Jeff

Well, I'm going to make a point of buying Tide, Crest, and GE aircraft engines (er, well, ok, two outta three aint bad...) Seriously, does anyone know how the vote went in terms of geography and demographics? Was it an across-the-board win? If I recall someone posted here that the Article XII orginally passed with big margins from the west side (upper Price Hill. I guess, and similar areas). How was the the repeal vote distributed?

Crate & Barrell was big in Chicago. They had some neat stuff.

There was a ski resort in Morrow?

...and thats great news from Cincy about the defeat of Article XII. As y'all might remember I was pretty pessimistic about that one, but sure enough, Cincy did it! Hooray!

I should point out that the Dayton suburb of Oakwood defeated Issue One, and it very narrowly won in Dayton and Jefferson Township. A freind sent me an e-mail on some of the local results here in Montgomery County.

^ This issue might be academic to most folks but not to me, as I am in a relationship, and I and my partner have medical powers of attorney over each other. Theres is a question whether or not these would be still valid. And, since my partner has AIDS, the issue of hospital visitation will eventually come up, too. I have looked into emigrating to Canada, and its not that easy, particularly if you don;t have the job skills they are looking for, and, of course the medical condition of my partner is an issue. My advice to young lesbian and gay people would be to seriously look into it, look going to college there, look into the kind of skills countrys like Canada are looking for and study for them, and look into establishing residency and emigrating. I don't see much future for lesbian and gay folks in this country (Im not singling out Ohio here, either) if they want to settle down and form relationships and even adopt kids, the way the political trend is going. People seem to see progress, but I think its stalled and might be starting to go backward. These anti-marriage referendums could be the start of a backward move on the whole gay-rights issue.

Actually..the doubles in Dayton are side-by-side...so I guess sort of a pseudo-row house. The "stacked double " upstairs/downstairs form in Chicago is called a "two-flat" (there are "three -flats", too)...and they are very common. Seems like thats another commonality between Cleveland and Chicago.

You know, there are not that many rowhouse in Dayton or Cincinnati either. The closest Dayton comes to that is the "double". While there are some individual examples of rowhousing in Dayton its not a typical or ubiquitous houseform here. I think the pix that was recently posted of York and Harrisburg shows that the rowhouse seems to be more of an east coast houseform that didn't transfer to the Midwest very much.

Hmm..sort of interesting...the increased cost of regulation hurt them (environmental cleanup and financial reporting requirements)? And the "Canadian operations?"

Germantown is a really attractive small town...pitcure perfect and well-kept. Alot nice old 19th & early 20th century architecture, and they are developing a bikeway along the creek south of town to the Germantown Reserve. Its a a real nice place. If I where to consider small town living in some big old victorian or antebellum house thats where I'd look. This industrial park is actually somewhat away from the town, so it wont really destroy the small town character of the place.

They are finishing up that Hall of Missles, but have a fourth hangar planned to. I've been told tha though the project was originally scheduled for 2010, the fundraising means it might move up to 2007. They will have space to permit visitors to watch aircraft restoration in progress...interpeting the restoration process.

That bank highrise on the square has an interesting design. There are classical details (like the quoins on the tower), but its a really "stripped" design, with no cornice or decorative feature on the top, which is pretty unusual. The town square looks pretty extensive and wooded, too. Thanks for those pix of Elyria...i wondered what it looked like. Looks like it is a small city, like Mansfield or (like others noted) Hamilton.

I would sort of expect DeWine to be somewhat less hostile to gay folks as he has a cousin, I think, thats gay. But Voinovich is pretty religous so I was suprised to see him come down against this amendment.

Dayco is still here as a HQ. They are in that little high-rise by the Dayton Mall, next to the interstate. Huffy is near the mall, in Miamisburg, off of Byers Road. Very nondescript. I didn't know Standard Register and MotoPhoto where having such problems. Although NCR is still in town as a HQ, their shutdown of most of their operations here in the early '70s was a very major blow, or so I've been told. One of the things that I think makes Cincinnati and Columbus fairly healthy economys is they are not dominated by one industry or a few large firms (well, maybe state government for Columbus, but i wonder if its that big a player in their local economy). The Dayton chamber of commerce person has a point. It probably IS better to have a large group of healthy and growing small to mid size buisnesses that are generating employment and turning a profit than having two or three fortune 500 HQs....

f y'all are familiar with cultural geography, there has been an actual typology established for town layouts based on the ntature of the town square. Youngstown actually has a square..apparently some of the Western Reserve towns where layed out with a square, really more of a villiage green, in the middle. I think Canfield is supposed to be a good example of this. Lebanon is a good example of a Main Street town. So was Dayton at one time, tho it orginally had a square. There are different types of squares. There is the "Urbana" form, with the square at an interesection, chopped out of the surrounding four blocks. (you see this in Kentucky, too, alot...Elizabethtown and Bardstown are good examples, except the Courthouse is in the square, not a monument, like in Urbana)...this form is also in Pennyslvania, where Lancaster is a good example of it...or even the center square in Philadelphia, where city hall is. Then there is the "Eaton" or "Xenia" form, where the square is the center block in town (where the courthouse is). When you get out of Ohio, into Wisconsin, you will find true "Main Street" towns...the courthouse isn't even on the Main Street. New London and Rhinlander are examples. I

Actually Covington is pretty neat at street level, at the Point (where the Licking meets the Ohio), and in the old downtown and Main Strasse. It just gets sterile around that new developement...yes....true.

