KJP

He's starting renovations next month (those that he can get away with in the absence of a permit). He's hoping to have the first units ready for occupancy this summer, with the entire building renovated in 18 months (including the Southworth Building). So, yes, people will move in as the units are ready. But he's got a lot of work to do on replacing the wiring, plumbing, HVAC, etc. before anyone can move in. At this rate, I won't have to write the Sun article. I'll just refer Sun's readers here!

When I was interviewing Howells, a polished-looking businessman his 50s approached him and asked "who do we talk to about putting down a deposit?" Howells excused himself for a moment and introduced the man to a PURE sales rep. Maybe he was one of them. Actually, isn't this what an open house is designed to do? Get pre-sales?? Howells said he was very pleased with the pre-sales considering he's done very little marketing. Is that a commentary on downtown's for-sale market or the building's location and design? (yeah yeah yeah -- I know it's probably both, but I'd love to hear which way UrbanOhioans are weighing it).

Let me put it this way. I'm not affluent. And if my credit card debt wasn't an issue, I could afford some of the condos downtown that are selling for under $150,000. The reason? Tax abatement. I was seriously considering buying a condo last year at the Pointe at Gateway until I figured my credit card payments into the mix. Downtown is one of the few places in Cleveland I would consider buying a home. The other revitalized or rebounding neighborhoods (Ohio City, Tremonth, Chinatown, University Circle, Little Italy...) are other places I would consider. It is also hard to find quality, for-sale housing in those areas for less than $150,000. I am not looking for a fixer-upper. Without tax abatement, there is no way I could afford to buy a quality home in a desirable Cleveland neighborhood. So I hope others will carefully weigh their thoughts before thinking that only the affluent benefit from tax abatement. I am most definitely at the bottom of a shrinking middle class.

Actually, the Waterfront Line was rushed. It first appeared in an official document in 1985 as the Flats Trolley, costing about $10 million. It was to run as a U-shaped route from the East Bank of the Flats to the West Bank via the B&O bascule bridge (located next to Nautica Stage/Scene Pavilion). A later version had it running on basically its current route (minus the bridge bridge over the lakefront freight tracks -- it would have stayed on the south side of those tracks). Yet, it would still be only a single-track line served only during special events by heritage trolleys. When the city went a-hunting for bicentennial legacy projects that could open in 1996, RTA GM Ron Tober and Assistant GM RoseMary Covington repackaged the Flats Trolley as a full-blown light-rail line. It would be an extension of the Blue/Green lines, with double-tracks, substantial stations, streetscaping, parks, and the big bridge over the lakefront freight tracks. The new version was projected to cost $45 million -- minus the parks. Between the fast-tracking of the project (they avoided federal funds to avoid the environmental reviews and thus speed up the project) and the addition of the Settlers Landing Park, the project cost ballooned to $72 million. The cost would have been even higher if some station features were included, such as the center canopy at the Flats East Bank station, the extended canopies over both platforms at the North Coast station, and a pedestrian walkway below East 9th Street to reach the east side of the street at North Coast Station. Here's where the Waterfront Line failed... 1. It has no ridership anchor at its end -- just a municipal parking lot. Even an anchor as strong as Hopkins International Airport isn't sufficient to keep Red Line trains from emptying out as they head farther from downtown. 2. The Waterfront Line was built as an end-product. Transit projects seldom do well when they are built in that way. They perform much better when they are built as one of the tools to achieve a larger vision of community planning and economic development. 3. The Waterfront Line is too slow. It plods along in some sections. Stops and sometimes waits for a Red Line train to clear before climbing the ramp into Tower City Center. And the bridge/elevated section over the lakefront freight tracks is about as circuitous as a bridge could be (I realize it was designed to serve an aquarium that was never built). Much of this would mean less if places along the Waterfront Line were destinations for trains coming from both directions. But since the Waterfront Line lacks decent pedestrian-oriented ridership generators at its end, it depends on ridership sources east of Tower City to provide its ridership. And the Red Line doesn't help the Waterfront Line. Most of the neighborhoods along the Red Line east of Tower City has withered away. West of Tower City, taking the Red Line and transfering to the Waterfront Line takes a lot longer than just hopping an RTA bus or driving. Solutions: 1. It's never to late to use the Waterfront Line as a tool for achieving community planning goals. Keep promoting development designed around the Waterfront Line -- Flats East Bank, Pesht, Lighthouse Landing, lakefront plan, redevelopment of the municipal parking lot, and if people so choose, deactivation and redevelopment of Burke Lakefront Airport. As long as there are different uses along the Waterfront Line (grocery stores, shopping, banking, post office, schools, work, nightlife and recreation) then it can be used as a shuttle within downtown and even as a ridership source, not just a ridership destination. 2. Extend the Waterfront Line someplace where it can tap ridership sources and be a part of a redevelopment plan (ie: lakefront plan). Right now, that's not a saleable idea. It will be viewed as running empty trains farther. So get what's in #1 above and then look to where full trains can be extended. Perhaps to the northeast to East 55th, Brahtenal, Collinwood or even Euclid. Perhaps as a downtown loop. Perhaps both. But only as an instigator of a larger end-product. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Fortunately, the building is in very good condition. The building was owned by three generations of the Swetland family from when it was built in 1904 to 2006. They maintained it very well. Although wood floors weren't in vogue in the middle part of the 20th century and thus got covered over, they did take care of the oak trim, and kept the marble and granite in the common hallways. I'm sure many of us have seen buildings prior to their renovation and wondered how in the world can these buildings be saved. But, yet they come out looking great. The Park Building looks almost ready to move in now, aside from the dust and the fact that the suites are still configured as offices. Howells told me the biggest expense he will have is updating the building's mechanicals. The reconfiguration of the suites into condominiums, expense-wise, is not a big deal. However, he said that he, his staff and the project architect spent many meetings intensely debating how to configure individual condo units within the confines of existing interior and exterior walls. That was a big challenge for this project.

