Wanted to weigh in on the posts of May 19th comparing favorite skylines between Cleveland Cincy Columbus and Pittsburgh (primarily)  I think Cleveland's skyline is unique in that Key Tower is significantly taller than even the second tallest Terminal Tower - and it more than doubles the majority of high rises in the heart of the downtown.  That factor along with a relative shortage of 500' high towers creates the feeling of gaps in the skyline which you don't feel with Pittsburgh or Cincinnati.  So it's "balance" and "density" that are a part of the reason why Cleveland seems (from certain angles) a bit "thin".  Though  Cleveland has the tallest building at 950 feet there are only 3 other towers over 500 feet compared to Pittsburgh with 10 towers over 500 and even Columbus with 6 over 500. Imagine how much more  impressive Cleveland would be if it added even a couple plus 500 feet towers - especially if one was, say Terminal Tower-like in height. I agree with those who say that height isn't everything - but height is a game-changer.  Think of Philly before the zoning change that allowed towers to eclipse William Penn's hat.  I think most would agree, however that Key Tower and the Terminal Tower are both world-class iconic buildings.

Key Tower is the contemporary of those two very tall office towers in Atlanta and the BoA tower in Charlotte.  The four of them are all kind of the same thing -- symbols of the insane late-80s commercial building boom that went bust right when each topped out.  It's more than noteworthy that each are still the tallest in their respective cities, 25+ years later.  Really illustrates how preposterously large the buildings were when they were built relative to actual market need. 

 

Tall buildings are being thrown up around the world at an unprecedented rate and they're definitely not special or interesting anymore.  It's hard to say if any tall building built after the Depression is actually interesting, since the technical challenges were all solved in the 1920s.  Only about ten cities in the United States have more than one prewar skyscraper.  In Ohio, we have yet to see a new building challenge the old icons in each of the 3c's.  Queen City Square in Cincinnati is a total dud. 

Queen City Square a dud? Nah, not at all! Keep in mind, it's easy to criticize the latest skyscraper in Cincy when it's in your home town. Not only do you know more about the project (and experienced headaches along the way) than most people but you see it often enough to where you can critique the hell out of it instead of just enjoying it as most people would. When it was first built, I had moved to Columbus and had been there a few years, after moving from Cincinnati. I remember going down to Cincy around '2011 - from Columbus (to The Justice Center to pay off traffic fines) and seeing it along the way, from 71 South. I remember it not only being a surprisingly cool, new addition to the skyline but a very iconic and aesthetically pleasing one at that. It really is a very nice looking high rise. Within the past 9 years I've lived in Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland and I honestly think that Queen City Sq is the best and most significant, memorable and iconic building to come to fruition in Ohio, in the past decade. If I were still a Cincinnatian, I'd be really proud of it. Cleveland is soon to have NuCLEus but it pales in comparison, honestly.

 

I really like Queen City Square and I'm sure many others feel the same way.

 

I'm curious what all you don't like about it.

Wanted to weigh in on the posts of May 19th comparing favorite skylines between Cleveland Cincy Columbus and Pittsburgh (primarily)  I think Cleveland's skyline is unique in that Key Tower is significantly taller than even the second tallest Terminal Tower - and it more than doubles the majority of high rises in the heart of the downtown.  That factor along with a relative shortage of 500' high towers creates the feeling of gaps in the skyline which you don't feel with Pittsburgh or Cincinnati.  So it's "balance" and "density" that are a part of the reason why Cleveland seems (from certain angles) a bit "thin".  Though  Cleveland has the tallest building at 950 feet there are only 3 other towers over 500 feet compared to Pittsburgh with 10 towers over 500 and even Columbus with 6 over 500. Imagine how much more  impressive Cleveland would be if it added even a couple plus 500 feet towers - especially if one was, say Terminal Tower-like in height. I agree with those who say that height isn't everything - but height is a game-changer.  Think of Philly before the zoning change that allowed towers to eclipse William Penn's hat.  I think most would agree, however that Key Tower and the Terminal Tower are both world-class iconic buildings.

