Scholar House to start construction by Spring

 

With funding in hand, construction permits are being requested from the city for the Cleveland Scholar House, a 40-unit affordable apartment building at 2543 Community College Ave., across the street from the Cuyahoga Community College (Tri-C) Metro Campus. The $12 million project will provide housing for single parents enrolled in higher-education learning and their minor children.

 

MORE:

https://neo-trans.blog/2022/01/18/seeds-sprouts-xxi-sweeties-candy-miraculous-86th-scholar-house/

I'm very glad to see this sort of housing option going in next to Tri-C.  I'm surprised that more community colleges don't offer something similar.

On 1/18/2022 at 2:43 PM, X said:

I'm very glad to see this sort of housing option going in next to Tri-C.  I'm surprised that more community colleges don't offer something similar.

 

 

yes -- more of this for cc neighborhoods.

 

lccc actually has had the elyria college heights neighborhood right across the street and a bit of a sprawly business strip on abbe road. i have a cousin who lived there in a house and had a private office on abbe when he taught at the college. some of the faculty live there and even some of students definitely do live in apts in the college heights.

Yes, one of my friends lived there while attending.  But it isn't tied to the college in any way, it's just proximate.

yes, better on campus or tied to the college, but right next to it is just fine, at least for the users.

 

Ex-Juvenile Courthouse up for sale, again
By Ken Prendergast / February 8, 2022

 

Cuyahoga County officials are once again soliciting proposals for the vacant Juvenile Courthouse and Detention Center, 2210 Cedar Ave. This time, the action may be a savior or a deathknell for the architecturally beautiful but neglected complex on the east side of downtown Cleveland.

 

MORE:

https://neo-trans.blog/2022/02/08/ex-juvenile-courthouse-up-for-sale-again/

53 minutes ago, KJP said:

 

Ex-Juvenile Courthouse up for sale, again
By Ken Prendergast / February 8, 2022

 

Cuyahoga County officials are once again soliciting proposals for the vacant Juvenile Courthouse and Detention Center, 2210 Cedar Ave. This time, the action may be a savior or a deathknell for the architecturally beautiful but neglected complex on the east side of downtown Cleveland.

 

MORE:

https://neo-trans.blog/2022/02/08/ex-juvenile-courthouse-up-for-sale-again/

 

Welp, I just spent too much time on the Architectural Afterlife site lol, for anyone interested here are the photos from the old JJC:

 

https://architecturalafterlife.com/2020/10/oldest-detention-center-us/

So my wife just started a new job teaching Chemistry at CCC Metro campus. She came home the other day and asked me if I knew anything about this interesting old building she drives by on the way to work. I told her it was the old juvenile courthouse. Said it's one of my favorite examples of Old Cleveland but since a new juvenile courthouse was built the old one was on the market with no takers at this point. And to make matters worse, because of it's size and age it's not being maintained well. I told her that without a buyer unfortunately we will probably be reading that its about to be torn down. 

 

Well, per Ken's article there is one final push to find a buyer who will save this gem. It won't be easy. This is America after all. If this complex was in Europe there would be no question it would be saved and re-purposed. I for one hope a buyer can be found, someone who can not only make the finances work but also find the right organization to inject life back into it. It's such a grand complex in a relatively prominent location. It would be a shame if it joins all the other examples of lost Cleveland. 

that really breaks my heart as the old juvenile center is a fantastic facility that could surely be repurposed -- or at least mothballed and saved until it can be.

 

i took a tour of it once just before the move to the new facility.

 

its really worth rallying around to save it.

 

and the neighborhood around it is really cool too, with lots of potential.

Hopefully it can be spared from the wrecking ball.  Perhaps it could be repurposed as a senior/assisted living facility.  Put a lawn/garden in that center courtyard for the residents to enjoy.

2 minutes ago, LibertyBlvd said:

Hopefully it can be spared from the wrecking ball.  Perhaps it could be repurposed as a senior/assisted living facility.  Put a lawn/garden in that center courtyard for the residents to enjoy.

My thought was student housing but I'm not sure how feasible that is. 

I'm told the Sisters of Charity are more interested in it than they led on. Even so, they didn't deny their interest in the juvenile center. They left it pretty open.

Would think this would make an awesome residential village for Cleveland State or Tri-C. Or both! 

Besides just housing, I wonder what other use this might be good for. 

