IKEA plans to adapt to urban populations by locating stores more centrally https://t.co/mwphYc2jWk

Great! I like this headline much better than IKEA plans to locate store on wetlands.

It's possible to disperse the population across the country and also have people living in walkable cities and towns where they can meet most of their needs without having to get in a car. The biggest problem with sprawl isn't that we're spreading out geographically, it's the way we're building it. By making new sprawl not walkable, we're requiring everyone to use a car for virtually every trip, which therefore requires us to build massive parking lots at every office building or retail store. If we build new walkable towns in the same way that we built them historically, you are allowing people to meet their needs without a car but still achieving the goal of dispersing the population.

It's possible to disperse the population across the country and also have people living in walkable cities and towns where they can meet most of their needs without having to get in a car. The biggest problem with sprawl isn't that we're spreading out geographically, it's the way we're building it. By making new sprawl not walkable, we're requiring everyone to use a car for virtually every trip, which therefore requires us to build massive parking lots at every office building or retail store. If we build new walkable towns in the same way that we built them historically, you are allowing people to meet their needs without a car but still achieving the goal of dispersing the population.

 

It's possible, practical, and it exists.

 

But the results tend to be culturally homogenous and that is the opposite of what some anti-sprawl advocates desire.

 

Nevertheless, some people want more breathing room and the marketplace will serve that.

Hallmark Christmases Don't Happen in the Suburbs

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-12-22/hallmark-christmases-don-t-happen-in-the-suburbs

They'll want Rickenbacker gone.

The nuclear safety argument really doesn't enter many people's thinking when it comes to suburban land use patterns these days.  Sprawl persists in part because people want to live there, and in part because cities are still largely stratified, generally consisting of neighborhoods that many suburbanites might want to live in but can't afford (in part because of zoning regulations that both restrict the quantity of new supply and set building standards that drive up costs), and neighborhoods that many suburbanites definitely don't want to live in and can afford to escape.

 

 

Another thing that we need to start thinking about on this site is that the rural areas are really emptying out. Some of these people are going to cities while others head for the 'burbs. So if people are trying to say "Millenianls are all moving to the 'burbs! I knew it!" we need to know if they came from the city or if they're a part of the rural exodus.

It's possible to disperse the population across the country and also have people living in walkable cities and towns where they can meet most of their needs without having to get in a car. The biggest problem with sprawl isn't that we're spreading out geographically, it's the way we're building it. By making new sprawl not walkable, we're requiring everyone to use a car for virtually every trip, which therefore requires us to build massive parking lots at every office building or retail store. If we build new walkable towns in the same way that we built them historically, you are allowing people to meet their needs without a car but still achieving the goal of dispersing the population.

 

It's possible, practical, and it exists.

 

But the results tend to be culturally homogenous and that is the opposite of what some anti-sprawl advocates desire.

 

Nevertheless, some people want more breathing room and the marketplace will serve that.

 

The culture argument is interesting. While I would never live in a new urbanist development because of how sterile and manufactured it feels, that is simply not a concern for the vast majority of Americans, who have no problem living in suburbs that are just as sterile and manufactured. And I think culture will happen organically in these places over time. I mean, look how much American culture came out of Generation X kids playing music in the garages of their generic suburban homes. In new urbanism, there's even more likelihood that people will have more interaction with their neighbors (maybe even with people who aren't the same income level or race as them) and new ideas can be exchanged.

All housing is subsidized, but for every $1 we subsidize urban homes, we subsidize suburban homes $6.95, says @Neil_lovitt #citymakingmath https://t.co/Wny0dv3ynm

It's possible to disperse the population across the country and also have people living in walkable cities and towns where they can meet most of their needs without having to get in a car. The biggest problem with sprawl isn't that we're spreading out geographically, it's the way we're building it. By making new sprawl not walkable, we're requiring everyone to use a car for virtually every trip, which therefore requires us to build massive parking lots at every office building or retail store. If we build new walkable towns in the same way that we built them historically, you are allowing people to meet their needs without a car but still achieving the goal of dispersing the population.

 

It's possible, practical, and it exists.

 

But the results tend to be culturally homogenous and that is the opposite of what some anti-sprawl advocates desire.

