KJP

High-rises are the result of market forces and dynamic economies. Not the other way around. We still have a lot of empty holes to fill, including in two existing, huge buildings that are a few ticks either side of a million square feet.

11/1/2023 Rail News: Federal Legislation & Regulation House bill would slash Amtrak funding by 64% The White House on Monday issued a veto threat for House Republicans' appropriations bill H.R. 4820, which calls for dramatic cuts in funding for Amtrak, rail safety, infrastructure and high-speed rail. The bill sets appropriations for the U.S. Department of Transportation and Department of Housing and Urban Development for fiscal-year 2024, ending Sept. 30. If passed, it would cut Amtrak funding by 64% below the 2023 enacted level. The cuts would reduce or potentially eliminate certain Amtrak long-distance and state-supported services, and risk operations and critical capital expenses on the Northeast Corridor, according to an Office of Management and Budget (OMB) statement issued Monday. MORE https://www.progressiverailroading.com/federal_legislation_regulation/news/House-bill-would-slash-Amtrak-funding-by-64--70550

Wish I could read the full article.... The Money Has Stopped Flowing in Commercial Real Estate Decline in construction loans has been particularly severe as lenders continue to cut back By Peter Grant Oct. 31, 2023 5:30 am ET Commercial real-estate lending is shrinking to historically low levels, threatening a rise in defaults on expiring debt and a sharp decline in new construction of warehouses, apartments and other property types. Banks, insurance companies and other commercial property lenders have been cutting back since the first half of 2022 when the Federal Reserve began increasing interest rates and recession concerns intensified. But creditors have been even more reluctant to make new loans as Treasury bond yields have soared since early August. https://www.wsj.com/real-estate/commercial/the-money-has-stopped-flowing-in-commercial-real-estate-43c003d3

Damn, I thought I'd have the scoop on this again.... County Courthouse project gets seven proposals By Ken Prendergast / October 31, 2023 While the specific proposals for a new or renovated Cuyahoga County courthouse haven’t been publicly released yet by the county, a list of who submitted the proposals was provided to NEOtrans as a result of a public records request. And the list of seven respondents provides some insight as to who has presented what for the county’s nearly 900,000-square-foot courthouse facility that could cost $400 million to $700 million to build or renovate. MORE: https://neo-trans.blog/2023/10/31/county-courthouse-project-gets-seven-proposals/

Property acquisition is often a year-long process. By the time the parties are willing to say anything publicly (and I'm surprised NRP said anything here), it's not news anymore. It's history.

Unreal. The only thing worse is getting the voters to approve a subway and it still didn't get built.... See Cleveland.

Gordon Square: more apartments, townhomes By Ken Prendergast / October 31, 2023 Less than a year after acquiring the Premium Metals property, 5901-6001 Breakwater Ave., in Cleveland’s Gordon Square neighborhood, Beachwood-based developer TurnDev has released conceptual plans for developing the site with a mix of multifamily apartments and townhomes. Tentatively called Breakwater Residences, its 193 housing units and a long, five-story building represent a significant project but not as large as what was previously proposed for the site by another developer. And it’s less dense than what the city’s zoning code allows. MORE: https://neo-trans.blog/2023/10/31/gordon-square-more-apartments-townhomes/

Meanwhile, somewhere on the New York-Chicago high-speed line in 2045

Erie RR actually didn't relocate its passenger trains to Cleveland Union Terminal until 1949 -- 19 years after CUT opened. Here's more info in a great video that came out yesterday...

National Transit Database. Lots of great info.

Yours truly appeared in this terrific video that used only old film of CUT and CUT trains. Too often, such videos used old film from other cities. Not this one...

Incredible devastation. The worst part is that Otis intensified faster than any hurricane in recorded history, from a 65 mph tropical storm to a 145-mph monster hurricane in just 12 hours. No one had any warning how strong it would be. Acapulco took a direct hit...

Let's wait and see what comes next before tarring and feathering the owners. Could the owners have waited? Maybe, but I don't know what the owners know. It's OK to not have an opinion on something.

But not everything makes sense, like spending nearly the same amount of money to rebuild/retrofit a stadium as it would to build a new one.

Unfortunately I don't. I remember my father driving us up/down the old Columbus Road ramp in the 1970s but I'm pretty sure the bridge was gone by the end of the 1980s. I couldn't find any references or pictures of it in later years but there's plenty of photos at Cleveland Memory of it under construction (posted below) including its June 22, 1927 opening. Perhaps the best way to nail down when it was torn down would be to find pictures of other nearby structures, such as the Detroit-Superior bridge.

New federal guidance for TOD funding could boost Cleveland-area projects -- cross-posted from the Random Cleveland Developments thread

Local projects may benefit from federal incentives By Ken Prendergast / October 29, 2023 Having too much office space, not enough housing inventory and tight private financing to address those conditions isn’t just a Greater Cleveland phenomenon. It’s a nationwide problem. So the federal government on Friday announced incentives to encourage the conversion of high-vacancy commercial buildings to residential use and develop surplus land owned by transit agencies. MORE: https://neo-trans.blog/2023/10/29/local-projects-may-benefit-from-federal-incentives/

A definite maybe

That's what I was wondering when I first saw that map last spring. But from what I understand, the Browns have abandoned the idea of relocating the stadium.

I have one in the article and linked to more (very first first link in article).

In 2012, NS sold the 135-mile Kalamazoo-Dearborn section of the Detroit-Chicago line to the state of Michigan for $140 million, or $1.037 million per mile. They've also abandoned and sold some rights of way in their 41 years, including a portion (in Portage County) of the former Erie Railroad into Cleveland. But I don't know how much money they received.

North Coast development authority launched By Ken Prendergast / October 27, 2023 With updated plans for redeveloping downtown Cleveland’s lakefront steadily rolling in like Lake Erie’s waves, the nonprofit development corporation charged with funding and implementing those plans also is coming together. Today, Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb announced the initial board of directors for the new North Coast Waterfront Development Corp. (NCWDC) and its chair, David Gilbert, CEO of Destination Cleveland and the Greater Cleveland Sports Commission. MORE: https://neo-trans.blog/2023/10/27/north-coast-development-authority-launched/

I replied in the Tower City-Riverfront development thread.

Except he doesn't have the money to do everything he wanted in Phase 1 of the riverfront development or he wouldn't have pulled the Cavs/Clinic piece out of it, moved it to the other side of Collision Bend, and called it Phase 1A. Right now, I suspect he's like everyone in one way -- he can't get the banks to ante up for big projects. Granted, phase 1A is a decent-sized project, but Phase 1 was going to be 1 million square feet (including parking). There's a saying going around in development circles -- "Stay alive to 2025." Not sure what the significance of 2025 is, though.

About 6 1/2 inches tall 😁