Eigth and State

"The Center Cities need to come down." -Le Corbusier

Don't forget about existing underutilized space, including 2 and 3 bedroom single family houses in the inner ring suburbs and outer suburbs that have only 1 or 2 people in them.

For comparison, when the GM plant in Norwood closed in 1987, about 4200 workers were laid off at once.

There is a new bike path under construction parallel to MLK between Cilfton Avenue and Central Parkway. It's not open yet, but it's built. It crosses Dixmuth Avenue and a driveway or two, but has very few crossings. It negotiates the hill at Central Parkway with a pair of hairpin turns. The other side of MLK has a sidewalk. I'm interested to see how this turns out.

Politics aside, the practical improvement in my opinion is to close the I-75 Covington Ramps and improve access from I-75 to the Clay Wade Bailey Bridge on the Ohio side, making the Clay Wade bridge serve as a long ramp to Covingron. If there is to be a toll plaza on I-75, it should be at the top of the hill near Kyles Lane, because there is room there and because it is at the top of the hill.

"If you want to make enemies, try to change something." - Woodrow Wilson

^In those days that Keller's did well, the Mitchel Avenue Kroger hadn't been built yet and the Corryville Kroger hadn't been remodeled. Clifton Natural Foods is still on Ludlow but you can't buy a gallon of regular cow's milk there.

Lately I've been driving a vehicle that automatically shuts off the internal combustion engine at stops. It's not my car, and I don't know how it works, but it seems like a conventional car with a feature that stops and starts the engine automatically, while keeping all of the accessories such as the radio, A/C, etc, in operation. So, pure-electric cars now have to compete with hybrids as well as high-efficiency conventional cars.

Seagulls! :laugh:

Nice. Thanks for posting.

^Funny that the Mercator projection is criticized for making Europe bigger (and by association with size making it seem more important,) yet National Geographic, while using the Fuller projection, STILL feels that Europe is important enough to warrant a detail insert. The real reason why the Mercator was invented is that it has special properties for navigation: a straight line between two points on the flat projection will give the correct astronomic bearing to follow to get from one point to another. The fact that it distorts the size to make the higher latitudes look bigger may actually be an advantage to those living in those latitudes, because, you know, other projections would require detail inserts to show all of those little countries in Europe. :-D

^Whoops, I didn't realize that the map came from National Geographic, which of course has to be the leader in cartography. Are they making a statement by using a different map projection?

I just today by chance found this fuller projection on a main stream news site. This is got to be the first time I have ever seen one of the lesser-known projections anywhere other than a map geek forum. I have to admit it threw me for a second, even though I had just been reading this thread about projections.

Who pays you for this again?

A buddy of mine drove a car from Bejing, China, to Paris, France, a distance of about 6000 miles. It took 35 days, which included 30 days of driving and 5 rest days. About 7 of those days were in Europe minus Russia. 28 days were in China, Mongolia, and Russia. That gives an idea of how big Asia is compared to Europe.

Did you count the initial purchase price?

^Fuel and emissions are only one part of the problem. How do you dispose of used car tires? What happens to the seats and non-metal parts when the car is eventually scrapped? How many square feet of asphalt pavement does the car require? How many people are injured or die in car crashes? An electric car is still a car.

^I think Bicentennial Park in Green Township, bordering Mt. Airy Forest, is the only one actually purchased, but one of the former township trustees announced the strategy of buying a chain of parks along the border.

^The land has to be contiguous. Cincinnati cannot annex land that doesn't touch the existing city boundary. Also, there is a provision in the state law that allows the County Commissioners to prohibit the city from annexing land, so there has to be support by the County Commissioners. It's not necessarily in the city's best interest to annex land. What if there is a liability? Maybe the land is more trouble than it's worth, such as a problem property that attracts a lot of crime, or one in a flood plain that is always flooding. Also, what if your city council is mostly on the Democratic party and the land is currently occupied by Republicans? It might just be enough to vote the democrats out of office next time. The big business that is on the border of town that has the high property value and the big payroll is what cities want. Chances are, the business will resist it, or incorporate into another town as a strategy to avoid annexation. This is the case of St. Bernard, home of the former Procter and Gamble Ivorydale Complex. Instead of becoming part of Cincinnati and paying lots of taxes, it became part of St. Bernard, which has a lower tax rate. Even so, St. Bernard, with a big industrial base and hardly any residents, enjoys premium city services. The garbage collectors will come collect your garbage cans from your back yard for you! On the other hand, some of the townships play the game from the other side of the table. Green Township is trying to buy a chain of parks along the border with Cincinnati in order to prevent annexation. Cincinnati hasn't annexed anything significant since the 1940's.

