dfly

Thanks for the explaination, it makes sense. And also, thanks for your efforts on this.

I agree with you in terms of making comparisons, but I think it does bring up a valid point in why and how we define downtown. Why have we chosen to make downtown and the CBD synonymous? In Cincinnati, Uptown includes several neighborhoods, correct? I'm sure tradition has a lot to do with it, but why shouldn't downtown have a broader definition. Sure, you'd have to take the bad with the good that would come from that, but I think it is something to at least consider. David Esrati has made the point many times in Dayton that downtown needs to be defined more broadly, including the Oregon District, Webster Station, McPherson Town, and possible even the Brown Street corridor and the UD area. I thought it was kind of ridiculous as first, but the more I have thought about it, I think it does have some merit to it. Again, I'm not completely sold on the idea, but it is something to ponder.

Maybe a dumb question, but if this has been so successful in other states, what was the legislature's hesitation in making this permenant from the get-go?

^ Oh, I agree. They just seem to have an interesting business plan.

^ LOL. Fixed.

Let's see how long before these guys end up shutting this place down it was what....18 months for Club Clau and 12 months for The Continental Lounge?

Dayton city manager readies for role Dayton Business Journal - December 15, 2006 by Yvonne Teems DBJ Staff Reporter Dayton City Manager Rashad Young walked into his office at 9 a.m. on a December day wearing a dark suit and a red tie undone and slung around his neck. The night before, Dayton had its first dusting of snow that had left the streets slick, and it was making for a busy morning for Young. At 7 a.m., Mayor Rhine McLin had sent him a text message that asked, "Where are the salt trucks?" ...

The story is here: http://cincinnati.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/stories/2006/12/18/story3.html But it is not letting me log in right now :(

I don't really think that this article really casts Cincinnati in a bad light. The only part that is crap, as kendall pointed out, is how the Enquirer is looking at Cincinnati's urban core. Development such as what has been going on in Covington and Newport should not simply be discounted because they happen to be in a different political jurisdiction but are actually very much a part of the urban core. But I don't think it is just the Enquirer that is guilty of this. As far as the mall comparisons go, when you combine the square footage of Tower Place and Newport On The Levee, you still have about half the square footage of Circle Center Mall, which in my opinion puts them in two completely different leagues. Indy has had a large number of suburban retail developments come online recently, so that will undoubtedly effect Circle Center. But I do think Circle Center has a better chance than Tower City did for two reasons. One, Simon is the largest owner of malls and there headquarters is just a couple of blocks away. And secondly, Indianapolis has done a fantastic job with their convention industry, including sporting events such as the NCAA Final Four. 3CDC seems to be doing things right, so I think things are headed in the right direction for Cincinnati. It will then be up the the big players such as the P&Gs and Krogers of the Cincinnati community as to how well the plans actually come to fruition. I think this is where Indianapolis has had their greatest success and hopefully Cincinnati will be able to have similar success.

This sounds like great news!

I found this newsletter by the Sacramento Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce to be an interesting read about what Indianapolis has done. It is a summary of a trip that 95 government and business leaders of Sacromento took to Indy to study what they have done and how they have accomplished it.

The Lilly Family and the Lilly Foundation each have been ranked as some of the most generous philanthropic persons/foundations in the country, so it wouldn't surprise me at all if Indianapolis has seen a great deal of benefit from that. As of a couple of years ago the Lilly Foundation was the second largest foundation in country, only behind the Gate Foundation. I'm not sure where they rank now.

What I really feel is at the root of the success of downtown Indianapolis is their Unigov. They don't have to worry about bickering between city and county officials, they have greater control of what gets built where (less competing with suburban cities), and also I would assume they have a greater amount of tax dollars they can funnel into downtown projects. Now exburbs such as Carmel, Fishers, Noblesville, and Zionsville are in other counties and really seam to be growing like crazy, so it will be interesting to see the effect on Indy and specifically downtown. One other huge advantage Indy has is that they are the only major city in Indiana, so they have less competition getting state funding for projects. I think both of these facts have been instrumental in Indy developing a lot of the successes that have been posted here.