 

Nevertheless, some people want more breathing room and the marketplace will serve that.

 

The culture argument is interesting. While I would never live in a new urbanist development because of how sterile and manufactured it feels, that is simply not a concern for the vast majority of Americans, who have no problem living in suburbs that are just as sterile and manufactured. And I think culture will happen organically in these places over time. I mean, look how much American culture came out of Generation X kids playing music in the garages of their generic suburban homes. In new urbanism, there's even more likelihood that people will have more interaction with their neighbors (maybe even with people who aren't the same income level or race as them) and new ideas can be exchanged.

 

LOL I said here at one point that rock and roll was largely a child of sprawl (trying rehearsing your garage band in an apartment bedroom) and it wasn't a very popular comment.  :)

 

The fact is, one huge trend since at least the seventies is people seeking to limit interaction to on their own terms, as much as possible.  I've always met way more people through other friends than through random interaction and I have noticed this increasing greatly.  Facebook in particular facilitates it.  I suspect it's one of those inherent trends that it would be extremely difficult to reverse even if it was desired to do so.

 

I can't think of many innovations that reduced the need for extraneous interaction that have failed, and many have succeeded.

 

People in NYC leave each other alone. In Ohio it seems every single person has a cumpulsion to talk to strangers. Except hot girls. Meanwhile in big cities everyone leaves you alone, except hot girls.

People in NYC leave each other alone. In Ohio it seems every single person has a cumpulsion to talk to strangers. Except hot girls. Meanwhile in big cities everyone leaves you alone, except hot girls.

 

Not true, in my experience. People in NYC seem more open to random interactions than Southwest Ohioans. But the situation has to call for it somehow. Southwest Ohioans (especially Cincinnatians) have a more reserved demeanor, while NYers are more comfortable with brief situational "relationships." If I had to guess, I would say the Ohioans are hung up on the idea that personal interactions should be somehow meaningful, which adds stress to the situation. I could be projecting, but I definitely think NYers are overall better minglers - in a bar, shop, train, or on the street.

Right, in smaller cities people think that every time you meet a random person you have to "network" with that person. It makes me a lot less likely to say hi or make a comment to a random person in a coffee shop, because I don't necessarily want to spend 15 minutes talking about what each of us do. Maybe I just want to have a quick exchange of words and then be done with that "relationship".

People in NYC leave each other alone. In Ohio it seems every single person has a cumpulsion to talk to strangers. Except hot girls. Meanwhile in big cities everyone leaves you alone, except hot girls.

 

I'm in Ohio, I'm single, and I have the opposite compulsion.  :)

In Cleveland, I find I do a lot of spontaneous mingling on the street, shops, cafes, or on the trains. When I'm cities like Boston, Chicago, New York, or Philadelphia, I find I'm the one initiating spontaneous mingling much of the time. But I also enjoy the fun/aggressive banter I get in response in the bigger cities whereas the reaction in Cleveland can be mixed. Some people respond in kind while others politely acknowledge my quips. But when I attempt similar spontaneous mingling in other Ohio cities, the response I usually get is that I'm trying to start a fight or there's something wrong with me, like I'm drunk or being an a-hole.

This is a very cool map and study.

 

Get Lost in this New-and-Improved Map of America's Megaregions

LAURA BLISS @mslaurabliss Feb 7, 2017

 

Ever been to Entrelacs? Or visited Mayflower in winter? (Don’t—it’s wicked harsh.) A new interactive map will let you take trips to the American megaregions you never knew.

 

Garrett Dash Nelson, a postdoctoral student in geography at Dartmouth College, and Alasdair Rae, an urban data analyst at the University of Sheffield, analyzed 4 million point-to-point commutes, representing 130 million travelers, sculpting the data to show the heaviest volumes of daily flows. (Sound familiar? CityLab wrote about it: Read more about their methods here.) This process revealed constellations of neighboring cities, connected by interlocking workforces—a new way of visualizing America’s megaregions, a concept that has lately gained steam among planners and economists. Nelson and Rae mapped and published their findings in PLOS One last December.

