"we" being the city planners/officials/architects

 

cleveland has torn down enough old buildings as it is that we dont need to tear any more down

 

while there are projects like the avenue district, warehouse district, flats east bank, and stonebridge there is still a lot of crappy suburban stuff bein built in the city of cleveland. while this isnt a view thats probably shared by the majority on here, there is more to a city than plush condos for young professionals and downtown. im not sayin im opposed to buildin condos downtown but a city is not a city without real neighborhoods. we cant just build a nice downtown and neglect half the neighborhoods in the city. some of us normal folk dont wanna live in a cul-de-sac

 

we dont know what half of those are gonna look like yet either

 

theres too much suburban crap bein built here. it seems like everything gets knocked down for crap or an empty lot.

 

-st lukes pointe

-steelyard commons

-cleveland clinic developments........a bunker that has no regards to the urban surroundings

-lexington village

-the mcmansions on central ave.........looks like youre in solon 2 minutes outside of downtown

-rennaisance village

-church square. shopping center

-beacon place/woodhaven

-that shoppin center on w. 25th that has parking in the front and looks suburban. they couldnt build somethin up to the street with parkin the back? theres plenty of room there

-kingsbury/reservoir place in mt. pleasant

 

 

those are just a couple of examples off the top of my head...theres a bunch more suburban townhomes/mcmansions that have been built within the city

 

 

how hard is it to built UP TO THE STREET? why cant builders nowadays build anything decent? the phrase "they dont build em like they used to" is true. whats so hard about building all brick structures and half decent looking? it doesnt have to be world class architecture but its not impossible to build somethin other than cookie cutter suburban lookin stuff.

 

i want to continue to live in cleveland but i dont want to live in a suburban city. cleveland isnt the densest city in the first place so theres no need to suburbanize it further.

 

if we continue to tear our city down, will we have anythin historic left in 50 yrs time?

Most of the developments you have listed there are several years old:

 

-lexington village

-rennaisance village

-church square. shopping center

-beacon place

-that shoppin center on w. 25th that has parking in the front and looks suburban. they couldnt build somethin up to the street with parkin the back? theres plenty of room there

-kingsbury/reservoir place in mt. pleasant

 

A couple are arguably not that suburban:

-st lukes pointe (though I think the CitiRama homes ARE quite suburban)

-woodhaven (though not perfect, they vastly improved the interaction with Euclid Ave. from Beacon Place)

 

I agree with you on these two:

-steelyard commons

-cleveland clinic developments........a bunker that has no regards to the urban surroundings

 

And this one I just don't know what you are talking about:

-the mcmansions on central ave.........looks like youre in solon 2 minutes outside of downtown

 

Do you mean Hough?  Or the Villages of Central?  Or the one or two independently built homes that were built there by private citizens when the whole area was urban prairie?

 

It just seems to me like you're being real selective about what you are noticing and dismissing.

 

 

I also agree with your opinions about the Clinic and of course Steelyard commons, like X said the rest are like 10+ years old. It seems like you think anything with vinyl siding is automatically suburban, which isn't always the case.

 

X, if you take a walk or drive through Hough you'll see hundreds of Mcmansions dotting the area on what was urban praire.

 

Example:

 

 

 

Central has new homes with vinyl siding, but look right at home sans the attached garages, they probably wouldn't fit in Signiture of Solon.

 

Example: (I apologize for the green tint.)

 

I think these fit in a lot better than the homes in Hough.

 

 

 

 

i'm still waiting for someone to show me a urban, pedestrian friendly hospital.

Ctown,

 

if you understood the economic side of development a little better, then I think that you'd be able to answer your own questions.

Mov2Ohio, yeah, I know about Hough.  I was asking if that was what he was talking about, not the couple or so houses like that in the Central neighborhood.

Mov2Ohio, yeah, I know about Hough.  I was asking if that was what he was talking about, not the couple or so houses like that in the Central neighborhood.

 

Oh OK, gotcha.

i'm still waiting for someone to show me a urban, pedestrian friendly hospital.

 

It's not paradise, but Longwood medical center in Boston has several hospitals that are urban and pretty ped-friendly.  Actually, I'd say even UH has traditionally been pretty ped friendly.  No huge surface lots or giant front lawns, but also no looming enormous building slabs over tiny sidewalks (like the Clinic on Carnegie).