From Grassroots Greater Dayton.... A Brief History of Dayton's Electric Trolley Buses PROVIDED BY A FRIEND OF GRASSROOTS GREATER DAYTON: Electric Trolley Busses (ETB’s) have been running continuously in Dayton Ohio, since April 23, 1933, some 73 years ago. At one period, there were five separate transit companies operating ETB’s; by 1956 all were merged into the privately owned City Transit Company (CTCo.). After several years of declining rider ship, and concomitant loss of revenue, City Transit sold, in 1972, their bus fleet and infrastructure to the newly formed Miami Valley Regional Transit Authority (now Greater Dayton Regional or quot;GDRTA"), a public agency which took over CTCo.’s transit operations in Dayton, oakwood, and Kettering. The CTCo. routes were primarily ETB-operated, with smaller motor busses used mostly as feeders to the trolleys; a few lightly used city routes were also diesel. In 1980 Montgomery County voters approved a County-Wide GDRTA, which was funded largely by sales taxes collected in Montgomery County, and thus did not extend operations beyond the Montgomery County boundary. The new county-wide system had little effect upon the ETB physical infrastructure, but several of the new diesel suburban routes did duplicate service performed by the ETB’s, as the diesels had to run on many of the same streets as the ETB’s to get out of the central city on their way to the county routes. This had significant effect upon ETB rider ship, as the diesel busses competed for passengers along the inner-city portions of their routes. Eventually the total number of ETB’s required declined due to the diesel duplication. This phenomenon continues to this day, as there is no practical way for a county bus to get to or from the Dayton Central Business District (CBD) without using most of the same streets as do the trolleys. The original GDRTA plan was to eliminate the then aging ETB system, and replace it with a fleet of new diesel busses. In opposition to this, a group of private citizens formed the Save Our Trolleys Coalition (SOTC). With much support from other citizens, the ETB system was saved, and a new fleet of Flyer ETB’s were purchased and delivered in 1977. Some of the Flyer trolleys remained in service until the summer of 1999, when they were replaced by a new fleet of ETI/SKODA trolley busses. In the late 1980’s, with the Flyer ETB fleet barely 10 years old, the issue as to whether to continue the use of ETB’s in Dayton came forth once again. The SOTC gathered together its forces, and once more fought to save the trolley system. The GDRTA management had allowed the fleet to seriously deteriorate, and had begun to tear down some of the overhead. Several ETB routes were converted to diesel or reduced to peak-hour service only. After a change in management in late 1992, a new trustee board directed that a new fleet of ETB’s be ordered to replace the by-then badly deteriorated Flyers. In December 1994 a contract was awarded, to Electric Transit Incorporated (ETI) for 63 new trolley busses. ETI was a Dayton corporation owned jointly by AAI in Baltimore, MD. and SKODA, in the Czech Republic CZ). The busses were to be a close derivative of the SKODA 14TR, a trolleybus widely used in Eastern Europe. One year later, in December of 1995,the first of 3 14TR prototypes arrived at GDRTA for testing and acceptance. These 3 prototypes, numbered 9601, 9602, & 9603, were completely assembled at the SKODA Works in Ostrav, CZ before shipping to the USA. The three 9600’s had their wheel-chair lift at the extreme rear end of the coach, which immediately found opposition with the Dayton handicapped community. A decision was made by a new GDRTA management to redesign the bus, placing the lift in the front door. This required the bus body to be widened an extra 6 inches as compared to the regular sKODA 14TR. The redesign was funded by reducing the number of production busses to 54, while the overall contract amount, roughly $34 million US, remained the same. The 54 production series were numbered 9801 through 9854, with the first completed bus arriving at MVRTA in the spring of 1998. Production of the 9800-series busses was quite different from the prototypes; the frame and propulsion system were built by SKODA in CZ, and then shipped to AAI in Baltimore, where the exterior skin and paint was applied. These shells were then trucked to Dayton, where final assembly was done in a local ETI facility. Prior to acceptance by GDRTA, each bus was given an extensive road-worthiness burn-in test, using RTA drivers. The final bus was accepted in September of 1999; the old Flyer fleet had been scrapped in August 1999. Meanwhile, the GDRTA constructed several miles of new ETB routes, installed new power substations, and replaced many miles of overhead trolley wire. Many support poles were also replaced. Much of the feeder cables, both overhead and underground, have been replaced also. The infrastructure is now capable of providing service for over fifty years, assuming service demands remain at current levels, and adequate maintenance is provided. Recently at GDRTA public meetings and via their publications, it is noted that the SKODA fleet is increasingly hard to maintain, resulting in higher removals from service of the trolleys. It is noted that non-availability of spares parts from SKODA CZ is one of the contributors to low reliability. The wheelchair lift is a continuing cause for road calls and/or removal of the bus from service. Assuming that the frames can be structurally repaired where needed, these busses should be able to reach their Federal Transit Administration (FTA) eighteen (18) year service life requirement. The oldest of the 9800-series SKODA fleet is now only seven and one-half years old, not even halfway through it’s expected life. As to the reliability aspect related to the electronic parts from SKODA, it is recommended that the propulsion controller system be replaced at mid-life by systems now widely used by other trolley buses, such as Kiepe, Alsthom, etc. These systems use modern solid-state devices that have wide usage other than just trolleybus applications, and thus have much great availability that devices from just one source, as is the case with SKODA. If one were to assume that the FTA would even allow the GDRTA to scrap the fairly new ETB system, after refunding a large prorated portion of the original FTA grants ($34 million for the busses, probably a like amount for infrastructure) the GDRTA would have to come up with huge matching funds for a new fleet of fossil-fueled vehicles. With appropriate maintenance of the existing fleet, ETB’s in Dayton can be retained for many years to come. There is no transit vehicle in sight today that will provide the quiet, emission-free, performance of the Electric Trolley Bus (ETB). With uncertainty of imported petroleum, the few cities that are fortunate to have ETB systems should certainly make every effort to retain them. To do other wise, surely history will adversely remember those that made such unwise decisions. http://grassrootsdayton.com/node/91