 

You've said it better than I could - having even one building that is significantly taller and set off from the rest of the skyline can really throw things out of whack and diminish the impact of the rest of the skyline. Detroit has the same problem from some angles, where the RenCen just completely dominates everything to the point that it looks to make up an entire third of the skyline.

Cleveland has an expanse and scale unmatched by the others.

 

QCS has grown on me over the years. I thought it's top-third proportions were off and should have been another 5-10 stories taller at the setbacks with a less dominant uh, tiara.

 

As for that Cincy angle from say, Bellevue Hill, Carew looks ridiculously thin. It's always bothered me how this angle betrays that wonderful building, reducing it to an almost imperceptible spire.

 

Cincy's dynamism comes from how significantly the vistas change with the angle. In my opinion, it's most attractive and impressive viewing either from the SE (Covington cut or the Devou money shot) or NE (Prospect or Mt. Adams).

 

More recently, it's actually been possible and pleasing to stand at the river's edge and look at the Cincy skyline. Now that the parking lots and produce warehouses are gone, it's quite a view to take in. This has created a nice wall effect completely from your left to your right.

Wanted to weigh in on the posts of May 19th comparing favorite skylines between Cleveland Cincy Columbus and Pittsburgh (primarily)  I think Cleveland's skyline is unique in that Key Tower is significantly taller than even the second tallest Terminal Tower - and it more than doubles the majority of high rises in the heart of the downtown.  That factor along with a relative shortage of 500' high towers creates the feeling of gaps in the skyline which you don't feel with Pittsburgh or Cincinnati.  So it's "balance" and "density" that are a part of the reason why Cleveland seems (from certain angles) a bit "thin".  Though  Cleveland has the tallest building at 950 feet there are only 3 other towers over 500 feet compared to Pittsburgh with 10 towers over 500 and even Columbus with 6 over 500. Imagine how much more  impressive Cleveland would be if it added even a couple plus 500 feet towers - especially if one was, say Terminal Tower-like in height. I agree with those who say that height isn't everything - but height is a game-changer.  Think of Philly before the zoning change that allowed towers to eclipse William Penn's hat.  I think most would agree, however that Key Tower and the Terminal Tower are both world-class iconic buildings.

 

You've said it better than I could - having even one building that is significantly taller and set off from the rest of the skyline can really throw things out of whack and diminish the impact of the rest of the skyline. Detroit has the same problem from some angles, where the RenCen just completely dominates everything to the point that it looks to make up an entire third of the skyline.

 

I agree; Detroit's skyline looks so small because of that and the Ren Cen sticks out like a sore thumb. Detroit has a beautiful collection of grand historic high-rises but the real tragedy in the Detroit skyline is that it's common knowledge that for a metro area that big, the skyline ideally should be roughly double the size or at least 1.5x the size it is and there really hasn't been much in the way of new construction and it's so obvious just by looking at it. It's also just...not dynamic at all (which I guess is sadly a direct reflection of their economy.) I remember one year going to the Detroit Auto Show... it must have been 2004 because I had just turned 18 and was able to also have fun in Windsor. That same year, I also drove to Florida and passed through Atlanta. I was a closet nerd back then and knew that Detroit and Atlanta (at that time) had very similar MSA populations. Reasonably comparable, anyway. But my God... Atlanta's skyline was MASSIVE and so impressive compared to Detroit's, even back then. More sprawly, obviously, but there was just so much more going and it looked so eclectic and vibrant. I think skylines can be a decent indicator of a city's economic health and culture and can really effect a city's perception - for both residents and visitors.