 

Personally, I would love if the whole block of Old Cedar came down between E. 22nd and E. 30th and the land were redeveloped, much like the block on the south side of Central Ave. The whole thing. Seriously- the whole thing. Maybe that’s what’s blocking my imagination of an adaptive reuse. 

I keep looking at the figure in Ken's article showing the rework for the bridges over I-90. And while I love me some green capped land bridges, it looks like the far more meaningful part of this rework might be the land it is opening up for development! Cleveland State gets two new parcels that will no longer be cut up by Chester, plus an extra plot on the other side of the highway. 

 

ODOT Inner Belt plan gets city pushback

By Ken Prendergast / March 19, 2022

 

Yesterday, Cleveland’s City Planning Commission unanimously tabled a request by the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) for consent to construct improvements to the Central Interchange, where Interstate 77 ends and connects with Interstate 90 in downtown Cleveland. The reason given was to have a “deeper conversation” with City Council which ultimately must vote on the consent request about how the project can right the wrongs of the past including using highways to divide minority neighborhoods from downtown.

 

MORE

https://neo-trans.blog/2022/03/19/odot-inner-belt-plan-gets-city-pushback/

 

Odots proposal is lackluster. The city should get them to cap a lof the inner belt. It doesn't need to be sped up. I agree with Slife's sentiment. 

All of these so-called highway improvements in the recent past and future are costing billions of dollars. Aside from rebuilding the I 90 bridge I fail to see how all this money is really improving anything. We don't have all that much traffic here and I just don't see the kind of benefits for the enormous money being spent. Having said that I'm sure these projects will get built in some fashion resulting in constructing delays, traffic flow  all that improved and the average driver none the wiser. That's how we do it here in America. 

 

Coming up with real alternatives would require the highway and cement lobby to take a backseat in the discussion and that's not going to happen. Taxpayers, rail and bike enthusiasts will remain on the outside. Status quo.

 

I dont understand. These building are already there, and they are already filled with students. Buying them adds zero capacity.

Why doesn't CSU spend $150M to build two to three more, thereby adding more capacity all around?

- Are the commitments from the current building owners to build more?

24 minutes ago, ExPatClevGuy said:

I dont understand. These building are already there, and they are already filled with students. Buying them adds zero capacity.

Why doesn't CSU spend $150M to build two to three more, thereby adding more capacity all around?

- Are the commitments from the current building owners to build more?

They aren't completely filled with students and they aren't considered on campus housing. I can see benefits to CSU as a revenue stream and as an opportunity to build a real campus community. 

 

Also might convince developers to build more student style housing near campus, knowing that CSU might buy them out in five years. 

1 hour ago, ExPatClevGuy said:

I dont understand. These building are already there, and they are already filled with students. Buying them adds zero capacity.

Why doesn't CSU spend $150M to build two to three more, thereby adding more capacity all around?

- Are the commitments from the current building owners to build more?

 

@ExPatClevGuy I wrote about this last October when I reported that CSU was trying to buy these two properties: https://neo-trans.blog/2021/10/05/csu-looks-to-double-its-on-campus-housing/

 

"The Edge and The Langston were built in the 2010s to accommodate CSU students yet both are considered off-campus housing. As privately owned buildings, they can be more expensive, have longer lease terms and may not be included in school boarding plans compared to what on-campus housing offers. To accommodate more freshman and international students, CSU reportedly sees the need to expand the number of beds in its on-campus residence halls. Acquiring existing buildings is the quickest way to do so."

 

I also noted:

 

"An interesting angle to the story, the sources said, is that the owners of both The Edge and The Langston may reportedly use the sale proceeds to afford constructing new off-campus housing facilities."

10 minutes ago, KJP said:

 

@ExPatClevGuy I wrote about this last October when I reported that CSU was trying to buy these two properties: https://neo-trans.blog/2021/10/05/csu-looks-to-double-its-on-campus-housing/

 

"The Edge and The Langston were built in the 2010s to accommodate CSU students yet both are considered off-campus housing. As privately owned buildings, they can be more expensive, have longer lease terms and may not be included in school boarding plans compared to what on-campus housing offers. To accommodate more freshman and international students, CSU reportedly sees the need to expand the number of beds in its on-campus residence halls. Acquiring existing buildings is the quickest way to do so."