That stretch of 4 between dowtown Hamilton and the Cincy bypass has to be one of the more dismal commercial strips in SW Ohio. OK, it does have Jungle Jims, but otherwise, bummer! Maybe they should Vegas-ize it and put alot more neon and big signs and such....just go with the flow rather than pretty it up with landscaping.

I was at UofK probably just overlapping Libeskinds time there. He came back as a guest lecturer, and was a quite fascinating speaker. Back then he was exploring line, plane, positive and negative space via a series of drawings called "Micromegas" (after the Voltaire story, I guess) ...you can see a bit of Malevich going on there, or even Lissitzky. But its quite a shock to see a Liebskind skyscraper going up on the banks of the Ohio! Now all we need is something by Rem Koolhaas and the region will have a complete collection works by the Deconstructivst masters.

Chicago has been pretty agressive in using the TIF concept to redevelop derelict or obsolete industrial sites, usually for retail and sometimes for housing. On balance they have been a pretty sucessful way of enabling resuse of these sites as well as providing convenient shopping options for inner city residents. This is the first time I have heard of a TIF being used in a suburban context. Frankly, if the economics dont work right for the developer to be able to do this without a TIF, too bad. This is a good site, and Beavecreek doesn't need a TIF sweetner to make it viable.

Damn straight I will be trying it out....to get to TO from Dayton you have to drive up to Detroit, then up through Ontario ...this cuts alot of travel distance, i think... ...the neat thing is that the terminal appears to be right downtown,too (it will be, won't it?) Heres a bit more on Royal Wagenborg... corporate website...in English, Dutch, and German. ....& they apparently are already involved with Great Lakes/Seaway shipping, according to this article from the Duluth port director "Royal Wagenborg, a Dutch Shipping company, has already initiated the process, introducing its small, shallow-draft 9,000-ton coastal traders to Seaway service. And, as predicted, this has opened up new markets. To further refine the process and better leverage the concept, the Great Lakes shipping community needs to work closely with the Europeans to refine ship designs and marine technology". on edit, after surfing around the corporate site, it looks like their passenger ferry buisness is from the mainland to two of the Frisian Islands....crossing the Waddensee. Not exactly like Lake Erie, as this is a very tidal stretch of water, with alot of sandbars and mudflats. But it also means the firm has experience with alot of leisure travel and holiday crowds as these islands are sort of resort areas.

Has anyone here toured the place since it opened? If not you should. It is a great museum. Easily equal to the new Indiana State Museum or the Heinz Regional History Center in Pittsburgh...maybe better as there is alot of audiovisual stuff going on.

It would be nice if something around here was based on Mariemont, or even Greenhills. Two of the most famous planned communities in the USA (at least to the planning and architectural world), planned in part as demonstration projects, yet we get all this generic sprawl. ..and I thought it was Daytons' Ernie Fraze who invented the pop-top?

There was a big political stink about the Randolph Township/Clayton merger. Clayton proper is one of those neat little rural villiages you find in Western Montgomery County(like Pyrmont or Farmersville)...but I think it was Randolph Township people who didnt want to be annexed by Englewood that intiated the merger with Clayton. The funny thing about Clayton villiage, is that is really isnt that urbanized...from what I recall its still pretty much surrounded by farmland, or those large lot minifarms & ribbon developement...most of the developement in the former Randolph Township is just urban sprawl more to the east & south of Clayton proper...tho not as intense as the south suburbs of Dayton.

Actually me and my signifigant other spent the weekend in Cincy for this...checked into the Hyatt on Friday night..dinner at Nicholsons (which is a really neat place, BTW), then the Oktoberfest on Saturday (watched the opening ceremony in the morning....then, off to lunch...crashed a bit, then back out in the afternoon .....pretty much spent the whole night there. Some pretty good bands, actually, if you are into this kind of music. Also, the Christian Moerlien beer was pretty good. That was my first time trying it...this is a new local brewrey? Sunday was spent at the Underground Railroad museum, then dinner at The Albee restraunt in the Westin, which, given its "ringside seat" on Fountain Square , was a great place to people-watch the Sunday evening Oktoberfest crowd. I was pretty impressed by this turnout, to say the least! Not sure how much of it had to do with the ballgames going on, or if its always this packed.

Too bad. When I first moved to Dayton I wanted to rent there but it was full-up. Great site. This is the last aparment builidng left on that stretch of the levy...according to older aerial photos there was a brace of three big ones where 3 Riverplace is now. But, yeah, this is really a primo site. Its about time it was developed...although I'm not sure what "modular townhouses" are. I wonder if there are any graphics ore renderings of the whats planned.