 

We stayed at the Marriott in the Ren Cen for the NAIAS. Overall it was really cool and memorable! They had just renovated it. It was so clean and modern and it had a movie theater, car museum, food court...all these cool amenities right there but at the same time it was sort of a bummer because we wanted to explore downtown a lot and we did but it was somewhat hard to feel motivated to do that. You feel like you're trapped in this giant, isolated, self-sustained indoor city that takes forever to get out of. It wasn't well-integrated with its surroundings. Perhaps because it was built at a time when architecture went the complete opposite direction of hypermodernity, putting form before function, as a reference point. The huge complex IMO is bad urban form though. The Ren Cen complex didn't seem to care about the rest of downtown. I believe a subconscious part of what makes a skyline/downtown aesthetically pleasing is when it's dynamic, diverse and yet you can sense the strong relationships between all of the buildings. IMO, far away, aesthetics can even translate to defragmentation and close proximity of buildings. After all, the whole point of the density is that the buildings have this healthy, efficient symbiotic relationship - like an ecosystem or organism. Up closer, I believe aesthetics can translate to very 'permeable' buildings that provide quick and easy access to each other, transit, parks, and other nodes. First floor store fronts with giant windows that expose some of the inside activity to the outside. Eclectic buildings for all types of uses with lots of windows and entrances. It's hard to describe without getting too philosophical but essentially the opposite of a suburban office park. I think a lot of people would agree that the ugliest skyline would look like a glorified suburban office park.

 

I'm not sure but maybe another reason Cleveland's skyline seems less impressive than it should from certain angles is that it's big skyscrapers tend to take up entire mega-blocks with relatively very small buildings next to it. Cincinnati's skyline (which appears much fuller) has skyscrapers that take up 1/4th-1/2 of the block with a wide variety of building sizes for buildings on those same blocks so you really get that sense of depth and urban density with Cincinnati. I'm sure it also helps that the streets are so narrow. I love Cleveland's skyline though. Key Tower really is an iconic, world-class structure and I wouldn't trade Terminal Tower for anything. Once they finish a couple of these projects up here, the skyline will seriously look incredible and much fuller. I'm excited to see what its going to look like.

Only about ten cities in the United States have more than one prewar skyscraper. 

 

Over 30 US cities have more than one prewar skyscraper.  I once did a spreadsheet on this very subject, using 80' as the minimum height.  Cleveland has 7, Cincinnati has 4, and Columbus just the one.  Akron has 1, Toledo and Dayton both have 2.  For reference, NYC has 118 (remaining) and Chicago has 37.

Come on 80 feet is weak.  I mean more like 300 feet, if not 500.  Cincinnati has two 500 foot prewar skyscrapers, both of which are still prominent in the skyline. 

Only about ten cities in the United States have more than one prewar skyscraper. 

 

Over 30 US cities have more than one prewar skyscraper.  I once did a spreadsheet on this very subject, using 80' as the minimum height.  Cleveland has 7, Cincinnati has 4, and Columbus just the one.  Akron has 1, Toledo and Dayton both have 2.  For reference, NYC has 118 (remaining) and Chicago has 37.

 

Your spreadsheet is incorrect regarding most of those cities, if not all.  For example, Downtown Columbus alone has 15+ buildings over 80 feet built before WWII.  I don't know if you meant 80, or 180 (either case, Columbus still has more than 1 in downtown alone).

I think he meant 80 meters, not feet.

I think he meant 80 meters, not feet.

 

That would give Cleveland more than one as well, with AT&T and Huntington

I think he meant 80 meters, not feet.

 

That's a random metric, if so.

So, about the Rust Belt revival ideas.....

I think he meant 80 meters, not feet.

 

Yes I meant 80 meters, not feet.  Sorry about that.  Reality determined the cutoff metric as 80-100 meters turns out to be the most common height for them.  The heights follow a pretty regular distribution up from there, 100 meters being a bit more rare, 120 a lot more rare, etc.  Below 80 meters you get a lot of church spires and city halls and other structures that don't really fit the bill.  80 meters still eliminates a few things it shouldn't, like Cleveland's Midland/Landmark building at 79, but them's the breaks.

 

Rep. Tim Ryan suggests relocating federal agencies outside Washington, D.C.

By Sabrina Eaton, cleveland.com

on April 20, 2017 at 6:39 PM, updated April 20, 2017 at 8:41 PM

 

WASHINGTON, D. C. - Could federal employment transplanted from the nation's capital replace some of the jobs lost in other parts of the country?