The Clinic just can't get it right; either they have faceless facades directly ontop of the street (Carnegie) or huge abysalls between the street and the building (Euclid).  Both are very very poor solutions.

i'm still waiting for someone to show me a urban, pedestrian friendly hospital.

 

It's not paradise, but Longwood medical center in Boston has several hospitals that are urban and pretty ped-friendly.  Actually, I'd say even UH has traditionally been pretty ped friendly.  No huge surface lots or giant front lawns, but also no looming enormous building slabs over tiny sidewalks (like the Clinic on Carnegie).

 

Philly as well.

Ctown,

 

if you understood the economic side of development a little better, then I think that you'd be able to answer your own questions.

 

i agree, how do you tell someone to spend their money.  A lot of those people bought land, paid the back taxes and built new homes.

 

Futher, I don't necessarily think the homes are that bad.  Just because the homes and apartment building were built on smaller lots, that doesn't mean the newer homes have to do the same.  think about 8shades letter to the editor yesterday, just because Hough was a dense neighborhood in the 50s...is that necessarily the way the neighborhood should be in the 2007 and beyond?

 

The Clinic just can't get it right; either they have faceless facades directly ontop of the street (Carnegie) or huge abysalls between the street and the building (Euclid).  Both are very very poor solutions.

 

I agree, but when the residents of the surrounding neighborhood, who don't have any political clout because they didn't vote or don't care didn't complain, it allowed the clinics designers plan buildings/area that don't serve the community at large which have snow balled - 20 years later - into a gigantic mess with a bunch of garages!

just because Hough was a dense neighborhood in the 50s...is that necessarily the way the neighborhood should be in the 2007 and beyond?

 

Ummm...yes.  If we build suburban McMansions 2 or 3 miles from downtown all around the city we sure will stifle any chance for expansion of urban renewal if we are able to fill up Downtown/Ohio City/Tremont.  Then we will have exurbs from 2 miles to 30 miles instead of just 15 to 30 miles from the city.

just because Hough was a dense neighborhood in the 50s...is that necessarily the way the neighborhood should be in the 2007 and beyond?

 

Ummm...yes.  If we build suburban McMansions 2 or 3 miles from downtown all around the city we sure will stifle any chance for expansion of urban renewal if we are able to fill up Downtown/Ohio City/Tremont.  Then we will have exurbs from 2 miles to 30 miles instead of just 15 to 30 miles from the city.

 

Again, how can one person tell someone else how to manage their money?

The Clinic just can't get it right; either they have faceless facades directly ontop of the street (Carnegie) or huge abysalls between the street and the building (Euclid).  Both are very very poor solutions.

 

I like how you can tell in the some of the older clinic buildings, where they actually took the time to board up the old street level windows.

When we "fill up" downtown, Tremont and Ohio City, give me a call. Don't get me wrong, I truly hope that's a concern we have to deal with that in my lifetime, but that's a lot of area you're talking about. I frankly don't think we'll be flooded with McMansions anytime soon.

 

Let's see - a rubble-strewn lot left over from the race riots, or this...

 

 

zoning and overlays also play a role here.  we'll see what euclid looks like in a few years and if that is effective enough to direct development without discouraging it.  if i buy a lot and it requires a setback or parking spaces, then that's probably what i'll do, especially with past leadership in cleveland and the number of variances that would be necessary to accomplish simple building projects.

 

it also seems that cleveland was happy to have any development for a long time, which is why some of these developments were built - providing essential services for mostly poorer, inner city residents.  hopefully these days have passed as well, although the steelyard example suggests it may have not (although i view this more as a special case due to the location and site constraints).

^^Personally, I'd much rather have that!  I for one like the transition that Hough has made.  We all know the history of Hough, and how it was truely a high density neighborhood in the 50s.  Hell, I have family that still brings up the old Hough in the 50s to this day, but at the same time love what has happened throughout the neighborhood today.  Who would've thought that Hough would attract this type of development when not too long ago the neighborhood was still devistated by the Hough riots?  I'ma fan of Hough, dammit!! :drunk:   

Ctown,

 

if you understood the economic side of development a little better, then I think that you'd be able to answer your own questions.

 

 

This is what it comes down to - that's all there is to it.

The city has/is continuing to refine its zoning code to create more sustainable neighborhoods. There is only so much they can do without turning off any new potential developers.