Very nice pictures (though I see you don't like blinds!!). Looks like you beat the crowds to the open house! Makes it easier to get better pictures without lots of people blocking the views. FYI the floors in each unit are all made of maple while the trim is oak. Some of the floors were covered by linoleum tiles (YEECH) but have since been removed to reveal the maple below. In the common-area hallways, the floors are terrazzo, installed in the late 1940s, with granite and marble for the walls and stairwells.

No, because the tax abatement for the 200 units was approved by City Council just this past Dec. 10. Corna and Price wouldn't have started construction on Stonebridge Plaza without tax abatement in hand. And Corna said the 200 units would be in one building. My only guess at this point is that Corna and Price have amended their previously announced plan. By the way, I really like their reuse of the former Cantina del Rio and the mix of uses they will have in it. Between the retail/restaurant uses and the office/housing surrounding it, they've pretty well guaranteed that the place skylit building will remain active at all hours. I only hope the businesses stay open at all hours.

That's cool. The owner gave me tour of the building. :wave: These are the times when I enjoy being a reporter. It's amazing what introducing yourself as a reporter does to some people. Sometimes it gets you a tour of a building. Other times it gets you thrown out of one. While I didn't bring a camera, I did bring a notepad and learned some neat stuff about the building and the owner. Some personal observations: That place is built like a bunker! As soon I walked in, you could see how solid a building it is. Here's a quote from owner Matt Howells: "You couldn't implode this building. You'd have to cut it up." Because of its solid construction, the noise from the street was negligible. Looking out the windows at Public Square during rush hour at twilight with all the pedestrians, the city lights and traffic was like watching a high-definition promotional video of Cleveland with the mute button on. I hate to put it in these terms, but I felt as if I was in another city (I felt the same way when I went to Jacobs Field right after it opened in 1994, after enduring decades of old Municipal Stadium). As for prices, the only unit selling for less than $200,000 is a 560 sq ft unit lacking a Public Square view. It is selling for $169,000. The non-penthouse units are selling for $300,000 and up. Prices for the four penthouses are not listed. It's like seeing lobster listed on the menu at a fancy restaurant -- "Market Price." The penthouses will be two levels, with bedrooms on the ninth floor (which has the lowest ceilings in the building because it was formerly an attic and the kitchen for the restaurant that was in the basement). The penthouses' living quarters will be on a tenth floor that doesn't yet exist. Each penthouse will have its own in-suite stairway. It was so wonderful to see so many people of so many ages and types show up for the open house. It was difficult to move around in the place at times because of the number of people there. When I left and walked out on to the street, I felt energized (though I wish the storefronts in the building would have stayed open -- why do they close before rush hour is over??). But the early nighttime streets remained busy with lots of people, cars, buses and energy which kept my spirits high. Anyone who loves cities couldn't help but get bolstered by the setting. Like Councilman Cimperman said in my first article about the Park Building, "You can't get more downtown than housing on Public Square." I guess others feel the same, because seven of the 27 units have already sold. A terrific building and event!

Not my article, but I'll pass the compliment along to David.

BTW, Norm Krumholz was City Planning Director under the Stokes, Perk and possibly Kucinich administrations. He was with CSU during the White Administration. Hunter Morrison was director of City Planning during the Voinovich and White administrations.

