Old AmrapinVA

With the NBA Finals, the RNC and now a UFC title event being held in Cleveland over the next four months I wonder if all these high profile events can create enough positive momentum to get the local economy humming at a better clip this year. I can't remember a time Cleveland has had so many major events which will draw national and international media attention.

Anyone see Game 7 of the WCF? It was a great game but the shooting was a little painful to watch, especially the first half. Curry and Klay got hot at times in the 2nd half but both teams looked very beatable. Even Game 6 wasn't that great. Klay set the individual record for made 3s in a game and GS only scored 108. Lots of missed shots and turnovers. Not quite sure how to feel about the Finals.

I agree, best is a bad term. It is very effective though. That lineup played most of the 4th quarter of Game 4 with Toronto's starters in and is the only reason why the Cavs had a chance to win. In fact Lue didn't play that hot hand in the fourth. He subbed this lineup out with shooters starting around the 3:00 mark to end the game and the offense stalled at 99 points while Lowry and Co. kept scoring.

The Toronto series would be over if the Cavs would have kept that lineup on the floor for the last minutes and kept attacking with the double switch/screen in Game 4. Delly looks like Magic when he passes and RJ is still a beast with that reverse lay-up. LeBron is not carrying that offense. It also pulled Biyambo away from the paint because he's forced to cover Frye. I'll never get why Lue waited soooo long to bench Love in Game 4 and they didn't go to the bench line-up sooner. He was clearly off.

The 2014 population estimate for EC is 17.4K. Amazingly it's only lost 400 people between 2010-2014 if the estimates are correct. I guess the people left are ones with limited means to get out. So EC would push Cleveland back to around 405K. Would that population funding boost be enough to offset the costs of the city taking over EC? I would think major incentives are needed.

The other end of the equation is Cleveland's house is pretty much in fiscal order. Why would the city want this albatross around the neck? The only argument I can think of is the federal and state funding involved with population increase. What's EC population now? 20K?

The AP is reporting that members of the East Cleveland City Council are starting to see the value in a merger with Cleveland. Whether Cleveland really wants this is still up for debate, I suppose. http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/apnewsbreak-poor-suburb-softens-merger-cleveland-39407352

Nice call on Game 5, Hts. You are earning your new title with this prediction even though the Cavs focused more on burning the Raptors in the paint as opposed to jacking up tons of 3s. Also, welcome back Tristan and Kevin. Please stick around until the NBA Finals are over! :) GO THUNDER! It would be great for Cavs to get home court in the Finals if they make it.

I understand the wishful thinking but please stop tying the PS redesign into some sort of vision that Jacobs will build a tower on their lot. There's no evidence or even rumors at this point. I wish Jacobs would do some sort of container pop-up retail on the part of the lot facing the square until they build something around the 24th century or so. Anyway, I'll stop going off-topic too.

Cleveland is going to have a hard time ranking high on these lists because the economy is not growing nearly fast enough compared to other US metros. When one starts to mention the Cleveland region's slow-growth economy people get defensive and say it's transitioning or whatever. Not quite sure how to solve this problem without first being honest of where Cleveland's economy is in terms of the nation and then addressing problems to fix it. This topic seems like third-rail stuff though, especially on these boards.

If you go on flightaware.com and type in the origin of the flight and its destination a list of flights will pop up. Select the Frontier flight and there is a "airline insight" button next to average airfare. You are able to scroll down and look at the load factors. Do note that some routes have this stat and some do not. I would caution using load factors as a metric of success for a flight or a route. The stat doesn't tell us what the yield is for each flight. You can have a full flight and it can be a money loser. Although with Frontier it would be probably be more accurate compared to a legacy carrier like United because of the low-cost nature of it's pricing.

Tristan, really? No doubt Tristan has had issues on the interior but has anyone seen Kevin Love? He just completely disappeared over the last two games. Can't score unless he is wide-wide open. Can't hang on to any rebound defensively or offensively. Can't get to the rim. How many open looks can he pass up? As for people on the ledge, the Cavs can't win a championship scoring 84 and 99 points. This is a fact. The Western Conference scoring isn't a mirage. If Love is going to shrink completely from a pressure situation then it's over for the Cavs. But lets be honest about getting to the Finals, I have doubts the Cavs can win Game 5 and if they don't it's definitely Toronto in six. Let's give credit where credit is due too, that 4th Quarter squad with Love on the bench erased an 11 point deficit in about 2 minutes with pick and rolls. It's something Lue should explore going forward in this series. They need to turn it up defensively because the shooters are fading.

Good to hear from the horse's mouth that they're focusing on Cleveland instead of giving out some nebulous answer leaving the hint that they may leave. Oops! Then I read the article. Looks like they did give out a nebulous answer as well. We'll see.

Even more than that with all the relegation leagues. Even MLBs minor league system can't compare. And that's only one country being represented in the Premier League. Who's the best team in professional soccer? It's never settled even with the Euro Champ. I think that's why the World Cup is popular because at least there's an agreement on who is the best. I understand ye ancient tradition but there are way, way, way, way, way, way too many clubs.

