Here is Canton, I don't have much praise for the city but thought I would share:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for the pics; I'm a fan of Canton.

Shoulda went to Massillon, instead.  I like Massillon better, but I consider it my hometown, so I'm a little partial.

 

I've never been there, but from the pictures and descriptions I've read, the Palace is amazing inside.  I think it's called an atmospheric theater.

It is one of those things...  You usually go to a city with a predetermined opinion and when you get there, if you are let down you leave with a worse off opinion.  Because I expected Canton to be more than it apparently is, I expected more and ended up being let down.  On top of that, I thought the Pro Football Hall of Fame was a big snoozefest and I am a sports fan.  I think it is time to give the facility and overhaul.

Huh. ;)

It is one of those things...  You usually go to a city with a predetermined opinion and when you get there, if you are let down you leave with a worse off opinion.  Because I expected Canton to be more than it apparently is, I expected more and ended up being let down.  On top of that, I thought the Pro Football Hall of Fame was a big snoozefest and I am a sports fan.  I think it is time to give the facility and overhaul.

 

You should have asked us before going! :roll:  I would have told you to save your $15 bucks!!

I totally agree with your assessment of the Football HOF - I lived in Canton from 1999-2003, and every time one of my friends came to visit we had to schlepp over to the Hall of Fame for a look.  The majority of the facility is very dated in appearance, the team displays are lame, and the only reason anyone wanted to see the player busts was to look for OJ... But what else is there to show off in Canton?  We climbed the steps of the McKinley memorial once or twice, and ate at Chris Spielman's restaurant a few times.  Never made it to the Classic Car museum, and had no requests for the First Ladies' Museum or whatever the heck it is...

From this photo alone I am already let down by the Pro Football HOF.  I mean really, you're going to have a back-lit, plastic monument sign for your institution?!?!

 

From this photo alone I am already let down by the Pro Football HOF.  I mean really, you're going to have a back-lit, plastic monument sign for your institution?!?!

 

It's not an institution, its a giant juicer!

It's not an institution, its a giant juicer!

 

It pains me to say it, but if I move back to Canton, it's very likely that I'll be working for the architectural firm that designed this.

 

montecarloss, what were you expecting Canton to be?  Your pictures seem to show an interesting little city.

^ LOL

nice pics, but really canton is a nice place.

 

they have a downtown with a lot of potential....should anyone want to take'm up on that again.

 

Well, one thing that Canton does have which is quite nice is Hills & Dales (which yes, was a later version of the one in Oakwood/Kettering) and the beautiful McKinley Monument area/park.  Very nice.  Regarding the city, there isn't much to it, really.

... Regarding the city, there isn't much to it, really.

 

Ah, but there's this:

I will admit that I have an unhealthy Heggy's habit - I have friends (enablers) who drive up to Cleveland with one pound boxes of white-chocolate covered pretzel pieces (like haystacks) on occasion.  I also miss Taggart's on Fulton and Milk and Honey on Cleveland Ave when I need my ice-cream fix.  I also think I still have a beer stein hanging from the ceiling at the Geisen Haus.

 

It is nice to see some downtown activity - in four years of living in Canton (actually in Jackson Twp), I think I went downtown less than once a year - I know I ate at Bender's once, Peter Shear's once, and I think I had to go downtown to change my voting address at the Board of Elections.

oh i dk -- it seemed ok to me in july, it was quite clean if underpopulated, but then again i was there early on a sunday morning. no, its not the biggest city anymore, its shrunk and lost a lot, but still there is more to downtown than just the pics on this thread, for example see here:

 

http://www.cityofcanton.com/gallerydt.html

 

also, of course this is the rust belt ---give it a break, there used to be a lot more to it, even in recent memory:

 

nice historic pics here:

http://www.cityofcanton.com/historic.html

 

1963

 

 

mrnyc, are you from Canton?

no, but i am quick with the googling tho!

Anyone knows he is from Lorain. ;)

But he's secretly from Elyria.

elyphugginria?

 

*BANNED!!!*

 

wait a sec i cant do that....

 

actually i am from the cle but yeah really lorain.

I was just wondering because you were a bit protective of Canton.

Downtown Canton is clean and well-kept, with some good buildings but not much activity on the street when I was there on a weekday afternoon about a year ago.

Can I get a hoover?!

Isn't that North Canton?

:x

I was just wondering because you were a bit protective of Canton.

 

I was just wondering because you were a bit protective of Canton.

 

no, not protective, just a different opinion than you. i did my own quick visit last july just like you did:

 

http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php?topic=13638.0

 

also, i've been there off and on a fair bit in the past....back when it was going strong and it was somebody, so i've seen thsoe rust belt changes, but as rob says its a clean downtown still full of potential relative to its size.

 

I can think of worse places you could have been.

 

Is that Todd Bell's OSU jersey that I see in one of your HOF pictures?