 

http://www.citylab.com/commute/2017/02/get-lost-in-this-interactive-map-of-americas-unlikely-megaregions/515898/

 

 

It's interesting (sad really) in the Cleveland Heights development thread to see how many UOers still believe that urban freeways are vital an necessary and that, somehow, an old, character-rich, walkable suburb like Cleveland Heights is lacking without them and that, somehow, the Opportunity Corridor or a full fledged freeway would somehow help CH.

 

Those folks should consider America's Big 5 transit cities: New York, Chicago, Boston, Philly and D.C.  Each of these cities have large, well-developed transit networks while also having underdeveloped limited-access road systems (freeways/toll roads) and, yet, each has the most desirable urban, inner circle suburban areas in the nation in terms of character, density and walkability; rental properties in these cities are among the most expensive in the nation... Look at Chicago's North Side, especially the suburb of Evanston (among several examples within and outside Chicago's borders) which is dense, walkable, rail transit friendly and has an established and growing downtown area with some mid-rise office buildings.  And yet Evanston has no freeways anywhere near it.  It sure seems, therefore, that freeways are not hurting this fine old university town in the least... in fact, the reverse is the case...

 

... build a bunch of freeway ramps into Evanston (to compete with and hurt rail transit; something Cleveland seems fond of doing, including the transit chief himself), cut up neighborhoods, build big boxes, strip shopping and cul-de-sacs, and you'll turn it into Evanston into Cleveland's version of ... Westlake.  Is this desirable??  ... I guess to some (too many) UOers, the answer is: yes.

Redirected from the Cleveland retail thread.....

 

To Rockandroller:

How did Cleveland get split up into all of these small municipalities? How is it that these 200 local communities are allowed to exist, all with their self interest at stake? So inefficient to have 200 city halls/PDs/FDs, but of course, the City of Cleveland has done a poor job at these tasks for decades. SMH. I'll keep reading this forum, so I can make more informed decisions that shape our region. All we can do.

 

 

The city of Cleveland wasn't split up into 200 local governments that include municipalities, villages, and townships that are all part of the Greater Cleveland metropolitan statistical area as defined by the US Census. All cities and villages are carve-outs from the original townships of Ohio and the Western Reserve. The townships are the original local governing bodies of the Greater Cleveland area. Some of the original settlements were organized as villages and if and when they exceeded 5,000 residents, they were incorporated as municipalities. Cleveland grew the largest of these by merging or annexing areas of land governed by villages, cities or townships. When it slowed its merging and annexing of areas settled by a growing population, those newly settled/developed areas created their own villages and cities which Cleveland did not absorb. This continued even after the metro area stopped growing in population in the 1960s. Outward movement of the population continued, which depopulated existing areas, and carved out and expanded more and more villages and cities from surrounding townships in Cuyahoga and, soon, into surrounding counties. Cuyahoga County alone has more than 50 local governments, with another 150+ in "collar counties."

 

Unlike Cleveland, Columbus continued to annex surrounding lands before it was developed so it is better able to manage the development of the metro area and share revenues to revitalize older, lower-income neighborhoods. Other cities have merged with their counties like Indianapolis, Jacksonville, Louisville or Nashville (see others at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consolidated_city-county). In Canada and Europe, there are regional governments that oversee far larger metro geographies such as Greater Toronto and have established growth boundaries beyond which development is prohibited. It's why you'll see a well-developed city on one side of a road and a farmland on the other.

Columbus required any new area receiving Columbus water service to join Columbus.  Cleveland did not.  That is the primary reason Columbus has less suburbs.  Ohio's home rule system encouraged balkanization by promising cities and their officials more power.  So in the absence of a competing force like the Columbus water ultimatum, suburbs gonna happen.  Note that most of Cleveland's inner ring incorporated during the early home rule era, 1910-1930. 

 

This would probably have happened to Columbus as well, if it had been booming like Cleveland at the time.  It happened to every US city that boomed early.  Since then, the pendulum has swung away from home rule.  We still have it but it doesn't amount to much, because the state preempts everything and the courts generally let it.  Developing later was advantageous because it gave Columbus a chance to try something different in a more favorable legal environment.  On the flip side, developing later also gave Columbus its sprawly character.  There's good and bad to everything.