 

That's what Rep. Tim Ryan wants to find out.

 

The Niles Democrat introduced legislation Thursday that would establish a commission to study relocating federal agencies to economically distressed parts of the country, or "areas with expertise in the mission and goal of the agency."

 

While the congressman said the nation should be proud of Washington, D.C. and its historic role, he said "the Founding Fathers could not have imagined our current federal government system, with more than 300,000 federal workers in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area in 190 federally-owned buildings and 500 leased buildings."

 

MORE:

http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2017/04/rep_tim_ryan_suggests_relocati.html#incart_most-commented_metro_article

 

Video worth viewing, sharing.....

 

Why government agencies should move from DC to the Midwest (not all of course, but some moves make sense)

^ An update to that video: recent rumors say the FBI isn't moving, partly for cost reasons.

 

The best recent practitioner of bringing-home-the-bacon politics has been former Sen. Barbara Mikulski of Maryland. She parlayed a Social Security office in Baltimore into 25,000 employees plus the Centers (gotta use the plural) for Medicare and Medicaid Services with 4000 more jobs. Nothing got her vote unless it had something in it for Maryland.  Ohio's politicians are *much* too easily satisfied with ego strokes.

 

One potential for Cleveland is the unique tumor registry that Cleveland Clinic was recently charged with starting.  With a long-term view, Ohio's politicians could make that into  the National Institute of [something or other]. Bureaucratically speaking, it's much easier to grow something than move something.

Cleveland has regional operations for the Federal Trade Commission, NASA and the Federal Reserve. Those are fairly exclusive federal agencies to have in or near your city and judging by how much I hear about the Federal Reserve and the size of the building which takes up an entire megablock, I'm going to assume they employ a sh!t ton of well-paid people. I am all-for decentralizing all of those agencies out of D.C., I just don't think Cleveland is the best example. It's a huge asset having all of the top doctors, medical researchers and NASA engineers in your region.

 

It could also be argued that some non-coastal cities or cities outside of D.C. disproportionately benefit from federal funds more-so than others. Even in cites you might least expect. Revenue figures from Cleveland Clinic's website for FY 2016:

 

Total Grant and Contract Revenue

$179M

Total Federal Revenue

$110M

 

Cincinnati is probably the smallest beneficiary of federal funding, by size on a per-person basis with regard to the cities mentioned in that video- at least it seems that way to me at first glance (especially considering how Detroit was bailed out in 2009), but Cincinnati seems to be doing well. I don't know a whole lot about the subject but I'm guessing medium-size cities like Toledo, Akron or Youngstown probably deserve those agencies more than he bigger cities do. Dayon... meh, they at least got Wright-Patt.

Coupe this with idea that the state should spread out state agencies across the state too

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. In Columbus, it's all about J.P Morgan Chase, Nationwide, Abercrombie, Limited, Cardinal, Battell, even the food service industry like White Castle, Bob Evans, Donatos and Wendys, etc. Government jobs are an after-thought for almost everyone. The private corporations in Columbus have a huge influence on the city - I would argue much more-so than state government.

 

Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

 

Have you ever been to one of the NASA open houses? It's a really cool experience. They actually have two gravity wells, one which is "outside" in a tower down into the ravine, and another that's a big pit that they dug. One of my elementary school teachers had a husband who was an engineer at Glenn so we all got to go on a field trip one time and throw stuff down the hole in the name of science, which was pretty exciting.

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy.

 

A lot of the people who work at those kinds of places live in the surrounding counties, especially the ones with few jobs such as Madison, Pickaway and Licking.

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. In Columbus, it's all about J.P Morgan Chase, Nationwide, Abercrombie, Limited, Cardinal, Battell, even the food service industry like White Castle, Bob Evans, Donatos and Wendys, etc. Government jobs are an after-thought for almost everyone. The private corporations in Columbus have a huge influence on the city - I would argue much more-so than state government.

