Flying over Chicago I was amazed by the size of our big sister. Chicago's grid looks twice maybe three times the size of Cleveland's. At it's pop. High we had 900 thousand +. What historically allowed the ridiculous number of burbs to pop up in our county. Even looking at Detroit, it is much larger than Cleveland proper area wise. What the hell happened? I know the dynamics of indy and columbus, but dense cities such as Cleveland and Pittsburgh almost doomed themselves. Does Cleveland control water like Columbus, I would really appreciate some history. Thanks in advance!

I can't give you the entire history of these cities but Chicago has always been a much larger city. Cleveland didn't have a very significant population compared to other cities until the 1880s or 1890s. Chicago had 1.1 million people by 1890. When Cleveland reached its peak population, Chicago had over 3 Million residents. Cincinnati's growth rate was declining after 1860.

I can't find the source off the top of my head, but I once read that Ohio made annexation rather difficult in the late 1800's.  Annexation is difficult in most states now, but back then it was pretty easy.  The book was about Cincinnati, and mentioned Cincinnati's practice of forcing other cities to annex if they wanted access to water and sewer hookups.  I'm not sure how Cleveland usually went about annexation, but Columbus put a stop to Cincinnati's method, and public works get extended to suburbs without annexation.

 

Sorry I can't think of what source that was from, it may have even been a lecture I attended.

Chicago also has some rather urban suburbs that it was not able to annex - Evanston, Oak Park, Cicero, Berwyn. Then you have Norridge and Harwood Hts., which are bungalow belt type suburbs that are surrounded by the city but remain separate municipalities.

What's the specific law in Ohio that impact's CLE's ability to annex?

I think Ohio's annexation laws are pretty middle-of-the-road from a national perspective today, though I don't know the history of either our own or other states'.

 

Ohio's annexation laws certainly did not stop Columbus from annexing aggressively in the 1980s.  Unless annexation got substantially easier in the intervening decades, i.e., after Cleveland was already functionally landlocked, that means that Cleveland could have done so earlier.

I can't find the source off the top of my head, but I once read that Ohio made annexation rather difficult in the late 1800's. Annexation is difficult in most states now, but back then it was pretty easy. The book was about Cincinnati, and mentioned Cincinnati's practice of forcing other cities to annex if they wanted access to water and sewer hookups. I'm not sure how Cleveland usually went about annexation, but Columbus put a stop to Cincinnati's method, and public works get extended to suburbs without annexation.

 

Sorry I can't think of what source that was from, it may have even been a lecture I attended.

 

im not sure either but isnt this the other way around? i thought cols held on to their water rights, even to this day, and aggressively forced farmtowns to annex if they wanted water and that cleveland rather foolishly gave away their water rights for some reason? we have discussed this before i am sure someone will straighten it out.

 

I don't know about Cleveland but that is correct about Columbus.

I don't know about Cleveland's suburbs, but most of Cincinnati's bordering burbs would not even be desirable to annex. The urban NKY burbs being the obvious exceptions. Wyoming is nice and quaint (with a walkable center), but that's largely because there's a municipal barrier between it and Hartwell.

 

Who wants their city to just eat up sprawl? Besides, err, Columbus.

I can't find the source off the top of my head, but I once read that Ohio made annexation rather difficult in the late 1800's. Annexation is difficult in most states now, but back then it was pretty easy. The book was about Cincinnati, and mentioned Cincinnati's practice of forcing other cities to annex if they wanted access to water and sewer hookups. I'm not sure how Cleveland usually went about annexation, but Columbus put a stop to Cincinnati's method, and public works get extended to suburbs without annexation.

 

Sorry I can't think of what source that was from, it may have even been a lecture I attended.

 

im not sure either but isnt this the other way around? i thought cols held on to their water rights, even to this day, and aggressively forced farmtowns to annex if they wanted water and that cleveland rather foolishly gave away their water rights for some reason? we have discussed this before i am sure someone will straighten it out.

 

 

I'm not sure about Cleveland or Cbus, but I thought Cincinnati had to do away with their practice because of a state law, but now that I think about it, it may have been a court case.  It may have been something that was reversed 50 years later, allowing Columbus to start doing that again. 

 

Aren't there some planners in here who are versed in the ways of urban planning law?

I don't know about Cleveland's suburbs, but most of Cincinnati's bordering burbs would not even be desirable to annex. The urban NKY burbs being the obvious exceptions. Wyoming is nice and quaint (with a walkable center), but that's largely because there's a municipal barrier between it and Hartwell.

 

Who wants their city to just eat up sprawl? Besides, err, Columbus.

 

Cleveland's inner-ring suburbs are not sprawl at all.  Lakewood, for instance, has one of the highest (if not the highest) density population between NYC and Chicago.  East Cleveland (for better or worse) has more foot traffic than anywhere in Ohio IMO.  Cleveland Heights and Shaker Heights are both treasures.  Moreover, the borders of the inner-ring with the City are nearly seamless.  I am not familiar at all with Cincy's suburbs, but it sounds like there is quite a different set-up, at least in this regard.  In all honesty, you could annex all of Cuyahoga County and it would have more of a cohesive feel than a lot of big cities.  Save for the 'corporate limit' signs, you simply can't tell when you pass from one city into another.

Save for the 'corporate limit' signs, you simply can't tell when you pass from one city into another.

 

Well, other than the quality of the roads, maintenance of the property, etc.  Always amazes me when driving through Cleveland into Lakewood or Shaker that the roads suddenly have less potholes, have been snow plowed, and businesses are held to zoning standards.

