Civvik

^Those are salient points. Further I would add that playing semantics with "attracting new residents" is simply that. You can victimize Westwood for losing residents to Over the Rhine. Or victimize Silverton for losing to Cincinnati. Or you could look holistically at the county and victimize Warren for losing to Hamilton. Or Dayton MSA losing to Cincinnati MSA, or Wisconsin losing to Ohio. Etc. There is no totally rational place to stop, once you move beyond the statement "the streetcar will attract new residents to its service area." Aside from natural increase, someone is going to leave somewhere, and someone else will have to take their place!

Thanks for the info!

Pretty cool man. Welcome to the forum.

I'm half convinced he's your alter-ego.

I think the streetcar will attract new residents. I mean, shit, why wouldn't it? And it wouldn't be a good investment if it didn't. We can be cautious, or even pessimistic. But let's not patronize a notion that is so pessimistic that it works against everyone's goals.

^ I'm anxiously awaiting the comments!

I think by "Forum" he means "Cincinnati: Downtown: Queen City Square"

I would not overlook the potential of in-migration from other states. Indeed, one of Ohio's only advantages over other states is its built environment, since we can't control the weather or the topography. So let's focus on our built environment in new and creative ways.

Doing a route down Ezzard Charles looks like it has a lot of development potential, but almost all that land is controlled by public or non-profit agencies that would require development agreements that would be unpredictable. This gets into the question of which is the more realistic aim of rail transit in the city in this political climate: promoting development or providing a service. "It's both!" Yeah, everyone knows that, but that's not necessarily how you can promote it.

We will have to hope that it's simply a good general investment. It would be nice to know exactly how each infrastructure dollar made its way through the economy, but you can't TIF everything!

We won't close it until they take occupancy. I'm sure you fools will think of SOMETHING to debate. ;P

The streetcar is for locals to use in order to densify and re-populate certain areas. Not for tourists to take from the train station to a all-inclusive hotel/casino. Um, says who? That's just as bad as saying the streetcar is for white yuppies, not transit dependent black people. That doesn't mean that a route from CUT to the casino would be a good investment, but it makes sense to consider it. The people going specifically between those two destinations would probably be small, but you get a good connection point where it crosses the current loop, and it's a way to get people from CUT and/or the casino into the heart of downtown or UC. I'm sick of this notion that streetcars are only good for short highly-urban circulator systems. There's nothing about the technology that says it must be that way, only that a bunch of planners decided to make it so. Streetcars can and should be faster and more useful for actually getting people around. Instead, by being pigeon-holed into this circulator notion, they end up with convoluted and inefficient routes that make them bad for actually getting people around quickly and efficiently. No matter what you want from the streetcar, you have to admit that it IS a form of mass transit, and if it doesn't perform that duty well, its value as a development tool is weakened too. I tend to agree with LincolnKennedy. If I may make a few points: 1) Streetcars are circulators. It's LRT's little sister, and exists on a spectrum of transit solutions where bigger machines and stations and less frequent service scales with larger station service areas. You could put a streetcar into the role of LRT - "faster" being less constrained by traffic and with less frequent stops, but then wouldn't it be LRT? It is not a universal solution - and I know you aren't saying it is - but you're flirting with the notion. You gotta keep in mind that this thing runs in mixed traffic. 2) I have a feeling people keep bringing up the UT line because it's simply in our field of view when we think about OTR. I would urge forumers to brainstorm other routes right now, like the post above this one. UT has a lot of drawbacks as a near-term streetcar route. You've even kind of admitted this in your own argument for considering it...so why consider it? Put the brainpower to use where it is needed elsewhere.

Dayton seems like its doing just fine.

I have to agree with Gramarye on this issue. I suspect that what you really want to do, J, is change people's minds. Antagonizing them will not do this. I do not believe we live in a world where conspiracies compel people to be anti-city, it's simply circumstances that do this. And in Cincinnati's case, a lack of good role models. I think most Greater Cincinnatians actually do see themselves as citizens of one community, it just has desirable parts and undesirable ones. And I beleive that most of these people simply disfavor Cincinnati proper because it is undesirable, not because it is urban. I compare the suburb-city relationship to that of a parent and child. The child-suburb thinks it knows best because it has the illusion of endless opportunity. It sees the parent-city's weaknesses as intrinsic faults while taking its strengths for granted. But inevitably the suburb gets older too and eventually its only remaining asset is its lower density. Then the region itself becomes mature when economic growth declines or simply can't keep up with the now-geographically-enormous developing fringe. I think this is the come-to-Jesus moment for a region, when you have no more Masons but lots of Fairfaxes and Mount Healthys. If this circumstance comes to pass along with a revitalized urban core, you might actually have aging suburbs look at the urban core for guidance and inspiration instead of disdain.

Ohio almost seems to have a pathological aversion to burying utilities. Never seen a place that does so many full fledged streetscaping makeovers and keeps them. Much bigger impression per dollar than rain gardens. Not that I have anything against creative storm water management.

Yep, game was a few days after that.

Love how the latest Horstman article is saturated with details right down to the percentage of designed stations. Somehow the Enquirer magically got their hands on all the detailed information that they lamented was missing in all of their editorials written before the grant award.

The Portland timetable reflected a similar pace of construction, maybe even longer.

I tuned in the other day when they were interviewing a guy who was saying that healthcare costs would drop on their own, using the example of plasma TVs... I switched back over to NPR.

A couple photos I grabbed last week at the Reds game. I'm sure the steel is even higher than this now:

I hate to be a Debbie Downer but maybe this Korean porno hot dog conversation could be continued in the Restaurants thread? Or maybe Senate needs its own thread. Lord.

Is there a thread for Government Square somewhere? If not I can make one. Let's not get too off topic!

IMHO we have beaten the Enquirer bias conversation to death. They can not be expected to provide unbiased journalism, this we have quantified and established. Just feel lucky that there are so many more sources of information on city developments, including many people on this site.

Awesome!

I do not see the point of engaging a popular restaurant on their own facebook page and being consumed with this issue. Maybe there is a point, but I do not follow. They built too far and they got caught, it was inevitable. they certainly have to follow the law like everyone else. End of story, far as I can tell.