Columbus required any new area receiving Columbus water service to join Columbus.  Cleveland did not.  That is the primary reason Columbus has less suburbs.  Ohio's home rule system encouraged balkanization by promising cities and their officials more power.  So in the absence of a competing force like the Columbus water ultimatum, suburbs gonna happen.  Note that most of Cleveland's inner ring incorporated during the early home rule era, 1910-1930. 

 

This would probably have happened to Columbus as well, if it had been booming like Cleveland at the time.  It happened to every US city that boomed early.  Since then, the pendulum has swung away from home rule.  We still have it but it doesn't amount to much, because the state preempts everything and the courts generally let it.  Developing later was advantageous because it gave Columbus a chance to try something different in a more favorable legal environment.  On the flip side, developing later also gave Columbus its sprawly character.  There's good and bad to everything.

 

The last suburb adjoining Cleveland incorporated in 1960 and the a word was not only a non-starter but a discussion poisoner from that point forward.  The nature of big city government was one of the things the first wave sprawlers were trying to escape.  Remember, Cleveland has always been a northeastern type city, Columbus midwestern, Cincinnati a southern-midwestern hybrid.  Northeastern cities sprawled into suburbs.

 

It wouldn't have worked anyway.  Facing an ultimatum like Columbus put out, Euclid and Lakewood would likely have built their own water systems, and then offered towns further south an option.

Suburbs in Columbus were all microscopic in 1960. I bet only Bexley and Whitehall had over 5000 people. Maybe Upper Arlington.

 

It wouldn't have worked anyway.  Facing an ultimatum like Columbus put out, Euclid and Lakewood would likely have built their own water systems, and then offered towns further south an option.[/color]

 

As Avon Lake did.

 

By the way it's interesting that until very recently nobody would move to Lorain County because many of its services were so bad including its telephone company. They didn't start the community to community hopscotch trailing behind them that pulls people out of Cleveland ( people from Cleveland usually don't move to Lorain County. It's people in Westlake and North Olmsted in Bay Village that moved to Lorain County then people from Lakewood and Fairview Park moved Bay Village in Westlake. Then people from Cleveland move to Lakewood and Fairview Park.

 

Lorain County's unattractiveness until really the 1990s is one of the factors that kept Cleveland west side neighborhoods more populated by the middle class and in better condition. Of course there was the racism. There were fewer blacks on the west side for them to flee.

Columbus required any new area receiving Columbus water service to join Columbus.  Cleveland did not.  That is the primary reason Columbus has less suburbs.  Ohio's home rule system encouraged balkanization by promising cities and their officials more power.  So in the absence of a competing force like the Columbus water ultimatum, suburbs gonna happen.  Note that most of Cleveland's inner ring incorporated during the early home rule era, 1910-1930. 

 

This would probably have happened to Columbus as well, if it had been booming like Cleveland at the time.  It happened to every US city that boomed early.  Since then, the pendulum has swung away from home rule.  We still have it but it doesn't amount to much, because the state preempts everything and the courts generally let it.  Developing later was advantageous because it gave Columbus a chance to try something different in a more favorable legal environment.  On the flip side, developing later also gave Columbus its sprawly character.  There's good and bad to everything.

 

The last suburb adjoining Cleveland incorporated in 1960 and the a word was not only a non-starter but a discussion poisoner from that point forward.  The nature of big city government was one of the things the first wave sprawlers were trying to escape.  Remember, Cleveland has always been a northeastern type city, Columbus midwestern, Cincinnati a southern-midwestern hybrid.  Northeastern cities sprawled into suburbs.

 

It wouldn't have worked anyway.  Facing an ultimatum like Columbus put out, Euclid and Lakewood would likely have built their own water systems, and then offered towns further south an option.

 

No doubt, Cleveland's "neighbors hating neighbors" philosophy was also a factor.  Wherever there's legal and political technicalities, there's always a belief system driving it.  You can try to address it at the technicality level but ultimately all that matters is what people want to do.  Can't make the horse drink.

 

Regarding Lorain County, it's a big swamp so not the ideal place to dig a bunch of basements.  No surprise that it would be our last frontier for sprawl.  I suspect it's gotten a good share of the city workers vacating West Park in recent years, as have Strongsville and Brunswick.  The residency law was an instance of home rule turning the tables and working against sprawl, until the state stepped in.