Cincinnati Police don't have jurisdiction over land outside of the city. In this case, the City is just another property owner. The City of Loveland owns land in Symmes Township. Loveland tried to enforce their own zoning ordinance on that land, and ended up losing to Symmes Township, which has zoning jurisdiction. It's not uncommon for cities to own land outside of their boundaries. Madeira's city hall is in Columbia Township. Wyoming's rec center is in Woodlawn. Part of Mt. Airy Forest, a Cincinnati Park, is in Green Township. French Park is in Amberly Village. Also, different governments make agreements with each other for various services. Forest Park provides fire service in part of Springfield Township. Cincinnati Water Works sells water wholesale to Norwood and Reading, which own their own water pipelines and charge their residents. On the other hand, Cincinnati Water Works provides water service to unincorporated Hamilton County, and charges customers directly. School Districts don't necessarily correspond to municipal boundaries. Part of Covedale in Green Township, as well as the City of Cheviot, are in the Cincinnati Public School District. Northwest Schools cross over into Butler County. The whole thing is a tangled web. You need a good map to keep track of it all. As for annexation, keep in mind that many of the smaller cities originally incorporated to PROTECT themselves from annexation. Some of them are still fiercely independent. Where can you find a store that sells firearms, for example? I don't think there are any in Cincinnati, but there's one in Norwood and one in Cheviot.

So, there are 3 Democrats running, and no Republicans, right? And this upcoming election is to choose 2 out of 3? The general election will then choose 1 of 2? Is this correct? If it is, well that's strange.

The zoo gets part of their funding from Hamilton County. (At one point there was a sign in the zoo thanking Hamilton County Voters). I imagine that they get a significant amount from donors, not to mention admissions. Many of the workers are volunteers. The zoo currently owns a farm in Warren County that they use as auxiliary space for operations. It would not be easy to move the zoo, but still possible. Maybe they could operate multiple sites, like the hospitals do. In any case, I am happy that the zoo has made a commitment to stay in Cincinnati, despite the fact that some buildings have been torn down for parking. The entrance area of the zoo, called the zoo village, with the ticket building, the gate, the restrooms, the gift shop, and the bridge is one of my favorite urban design examples. It all used to be a parking lot. Do you remember the old zoo entrance off of Dury? It was a messy and overcrowded area. The gate was an automobile gate rather than a pedestrian gate, and traffic would back up into the street. Once inside the gate, visitors found themselves in a sea of parking lots. That is all exhibit space now. The zoo is getting better, and the zoo is doing pretty well in the urban design area. I met the facilities director at the zoo, and he is not proud of what the zoo has done to the neighborhood over the years, and he is committed to make the neighborhood better, not worse. That said, the zoo is in kind of a predicament with regards to parking, because almost all of the visitors are families that drive to the zoo.

^They do realize it. They are just stuck with regard to parking. Almost all of the visitors to the zoo are families that drive to the zoo for the day, and they bring their cars, or more likely, their SUV's and Minivans. If you are the zoo, what could you do better? Tell your visitors to ride the bus? Build a parking garage? Turn them away when the parking lots are full? Give them credit for staying in Cincinnati, please. They could have moved to Warren County and built a giant parking lot like Kings Island.

So true! I'm glad that these families are riding the streetcar, but wow, who would have guessed?

Hey, kids, do you want to ride the train? :-) Whitewater Valley Railroad: Drive to Connersville, Indiana, pay $25 per adult, $15 per child, arrive on their schedule. Lebanon Railroad: Drive to Lebanon, Ohio, pay $15 per adult, $10 per child, arrive on their schedule. Cincinnati Zoo Train: Drive to zoo, pay $10 parking, pay for zoo admission. Train is $7 on top of that. Kings Island Train (live steam!) - Drive to Kings Island. Train is included in park admission. Daily ticket is $45. Delta Train: Drive to airport, go through security. Normally, one wouldn't do this without an airline ticket. Amtrak - oh, nevermind. Any more? Is the Strickers Grove train still operating? Coney Island? Cincinnati Streetcar: $2, whenever you want. What a bargain! :clap: Oh, I almost forgot about the Cincinnati Cindersniffers, near Bright, Indiana, modelers of live steam toy trains you can ride: https://www.youtube.com/embed/WQz-cxJFWgw