That's the confusing part, and I made followup calls to Bob Corna back to get more information. I never got those calls returned, however. Here's what he told me in the initial call: He said the 200 units would be in a 12-story building on a large footprint next to the old viaduct and the tower that is nearing completion. The site is fenced and Stonebridge is storing construction equipment there right now. The 12 stories includes several levels of indoor parking. However, when I checked the Stonebridge site plan, the location didn't make sense. And, when I asked for a rendering of the building, the image that was e-mailed to me was of a 68-unit building between the old viaduct and the turn in Washington Boulevard (I'll post the rendering later this evening). Yet the rendering that was sent to me was not of a 12-story building (even including the parking levels). And, it's not next to the tower that is nearing completion. The only location that fits the criteria as explained by Corna is a parking lot between the nearly finished tower and the Powerhouse. But records show that parking lot is still owned by Nautica Inc. (Jeff Jacobs), and Corna specifically told me it wasn't a parking lot. Plus, that site is not showed as part of the Stonebridge plan. Furthermore, there is no 200-unit building in the next phases of the Stonebridge plan. So I wrote the article as generally as I could, and de-emphasized the "next-phase" portions to secondary status in the article. So I hope I didn't screw it up too badly.

I suspect you're talking about buildings like the one on the greenspace along St. Clair, in front of One Cleveland Center's huge parking deck? If so, I believe those were listed as "future phases" or words to that effect.

You are correct, MGD, regarding the location of the townhomes. There is no parking deck planned for that block. Bada Bing.... Gold Horse.... Hoods of a feather flock together (Although Bada Bing closed).

Thanks for reminding me. I'd forgotten about it too!

Probably the new street between Rockwell and Superior. But I think the rendering is meant to present only a general townhouse concept.

Were your ears burning? __________________ http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1168508569313960.xml&coll=2 Ridership on RTA rises for 4th year in row Thursday, January 11, 2007 Sarah Hollander Plain Dealer Reporter The number of people riding RTA buses and trains grew for the fourth straight year in 2006, the second longest stretch since the public transit agency started more than 30 years ago. Despite a fare increase, and volatile gas prices, the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority counted 150,000 more rides for a total of 57.2 million trips. The rapid transit lines did particularly well. Use of light rail service, which includes the blue and green lines through Shaker Heights and Cleveland, jumped 5.1 percent. Ridership on buses and paratransit for disabled people also increased. Ridership on circulators dropped slightly. .... To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: [email protected], 216-999-4816

Already posted at: http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=5549.msg153508#msg153508

Cough...cough.....

I forgot to post these. Here are the pictures submitted with my two-part series on the Avenue District. All were used in at least one of the papers that was able to fit them.... [ALL IMAGES ARE COURTESY OF ZAREMBA HOMES INC.] Site plan -- north is to the left... Although everyone has used this image, it was too good to leave out of the series... Small sampling of the Avenue District's townhomes... Caption for the groundbreaking appears below this image.... From left to right: Honorable Jane Campbell; Joe Roman, President & CEO, Greater Cleveland Partnership; Bruce Murphy, Community Development Banking President, Key Bank; Mayor Frank Jackson; Nathan Zaremba, President, Zaremba, Inc.; Dan Mullinger, Senior VP, National City Bank

Isabella Basile is related (I'm not sure in what way, maybe sister?) to late mobster Carmen Basile. Carmen was quite the force in the Cleveland Mafia from the 1950s until his death in the mid-1980s.

Cool!

At the start of the New Urbanist movement, Disney World was hailed as the place where Americans went to enjoy the way their cities and towns used to look. It has a main street lined with active shops, lots of pedestrians and a streetcar. And, linking it to other nodes of activity is a fast monorail. That analogy, as intentionally comical as it was intended to be, was also persuasive in making some Americans question the direction their cities were taking. And it also helped some realize that different modes of transportation foster and support their own brand of development patterns and densities. So, the short version is that a fixed guideway system like a monorail, streetcar, light-rail line, commuter rail line or high-speed rail line will draw significant amounts of ridership when supportive land uses are encouraged. And Disney sure did that by integrating investments in its park with respect to the monorail serving it. Ol' Walt was more than a cartoonist and businessman. He was probably one of the first New Urbanists, and a skilled one at that, while the rest of America was convinced that the organic, pedestrian-scale city was obsolete. The guy was a genius. That's probably why they froze his brain for posterity....

Great find, Ink. Sad to see the neglect, but not surprising to see it. We're still living with the policies from 50 years ago that fostered such neglect of our walkable cities and the transportation systems that let them grow bigger. So here's a scene of the same place in a happier time....

I believe the 11.96 percent figure is the overall vacancy for all Class A office space in Greater Cleveland. The 9.2 percent figure is just for the downtown area.

I thought I saw from the IRS that it was 47.5 cents at one point. No biggie.