When we "fill up" downtown, Tremont and Ohio City, give me a call. Don't get me wrong, I truly hope that's a concern we have to deal with that in my lifetime, but that's a lot of area you're talking about. I frankly don't think we'll be flooded with McMansions anytime soon.

 

Let's see - a rubble-strewn lot left over from the race riots, or this...

 

 

 

I have no problem with that, but some of those McMansions on Chester are very Westlake-ish.  That's fine if it spurs a renewal, I just hope future development doesn't follow that suburban path in areas so close to the core of the city.  That pattern of development is just as inefficient and impractical 2 miles from downtown as it is in Broadview Heights.

 

Again, how can one person tell someone else how to manage their money?

 

I'm not saying anyone can.  I'm just replying to the comment that made it seem like the area would be just as well served by McMansions on .5 acre lots as by something much more dense.

MayDay, where exactly are those homes located?  I don't recognize them.

 

I see pro and con arguments to the way that Hough has redeveloped.  Sure, it was a miracle that anyone was willing to put any money at all into redeveloping the neighborhood when the suburbanesque mansion phenom first started in the early 90's.  But alot of people (myself included) feel that the haphazard way in which Hough redeveloped has limited it's ultimate potential.  Hough no longer has the old school charm that has attracted most of the people that have been moving back into Cleveland.  And the market for suburban living in the inner city seems to be very shallow, which makes sense if one thinks about it.  Why buy half an enchilada, and half another?  There aren't that many of the Hough Custom Homes being built anymore, in fact.

MayDay, where exactly are those homes located?  I don't recognize them.

 

I think the shot is of E82 or E83rd just east of Church Square.  I really dig the intense landscaping on those blocks.

just because Hough was a dense neighborhood in the 50s...is that necessarily the way the neighborhood should be in the 2007 and beyond?

 

 

ummm.....yes. why shouldnt it be? you are on a site called URBANohio.com yet you are justifyin de-urbanizing of a city

 

if it were up to me every neighborhood in cleveland would return to the same density it had in the 50s

 

i want to live as close to downtown as possible, but when cleveland hts or lakewood are more urban than 2 miles from downtown we have a problem. good cities are built up with high density close to downtown, not demolished and mcmansions strewn over what were once dense urban neighborhoods

 

 

Thank you, and well said! While I don't want everything the way it was, there are some thing's worth bringing back -- density, streetcars, mixed-use buildings with a street presence, and about a half-million residents!

Do we want the population density, or the built form density that we had at our peak?  Because if we replace our housing stock unit for unit (singles for singles and doubles for doubles, etc,) we will have significantly less than our peak population, due to declining household size.  If we want to regain our 1 million person population, we will have to build apartment style homes and townhouses on a massive scale.  It would probably also mean demolishing large swaths of historic singles and doubles for denser housing.

just because Hough was a dense neighborhood in the 50s...is that necessarily the way the neighborhood should be in the 2007 and beyond?

 

 

 

 

ummm.....yes. why shouldnt it be? you are on a site called URBANohio.com yet you are justifyin de-urbanizing of a city

 

if it were up to me every neighborhood in cleveland would return to the same density it had in the 50s

 

i want to live as close to downtown as possible, but when cleveland hts or lakewood are more urban than 2 miles from downtown we have a problem. good cities are built up with high density close to downtown, not demolished and mcmansions strewn over what were once dense urban neighborhoods

 

 

SLOW YOUR ROLL.  I've never stated I wanted the city de urbanized.  I'm stating that the city and lifestyles have changed since Cleveland's peak in population.  Hough was an over run area, I don't want any neighborhood in Cleveland to be like that again.

 

While I don't want everything the way it was, there are some thing's worth bringing back -- density, streetcars, mixed-use buildings with a street presence, and about a half-million residents!

 

KJP, that I can agree with!

 

 

Good point, X, about household sizes. But I contend that there is enough vacant land (and I'm including surface parking lots and abandoned factories) in Cleveland to build some high-density mixed used communities from scratch without any demolitions (aside from razing structurally deficient buildings).