^ As much as I would love to support that, I just can't see something like that even being close to economically feasible here in Dayton.

Correct

Larger size here

The Springfield-Beckley Municipal Airport is located south of town...pretty much between Springfield and Yellow Springs.

$4M condo project set for district Dayton Business Journal - December 8, 2006 by Yvonne Teems DBJ Staff Reporter An area developer is launching a $4 million condo project in the Oregon District. Tom Tornatore said he plans to renovate the Chapel Electric Building on Sixth Street into 12 condominiums and penthouses by fall 2007. The Excelsior Condominiums project is located next-door to Jay's Seafood restaurant, in the 20-block neighborhood of rehabilitated, historic homes and within reach of Fifth Street shops, restaurants and bars. The project's success will be a result of its location, said local Realtors. "It's a very established residential community. You have tremendous community pride," said Steve Brown, broker and president of Irongate Inc. Realtors, which works with downtown housing, including the condos at Performance Place on Main Street. "That's one reason why any development in or around the Oregon District has always been successful." More at the DBJ! www.daytonbusinessjournal.com

Here are some statistics from February of this year from sprawl-busters.com... Wal-Mart discount stores are slowly disappearing. Over the past 5 years, Wal-Mart has shut down 35.3 million square feet of discount stores. Since 1999, Sprawl-Busters has monitored Wal-Mart’s abandoned stores. These are stores the company leaves behind to build bigger stores—what the company likes to call “dark stores.” Last year, for example, we reported that Wal-Mart had 356 dead stores, with 26.69 million square feet of empty space on the market. At that time, 31% of these dead stores were over 100,000 s.f. As of February, 2006, Wal-Mart Realty is still sitting on a colossal amount of dead air. A total of 310 stores in 38 states are on the list of “available buildings”, a total of 24.39 million square feet, or roughly 508 football fields of empty stores. The top ten states in 2006 with empty Wal-Mart’s are as follows: Texas, 31 Tennessee, 26 Ohio, 19 Georgia, 17 Illinois, 17 Iowa, 14 Louisiana, 12 Kentucky, 11 Michigan, 11 North Carolina, 11 In the “million square foot” club of states carrying more than a million square feet of empty Wal-Marts, are the following 6 states: Georgia, 1.32 million; Illinois, 1.4 million; Michigan, 1.23 million; Ohio, 1.62 million; Tennessee, 1.8 million; and Texas, 2.3 million. Last year, states with over a million square feet of empty space included Texas, Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, and Michigan. In 2006, Illinois and Ohio are new on the million square foot list, while Arkansas, Louisiana, North Carolina, and Oklahoma have dropped below a million. In 2006, a total of 91 stores (29%) are over 100,000 s.f. Most of these dead stores are former discount stores that Wal-Mart replaced with a larger format supercenter. What you can do: According to the company’s SEC filings, between 2000 and 2005, Wal-Mart closed down a net of 35.305 million square feet of discount stores. In terms of discount store count, in 2005, Wal-Mart had 1,353 discount stores, or 448 fewer discount stores than the retailer had in 2000. The company’s number of discount stores began rolling backwards around 1995. In the past 5 years, Wal-Mart has closed the equivalent of 735 football fields worth of discount stores. http://www.sprawl-busters.com/search.php?readstory=2265 And from