Downtown Cincinnati, Inc. does this quarterly.  Read the 12-page report here:

http://www.gototown.com/PDFs/3Q_State_of_the_Downtown.pdf

 

Downtown: Just the facts

Advocacy group plans regular reports on the state of the center city

By Greg Paeth Post staff reporter

 

Failure and success in downtown Cincinnati get fairly balanced billing in a first-of-its-kind report that provides a comprehensive snapshot of the region's core for the first nine months of the year.  Crime rates climbed for serious offenses, but declined for minor charges.

 

Office vacancy rates improved and business openings and closings all are chronicled in the "State of Downtown Report" by Downtown Cincinnati, Inc.  The report also shows continued demand for downtown condominiums and provides a glimpse of still-on-the-drawing broad projects that may advance beyond the talking stage in the near future.

 

Developers invested $210 million in downtown and the riverfront for the first nine months of the year, according to the report.  But the three biggest investments were made by institutions: the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center ($110 million), phase two of Great American Ball Park ($45 million) and the Taft Museum renovation ($23 million).  DCI, often described as downtown's most enthusiastic cheerleader, is the semi-public agency chartered to promote business and residential development in the heart of the region.

 

Read full article here:

http://www.cincypost.com/2004/10/21/down102104.html

DCI releases first 'State of Downtown' report

 

Serious crime is up 2.1 percent, less serious crime is down 7.9 percent and the office vacancy rate has improved to 13.6 percent in the city's central business district, according to a new comprehensive quarterly report by Downtown Cincinnati Inc.

 

The nonprofit business group has produced its first "State of Downtown" report, looking at downtown's facts and figures from July to September. DCI's CEO David Ginsburg said the group will update the reports on a quarterly basis, with an annual overview released in April.

 

Read full article here:

http://cincinnati.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/dailyedition.html#5

Someone pinch me… The Cincinnati Enquirer actually wrote something positive about downtown.  Hell has just frozen over!

 

BY MARLA MATZER ROSE | ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

 

Downtown is seeing positive trends in virtually every area, according to a report to be unveiled this morning by Downtown Cincinnati Inc.  The nonprofit service organization holds its annual meeting beginning at 8 a.m. at Cincinnati's convention center - expected to soon change its name fromCinergy Center to Duke Energy Center to reflect the companies' merger.

 

Acceleration of residents moving downtown was a highlight of 2005, along with a building boom and gains in areas including tourism and arts offerings, according to the 2005 State of Downtown report.  DCI's work focuses on the Central Business District between the riverfront and Central Parkway, where it oversees such things as the Downtown Ambassador program to assist visitors with information and cleaning and maintenance in public areas.

 

Read full article here:

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060405/BIZ01/604050323/1076/BIZ

so is 500 residents a lot?  It seems to me it is a quality number of people. 

i wonder if those numbers are based on actual population increase for last year or if they are making assumptions based upon units that have been sold, but not necissarily occupied.  if its based on actual population increase one would think downtown should be posed for another year of strong positive growth with the mcalpin and park place coming online

It has to be an increase in persons, not units sold. If they state that 500 units are sold, then that would be even better considering that quite a few of those buyers would be in relationship with someone, or have a kid(s).

 

Yeah, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that things are changing for the better -at a good pace.

 

 

On a side note: I think they should revamp Walnut St. into a major entertainment district. That's just my opinion though.

^ no no...i realize they are not refering to the number of units sold.  i meant was are these 500 people physically living downtown.  as an example of what i mean...if say the mcalpin knows the population of each of the units they have sold, but obviously none of them are living downtown yet,  i can see someone from the newspaper making it easy on themselves by using that information rather than an actual head count thus inflating the real number.  i guess im just making this more complicated than it should be...i was just curious. but maybe somebody understands what im trying to get at...Go Cincinnati!!!

Report: Downtown boomtown

 

Although it's difficult to measure perceptions and how they might impact the long-term future of downtown Cincinnati, it's pretty simple to notice tangible evidence of the changing face of the heart of the city.