 

I also noted:

 

"An interesting angle to the story, the sources said, is that the owners of both The Edge and The Langston may reportedly use the sale proceeds to afford constructing new off-campus housing facilities."

I like that last part. Would love to see CSU campus and the Avenue District merge into one continuous neighborhood.

Edited June 10, 20223 yr by marty15

On 6/10/2022 at 5:25 AM, marty15 said:

I like that last part. Would love to see CSU campus and the Avenue District merge into one continuous neighborhood.

As long as Becky's survives....

TBH I’m not sure if I like this or not…

 

 

Do they need to demolish everything or could they just demolish the one building closest to the innerbelt to ease the squeeze?  

 

Edited June 16, 20222 yr by LibertyBlvd

I hate this. 

Yeah....I hate it.  

Don’t like it at all. And why the half assed inner belt cover? Do the whole portion or don’t bother. 

Edited June 15, 20223 yr by marty15

These are all bandaids to fix the problem of running a highway along our lakefront and through our downtown. Tear out I90 and the Eastside geta better access to the lake and the two employment centers of Cleveland aren't separated by a highway making the area in-between much more desirable. 

 

East-West through traffic wouldn't be affected that much by routing to 271, 480, back to 90. 

 

And I advocate for this as someone who takes 90 to regularly to get from Lakewood to work in Akron. 

I would sure like to see the old juvenile hall saved and repurposed; it reminds me of an Oxford (UK) college with its block-square building and grassy interior court. Irreplaceable, really. Ten years from now, Cleveland might even need another downtown high school. Or it could be a small corporate hqs. The district could still cap a bunch of freeway, if they insist.

Tough one, right? I think most of us would love to see the Court complex repurposed and most would like to see some kind of cap on the innerbelt. But do we have to lose one to get the other? Perhaps, but if there continue to be no takers for the Court buildings maybe the question is moot anyway. 

I noticed a mistake in their proposal, so I figured I'd fix it for them.

 

Sadly, the only reason why ODOT is even considering a partial cap is because it's necessary to accommodate a rerouted Cedar Avenue.

So is there a technical/physical reason why the proposed cap is so short?  Or is it just money?  If the budget got boosted a couple mil could they do the longer cap posted above?

Boston spent untold billions on the Big Dig. Ours is already dug. Just cover the damn thing!

I vote to get the “cap” over the Shoreway  from the malls downtown to the lakefront before this crappy idea.

"St. Vincent Charity Medical Centers officials announced Wednesday the hospital will discontinue inpatient and emergency room services in November.

'Seismic shifts in health care over the last decade have created a challenging environment for St. Vincent Charity Medical Center to continue as a traditional acute care hospital,' officials said in a media release."

 

Nothing in the press release or article from NPR about this site development rendering, not sure how old it is, but it's certainly something to be picked apart. Sad to hear about St. Vincent decreasing their services, hopefully they can adapt and thrive in the coming years as the Cleveland medical economy continues to grow.

 

https://www.wksu.org/health-science/2022-09-14/st-vincent-charity-hospital-to-end-inpatient-and-er-services-in-cleveland

 

 

 

It's a new rendering. They sent it out with their press release about their campus masterplan. But I didn't write about it because I didn't see specifics in it. Just a lot of quotes about how great. Sorry, but I want to see the detailed plan so I can decide how great it is/isn't. 

All UH employees received this email yesterday:

 

Supporting the Transition of St. Vincent Charity Medical Center

 

A Message for UH Caregivers from Cliff A. Megerian, MD, FACS, UH Chief Executive Officer; Jane and Henry Meyer Chief Executive Officer Distinguished Chair

 

 

St. Vincent Charity Medical Center has a long legacy of caring for the people of Greater Cleveland. We have collaborated with them on numerous community health issues, the most prominent being our response to the opioid pandemic and its devastating effects on individuals, families and the community. We partnered with the Sisters of Charity on the operation of St. John Medical Center and its eventual transition to University Hospitals.

 

In the wake of an evolving health care landscape, St. Vincent is evolving as well. They are transitioning away from inpatient care to concentrate on ambulatory services. We were honored when leaders for St. Vincent came to us with their plans and requested our support in three key areas:

 

·         Inpatient care – St. Vincent patients will be welcome at UH and other local hospitals, and we are committed to providing them with the highest-quality, compassionate care.

