prolix

lots more expensive condo's would be my bet

I think the problem with the playhouse is access. Sure they can expand, sure the facility is fine, but parking in mt adam's isn't exactly prime. The playhouse leaving mt adams won't have much of a long term affect, real-estate is gold up there and it would no doubt find a use before it was even empty. The Emery is an excellent idea, I'm not familiar with the facility size though and the playhouse has a few different theatres doesn't it? Still would be a very interesting fit, and good for the neighborhood.

i was getting off at 5th on my way home the other night and the green flowing led sign is insane. it looks really cool, but i'm sure it makes living on 5th street at night annoying. i know MED has some lofts across the street and i bet those tenants all enjoy a nice green glow through their windows. i'm sure the fire dept loves it too

Great looking place mark, glad it all worked out in the end. Love the way yours turned out I may start looking to buy something soon, hopefully I'll end up with something as cool. I know living at Kinsey Flats has spoiled me b/c now I look at houses and condo's and they all seem so dull.

Get their houses back? Are they kidding? What are they going to do? Live on little islands in the middle of a parking lot? I can understand their position, but I think its a bit too late

i meant to post this a while ago, but i got a tour of the building and it is coming along pretty quickly. i toured it about 2 weeks ago. its far from done, but the inside all framed up and some of the floors are almost done with drywall. i'm not sure what the final windows will be. the original windows are still there and in fairly bad shape. a few on the south end were replaced by a previous owner, so you have this odd mix of old/new windows that aren't even the same style. b/c this is a historic building they are supposed to put original 'style' windows back in, but it wasn't clear whether the originals were getting fixed or replaced. if they just fix the old ones and paint them it will be a nightmare to heat/cool since pretty much every exterior wall is covered with windows. the layout of the units are great. they even have closets and washer/dryer hookups (a big deal, i live at kinsey and we have neither of those!). the flooring is the original wood floors, they will be refinished. interiors have exposed brick, but that hasn't been stripped and sealed yet. parking is in the basement, which seems kinda of iffy. the tendency to use the basement of these buildings for parking usually turns out to be a problem. its horrible at kinsey, but maybe this will work out better. its a larger basement, but its a sea of huge steel columns. not as bad as kinsey, but still difficult. i think there will be outside parking, but right now the entire site is a mess with construction so it's hard to say what the final look and feel of it will be. hopefully it will all be repaved and nicely landscaped. maybe a nice black iron fence around the property. i think the hot lofts will be the 1st floor (which has insane ceiling height and really nice architectural elements). 2 and 3 are nice, but smaller lofts. the 4th floor gains use of the extra windows that run along a raise section of the roof. they are all nice though. i'd like to get in one of the south end units, but i'm waiting for the model unit to get completed before i make any decisions. here's a layout of the site in case anyone is interested. i colored and marked the various buildings on the site. MED is using the large building to the south of the site as their office/storage/etc. its a HUGE building. i am not sure about the small building between their offices and machine flats (in yellow). there are also a few other peripheral buildings around the site (in yellow) that i'm not sure about. the factory had it's own power plant which will be turned into a rec room for the building. should be very cool.

i wandered over to camp washington today and snapped some shots around the machine flats building. looks like a lot of work has to be done yet, but it does look good so far. grasscat, you're right. if you don't know the jail/whatever is there, you wouldn't even notice it. the park is quite large and shields you from it. the rest of the area directly around machine flats is pretty rough and could use some work. hopefully this project will be the catalyst for it. the area south of the park looks like it's improving quite a bit. enough rambling, here are some pics! just a quick gallery i tossed up, not very pretty http://www.ciph3r.net/~dan/machine_flats/machine_flats.html

I did some digging, the facility is the 'River City Correctional Center' http://www.hamilton-co.org/common_pleas/rivercity.htm It's on the opposite corner from Machine Flats. I'd think that would create problems finding residents What's the rest of the neighborhood like? I was going to cruise over there this weekend and see what it's like, but the correctional center kind of ruins the idea of living there for me.

it is rumored that occupancy @ machine flats may be available as early as september. i don't know much about the area so i was doing some reading and studying of maps. i realized there's some correctional fascility across the street from it. a half-way house i guess? i was actually thinking of looking into it but the half-way house thing kind of makes me wonder

the damage under the barge must be pretty bad b/c they are still pumping water out of it, i'd think they'd have to repair that before they could even move it

those elevated express lanes are wild looking i think if you live right on the edge of the freeway you would just have to assume this would happen at some point. yeah it sucks, but i also would bet that most people in that position would be glad to get away from the road. as long as they are fairly compensated for their move and home/business/whatever 75 can't be left as is, so in the end they aren't going to have a choice anyway this will be a big mess of a project though, glad i don't have to drive 75 that often.

or even better yet, forget the rest of the cladding, just hang some yellow lights over 5th street.