 

Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

 

It would be more important to cities like Dayton and Toledo and Youngstown to have those agencies than it would be for the big C's who have much more diversified economies.

According to onthemap, 6% of jobs in the city of Columbus are in public administration. That's 28,031 people employed in public admin. 21,903 of those public admin jobs pay 40k or more per year.

 

The city of cleveland----6.1% of total city jobs are in public admin, but that only accounts for 15,862 jobs. 10,942 public admin jobs pay greater than 40k.

 

So they both make up a relatively equal portion of city jobs....columbus just has almost double the number.

That's what I was thinking - based simply on observations, without even taking the time to look up statistics. Wages in Cleveland are generably horrible compared to other cities in the Midwest or anywhere else, anyway, even for white collar jobs (outside of executive positions and the ultra-rich.) I'm not going to sit here and say that Columbus hasn't benefited from state government jobs or more indirectly benefited from federal funds but certainly the Federal Reserve's undisputed, large presence in Cleveland along with the stellar non-profit organization known as the Cleveland Clinic have undoubtedly helped the City of Cleveland in ways that Columbus or Cincinnati (at least to my knowledge) have never seen. Honestly, the only federal-level agency Cincinnati can lay claim to and take pride in is a big EPA office and we all know where Donald Trump stands with the EPA. You have to understand how weird that was for me, seeing the Cincinnati Enquirer going Rogue and not endorsing a Republican candidate, especially after working there. I'm guessing because for the first time in a long while, they felt that a Republican wasn't actually representing the best interest of locals. It's sad that some locals still just don't get it.

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. In Columbus, it's all about J.P Morgan Chase, Nationwide, Abercrombie, Limited, Cardinal, Battell, even the food service industry like White Castle, Bob Evans, Donatos and Wendys, etc. Government jobs are an after-thought for almost everyone. The private corporations in Columbus have a huge influence on the city - I would argue much more-so than state government.

 

Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

 

It would be more important to cities like Dayton and Toledo and Youngstown to have those agencies than it would be for the big C's who have much more diversified economies.

 

I hear you.

 

. You have to understand how weird that was for me, seeing the Cincinnati Enquirer going Rogue and not endorsing a Republican candidate, especially after working there. I'm guessing because for the first time in a long while, they felt that a Republican wasn't actually representing the best interest of locals. It's sad that some locals still just don't get it.

 

No serious Republicans ran.

Who are the serious Republicans?

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

 

Have you ever been to one of the NASA open houses? It's a really cool experience. They actually have two gravity wells, one which is "outside" in a tower down into the ravine, and another that's a big pit that they dug. One of my elementary school teachers had a husband who was an engineer at Glenn so we all got to go on a field trip one time and throw stuff down the hole in the name of science, which was pretty exciting.

 

No, I've never been to one and I never knew anything about it but I'd love to go! He never  told me about that.

 

It just bewilders me that NASA has a big presence in Greater Cleveland and yet you never hear about it, even locally! That's awesome.

 

Also, what is going on with the air base in Cleveland, along Lake Erie on the east side of town near the lake? I know that the Coast Guard has a presence for obvious reasons but when I checked into it by googling it, literally all I saw was that the Department of Defense operates that site? It can't just be a launch site for a spectacular air-show held in Cleveland every year, right? What is going on with the Department of Defense's site on the east side of Cleveland? I literally can't find anything through Google.

^The tours are one Saturday each month, and you just missed one, but each month covers a different topic and different parts of the facility. The August topic is solar cells, and they're actually showing off the drop towers on September 9 - might want to add that to your calendar!

 

What "air base" are you talking about? Burke? Or the DCMA offices near Gordon Park?

I honestly don't even know what you're talking about. Burke and DCMA. You'll have to enlighten me. Believe it or not, Google isn't much help at all.

Burke is Burke Lakefront Airport, between the Rock Hall and the USS Cod. It's just a general aviation airport but there may be some random Air National Guard stuff there from time to time. DCMA is just a government oversight agency but it looks like they have a little campus over in Bratenahl on Google Maps.