 

And Hough didn't get overrun with population until the 1960s when African-Americans were displaced from the Central neighborhood by freeway construction projects. In the 1950s, it still had a sustainable population density for the housing and services available. It was very similar to that of Lakewood's Gold Coast, Shaker Square and the areas west of Coventry (roughly 15,000 people per square mile). But by the mid-1960s, Hough's population swelled to 30,000 people per square mile (possibly double its sustainable capacity), jammed into apartments and boarding houses, and many people were low-income. It was a recipe for disaster.

 

See my Hough photo spread for the outcomes...

http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=2047.msg18385#msg18385

SLOW YOUR ROLL.  I've never stated I wanted the city de urbanized.  I'm stating that the city and lifestyles have changed since Cleveland's peak in population.  Hough was an over run area, I don't want any neighborhood in Cleveland to be like that again.

 

you are making excuses. because hough became overcrowded apartment buildings and there are "lifestyle changes" it shouldnt be a dense urban neighborhood anymore. you say that "the city and lifestyles have changed since Cleveland's peak population" yea like white flight and everyone moving to the suburbs. since lifestyles have changed in cleveland and america with people preferring to live in the suburbs i guess we should all move to the suburbs right?

 

 

Do we want the population density, or the built form density that we had at our peak? 

 

built form density first and foremost. cincinnati has a lower population density than cleveland yet has a much denser built environment and feels more urban

 

If we want to regain our 1 million person population, we will have to build apartment style homes and townhouses on a massive scale.  It would probably also mean demolishing large swaths of historic singles and doubles for denser housing.

 

disagree completely. why would you have to demolish large swaths of historic singles and doubles when there are plenty of vacant lots in the city to begin with to build denser housing on? even within those neighborhoods of doubles apartment style buildings have been knocked or burned down. much of that housing existed back when cleveland had 900k+...difference is the whole city was filled with homes and entire neighborhoods werent gutted.

 

 

 

it seems like with developments nowadays they can never get it right. they may be on the right track and have some good qualities  but ive yet to see many that are all the way "there".

i dont like the direction this city is going in terms of new development

 

how can anyone justify most of the stuff that is getting built and replacing what was once there? i have no problem with cleveland hts and lakewood but there IS a problem when these suburbs are more urban than 2 minutes outside of downtown.

 

people in other countries and even other cities across the country would love at what we call urban.

 

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=126151

 

this thread on skyscraperpage shows new infill in various cities. while some of it is very bad there is also some good stuff and most look better than the majority of projects built in the city of cleveland nowadays. even the terrible lookin stuff is built up the street. i dont get whats so hard about building up to the sidewalk here. what is the point of these tiny little strips of grass in front ....they will not be used as a yard. if you are going to have a yard for a home at least make it more than a strip of grass or have a backyard. otherwise build homes UP TO THE SIDEWALK! 90% of new construction is gonna pale in comparison to early 1920s buildings but IT CAN BE DONE WELL!

 

 

are people really going to not buy townhome units if they are actually built to street level and quality alll brick structures mimicking what used to be in the area? i live in one of the more densely populated areas of cleveland and it still isnt urban enough to me. i guess i just crave east coast density and will never get it here  :-(

 

and as far as filling up downtown before anything else i wouldnt want cleveland to be a city with a "pretty" downtown and urban praries just outside where it looks like a bomb was set off in the area.

 

 

i dont get whats so hard about building up to the sidewalk here. what is the point of these tiny little strips of grass in front ....they will not be used as a yard. if you are going to have a yard for a home at least make it more than a strip of grass or have a backyard. otherwise build homes UP TO THE SIDEWALK! 90% of new construction is gonna pale in comparison to early 1920s buildings but IT CAN BE DONE WELL!

 

 

The very first thing that comes to mind: Storm Water Run-off. As in helping stop too much of it.

are people really going to not buy townhome units if they are actually built to street level and quality alll brick structures mimicking what used to be in the area?

 

Where was this the case in Cleveland?

-the mcmansions on central ave.........looks like youre in solon 2 minutes outside of downtown

 

LOL.  You obviously haven't spent much time in Solon.

This is an old thread, I know, but after working as a planner in the Cleveland area for over four years, I thought I'd add in my two cents.  This is quickly drafted and not very eloquent, so bear with me ...