 

Rumbling construction trucks on Fountain Square and nearby Government Square, the recent completion of the Western & Southern Queen City Square high-rise at 303 Broadway and the nearly completed $160 million expansion and renovation of Cinergy Center - the convention facility - all provide ample evidence that downtown is in the midst of a major makeover.

 

Bricks and mortar progress as well as what seems to be a fresh new attitude among elected officials were cited this morning as indications of better things to come in the future by Downtown Cincinnati Inc., the private, nonprofit agency created to promote and nurture the geographic hearts of the region.

 

Read full article here:

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060405/BIZ01/604050323/1076/BIZ

My response to this is that Cincy is prime for another residential tower or two.  I know condos have been the attractive development as of late, but affordable apartments are in very high demand as well.  Not to mention that the new condos are extremely high in price.  I would love to see the frenzy for some more affordable condos built downtown.  I would certainly look into one!

 

Just think how what these numbers will look like when 'The Banks' is developed/completed.  Downtown Cincy will be a completely new place....for the better!!!!!!

Two positive articles in one day - awesome!

 

Although I can't say that perception is changing.  I listened to the "Two Angry Guys" this morning on the Sports Animal spew inaccurate data over the air waves with some moron calling up and saying that Hyde Park had 4 murders this year - whaaa?

 

While the city is making progress, perception with take a while longer.

 

Things are looking up downtown, DCI reports

Cincinnati Business Courier - 10:23 AM EDT Wednesday

 

More than $600 million in public and private development, an influx of residents and new office and garage space are helping to transform the city's central business district, Downtown Cincinnati Inc. reported Wednesday.  The nonprofit group presented its "2005 State of Downtown Report" at its annual meeting at Cinergy Center.

 

"While development and construction teams literally have been building our center city, Downtown Cincinnati Inc. has continued its focus on building block programs to ensure a safer, cleaner and more vibrant downtown," said outgoing Chairwoman Charlotte Otto.

 

Read full article here:

http://cincinnati.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/stories/2006/04/03/daily33.html

Take the survey yourself and rate downtown Cincinnati on various topics:

 

http://www.downtowncincinnati.com/cgi-bin/listevent.cgi?evnt_id=7219

That's good to hear downtown is changing for the better but I wish Over the Rhine was improving at a faster pace because the slower it changes, the longer it takes to change perception and I heard those condos aren't selling well. I don't know if the rendering of fountain square that I saw was the finalized plan but it didn't look significantly better than what it already was (considering how much money they're spending). I wasn't a big fan of the lining with trees blocking the fountain. I would like to see Lower Price Hill improved but my guess is that LPH could fall off the face of the earth and no one would ever notice.

^ No I hope to see LPH continue to become more of an hispanic immigrant destination -naturally of course

^ no no...i realize they are not refering to the number of units sold.  i meant was are these 500 people physically living downtown.  as an example of what i mean...if say the mcalpin knows the population of each of the units they have sold, but obviously none of them are living downtown yet,  i can see someone from the newspaper making it easy on themselves by using that information rather than an actual head count thus inflating the real number.  i guess im just making this more complicated than it should be...i was just curious. but maybe somebody understands what im trying to get at...Go Cincinnati!!!

 

Here's bit more info on the Residential part of the report. The last two are really nice to see. WCPO has a Word file to download.

 

<b>Residential</b>

• 500 new residents moved downtown in 2005, bringing the center city residential population to nearly 7,000. The downtown residential population has nearly doubled since 2000.

• Major 2005 residential projects representing a total investment of more than $90 million and 266 units included: Park Place at Lytle, The McAlpin, 18 East Fourth, The American Building, and The Lofts at Graydon Place.

• The downtown apartment market remains in high demand with a 94.5% average occupancy rate.

• Nearly 700 residential units will be under construction in 2006, welcoming nearly 1,000 more residents downtown.

