Bookman

Cross-post https://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php/topic,29115.msg875739.html#msg875739 Thanks KJP for posting the article about Menlo Park Academy.

Perhaps, but I have three kids at this school and they are thriving there. The school is the top-ranked gifted school in Ohio and is attracting a great deal of attention. Hopefully this will help develop the area.

I was just thinking that. They would've been better off building a new one at this rate! If anyone actually watched the video, it was clearly mentioned that a new building would have cost $400 million. So, no, they could not have built a new building for what has been spent thus far. The initial money was for the outside and the new money is to update and renovate the inside for a grand total of half what a new federal building would have cost. Sounds pretty cost efficient to me. I did watch the video and I did notice that statement that it would cost $400 million. It did include moving all of the staff out, finding new workspaces, demolition and then new construction. So while the actual building might not have cost much more than has been spent, or going to be spent, the ancillary costs were considered in their decision process. Sidenote, I have a good friend that worked for Van Dyck back in the 80's. I'm sure he will be interested to see this video.

There are (or were) pedestrian signals at both of the crosswalks inside the promenade. Use the photo here: http://bit.ly/2mxKDBW and check out the 360 view.

^^I think they should look at the Superior block (East 3rd to East Roadway, West 3rd to West Roadway) coming into the Square and make the far right lanes for all non-bus traffic, put an island with bus shelter in the next lane and then the third lane from the curb becomes bus only. Outbound from the Square shouldn't need to change. The 55 (Cleveland State Line) has to make the turn westbound on Superior from the second lane from the curb anyway, this would resolve the jockeying for position with the cars that will have to turn right.

^From a conversation with a reliable source, the building next to Virginia Marti College of Art & Design may become a culinary school.

No doubt. Classic case of form over function. People will always take the shortest path, even if it means trampling the lawn. I was downtown last week too and found myself walking South on Ontario approaching the Square. I did walk around on the sidewalk, but only because I had the time to do it and I wanted to experience the space as it is designed. That grass will always be getting trampled except when there is lots of snow on the ground.

It wouldn't solve its largely windowless bunker-style design, or its large apron (er, moat) of concrete and grass surrounding it. The whole structure says "I don't care about interacting on a human scale with my urban surroundings." And guess what -- it doesn't. In fairness, most arenas aren't built to be big statements of urbanity And there's plenty of space to build a 15 story, 1,000 room dorm in front of it attached to the arena.... I highly doubt that CSU will build any dorms taller than four, maybe five stories. Ongoing maintenance expense is something they want to minimize. By using the entire block of E. 21st to E. 18th between Prospect and Carnegie, one should easily fit an 8,000 seat arena, practice facilities for Men's and Women's basketball, as well as 1,000 to 1,500 beds of modern dormitory living. CSU needs to rid itself of the buildings that have high ongoing maintenance costs. This is just my opinion...

I'm really getting tired of this whole issue with buses on Superior. Bottom line, Monday through Friday between 7am and 7pm, moving buses through Superior will significantly reduce the congestion around the Square and minimize travel times. There is no way you can tell me anything different. I can't wait for a snow storm that starts at 4pm and watch traffic barely moving.

I thought it would be interesting to identify exactly which buses should be using Superior through the square and I found something interesting. Of the new RTA schedules I checked, no buses or BRT's are going through the square. Now perhaps RTA quickly made the adjustments, or they knew that the city was going to want to keep Superior closed.

As I have stated before, riding a bus that once went through the square and now goes around it requires me to take an earlier bus so that I arrive at work on time. While I can make that adjustment, there may be others that can't. Let's have a dose of reality, once K-12 schools open there won't be as many people enjoying the square. Also, I doubt there are many people on the square during the morning rush hour unless they are heading to work. Open the bus lanes and see what happens.

More discussion about buses... http://www.cleveland.com/naymik/index.ssf/2016/07/cleveland_mayor_frank_jackson_3.html#incart_m-rpt-1 Officials consider banning buses from renovated Public Square: Mark Naymik CLEVELAND, Ohio – One month after the completion of the $50 million renovation of Public Square, Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson and others are already thinking about making changes. They are investigating whether to permanently ban buses from passing through the square, something Jackson has long wanted. Informal discussions on the point began last week, when people and police mingled in the middle of the square during the Republican National Convention.

I don't think I said that I was complaining about Ontario being closed. Given that Ontario only goes another two blocks North, St. Clair then Lakeside, I would imagine that the impact is minimal. How many routes are there that end North of Public Square? Also, I didn't say I was concerned about walking an extra block. In fact I will gladly walk several extra blocks in order to avoid a two-seat trip. My observation is simply about timing. The bus that I was taking before PS construction started allowed me to arrive with a sufficient cushion to my start time at work. Once construction started and the bus was no longer able to go through the square, I needed to take an earlier bus which depending on my start time caused a shift of as little as ten minutes and as much as thirty. If it was just me those adjustments are not a big deal. The reality is that I have a family with school age kids and the timing of getting the kids to school is a factor that I have to consider. I'm sure RTA isn't thrilled about the West Shoreway going to 35 MPH either. Granted the time difference is minimal, but I'm betting the MPG of the buses means higher fuel costs over time.

What platform do RTA riders have to make their concerns public? People like KJP advocate for transit because nobody else seems to. You say there is no argument against keeping the square unified. But you have yet to see how how it operates as two sections. Talk about closed minded. The already closed Ontario permanently and restricted cars through Superior. Once the work began on Public Square, I needed to take an earlier bus in order to make sure I was at work on time. While that was easy for me to do, there may be others that for various reasons could not make the ten to fifteen minute adjustment to their lives. I think it is reasonable to expect that others were not happy about making the adjustments. I think we have to let a few months go by with the road open to really pass judgement. Perhaps the number of buses going through the square is not as high as everyone anticipates. Remember, Ontario is closed, so buses like the 55 will not be going through the square as they once did. There are probably other routes that are impacted similarly.