Also redirected from the Cleveland retail thread:

 

I don't think you can, or maybe should tell people to stop building houses and then retail and restaurants in the neighborhoods around those houses. I mean, everyone knows Orange has the top school district in all of NE OH, or at least they are way up there, and Solon, also full of sprawl and traffic, is in the top 5 as well. Strongsville is also a strong district, though not as strong as they used to be as I understand it, but people want to live there because a) they can have a decent amount of land and b) SCHOOLS. Until someone fixes schools in the city and in the closest inner ring suburbs, the vast majority of the people these retail businesses are serving, who are parents of school aged children, or of those who recently graduated from school, they're not going to want to live further in.

 

People are regularly driving an hour-plus back and forth to work every day so they can live in communities where there are good schools and they can have a big house and a big yard. That's what they want. I can't blame the retail and restaurants for springing up around them. I do agree it isn't necessarily sustainable but that's because our whole region is shrinking, not because fewer people are living in Beachwood or Strongsville and are choosing to go somewhere else in NE Ohio. Turnover on houses in these areas is still pretty quick from what i understand of my friends who sell real estate. Good houses go in a week or less. So there is demand, even if it's slower because of the shrinking region.

 

I do agree it is toxic and bad for our downtown core. I hate the fact that more and more jobs are way, way east and there's fewer and fewer opportunities to work downtown but at some point, you have to realize the reason they are settling in these places is because the schools are better.

 

I don't know how to fix the schools. Thankfully that is not my job. And I do hate the sprawl myself, because it's a lot of driving, but bigger cities are even more sprawled out and they have the people to sustain it. It's normal for people in larger cities to drive a half hour to a place for dinner because everyone else is driving the same amount of time to get everywhere they go because there are so many people there, that's just how it is. I don't think being spread out per se is inherently bad, but if you don't have the people to sustain it, that's when it gets bad. And we don't. And more are leaving. Because of the schools and because there aren't enough jobs.

 

The "best" public schools in the region are generally located in outer suburbs with steep economic barriers to entry. This ensures that these communities and thus their schools consist of limited socioeconomic diversity and students from primarily upper-middle and upper income backgrounds, a demographic that generally does very well on the tests that determine school ratings. (I'd rather not get into a sociological discussion as to why this might be the case, but the correlation is strong and widely-acknowledged). The balkanization and a lack of regional governance in Ohio actually enables the conditions for these communities to exist and thrive in a demographic bubble.

 

Even worse, there isn't much that can be done to "fix" education in the urban and inner-ring suburbs on a wide-scale basis. The best alternative for these communities is to create programs and schools that have their own barriers to entry (advanced academics, magnet, charter, etc.). That's probably the best way for these communities to compete with outer-ring suburbs on the education front, though it will have to come at the price of creating socioeconomic disparities within those communities in who attends those specialized schools, and it's still unlikely to really appeal to folks more comfortable with the outer-ring bubble. CMSD has already come to grips with this reality, and has done much to create niche programs to retain residents as well as collaborate with strong charter schools, though the inner-ring suburbs have not (and in fairness because of their size have less flexibility to do so).

There is an intriguing plan coming forth out of the State House to resolve the school funding issue. It hasn't been totally been finalized but the bill sponser wants it to go to a general vote of the people.

  The plan essentially does a one-time forgiveness if you will on debt that all the school systems have. The state will take over the debt. The schools will then all have the same amount of tax dollars per pupil to spend. The idea is to take debt management out of the school systems. But also to save money on the interest that schools are paying. Then to level the playing field since communities are sending so much of their tax dollars from wealthy areas to poorer.

  A fixed amount of money will follow each student. They will also tack on additional funds if student has special needs. So perhaps $9000 per student and $11-20,000 for special needs based on some formula that would likely change a bit every year.

  The idea is that would incentivize the schools to better focus on the needs of the students since the schools will be trying to keep their students happy.

  I think this is so radical it might need a pilot program to see how this may be work or be abused.