 

^ No I hope to see LPH continue to become more of an hispanic immigrant destination -naturally of course

 

I think LPH needs to make up its mind, is residential or industry? IMO, there's way too much industry to make it a decent residential environment.

What's an ideal downtown population  number?

^ No I hope to see LPH continue to become more of an hispanic immigrant destination -naturally of course

 

I think LPH needs to make up its mind, is residential or industry? IMO, there's way too much industry to make it a decent residential environment.

The last time they made up their mind about something like that was probably around 1880 lol.

 

I want to buy one of those factories and convert it to lofts :) When I'm rich of course. Then eventually I'll have a lot of the buildings bought up and converted to residential property then I'll install a light rail going from LPH to downtown to make it easy for people that work downtown to live there. Since the rail will have a stop in Queensgate downtown will suddenly grow rapidly in between LPH and CBD with skyscrapers all throughout. I have it alllll figured out. Just wait and see!

Does anyone know how we compare to the other large Ohio cities' on CBD pop. only?

 

Cleveland

Columbus

Toledo

Dayton

 

 

This is a HUGE statement!:

"* The average downtown apartment occupancy rate is 94.5 percent."

I would be more interested in density numbers. Downrown Cincinnati is only 0.8 square miles

Monte, I also heard the angry guys this morning.  I was so tempted to call in when they were taking about being too scared to take their families downtown to a Reds game.  Sounds like somebody has spent a little too much time in their cul-de-sacs.

 

Also don't know if anybody else saw the Cincinnati Realtors forum on one of the public access television stations the other night.  Jim Tarbell spoke after DCI presented all the data that was talked about in today's enquirer.  He spoke about a mixed use grocery store building that is proposed in between 7th and 8th streets and Main and Sycramore.  I believe thats the surface parking lot across from Silverglades.  Unfortunately I don't remeber who he said the developer is and whom to call and lobby to.

Good news! Cincy must be doing something right!

Quote from Nick Spencer on this issue this topic at  http://cincinnati.blogspot.com.  I would like further input on Nick's breakdown of the numbers.  Does the CBD have about 7,000 residents or not?  Is DCI including the East End & OTR?

 

I do think people have to be careful with that 7,000 residents number. That's not entirely accurate, at least as its posed in this report.

 

When potential investors or realtors look at making a move in a CBD, they are going to look at the number of market rate tenant in the CBD proper. That number is more like 2k, and we have to get it up to 10 (at least) if we want to be taken seriously. Right now, the downtown sales market is decent but not superb... there are plenty of available units on the market right now.

 

What DCI does to get this number up is include the Eastern Riverfront and OTR. And especially with OTR, that's a LOT of low income residents padding that number. I think the total number of market rate tenants in the Center City area is still somewhere under 2k, and needs to get into the 10k-15k range, as Mayor Mallory talked about during his campaign.

 

I do wish DCI would spend more time trying to address this and less time fudging numbers to paint rosier pictures. Also, we did have a net loss of jobs and businesses last year, something they attempted to gloss over in this report. Now, a lot of that has to do with badly run businesses, not the state of downtown, but its still something that needs to be acknowledged if this report is to be taken credibly.

 

I'm glad so many folks are having positive experiences living in the CBD. I see a lot of hit and miss, personally. There's a lot to be said for and against the CBD right now.

 

But when the local media uses terms like 'boomtown' it show they're regurgitating press releases rather than doing real reporting. We've had WAY too much of that lately.

Nick Spencer | Homepage | 04.05.06 - 6:09 pm | #

Under 2k!? Woah. I thought 7k seemed about right. As much surface area as condos like The Gateway take up for only 26 units, I hope they plan on building really tall structures for these properties. Downtown is already pretty dense, where could they build new residential units without using existing commercial space? (I'm assuming it has a high occupancy rate too) If more residents means occupying space that would otherwise still be used commercially then I don't see why it would be any better or worse. It seems like this kind of population growth would be a lot easier in Queensgate, West End, OTR and the East End.

man, that sure had a way of makin' my mood go from  :clap: :-D 8-) to  :| :cry: :oops: :drunk:

^ LOL. There is always something behind every story. Does this include Adams Landing?