Now that I think about it, there would be some good candidates for Cincy. North College Hill (which runs seamlessly from College Hill, a city neighborhood) would make a lot of sense. Norwood and St. Bernard+Elmwood Place are bubbles surrounded completely by the city. Cheviot, Wyoming, Lockland, Amberley Village, Madeira...maybe

 

Cincinnati and Cleveland are very close in physical size, and Cleveland of course had a much greater peak population. So it makes sense Cleveland would have a larger footprint of urbanized areas. Cincinnati also has the funky geography thing going on, which led to some weird development patterns.

 

If Cincinnati were able to annex from Ludlow to Dayton in KY (including Covington, Newport, Bellevue), St. Bernard, Norwood, Elmwood Place, and North College Hill, that would be pretty legit and sensible. In fact, it would make Cincinnati a more coherent whole by breaking down some pretty arbitrary boundaries.

^And then you have crossing into East Cleveland, where the roads gets worse.  But I was actually talking more about going from Cleveland Heights into South Euclid.... or Shaker Heights into Beachwood.

Save for the 'corporate limit' signs, you simply can't tell when you pass from one city into another.

 

Well, other than the quality of the roads, maintenance of the property, etc. Always amazes me when driving through Cleveland into Lakewood or Shaker that the roads suddenly have less potholes, have been snow plowed, and businesses are held to zoning standards.

I touched on school districts, but these are other issues. I think a lot of what makes some of these places stand out is precisely the fact they are separate from the cities they border.

^And then you have crossing into East Cleveland, where the roads gets worse.  But I was actually talking more about going from Cleveland Heights into South Euclid.... or Shaker Heights into Beachwood.

 

I actually think the Shaker Heights/Beachwood border is fairly noticeable, especially along Fairmount.  For a little bit east of Green Rd., Farimount divides Shaker and Beachwood.  Shaker's side continues the nice tree lined boulevard that extends all the way to Cedar/Fairmount in Cleveland Heights.  Beachwood's side has nothing but a few 8 foot trees and looks far more suburban.  Also, Shaker doesn't plow their streets the best, where Beachwood streets have a ton of salt on them and are often wet even in the middle of a blizzard.  It also doesn't hurt that Shaker Heights uses the old timey white and black street signs and traffic light poles, where Beachwood has more plain blue street signs.

 

The borders I really can't distinguish are more like Garfield Heights/Maple Heights, Lyndhurst/South Euclid, Lyndhurst/Mayfield Heights, Wickliffe/Willowick, Willowick/Eastlake, Parma/Brooklyn, etc.  Also, some neighborhoods in Cleveland are very similar to their neighbors, such as Westpark/Fairview Heights, Brooklyn/Parma/Old Brooklyn (in parts), Warrensville Heights/Lee-Miles, etc.

It was just a general observation.  Of course there are instances where it doesn't apply.  For instance, I can tell when I am leaving Cleveland and going into 'the Heights' because I would be traveling up a hill...... if we really are going to be that technical.

 

Here's the point.  Drive down Monticello (without looking at the signs) and tell me if you notice when you leave Cleveland Heights and enter South Euclid (are Keystone and Quarry roads distinct enough to say which one belongs to which City?)  How about driving down Mayfield Road and tell me when you leave Lyndhurst and enter Mayfield Heights.  Head south on Green and see if you can tell when Beachwood begins.  Head west on Cedar and point to what parts are South Euclid, what parts are University Heights and what parts are Cleveland Heights.  A resident who has knowledge of these borders would be able to, but a visitor is likely to be oblivious assuming it is all one City.  It is all one fabric, eventually transforming into sprawl as you get to the outlying areas of Cuyahoga County and into the adjacent counties (save for those nabes bordering the Lake where sprawl does not occur until a good bit out).

Be glad for that. One of the reasons Detroit was hit harder than Cleveland by white flight is the sheer size of the area compared to the amount of people lost from the tax base.

Never got to an answer here and I actually have the same question.

 

Annexing some of the surrounding municipalities would increase the population of Cleveland, providing greater federal funding.

 

It would increase the tax base (depending on which municipalities are annexed), allowing for improved services. 

 

It would allow for more coherent regional zoning and tax incentives, hopefully curbing some suburban sprawl and poaching of businesses. At the very least some of those businesses would be brought back into the tax base. 

 

So is it simply resistance from the residents of the surrounding municipalities or is there another obstacle preventing this? 

2 hours ago, Luke_S said:

Never got to an answer here and I actually have the same question.

 

Annexing some of the surrounding municipalities would increase the population of Cleveland, providing greater federal funding.

 

It would increase the tax base (depending on which municipalities are annexed), allowing for improved services. 

 

It would allow for more coherent regional zoning and tax incentives, hopefully curbing some suburban sprawl and poaching of businesses. At the very least some of those businesses would be brought back into the tax base. 

 

So is it simply resistance from the residents of the surrounding municipalities or is there another obstacle preventing this? 

Annexing municipalities is hard legally and practically because municipal politicians don't want to give up their jobs and suburban residents don't necessarily want to be living in the big bad dangerous city.

 

If you look at Columbus, I believe most of the growth came from annexing unincorporated areas or townships, not cities. Columbus refused municipal water and sewer service to surrounding areas, and so it could strong arm surrounding small communities into joining. This was something that was easier to do because the surrounding areas were still fairly rural and didn't have water or sewer connections yet. Columbus's annexation started when cities became concerned about the rise of the suburbs in the '50s. Before the '50s, exodus to the suburbs was not a well known phenomenon, so there wouldn't have been as much reason for a central city to feel anxious about its suburbs. By this point, Cleveland's and Cincinnati's suburbs were pretty well built out and independent already.