 

If it's neither of those, you might need to post a screenshot, because I have no clue what else you'd be talking about.

Burke is Burke Lakefront Airport, between the Rock Hall and the USS Cod. It's just a general aviation airport but there may be some random Air National Guard stuff there from time to time. DCMA is just a government oversight agency but it looks like they have a little campus over in Bratenahl on Google Maps.

 

If it's neither of those, you might need to post a screenshot, because I have no clue what else you'd be talking about.

 

Found it :-)

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

 

Have you ever been to one of the NASA open houses? It's a really cool experience. They actually have two gravity wells, one which is "outside" in a tower down into the ravine, and another that's a big pit that they dug. One of my elementary school teachers had a husband who was an engineer at Glenn so we all got to go on a field trip one time and throw stuff down the hole in the name of science, which was pretty exciting.

 

No, I've never been to one and I never knew anything about it but I'd love to go! He never  told me about that.

 

It just bewilders me that NASA has a big presence in Greater Cleveland and yet you never hear about it, even locally! That's awesome.

 

Also, what is going on with the air base in Cleveland, along Lake Erie on the east side of town near the lake? I know that the Coast Guard has a presence for obvious reasons but when I checked into it by googling it, literally all I saw was that the Department of Defense operates that site? It can't just be a launch site for a spectacular air-show held in Cleveland every year, right? What is going on with the Department of Defense's site on the east side of Cleveland? I literally can't find anything through Google.

 

These are Nike Missle Sites. There is one in Wilmington, where I am from originally, that has now been converted to the HQ for Clinton County's Developmental Disabilities programs. Here is a list of the sites: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nike_missile_sites and the Wikipedia page on Project Nike: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Nike

 

These missile sites would form circles around cities that were deemed targets following WWII. Scroll to the end of the Wikipedia article for some cool maps.

Exploring Buffalo's waterfront renaissance; what can Cleveland learn from its Lake Erie neighbor? (photos)

 

By Susan Glaser, The Plain Dealer,

[email protected]

 

BUFFALO, New York - Pushing my way through a capacity crowd at Buffalo's Canalside park on a recent Friday evening, I couldn't get businessman Peter Florczak's words out of my head:

 

"As recently as five years ago, this area was nothing but a wasteland," he told me a few hours before, as we walked along the riverfront boardwalk.

 

What a difference a few years makes - especially on a balmy summer night, with the Buffalo Philharmonic playing in the background.

 

I set off for Buffalo a couple of weeks ago - it's closer to Cleveland than Cincinnati - with the purpose of exploring the city's emerging waterfront renaissance.

 

Cleveland and Buffalo have much in common, and not just their addresses on Lake Erie. These two once-thriving industrial towns are both fighting hard for a 21st-century reboot.

 

Waterfront development is seen as key to both communities' revival - important to both attracting new residents and encouraging a fledgling tourism industry.

 

 

http://www.cleveland.com/travel/index.ssf/2017/07/exploring_buffalos_waterfront.html#incart_river_home

 

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. In Columbus, it's all about J.P Morgan Chase, Nationwide, Abercrombie, Limited, Cardinal, Battell, even the food service industry like White Castle, Bob Evans, Donatos and Wendys, etc. Government jobs are an after-thought for almost everyone. The private corporations in Columbus have a huge influence on the city - I would argue much more-so than state government.

 

Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

 

The top two employers in Columbus metro are The Ohio State University and the state of Ohio.  Over 50,000 jobs.  That definitely helps the C-bus economy.

Remains Of Ancient Race Of Job Creators Found In Rust Belt

http://www.theonion.com/article/remains-of-ancient-race-of-job-creators-found-in-r-26490

Remains Of Ancient Race Of Job Creators Found In Rust Belt

http://www.theonion.com/article/remains-of-ancient-race-of-job-creators-found-in-r-26490

 

That's a pretty well written and funny article. It's also from 2011!?  The "Job Creators" have risen, a bit, since then.