I say take the positive press and enjoy it.  We certainly know the Enquirer has no problems highlighting the negative, and does not care about getting the facts completely accurate.  If this helps in creating a different perception, great.

 

I do think the article distinguishes between Downtown and Greater Downtown, which is probably a more accurate depiction anyway considering the boundaries other downtowns use.  I also would not put too much wait into negative Nick's comments about including OTR and lower income residents.  They obviously only included parts (recently developed projects maybe) since OTR has a population of 7,000 by itself.  I have always seen Downtown proper listed around 3,500, and regardless of the exact numbers, the population is going up.

 

^well the article did say that the pop. in 2000 was 3500 and that was always the number I thought of so thats prob. where we are getting it.  they also said the pop. doubled in seze since then and, obviously, now its 7,000.  so maybe their numbers are right.  yea...theyre right.  well, when i move down there, it will be 7,001.

Here is the actual "State of Downtown"

http://downtowncincinnati.com/PDFs/StateOfDowntown2005.pdf

 

 

According to the report, downtown as we know it (CBD) has a population of 3,849 as of 2005 with a population estimate in 2006 of 4,226.  The population number they used for downtown in the Enquirer is what they call "Greater Downtown" which makes up the CBD, OTR, Adam's Landing, Betts Longworth & Pendleton. 

It would be interesting to get the exact boundaries they used as they obviously only included parts of OTR, the West End, and the East End.  As of 2000, OTR had 7,600, the West End had 8,100, and the East End had 1,692.  They seem to have more clearly pointed out the parts of the latter two, but OTR is still unclear.

 

http://www.cincinnatichamber.com/pdf/pop/city_pop.pdf

Nice find Cincy1.  It is interesting to see Queensgate listed with 641 residents.  I thought Queensgate was the only neighborhood without any residential?  Where are 641 people hiding out at in Queensgate?

 

I also don't know why the city can't be consistant with its neighborhood breakdowns.  We know there are 52 neighborhoods in Cincinnati, why can't they just list all 52 and show the population numbers for each?  The same could be said for how the Police keep crime data in reference to the neighborhoods.  Oh and the MLS is a whole-nother mess.  They apparently only list by zipcode so if a home is in Evanston but it has a 45208 zipcode, they list it as Hyde Park.

^The jail?

Maybe parts of what we thought was the west end is queensgate? I think theres a few big hotels in queensgate.

Maybe they are living at the back of the main post office.  That is interesting, but now that you mention it I think the Queensgate could be a prime area for development as it is the one of the flattest areas of the city.  The street grid is already in place so this would be a great area for re-use if current tenants/businesses move.

 

I agree with the neighborhood breakdown.  You hear of Pendleton or O'Bryonville or CUF - they sometimes talk about a part of a larger neighborhood or group some together.  It would be nice to always have the apples to apples comparison.

Maybe they are living at the back of the main post office.  That is interesting, but now that you mention it I think the Queensgate could be a prime area for development as it is the one of the flattest areas of the city.  The street grid is already in place so this would be a great area for re-use if current tenants/businesses move.

 

That's what I really don't understand. The land is completely flat and easy to build on. I guess it's hard for it to connect to downtown though with 75 in the way.

I think we need to keep residents out of Queensgate and keep it industrial/commercial.  The jail, citylink center and other services that aren't attractive to residential neighborhoods should be built there.  It we were building Cincinnati from scratch I would have planned it differently but this is the hand we have so I think we should play it that way.

I always thought the residential portion of Queensgate was the Job Corps Center by Union Terminal.  But, looking it up, they only have room for 225 live-in students.

 

It couldn't be the jail...could it?  That jail holds over 800, and it has to be full.  That would put the number well over 641.

 

I think the last time I tried to find out anything on that, the information said that there was one "household" in Queensgate and the rest of the 641 live in "group quarters".

 

But I'm getting way off subject here....