I like the building stock in and around Downtown Canton.  It is a very attractive area.  But it is as empty every time I've been there as it sounds like it was for everyone else.  I think it's tough for these "little cities" like Canton, Youngstown, or Mansfield to reinvigorate themselves as popular places to live.  If someone looking for a place to live wants small town living they're a little too big for that, but if they want big city living they're a little too small for that, too.  That and the lack of economic diversity makes it tough to find jobs there, of course.

Well I visited Wooster right before we arrived in Canton and I thought it had a much better downtown/business district.  The street level retail was healthier the streets actually had pedestrians.  Although with a silly name like Wooster, I am sure it is hard to get any respect. ;)

It looked pretty good to me.

 

This bit of infill is sharp.

 

^Agreed.  There definately are enough bright spots in Canton to make it worth a look.

It looked pretty good to me.

 

This bit of infill is sharp.

 

Yeah, they did a pretty good job with it. I believe all three of those buildings are new.

 

The Canton Preservation Society did a lot to make it happen. I'm glad to see such an organzation not only focused on restoration, but also infill.

 

From their website:

 

[CPS] purchased all the land and buildings on the east side of the 200 block of Market Avenue North for the eventual COMPLETE DONATION to the Millennium Centre development. When this project was initially threatened during the planning stages, CPS and the Chamber of Commerce contributed $125,000.00 each to the project. THEN when the project was threatened a second time with cost overruns, CPS loaned the developer ANOTHER $120,000.00 to be repaid over a term of ten years.

 

http://www.cantonpreservation.com/about.html

I've always liked downtown Canton.  It's always looks real neat and clean.  The rest of Canton, however, doesn't really thrill me.

I think Canton has a very nice downtown for a city that's suffered the industrial losses of other small rust belt cities (Erie, Flint, Youngstown, Altoona), though not as severely as some of those. Canton has a tidy downtown with a nice mix of fancy old and sleek new buildings. And, it's transit system is one of Ohio's most heavily used -- I think it ranks third or fourth in the state in daily ridership and even outcarries COTA.

^ indeed its a good and relatively well used system -- in fact canton's stark area regional transit authority aka sarta recently won the apta best medium sized transit system award in 2006 (cleveland's rta just won in the big city category this year - yay!) .

The question is, where does it go? ;)

it must go somewhere apta was impressed with :wink:

 

but serriously, probably the mall.  :laugh:

See for yourself....

 

http://www.sartaonline.com/routes.html

 

SARTA has quite a few routes, nearly all of which offer at least hourly service from 5:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Their trunk routes in the city of Canton and adjacent suburbs have service every 30 minutes.

 

Plus, SARTA has routes from downtown Canton to cities at the outer edge of Stark County and even beyond the county:

Downtown Akron (25 miles from downtown Canton)

Akron-Canton Regional Airport (10 miles)

Alliance (20 miles)

Brewster (15 miles)

Canal Fulton (12 miles)

East Sparta (10 miles)

Hartville (12 miles)

Massillon (10 miles - several routes offered)

any city can be wonderful, the people only have to want it to be and it shall

Is there a reason the Football Hall of Fame looks like an orange juicer? I grew up in Cuyahoga Falls, like 35 minutes away, and I've never been to downtown Canton. I guess it's me keepin' it real, A-K-Rowdy, style!

yes, there are some reasons. first and foremost it was designed and then built during the googie/jet-age late 50's-early 60's design era (1962). the juicer top part is supposed to be a stylized football. i think.

Its still a juicer to me.

 

They should slap the "George foreman" name on the side, it set up a George Foreman retail location on the inside and watch visitor numbers skyrocket!  They can change the name to "the juice"!

 

I can see the commercials/informercials now:  Come to the FHOF and try the new George Foreman NHL Juicer....then bam.....OJ can run thru the museum as the spokesperson!  "the juice" promoting "the juice"  Genius I tell you, genius  :mrgreen:

"Juicer"...LOL, I'd never heard that but it does kind of look like one....

Well I visited Wooster right before we arrived in Canton and I thought it had a much better downtown/business district.  The street level retail was healthier the streets actually had pedestrians.  Although with a silly name like Wooster, I am sure it is hard to get any respect. ;)

 

Dude, you cannot compare Wooster to Canton... Wooster's "attractive" business district extends only about 1-2 blocks in each direction from the "square"! 

 

...so if I rub the giant marble a few times and make a wish will it come true?

 

 

Dude, you cannot compare Wooster to Canton... Wooster's "attractive" business district extends only about 1-2 blocks in each direction from the "square"! 

 

I certainly can...  Wooster's main boulevard had shops, restaurants and people, Canton had a nice median with picnic tables, little restaurants or shops and little to no people.  This was on a Friday around 12PM too.

^Well, yes and no.

 

They are two completely different types of cities. Quaint, rural small town versus gritty, decayed midsize industrial city. Canton has some major preception/image problems that must be overcome to attract people downtown.

Canton looks nice, just needs to be appreciated like plenty of other Ohioan cities.

Appreciated and occupied, of course!