The Corlett building was on this site until 2010ish. Is it common for utilities to run underneath buildings? http://www.clevelandareahistory.com/2010/01/demolition-of-cleveland-cadillac.html I'm guessing that the footprint for a 1000 bed dorm is going to be much larger than the footprint of the Corlett building.

I hear the biggest problem with this location is the quantity of utilities that run underground through that area down to the West end of campus. They would need to be re-routed and the costs might be a big unknown.

How much revenue do you think the cafe will produce? Will it be enough to justify the space and investment? Someone should ask Zack Bruell how his Dynomite Burgers is doing at Playhouse Square. Because the whole Public Square cafe should hinge on how Zach's Dynomite Burgers is doing? Hinge? No not hinge, I just mention Dynomite as an example of a standalone cafe in an outdoor area. I would hope think that having some sense of the performance of that location could be utilized in developing projections for the PS Cafe. Frankly, IMHO, the key usage of the new PS is going to be special events. Those will generate revenue and need a lot more than the cafe to provide food and beverages.

How much revenue do you think the cafe will produce? Will it be enough to justify the space and investment? Someone should ask Zack Bruell how his Dynomite Burgers is doing at Playhouse Square.

It looks like demo has started on the building at East 18th and Euclid.

The author, Andy Borowitz, is a 1976 graduate of Shaker Heights High School. His stuff is great!

I lived in Shaker from 1972 until 1985 so I realize that I'm a bit removed from the dynamics of the area at this point. When various people call this development the new downtown for Shaker Heights, I have to scratch my head. I've always thought that the area around Chagrin-Lee-Avalon was more of a "downtown" for Shaker. City Hall, the police station and municipal court are on Lee, just the other side of Van Aken. You have retail and services for several blocks in each direction from Chagrin and Lee. To say that you have a new downtown would almost imply that you are abandoning your current downtown. To me this project still makes sense. It's a transition area with significant visibility. Solid retail, services and housing that can capitalize on the available transit options. I just would never call it downtown Shaker.

One key player in the development team is a longtime rail advocate. I'd be surprised if he was involved in the decision for putting a parking lot in phase 1 next to the rail station. I've been meaning to ask him about that. That kind of bothered me, too. I guess it's a little justifiable because that station is the terminus of the Blue Line, so there's a bit of Park-N-Ride potential. But it would be more justifiable if there weren't so much parking elsewhere in the development... Actually, not really-- I don't know why there should be a desire for something that's never been available... As far as I know, there has never been Park-N-Ride at the Warrensville/Van Aken terminal of the Blue Line, not even back in the Shaker Rapid days. Van Aken Shopping center had signs forbidding and threatening towing ... at least they used to. Part of the reason is the unusual configuration with the Farnsleigh station being only a few hundred feet (1,000 feet at the most) from the end of the line, where there is both a large surface lot across the street from the station and a smaller angle, pull-in lot adjacent to the tracks. I just don't get this design at all... For all the big TOD ballyhoo about this project over the past decade, what we're being presented, at least in Phase 1, is the same old cookie-cutter suburban type stuff that this development is replacing: a grouping a bland, squat office/retail buildings in a suburban campus on a wide plaza whose back is turned toward the transit station (keep in mind, many of the current, soon-to-be-bulldozed Van Aken Shopping Ctr buildings, are mixed also office-over-retail mixed use buildings, so this new plan is nothing new)... And just like the 50s era plaza, these new buildings will be a distance away from the Rapid station, separated by the same ol' bland-suburban sea of asphalt parking. All I can say is: Here we go again! ... 25 years ago, Shaker blew it that absurd single-use, one-level strip mall along Chagrin at Lee road that replaced mixed use, sidewalk buildings from the 1940s. Despite it's status as being THE rapid transit city in the State -- the town where the Rapid was both born and which still the most intimately Ohio town served by the Rapid, Shaker is still showing it doesn't have a clue about TOD, which is both ironic and sad. If memory serves, there is a large parking lot on the North side of Farnsleigh between the corner at Van Aken and the Ohio Savings Bank building. That is where most of the Blue Line riders park and then get on at the Farnsleigh stop. In those renderings it looks like new residential is proposed for that lot. Perhaps there are just not that many people using that lot as when I lived in the area.

In my humble opinion, Geigers is the perfect type of retailer to open downtown. They are local with history and a recognizable brand name. Since they are small they can be fleet a foot to make changes. They won't get bogged down in the cookie-cutter mentality of the larger chain stores where there are set planograms and sales that may not make sense in every location. What they carry in the downtown store may have lots of trial and error and that is going to have to be part of their business plan. Gee, sounds a lot like Heinens.

Risky in what way? Being first? No. Selling ski/snowboard gear downtown. Just seems like a lot of overhead for such a seasonal (and narrow) business in the area. I'm betting they do mostly clothing/shoes out of this locations, with a sprinkling of outdoors gear. Sprinkling or sampling -- They could offer pickup for larger items at their Lakewood or Chagrin Falls locations for those that work downtown but live in the burbs. It also becomes a pickup location for those folks living downtown that want to order from their web site and avoid shipping charges. I think this is a good fit and it meets many of the needs that some have expressed on this forum.

That would not surprise me. In a former life, I worked for an athletic shoe and apparel store that had a location on Euclid Ave. near Playhouse Square. We did very well. The lunch time crowd was the best. Of course this was back in the late 70's.