·         Graduate Medical Education – UH has a place for every St. Vincent resident at our nationally renowned academic medical center, UH St. John and UH Geauga medical centers. We have worked closely with St. Vincent, accrediting bodies and our faculty to make their move as seamless as possible when they choose to transfer to UH.

·         Caregivers – UH will offer opportunities for many St. Vincent caregivers to continue their careers with an organization that respects and appreciates their service. Members of our HR team will be on site at St. Vincent all of next week to discuss the advantages of joining UH and applying for open positions. As an enticement, we will be bridging seniority for St. Vincent caregivers if they join UH before year end. It is advantageous for us to recruit these experienced caregivers. 

 

In its new form, St. Vincent will remain an important and well-respected member of our health care community. We wish them the best as they continue their healing mission. At the same time, we welcome those St. Vincent residents and caregivers who will bolster our staff and make UH stronger. 

 

The transformation of St. Vincent is yet another indication of the forces of change on health care. Guided by a new strategic plan developed last year, UH is moving proactively to meet the difficult challenges ahead, which include a lengthening workforce shortage, rising inflation and supply chain issues. With your steadfast support for our patients and mission, I am confident that we will advance our goal to be the most trusted health care partner in Northeast Ohio.

^UH can certainly use the former St. Vincent employees.  Since early July my mom has experienced 4 UH emergency room visits (Ahuja) and eventual  hospitalizations of anywhere from 1 to 5 days.  She has dementia so I was usually with her 12-14 hours a day and was able to observe first hand hospital operations in the ER and on the floors (as well as front desk and food service operations).  It was obvious to me, as a layperson that they are having real staffing problems, even with the closure of Bedford and Richmond, and this was confirmed in many conversations with the nursing and tech staffs.  One Saturday night I felt I was in a horror movie as the many nursing stations on the floor were practically empty.

 

I learned one stat that really surprised me when talking at length with a gossipy ER nurse.  She told me that at least 90% of the UH nursing staff were not employees but what they all referred to as "travelers", or what I would consider a contract employee, retained through an agency.  They considered themselves a traveler even if they were local and just moving from one Cleveland hospital to another.  However, many of my mom's 12 hour shift nurses were from out of town:  As close as Warren (they would stay at a local Beachwood extended stay and then go home when they had days off in a row) and as far as South Carolina, Florida and California.  I got the impression these warm whether nurses would be heading out to new assignments once the snow starts flying.  The chatty nurse told me she worked at the Cleveland Clinic main campus ER for 20 years but could not stay because they could not match or even come close to the huge amounts of money she was making as a traveling nurse, even with local assignments, as she had no interest in leaving Cleveland proper.  She said the tables may turn in the future but for now all the nurses were taking advantage of the situation.  She pointed out a number of long time employee nurses in the ER that were leaving UH shortly for other assignments.  It seemed like the only UH employees were nurses right out of nursing school (we had a great one who was from Athens and went to school with Joe Burrows and currently lived in Kent and commutting from there as she went to KSU for nursing).  Apparently you have to work professionally for at least one year before you can travel.

@Htsguy That sounds like the market the Stokes West development is going after... small, many furnished apartments with limited parking. 

28 minutes ago, KJP said:

@Htsguy That sounds like the market the Stokes West development is going after... small, many furnished apartments with limited parking. 

Sounds right.  Strangely, my mom's nurse from South Carolina was living somewhere in a rural area near Canton.  He said he really didn't even know where he was or how he got to the hospital every shift.  He just plugged in his GPS.

So I don't know how to interpret the meaning of this except that St. Vincent is circling the drain.  Someone please tell me that I'm wrong.

41 minutes ago, X said:

So I don't know how to interpret the meaning of this except that St. Vincent is circling the drain.  Someone please tell me that I'm wrong.

 

I'm not an expert, but yes, many health systems are collapsing (dying the slow death of bankruptcy) and thankfully being absorbed. In the past 6ish years, Cleveland Clinic acquired Indian River health system and Martin Health in Florida, Akron General and Union Hospital. UH got Lake Health system, St. Vincent, and Aultman Hospital, but that hasn't been finalized yet?