Yeah, the further they get on this project the more bizarre the entire thing looks. All the renderings and models they showed before this started were monochromatic so we never really saw the contrast between the two designs that much, but now we're all looking at this mesh of 80's pink marble and an attempt at modern chic. Were there any full color renderings shown to the public of this (showing the original + addition?). Or did they just keep it monochromatic in renderings and models so we wouldn't notice or ask questions?

thats the cincinnati way. if they can find a way to half ass a project, they will. and they will do an amazing job at it. just check ot the improvements on our side of the purple people bridge. i mean, newports got nothing on a bunch of yellow home-depot lighting hanging on wires. we rule! maybe the final finish will amaze us all.

yeah, by the time the lawsuits and whatever else are over it will be a forest and the state can just declair it a nature preserve

ah yes, how many years of delay will this cause?

i just hope whatever ends up there stays open late. bookstores, whatever. i mean, graeters on 4th even closes at 6 or something. i get home and everything is closed! if you walk around there is quite a bit downtown, but it all closes so damn early. i think even starbucks on 4th closes at 4 or something stupid. i wish a decent coffee shop (similar to highlands or something) would move onto w 4th somewhere. would fit in nice, and give me some place to go at night with all teh new residential you have to get some sort of normal lifestyle stuff to go on downtown to keep the residential going. the two go hand in hand, unfortunately people in this town don't want to take a chance with downtown. instead we keep the sprawl of these lifestyle centers going on

i didn't think that 'lake' was even that big. more of a glorfied pond

yeah, i saw that crane last night and i was wondering what was up. i wish i would have had my camera with me!

the focus thing more what i refer to and why i have a fairly pessimistic view of the banks. believe me, i'd love to see it happen. i live on 4th street and anything new downtown would be great. i think cincy and the city council just lack focus. seems like they bicker too much to ever get it done, thus the reason a private entity would have to lease and control fountain square. and montecarloss is right, i mean, why focus on the square when there's that big hole between the stadiums. that's the prime spot to invest, but they get so tied up in these other things that could really wait. i mean, if the banks took off, that would free up the resouces to do these other small projects later down the road, and perhaps give more justification to them. nky is beating cincy to the punch on a lot of stuff, and while cvg is just dull towers, newport is cleaning its act up. sure it has a long way to go, but look how far it's come in very few years. then we look at stuff like the banks and what's the holdup? garages? there's a big hole, fill them with garages, problem solved right? or is the councils bickering and lack of focus what is scaring off investors and developers?

i doubt mt adams would have an issue finding a use for it, where space is severely limited any sort of open space will get used. well, unless its downtown cincinnati ;) i have more faith in mt adams than i have in downtown

this would be great, some sort of catalyst to start something.

it will never happen. city council will be sure of that one, with their idiocy. i mean, look across the river. that is what happens when cities have vision and the followthrough to make it happen. all cincy does is argue, bicker and burry projects in red tape. i mean, its pretty lame when bellvue sudden becomes some hip building spot and cincy can't even get anyone to build on our own riverfront, which in reality should be a lot hotter property. go figure. way to go city council!

some new signage went up on the corner the other day, so it looks like the beginning nears. we are going to lose all of our parking at kinsey though. i'm also kind of wondering how that's going to work since neyer came and leased up over half our lot already. anyway, as sad as those MED comments are for people who purchase, i wouldn't say they are much quicker or reliable for the rentals (@ kinsey at least). lots of promises, very little follow through. they are all nice people though, i think they may just take on too much? or maybe they aren't very organized. over a year later and the much promised rec/exercise room in our building still is a ghost. same with teh promise of having our windows cleaned (since they were never washed after the original construction ended, i can barely see out of mine anymore). parker flats does look cool though, hope it turns out well oh and as a bonus, someone tagged the front of our building last night. a little competition for the parker flats signage i guess? i'll take some shots of it when i get home tonight

this would be the greatest project for cincinnati to complete (in my opinion). but as we've seen, they could destroy it and take 10 years to do it. and in teh end, we'll just get yellow party lights hanging on strings.