I don't think it's sprawl in and of itself that is the problem with the region. It's sprawl without growth. When you have sprawl without population growth, it spreads limited resources too thin and all we're doing is just swapping out people from one sidebar of the county to the other or one side of the region to the other. That is a problem. We need more overall growth. But I would argue one of the impediments to that is not necessarily the schools (although it's an issue), it is our old and outdated housing stock. I think every neighborhood in Cleveland except 3 or 4 were built pre WW2. We have homes that people just don't want to live in. They are too old and outdated. I have always believed that if we wanted to start rebuilding our neighborhoods that we needed to rebuild the housing stock, knock two houses down, replace it with one bigger house. People may not like that and call it too "suburban" but the consumer made their choice a long time ago as to what kind of house they wanted to live in. And of course I don't think this should be in every neighborhood. I've said here before that I believe the city should have something to offer everyone, whether you want a suburban-ish lifestyle or a traditional big city urban density lifestyle. The city is big enough to do both. But I believe we are going to continue to have a problem drawing families in most areas until we deal with our old and outdated housing

Suburbs in Columbus were all microscopic in 1960. I bet only Bexley and Whitehall had over 5000 people. Maybe Upper Arlington.

 

Upper Arlington had over 28,000 in 1960-by far the largest suburb. Also the above 5,000 crowd in 1960 included Grove City, Hilliard, Reynoldsburg, Worthington, Grandview Heights, and Westerville.

Hmm, I wouldn't have expected Worthington and Hillards (as it was known at the time). I suppose a lot of housing that looks like itis from the '60s was actually built in the '50s.

Are there any statistics out there that compare where the spending per pupil goes in different districts?  I'm thinking mainly academics vs sports vs busing.  Consolidated suburban and rural districts spend a lot of money on busing kids to their isolated school campuses that are impossible to walk to, and I suspect they also spend more on athletic facilities (gyms, pools, ball fields, and all the maintenance associated with them) on top of the programs themselves.  I wonder how those factors would play into a unified funding scenario. 

I don't think it's sprawl in and of itself that is the problem with the region. It's sprawl without growth. When you have sprawl without population growth, it spreads limited resources too thin...

 

Even sprawl with growth spreads limited resources too thin.  It's not that you can't have suburbs, but the amount of infrastructure and services we insist on building for those suburbs is more expensive than the tax base can support.  If you want a financially stable suburb without it having to be super wealthy or with crazy high taxes, then you may find that you can't have things like curbs and gutters, sidewalks, street lights, sewer, municipal water, 5-minute fire response times, or 1-acre lots.  Many streets might even have to be unpaved.  These aren't necessarily bad things either, especially if you're interested in supposed "rural character." 

^^They talked about the bussing in hearings and they mentioned that most systems have contracted that out apparently and the sponser didn't feel that would have much affect on this bill. I didn't get that either. No mention was made of the sports facilities. But they said there were some things that needed fleshed out still.

Oooooh, one thing I LOVED about the semi-rural school system I attended from 7th grade on up was the 1 hour plus a day I spent on the bus getting to a school that took literally 5 minutes to drive to.

So, do they have an app now showing bus locations so that kids can stay in their houses until the last possible minute?  Or do all the moms still idle in their minivans?

 

 

Oooooh, one thing I LOVED about the semi-rural school system I attended from 7th grade on up was the 1 hour plus a day I spent on the bus getting to a school that took literally 5 minutes to drive to.

 

Yes, I rode that bus too -- mine was in Bainbridge Township in Geauga County in the late 1970s and early 80s when the area was just starting to develop. Those were some long-ass bus rides, literally so on snowy days or seemingly on hot days (do 21st century school buses have air conditioning?).

Are there any statistics out there that compare where the spending per pupil goes in different districts?  I'm thinking mainly academics vs sports vs busing.  Consolidated suburban and rural districts spend a lot of money on busing kids to their isolated school campuses that are impossible to walk to, and I suspect they also spend more on athletic facilities (gyms, pools, ball fields, and all the maintenance associated with them) on top of the programs themselves.  I wonder how those factors would play into a unified funding scenario.

 

Generally-speaking, the outer-ring suburbs have lower proportions of students with special needs and English language learners, which means more money for other programs (whatever those may be, academics, athletics, extracurriculars, etc.).

 

^^They talked about the bussing in hearings and they mentioned that most systems have contracted that out apparently and the sponser didn't feel that would have much affect on this bill. I didn't get that either. No mention was made of the sports facilities. But they said there were some things that needed fleshed out still.