 

 

^ But those numbers were from 2000.  Maybe it wasn't full back then.

Maybe residency requires being there for a certain amount of time?  Like, if 150 beds are 30-60 day sentences, maybe they aren't counted as residents?

Most of Queensgate is occupied by active commercial/light industrial businesses.  There aren't large swaths of land that could easily be redeveloped into residential, at least not without booting tax-paying businesses.  Remember, the city not only gets property taxes from businesses, it also gets income taxes from the workers.

Downtown: High risk returns high reward

BY CLIFF PEALE | ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

 

So does downtown Cincinnati even matter anymore?  Depending on what you're watching or reading, or to whom you're talking, you will get a different answer seen through different lenses.  Say you're reading the new report of Downtown Cincinnati Inc. You see the $42 million makeover of Fountain Square, the $160 million expansion of the convention center, the $9.3 million reconstruction of Government Square and the new $62.5 million office building at Third and Broadway. Overall, $600 million is invested in downtown projects at the moment.

 

The report tells us that people are lining up to buy condominiums downtown and in Over-the-Rhine. Eight out of 10 people feel very safe downtown during the day. There are numbers and tables and statistics - did you know 7,000 people now live in or near downtown? - all pointing to a central business district booming with people, activity and money.  "The excitement," it says, "is building downtown."

 

Read full article here:

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060409/COL01/604090343/1004/rss03

Go to town:

http://www.downtowncincinnati.com/PDFs/1Q_2006_State_of_Downtown.pdf

http://www.gototown.com/PDFs/2Q_2006_State_of_Downtown.pdf

The 3rd Quarter 2006 State of Downtown report is out.  Check out the PDF.  It looks like good news overall.  There are 377 residential units under construction in greater downtown (Betts-Longworth, OTR, CBD, East Riverfront), 273 in pre-development (whatever that means) and 2546 proposed.  The proposed number only takes into account 1200 units for the banks project even though AIG Carter said they wanted something like 3000-4000.  In addition the downtown office vacancy rate is lower than the regional rate.  Read the full report (PDF) at

 

http://www.gototown.com/AboutDCI.html 

A couple of items for this edition:

 

• Paragon Salons (currently in the basement of the Carew Tower / Nertherland Hilton complex) is moving to the corner of 4th and Race at the old Closson's site.  IT will be good to get something in that spot, but the site definitely lacks curb appeal
   
   
   
  
• Part 1 and Part 2 crimes in the CBD are both down from the same period last year (21.8% and 10.4% respectively)
   
   
   
  
• I'm a bit surprised at the count of 22 business closings, but I can't say I'd miss any of them except the dry cleaners.
   
   
   
   
  
• I can't believe they are still listing the Next project as proposed in the table in the back. That is surely dead.
  

^yeah I was pretty sure that the next project and the beer hall of fame were both dead.  They were listed at the very end of the projects list, so I think that DCI knows something is up. 

 

I wonder if they will ever exercise the air rights and build condos above the gargage at 8th (maybe 7th) Broadway.

I'm a bit surprised at the count of 22 business closings, but I can't say I'd miss any of them except the dry cleaners.

 

I'm surprised, too.  I miss the Servatti's on 6th Street, New York & Co, and Bath & Body Works.  :(  There needs to be a good bakery closer to Fountain Square (Dunkin' Donuts doesn't count).  Also, Macy's selection of women's clothing has been horrible lately, so I really miss the women's clothing stores.

 

I think the Beer Hall of Fame sounds great.  I wonder where that will go.

I believe the "Beer Hall of Fame" is a bad joke and needs to go away.  Melanie it was due to go in the Tower Place food court (ugg) when it was proposed.  It would be a failure if that happened.  If it didn't have a street side location it would never work.  I think the Beer Hall of Fame and the American Sign Museum should get together and combine the two and open a location along West 5th. 

 

http://www.signmuseum.com/

^Ugh....that would be awful.  Not to mention we would lose cheap, fast options for lunch.

I think the sign musuem is moving to camp washington.