So the capsule will have no power? Just a seat? No electricity or lighting in the tunnels under a mountain or at night? No flammable materials used to open each segment of the tube in case of an emergency? The tube itself will not be flammable? Once smoke is in a tunnel, it can quickly turn into a disaster. I find it hard to believe the Feds, California and local governments will just abide by the fact it's a closed system and there is no reason to plan for a quick escape from a smoke and/or fire. This new system will require training up the ying-yang. And almost every segment will have to have the ability to open? So the whole system will need constant safety testing and maintenance to assure they can open. And the government will want to test each segment before operation, they wont just abide by Musk's promise that it works. I just see more and more $$$$.

Those are good points but problems are even less complex than that. What if the capsule has an issue and stops in the middle of the Central Valley or inside a mountain. How will these folks get out? Where will the entry and exit points be? Will it be the responsibility of local fire and police to get in? Will Musk have his employees along the route in case of an emergency? Now multiply this issue by 1000 for a national network.

Only one day off between for Games 4/5/6/7 despite the travel between Oakland and OKC. I guess I shouldn't complain though. I kind of like the gap after the result of Game 2. Maybe the Warriors will come back to Earth for Game 3.

You mention all the transportation modes that have succeeded but think about how many modes of transportation that have failed because they couldn't scale. I don't really see this working without doing something crazy like banning or severely limiting air travel. Because the costs of infrastructure on the tube network alone will outweigh any advantages it has. But it could work in a place where other modes of travel would be impossible.

I work in the industry. Without working for the airline, it would be just as effective for you to go to a non-busy Frontier gate agent and just ask. Just FYI. Wouldn't that have been easier to say? It was an honest question from the start. Really don't want to get into the weeds on this, let's keep the thread on-topic.

Actually Cleveland only lost around 1,000 people between estimates for the year, I thought it would be closer to 2k considering the MSA had accelerated losses. Overall loss is definitely slowing compared to the region as a whole.

I work in the industry. Without working for the airline, it would be just as effective for you to go to a non-busy Frontier gate agent and just ask. Just FYI.

It's not going to work, and I don't know why people want it to work so badly. Said every naysayer about steam engines, automobiles, airplanes, high speed rail, maglev, electric cars, faster-than-sound air travel, the space shuttle, landing on the moon, intercontinental railroads, a plethora of "world's largest" ships, the space station, the construction of early skyscrapers, the Hoover Dam, an endless stream of bridges, the internet, wifi, smartphones, laptops, etc., etc., etc. Failing to see the benefit of a major increase in the speed of land travel requires a complete inability to grasp the benefit of technological advance while living in a world that has relied on technological advances that people like yourself claimed wouldn't work. If it's going to work you need scalability. Think of the amount of passengers that fly in the United States alone. People don't really comprehend it. Now transfer that total to users who can only use certain tubes to travel from place to place. If one capsule breaks down, then what? A bigger tube? More tubes? How many tubes will it take for travel between Cincy and C'bus? What about DC to Boston? Or Chicago to Denver? What about State College? Bangor? Cheyenne? Bismarck? Fairbanks? All these cities have air service. Do they get tubes? Now think of the NIMBY urban areas that won't want 700-mph "trains" moving through their neighborhoods. Think of the safety hurdles. The security issues. I don't think Elon Musk really has on this one. It looks cool don't get me wrong. This would be great for connecting areas on another planet that is mainly flat, like the Moon.

He's a Delta pilot. How would he know?

To be fair we've had over a decade of best-of-seven through the entire playoffs and no team has done better than 10-0. So it still would be quite special to go 12-0 even if one of those games is not in the Finals. I'm quite aware of the 2001 Lakers. As I stated upthread they were one insane Mr. "Practice" AI performance away from going 15-0. The Lakers had some rust from having 8 days off. Even though the Lakers played really bad in the first half they still forced that game into OT. What was nuts about that game was after Philly won "experts" were saying Kobe was already handing the torch over to AI and that the Sixers would sweep. Uh, yeah. Agreed; in no way was I diminishing either your point or what this team/Lue are doing in these playoffs... Isn't it ironic that Lue, the very coach helming this amazing Cavs run, was probably best known for Iverson's step-back 3, then stepping over the fallen Lue during that lone Lakers' hiccup in their 2001 championship run? I was actually thinking about that too. Rick Fox mentioned it on NBA TV last week. That was probably the most memorable 4-1 Finals in this history of the NBA, even more so than the 4-1 Thunder-Heat finals when people were waiting for LeBron to "choke". Feeling less confident about the Cavs chances after the Warriors thumped OKC. We'll see tonight. On the side: I think it's ridiculous the Cavs/Raptors have to play every other night while the Thunder/Warriors get 3 days off. NBA playoff scheduling has always been bad. It took them forever to get rid of the terrible 2-3-2 home/away/home Finals format.

It's not going to work, and I don't know why people want it to work so badly. I agree. That $6 billion tag for an LA-SF line is the lowest estimate. Beyond all the basic efficiency, comfort and safety issues, the tubes can't really have bends for the pneumatics to work. Also, a very small puncture in one tube segment will shut a whole line down. Security on this network will have to be through the roof. Maybe this will be feasible if humans colonize the Moon or Mars but it's just not realistic travel for this planet.