I honestly don't think many folks in Columbus would care if that happened, if it meant appeasing people in other Ohio metros who think they're getting such a sh!tty end of the deal. I literally know NO ONE in Columbus who works for the Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Department of Transportation, etc. I don't think government jobs are a very big portion of Columbus' economy. I also know no one who even wants or ever wanted a government job. In Columbus, it's all about J.P Morgan Chase, Nationwide, Abercrombie, Limited, Cardinal, Battell, even the food service industry like White Castle, Bob Evans, Donatos and Wendys, etc. Government jobs are an after-thought for almost everyone. The private corporations in Columbus have a huge influence on the city - I would argue much more-so than state government.

 

Personally, if there were any government agency I would want to work for as a programmer, it's NASA and that's near Cleveland. I made friends up here with a NASA engineer who was telling me about their zero-gravity tunnel. Extremely cool sh!t!

 

The top two employers in Columbus metro are The Ohio State University and the state of Ohio.  Over 50,000 jobs.  That definitely helps the C-bus economy.

 

Its just weird to me, that the largest employer is a government agency. I literally know no one in Columbus who works for a government agency other than one person who worked for ODOT and was fired for no reason. I know that compared to other Ohio cities, Columbus does have a significant number of government jobs but I can't help but think that its prevalence and economic impact on the region are a little over-blown. It doesn't seem as though those jobs attract the best and brightest and it doesn't seem that they pay as much as the thriving private sector in Columbus. Like I've pointed out, Columbus has the highest wages in the state, within the private sector.

Well "largest employer" and wages don't always align, although government jobs usually are decently-paid positions. Most states' largest employer is Wal Mart but economically that doesn't do many people much good. Also, it's 50,000 jobs in a region of about 2 million people. That's only less than 3% of columbusites, so the chance of you interacting with one, much less multiple, is still fairly small.

Is Ronald Reagan to blame for the decline of St. Louis? Some experts think so.

 

The growing economic gap between prosperous coastal cities and struggling cities in Middle America is often blamed on impersonal forces like globalization and technological progress. But some thinkers have started pointing to another culprit: little-noticed shifts in antitrust enforcement, beginning in the 1980s, that allowed a string of mega-mergers.

 

The argument goes something like this: Back in the 1980s, the Reagan administration changed antitrust policy to be more friendly to mergers. As a result, we got a lot more mergers, resulting in massive conglomerates that are disproportionately headquartered in a handful of big cities. The result: A few big cities have gained so many jobs that it’s producing a housing crisis. Meanwhile, a lot of midsize cities, like St. Louis, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh, have suffered from anemic economic growth. And having so much economic activity squeezed into a handful of cities may be holding back the American economy as a whole.

 

“Virtually all cities and metropolitan areas have seen precipitous declines in the number of locally owned corporations,” Mark Muro, an expert on urban policy at the Brookings Institution, told me earlier this year. That has “seriously degraded the quality and local focus of regional business leadership, philanthropy, and other resources.”

 

More below:

https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/7/14/14702240/antitrust-enforcement-decline-st-louis

 

Toledo and Dayton are two classic examples of this. Also, much of this is chronicled by Donald Barlett and James Steele in their 1991 book America: What Went Wrong. http://americawhatwentwrong.org/Barlett-and-Steele/ It grew out of a series they did for the Philadelphia Inquirer.

 

It makes perfect sense!

Many of Regan's poisons took effect so very slowly while Bush II's struck almost immediately.

CNN aired a documentary on the 80s last week and they discussed leveraged buyouts and mergers.  These moves made great returns for investors on Wall Street but created job loss in manufacturing.  I'd like to see some more research on this topic but it is fascinating.

Is Ronald Reagan to blame for the decline of St. Louis? Some experts think so.

 

The growing economic gap between prosperous coastal cities and struggling cities in Middle America is often blamed on impersonal forces like globalization and technological progress. But some thinkers have started pointing to another culprit: little-noticed shifts in antitrust enforcement, beginning in the 1980s, that allowed a string of mega-mergers.