 

Who is the sponsor of the bill? If it's what I vaguely remember reading about a while back, I believe there's an ulterior motive.

 

Yes, I rode that bus too -- mine was in Bainbridge Township in Geauga County in the late 1970s and early 80s when the area was just starting to develop. Those were some long-a$$ bus rides, literally so on snowy days or seemingly on hot days (do 21st century school buses have air conditioning?).

 

Yes modern school buses do have air conditioning.

 

Interestingly enough, the Lakewood City School District does not have its own bus fleet thanks to the way the district is built around neighborhood schools. There was an interesting piece written about the district's transportation situation in a national publication a year or two back.

^The State rep is Brenner i believe from Powell, Ohio.  I was suspicious as well about it but since it isn't one of those cut and paste pieces from other states and they are still hammering through it and keeping an open mind seemingly, I thought it was interesting to explore.

Hmm, I wouldn't have expected Worthington and Hillards (as it was known at the time). I suppose a lot of housing that looks like itis from the '60s was actually built in the '50s.

 

hahaha...yes I remember when people called it 'Hilliards'. I did not think Hilliard was above 5,000 by 1960 either until I looked it up.

It was?! I never saw any homes in Hilliard that looked that old. I suppose some parts are, though. There's neighborhoods in Upper Arlington that were built in the 50s that don't really look like it. I think Suburban Columbus might have been ahead of it's time in terms of bland, modern suburban architecture. Before exaggerated features that took over. I thought Hilliard didn't really take off until the 90s. I do recall seeing split-level houses that would be indicative of 70s'-ish development but the late 90s is when they built Tuttle and the farther-out parts of the west side of Columbus went to sh!t.

 

Before the mid-late 90s, it seemed that the Hilltop was much more in tact. It had many more middle class families and people who cared about the community and their kid's education. Now, it's worse than The Bottoms. With the recent development happening in The Bottoms, it's going to be MUCH worse than The Bottoms.

 

I remember as a kid living on the west side, people talking about Hilliard as if was some magical paradise. I honestly think the school district is what persuaded almost everyone to move there, though. Hilliard really isn't and never was that great. It's boring and sterile. It does have huge employment centers nearby, though. That's probably because the people who have a say in where companies are located, moved to Hilliard.

 

Personally, I'd rather live in the Westgate neighborhood, than Hilliard even though there isn't much commercially going on nearby. That area is truly a diamond in the rough. They have a really cool park (Westgate Park) with an awesome recreation center for kids and adults. You can grill out, there. Play tennis or basketball. They have a great playground for kids. It also has a big pond where you can catch giant catfish - some of which I've seen caught, are 4 feet long!

 

Murray Hill is also a tucked-away gem and very under-rated.

I think one thing that helped is that Columbus had a lot of space to work with and cheap land. That enabled houses in the '50s to be built in'60s/'70s sizes of 1500+ square feet rather than your standard Leavittown '50s size of 900-1300 sq. ft.

I don't understand why land has apparently been so cheap in Metro Columbus. It's always been a rapidly growing city or metro, at least as long as I've been alive.

The site won't let me copy and paste any part of the article but it states that the average price of a new home last year in Central Ohio was $334,000. Due to regulations, land and labor costs. Twice as much as your average already-built home. That's an insane disparity.

 

http://www.dispatch.com/news/20170212/new-homes-too-pricey-too-distant-for-many-in-central-ohio

I don't understand why land has apparently been so cheap in Metro Columbus. It's always been a rapidly growing city or metro, at least as long as I've been alive.

 

No geographical constraints, or for that matter more (geographically) desirable areas.

Columbus was a great place to build a city. When I lived in Cincinnati, I got in numerous wrecks and had my car end up in ditches from sliding down icy hills. In Cleveland, it just takes forever to get to the other side of town due to geographical constraints that dictate the layout of even highways. Columbus is so flat. That even makes it an ideal city to walk or ride a bike.

Land on the west side of the City of Cincinnati is very, very cheap.  At least 10 buildable lost on MLS right now for $1,500.  The land bank owns 1,000 lots that anyone can get for free if they want to build a house but nobody does. 