 

1)  Planning?  What planning?  In most other metropolitan areas in the US, a municipality with more than about 10,000 or 20,000 residents will have a full-time staff planner, if not a small planning staff.  In the Cleveland metro area, by comparison, there are relatively few municipal planning agencies.  The state of local government planning in Cleveland reminds me of that in Buffalo, where, surprisingly, suburban municipalities are much larger than in Cleveland; large building departments, an emphasis on CDCs/community development (free paint programs, affordable  housing, etc), and a very strong emphasis on economic development (look at the qualifications for the Assistant Planning Director position in Lakewood), but as for "planning planning" - land use, zoning, urban design, and the form of the built environment ...well, who cares, as long as the schools are good and the streets are plowed, right?

 

Because there's so little local planning, there are few to actually implement and champion the plans that are actually in place,  Once some consultant gives a community a freshly minted comp plan (seems like only the counties and NOACA draft plans in-house), where do they go from there?  If there was a staff planner, they can carry it forward and work on implementation.  Without a planner, it'll usually sit on the shelf as a reference document, to be leafed through and interpreted like a holy tome only when NIMBYism rears its head.

 

2)  Strong resistance to contemporary planning techniques.  There's almost too much to say about this, so for now I'll just offer my experience with New Urbanism.  While NU and traditional neighborhood development is embraced elsewhere, here in northeast Ohio it's a very, very hard sell.  Why?  Here's what I wrote in a post on Cyburbia a while back:

 

* Negative associations with urban-like built environments are still stuck in the heads of much of an insular and aging population, thanks to lots of cultural baggage left over from years of decline, flight, and racial tensions.

 

* Very low land values offer no incentive for compact development. Developers can build $200K houses on 1/2 acre lots and still make a tidy profit.

 

* Outdated zoning codes often have no PUD requirements, or mandate very low maximum densities in PUDs and even multi-family districts. We're talking about codes that still mention telegraph offices and haberdasheries.

 

* Conservative local developers and builders are leery of straying from a "tried and true" formula of single family houses on large lots in a cul-de-sac filled subdivision. There's nothing on the ground in the area, so they're leery of being the guinea pig for NU.

 

* Conservative lenders/bankers. See the above.

 

* Land ownership/platting pattern: there are few large parcels available for a good-sized NU development, and it's very difficult to acquire and agglomerate smaller parcels.

 

* Possible cries of NIMBY because of the much smaller lot sizes associated with NU are likely. The small lot suburban development (5,000-6,000'^2 lots) that is the norm in California, Colorado and the Sunbelt is rare or nonexistent in post-1960 Rust Belt suburbia; those in the Rust Belt aren't accustomed to the sight of higher density suburbs. In the eyes of many, small lot sizes = cheaper houses and more intensive traffic.

 

* There is widespread belief that cities should copy the built environment of its suburbs. The roots of this may be a spurious relationship logical fallacy. "Solon is growing. Solon is dominated by low-density residential development. Therefore, Solon is growing because it is dominated by low-density residential development on winding drives and cul-de-sacs. For our community to grow, it needs to be more like Solon, and have plenty of low-density residential development in loop-and-lollypop subdivisions too."

 

* Desperate local officials have low expectations and a fear of scaring developers away from their communities by asking for more than the bare minimum. "Any development is better than no development."

 

* Perceptions of design limitations; not just the usual concerns about emergency vehicles but also about snow storage.

 

 

3)  Extreme not-invented-here syndrome.  In my day-to-day work, I'm constantly confronted with one recurring question: "Has it been done in Ohio?"  As a planner who has worked throughout the US, we always looked far and wide for inspiration, ideas and successes.  In the process of writing a sign code for a community in Florida, I quoted various codes in Colorado, Kansas, Arizona and California, with barely a blink.  Here in northeast Ohio, though, it seems like the mantra is "Has it been tried in Dublin?" or "What do they do in Delaware County?"  If you're introducing a concept from out-of-state, it's approached as if one who has a great fear of dogs is suddenly confronted with a smiling, tail-wagging Labrador Retriever.  "Will it bite?  Is it dangerous?"  I can understand this mindset in townships, but in incorporated communities it's stifling. 

 

 

4)  Bad plans.  Most of the more recent comprehensive plans I've seen for Cleveland-area communities seem rather old-school; lots of inventory, little critical analysis, and concluded with vague goals like "maintain the integrity of the housing stock" -- the only meat of the plan -- lumped together at the end of the plan in paragraph form.  Contemporary plans have very specific goals and policies spelled in the individual elements, usually in an outline-like format. 

 

More later ...