension or incarceration), is that the Browns should go after somebody like Cam Newton (NO WAY on that individual).

It is an older picture. The Bluebirds were retired from service around 1985. Also, the photo shows the heavy rail portion of Tower City before it was rebuilt to accommodate both the heavy and light rail operations in 1990.

Yes, it is Tower City in the days when the heavy rail had separate platforms from the light rail/former Shaker Rapid platforms.

In the early days of Airporter operation, they very occasionally ran in 4-car trains, but they eventually cut that back to 3-car trains. For the Bluebird cars, the maximum was 6 cars. Aside from places like Tower City, those trains were limited in the number of cars was due to platform length. The Tokyu cars are about 5 feet longer than the Airporters. The extra length was used to incorporate the middle doors. The Bluebird rapid transit cars were the adaptation of PCC streetcar technology into rapid transit equipment. Aside from length and width differences, this rapid transit car design and equipment was operated by Boston and New York City. The 6000-series cars that ran on Chicago's EL were also based on the PCC streetcar technology. The first 200 were built new for EL service, but the last 570 were built using many salvaged components (motors, windows, seats, electrical gear, trucks, etc....) from practically brand new Chicago PCC cars when that city got rid of its streetcars. They were fully compatible to the first 200 cars plus 4 "experimental" articulated train sets from the late 1940's. This permitted for Chicago to rather inexpensively modernize its EL fleet and retire the large number of wooden cars that were still in service in the 1950s.

NEWS FLASH: It will be very hard for Watson to be a contributor for any team while stuck on a suspended list and that is if his legal situation is resolved by the next season. The Texans were a bigger mess than the Browns this year and how much playing time did he get?

It almost seems like Freddie Kitchens lost 150 pounds, was back on the sidelines and doing press conferences. This season was basically a repeat of 2019. Over-confidence based upon the success of the previous season. Questionable play calling by head coach over and over again with repeated calls to give up play calling duties to the offensive coordinator. Undisciplined players making repeated boneheaded plays where they cannot line up correctly or commit stupid unsportsmanlike conduct/unnecessary roughness penalties. Disgruntled players orchestrating release from team. When things go south, players check out. Sounds familiar, doesn't it.

Well, there have been numerous media reports that taint the situation on chases. Perhaps it is an attempt to shift the blame and that is unfortunate that they are casting blame on CPD when they shouldn't.

Then why do suburban police departments break off pursuit when the criminals cross over into Cleveland? It is very well documented that that is STANDING suburban chase policy. It has been stated that suburban and/or out-of-county police officers know very well that they will not get any support from CPD. They are on their own on unfamiliar streets. Only in rare instances do pursuits continue once they cross over into Cleveland. It is also well documented the CPD is so short-staffed, they cannot even respond in a timely matter on most normal and/or minor calls. Regarding criminals leaving the confines of Cleveland to commit their crimes, it just a matter of expanding their territories and perhaps getting better "pickings". There are still many suburbanites who still feel safer in their communities, regardless of where the criminals originate from. This plays a large part in the recent carjackings that has been happening in Lakewood near W. 117th Street. As for your statement regarding the shooting of a CPD officer and the ensuing chase, that is such an exception, any reasonably thinking individual would know better than to make it. When ANY law enforcement officer is shot, almost all rules are out the window. The homicide rate within Cleveland in 2021 was 0.456 per 1000 residents. In the suburbs it was 0.080 per 1000 residents. Those numbers show the problems are much worse in Cleveland.

Criminal activity knows no borders. With the known lack of pursuit within Cleveland, the criminal elements have taken there activities beyond Cleveland's borders and have their escapes planned to get them "home free". As for various suburban places that have seen increases in crime, drugs and homicides, if one didn't know where they were at, there is little differentiation between the crime-riddled neighborhoods of Cleveland and some of the suburbs.