walmartwatch.com.... According to the company, Wal-Mart is the "largest owner and manager of retail space in the country." But not all that land is for working, thriving supercenters. Wal-Mart has shed hundreds of stores to move onto bigger facilities. Most of these relocations have been in towns where Wal-Mart shuts down a discount store to open up a larger supercenter a few miles, or even blocks, away. "As (Wal-Mart) rolls out new supercenter prototypes," the company explains, "it must also find uses for existing relocated stores after they are closed." Although the company claims that in 1998 it sold or leased 10 million square feet of what it calls "once-occupied" stores, the February, 1999 list of "available buildings" from Wal-Mart Realty reveals that the amount of buildings on the market at that time was closer to 20 million square feet of empty stores. As these stores sit dormant, they continue to generate polluted runoff, poisoning rivers and lakes. Based on Wal-Mart’s own list, here are some statistics on these empty stores that might surprise you: Wal-Mart listed 333 empty buildings as of February, 1999. These buildings are spread across 31 states. A total of 20.66 million s.f. of empty stores were on the market Only 17% (58) of these stores are owned by Wal-Mart, 83% (275) are leased Estimating that Wal-Mart has roughly 2,850 U.S. stores open, these additional 333 empty stores meant that 10.5% of the units Wal-Mart owns or leases were "available". 15 states had 10 or more empty Wal-Mart stores The average size of empty Wal-Marts was 62,057s.f.--larger than most other retail buildings in a small community. 52 of the empty stores (16%) were larger than 100,000 s.f, with some as large as 134,000 s.f. 54 stores (16%) on the February list were marked "new" Wal-Mart stores and parking lots already occupy roughly 75,000 acres in the U.S. and the company plans to nearly double its footprint over the next 10 years. Many of these new stores will be built on undeveloped land, even though the U.S. is overrun with thousands of vacant malls, shopping centers, and big-box stores. [institute for Local Self-Reliance, 7/21/05] The symptoms of retail saturation are everywhere: We have more than 4,000 abandoned shopping malls in America. We have more shopping centers than high schools. We have 20 square feet of retail space for every man, woman and child in America, up from 14.7 s.f. per person in 1986, compared with 2 s.f. per person in Britain. http://walmartwatch.com/battlemart/go/cat/community_impact

From the Saturday, December 9th, 2006 edition of the Celina Daily Standard Former Wal-Mart site still awaiting tenants Ohio is second with empty Wal-Mart buildings By Shelley Grieshop Photo: The former Wal-Mart building along Havemann Road isn't seeing much action these days since being abandoned 19 months ago when the new supercenter opened across the road. Seagulls from Grand Lake are the only visitors these days to the abandoned Wal-Mart building in Celina. Although Wal-Mart officials - specifically their own realty division - and Lakewood Village Shopping Center owner Austin Management are busy trying to market the nearly 69,000-square foot building, it remains empty. For more info, click link http://www.dailystandard.com/archive/story_single.php?rec_id=1606

As always, phenomenal job, montecarloss.

Another book I just saw recently for the first time was Historic Photos of Cincinnati http://www.turnerpublishing.com/detail.aspx?ID=1317

http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=3390.0

I hope this doesn't take up room needed for the Beer Hall of Fame :-D