 

The argument goes something like this: Back in the 1980s, the Reagan administration changed antitrust policy to be more friendly to mergers. As a result, we got a lot more mergers, resulting in massive conglomerates that are disproportionately headquartered in a handful of big cities. The result: A few big cities have gained so many jobs that it’s producing a housing crisis. Meanwhile, a lot of midsize cities, like St. Louis, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh, have suffered from anemic economic growth. And having so much economic activity squeezed into a handful of cities may be holding back the American economy as a whole.

 

“Virtually all cities and metropolitan areas have seen precipitous declines in the number of locally owned corporations,” Mark Muro, an expert on urban policy at the Brookings Institution, told me earlier this year. That has “seriously degraded the quality and local focus of regional business leadership, philanthropy, and other resources.”

 

More below:

https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/7/14/14702240/antitrust-enforcement-decline-st-louis

 

 

Very interesting article; and I think the writer is on to something... Obviously Cleveland was decimated by the loss of industry, jobs and corporate headquarters where, in the 70s and early 80s, we were one of the top 3 or 4 major corporate HQ in the nation... The biggest and most notable Cleveland corporate sacking was Standard Oil, our signature home-grown international conglomerate John D. founded during the industrial boom of the late 19th Century that led to Cleveland growing from promising small town to becoming a booming powerhouse industrial/corporate center of the 20th century.  But SOHIO was merged out of Cleveland -- first to AMOCO in Chicago and, then, BP.  Some SOHIO/BP big-wigs griped that Cleveland became highly corporate unfriendly following the Kucinich (as mayor) years of the 70s, but no doubt Reagan's merger-friendly policy had a primary effect... More recently, and on a much smaller scale, Shaker Heights' own OfficeMax was gobbled up and moved away in the early 2000s.  Again I would suspect Reagan's policy had a hand. 

 

In addition to this, so much of the wealth-concentration, destruction of the middle class can be traced to Reagan's corporate friendly, tax reform and trickle down policies that have seriously harmed America.  And yet current Republicans want MORE of it and many progressives, who should know better, have seemingly hit the Snooze button.  Unbelievable.

Cover story of the last issue of the Harvard Business Review discussed "Globalization in the Age of Trump" and talks about striking a better balance between global and local presence. Perhaps suggesting that these large, merged, organizations ramp up their presence in smaller, more scattered places.

 

https://hbr.org/2017/07/globalization-in-the-age-of-trump

This article coincides with a Democratic party rebranding called "Better Deal" in which they also complain about mega mergers.  I am thinking they want to shift the focus off of free trade, and NAFTA.

 

That said, the idea has merit, and it is worth looking into to see if the data supports the hypothesis. 

 

 

Sadly, I recall people in Cincinnati cheering on Cleveland's decline in the 1980s.  Back then, any and all decline was blamed on "the unions", and Cincinnati was never a big union town.  At the same time Cleveland was on the decline, Cincinnati was just plain lucky in landing several major relocations thanks in large part to Carl Lindner's far-reaching business deals in the 1970s and 80s.  He and the Cincinnati old money kept their offices downtown and brought their purchases downtown in order to strengthen their family real estate holdings.  That is still going on today and is why Downtown Cincinnati avoided the total collapse that afflicted most of the rest of the United States.  P&G hasn't been under family control for over 50 years so, again, Cincinnati is simply lucky that they never picked up and left.   

Eyeing idle Ford plant: Cleveland-based American Plasma Energy Group (APEG) is a company that hopes to change the world, or at least how the combustion engine works. The company recently announced an exclusive licensing deal with Plasma Igniter, LLC, to make the Coaxial Cavity Resonator Ignition System (CCRIS). The CCRIS is a fancy title for some pretty cool technology that replaces the traditional spark plug in car engines. The company's technology uses two signals, a microwave radio frequency and direct current, to ignite a new spark plug that uses much less fuel.

 

Anything new on this? I thought APEG was supposed to announce something by the end of summer.