 

This is happening all over the US, giving hospital systems better buying and negotiating power with vendors, manufacturers and insurance. The same thing is happening with senior care facilities. These are slowly becoming monopolies similar to what is happening with mobile home parks

 

Right now, this is a battle between US hospital systems and insurance companies, and this is one of the strategies playing out. The US is the most expensive developed country to receive healthcare or have a baby, and while we may have access to excellent care, the cost is pricing some out of the right of healthcare. Just look at social media of people who need an ambulance pleading for help, but also begging to not have EMS arrive because they can't afford a $4000 2 mile trip to a hospital.

 

Steering this conversation back to St. Vincent, the bottom question is: Why go there?

 

it is not known for being amazing at any specialty, or achieving better patient outcomes, or being cheaper. It is simply a decent hospital in a market dominated by 4 major systems that just outperform smaller hospital systems. If you have cancer, go to CCF or UH. If you are critically wounded, Metro has the Trauma 1 ER, If your baby is sick, UH Rainbow is here for you. If you're a veteran, we have a big VA hospital a few miles away. 

 

The geography to downtown doesn't bring in patients either due to what I just spelled out above. We have a choice in healthcare in Northeast Ohio, and why would anyone choose to go to St. Vincent? Therefore, the hospital was losing money and could track it's future and needed to make a change before it was too far down the rout of no return. Downtown doesn't need 2 hospitals that close (Lutheran is just across the bridge) 

 

I haven't heard any specifics on the fate of St. Vincent, Richmond and Bedford hospitals structures, only that they will continue to expand outpatient care and that they will no longer contain ERs or any inpatient care. 

 

It's not just a traveling nurse pandemic, many technical roles are suffering the same staffing situation. (radiology, pharmacy, surgical techs)

 

If you want to put an end to travel healthcare employees, pay your staff better. The pay for traveling healthcare workers can be double what 20 year on the job staff are earning. You get housing and food stipends, and get to travel around the US with health insurance similar to what you may have had. I personally worked with over 30 hospital employees that started traveling out of Ohio and love it and should be able to retire early. Healthcare created it's own mess when it comes to staffing. Track the pay of non-physician staff over 40 years vs. surgeons, MDs and Pharmacists and you will see the wage gaps moving apart. 

 

Autlman Hospital was paying ICU nurses double time and a $50 Amazon gift card for every extra shift they covered during the pandemic, and they still couldn't staff their hospital... what does that tell you?

 

Lakehealth was nearly bankrupt for years, and tore down Lake East hospital (had to be done) and built Tripoint hospital in the middle of nowhere. A hospital designed without Network infrastructure or an inpatient or outpatient pharmacy... How are patient's going to survive without any meds. The level of negligence on the part of the board of directors at that time should have yielded a different result. 

 

Look into nearly every small health system and you will see the same crippling issues developing that a larger hospital system can just absorb and move on with. But obviously, the main golden ticket to success, is to be non-profit!

 

St Vincent is adapting to it's patients needs in the most economical way that it can. It is also leaving the door open to whatever the future may bring, so the story is not over yet. This is just the next chapter. I don't like the outcome either, but we will just have to sit back and see how this one plays out. 

22 hours ago, WhatUp said:

Why go there?

 

The geography to downtown doesn't bring in patients either due to what I just spelled out above.

 

 

Keep in mind a huge percentage of families in the Central neighborhood do not have cars and St. Vincent's is convenient. It's the same reason why people in Lakewood and Cleveland heights (and now Bedford and Richmond heights) were so pissed off when they lost in-patient services... you can tell someone "oh just drive to avon or mayfield or beachwood or downtown"... the reality is we're very fortunate to have that option, but some are not. St. Vincent also hosts addiction and urgent care services which targets neighboring areas. 

 

I agree that I personally would likely never go there and it's unsustainable in our society's healthcare model, but it served an important purpose for 150 years and the hospital system was double the size it is today just 3 years ago. 

 

Edited September 16, 20222 yr by MrR

Just saw this on Facebook regarding St. Vincent's Hospital...

 

Greyhound station may leave downtown

By Ken Prendergast / May 11, 2023

 

Cleveland may soon join the list of medium- and large-sized cities whose central business districts have lost their Greyhound bus stations to less-accessible locations. And that’s of concern to low-income travelers, college students and others trying to save money or avoid the stress of driving while traveling to and from Cleveland’s station at 1465 Chester Ave., downtown.

 

MORE:

https://neo-trans.blog/2023/05/11/greyhound-station-leaving-downtown/

:( that stinks

Another loss in the ongoing mobility crisis that has been underway since the 1950's and even before.