 

Meanwhile, lots in the suburbs are usually at least $30,000.  Yes, they're bigger, but it's still the case that there is zero infill construction going on in the City of Cincinnati between Central Parkway and its western municipal borders. 

It's not a cool part of town. That's where all the white trash lives.

 

There also just isn't much connectivity between downtown and west side neighborhoods. I honestly think that if that were the case, there'd be a good chance that Lower Price Hill or Sedamsville would look like Society Hill in Philadelphia or... Over the Rhine in Cincinnati.

Lower Price Hill and Sedamsville are really interesting neighborhoods with a lot of history and stellar architecture and geographic features yet no one ever seems to care about them. One of the interesting things I learned about Lower Price Hill and it probably applies to Sedamsville, is that families who live there, have owned those homes going back 5-6 generations. I remember learning about that in a news article. That's pretty incredible, considering how poor they are.

 

Lower Price Hill:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Despite geographic constraints, if those tucked-away neighborhoods existed that close to downtown in Cleveland with that much architectural integrity mixed with grit (which is perceived as charming up here - like views of salt mines from Tremont) bet your ss[/member] it would be gentrification-central in an instant. Cincinnati is just an entirely different culture.

 

 

There are some great, interesting, odd corners of the West Side (South Fairmont jumps to mind, as does the State Avenue corridor), but it all feels so disorganized and jumbled and disconnected from the rest of the city. In a lot of ways (to stay somewhat on topic), some of even the older neighborhoods like Westwood and Upper Price Hill feel very sprawly even though they came around before "sprawl" was really a thing. It's especially strange given how geographically close they are to the basin, notwithstanding the fact they're on the other side of a massive rail yard and the Mill Creek and the industry related to those two features.

Cincinnati as a whole, feels disorganized, jumbled, fragmented, compartmentalized, etc. It's essentially an archipelago of neighborhoods. To Cincinnati's advantage, it strengthened neighborhood pride and a sense of community but it also divided communities. It sure does make for some picturesque scenes. Cincinnati is probably one of the best examples of geographical constraints in America.

 

When I lived there (before GPS) navigating the city was so confusing. Outside of downtown, there's hardly any linear streets in the city. You have zero sense of what direction you're even driving in. I think that does something psychologically to you. When you live in Columbus, on a giant grid with a very simple highway system, you feel this great sense of control. I don't really know how to describe it. It's obviously less profound, now, since everyone can rely on GPS.

 

Anyway, my point was that Cincinnatians easily take for granted those neighborhoods like Lower Price Hill, S. Fairmount and Sedamsville. Probably because it's just nothing new and they're everywhere and everyone is used to it and they're used to associating those kinds of neighborhoods with negative feelings. They could easily be gentrified (and should, considering their history and amazing architecture.) Developers wouldn't even have to deal with ridiculous notions from the community about how the white people are moving in and want to kick out all the black people. In Cleveland, if similar neighborhoods existed that close to downtown, they would no longer be missing any teeth. Connectivity is another thing some cities take for granted. In Cleveland, Lower Price Hill would be perceived as an oasis - an exclusive, tucked-away, very charming enclave away from traffic and the madness of the city and yuppies would have bought all of that up, yesterday.

Hipsters WILL NOT move into a white trash area. They avoid hillbillies, meatheads, wiggers et. al. like the plague. Those are the types of people that made hipsters miserable in their small town or fringe suburb and they never want to see them again.

There's a lot of cool houses in the Price Hills, and a lot of cool old divey bars and restaurants that hipsters would normally flock to. I love visiting there from time to time but would never move there because I don't want to live next door to Kid Rock.

Hipsters WILL NOT move into a white trash area. They avoid hillbillies, meatheads, wiggers et. al. like the plague. Those are the types of people that made hipsters miserable in their small town or fringe suburb and they never want to see them again.

 

Developers need to stop following hipsters and caring about what they think or do. It's amazing how no one has any interest in inner city Appalachian communities in Ohio. In the case of Lower Price Hill and similar neighborhoods in Cincinnati, they have amazing architecture and dense built environments along with beautiful views. More broadly, Appalachian neighborhoods consistently have the lowest crime rates in their respective city, making it a very livable place. No one in Ohio cares except for developers in Columbus who are finally taking on The Bottoms.