It would be a HUGE development if Cincinnati brought back the canal on Central parkway.

 

Just take a look at Milwaukee's riverfront.

 

paule17

You know, I've thought about this a lot too.

Interesting idea...I would be able to walk over a bridge every morning on my way to work.  :)

Standing water is a bad thing. How would you make it flow?

Connect it to the Ohio and Mill Creek!

Some guy floated the idea around in the early 90s, the Enquirer did a neat story on it and he had done a ton of really sweet renderings, the main point of which was a marina oriented facility at Broadway Commons from a canal up Eggleston, down Central Parkway and back around downtown.  I have since lost the renderings, but some detective work might find them at the Enquirer.

^That would be fantastically cool.

Milwaulkee's riverfront has a great scale to it.  The symbolic heart of downtown is actually an elaborate drawbridge over the river. And you can see how neat that riverwalk is.

 

Downstream from that, around the confluence of the Menominee River, its even cooler as there backs of little warehouse/loft buidings facing the rivr, and it looks like a little Midwest Venice. 

 

 

 

Interesting idea...I would be able to walk over a bridge every morning on my way to work. :)

 

You would suddenly have waterfront property, and be able to sell for a 300% profit!

Interesting idea...I would be able to walk over a bridge every morning on my way to work.  :)

 

You would suddenly have waterfront property, and be able to sell for a 300% profit!

 

Hmmm....let the digging begin!  ;)

Hold on now; obviously we know that would kill any chance of the subway's "return".

I love this idea but I have no idea how it could ever get done.  There's so much negative sentiment aimed at the streetcar, and it's only $100 million.  It seems like this would be more expensive than that.  Still, it would be very cool.

Chicago made its river's flow reverse in the late 1800s. I am sure we can revive the canal, if the desire is there. The question though becomes, what is the prerogative of the city? Somehow, I think there are bigger more important issues than restoring the canal.

There's so much negative sentiment aimed at the streetcar, and it's only $100 million.

There is??  BS.

 

lol

LOL,    Rip the roof off the subways and fill it up!!    Couldn't cost that much.

The canal doesn't make any sense north of the Plum St. turn, so if they wanted to do this across from Plum to Broadway it would only mean filling in the Race St. station.  The subway tunnel could eventually reach downtown by simply heading further south under Plum and turning east at 5th or 6th. 

 

Historically the canal was about 4ft deep and the water level was about 6ft. below the bridges.  Utilities obviously were forced to pass underneath the canal but they might have been rebuilt between the top of the subway and street level.  I don't know, but that would be the major expense.  Such a move would also require any future subway construction to pass deeper under this point, such as a Main or Walnut St. line, instead of simpler cut-and-cover construction. 

 

 

Central Pkwy offers one of the few vistas downtown.  Distinctive buildings at either the east or west end could be dramatic.  Much like the Capitol and White House at either end of Pennsylvanna Ave. (well, before that idiot from Tennessee build the treasury building blocking the view!)

Al Gore built the Treasury Building?  I knew he invented the internet, but.....

 

Oh, you mean the other idiot from Tennessee.  Never mind!    :wink2:

While we are at it lets bring back the skywalk system too, that way we don't have to walk over dead bodies on the sidewalk downtown.  :lol:

Al Gore built the Treasury Building? I knew he invented the internet, but.....

 

Oh, you mean the other idiot from Tennessee. Never mind!   :wink2:

 

Ah, yes; the one who actually become President.

^ The only problem with that is the city has no money. Bring private developers in for a chance and see what they can propose.

People seemed very happy to see the "stinking" canal go when it did.  If it would have to be flowing to prevent stench and mosquitoes, why not high speed flow with a kayak course down the middle of the parkway?

They could chop a whole through the Queensgate yard and divert the Ohio through Central Pkwy.  That would be some serious flow. 

 

  Ok folks, before this gets out of hand...

 

  The original Miami and Erie Canal was fed by feeder dams on the Great Miami River.

 

    The level of the water was about 80 feet higher than the level in the Ohio River. Water flowed from the canal to the Ohio River, not the other way around.

 

    Central Parkway is about 80 feet higher than the Ohio River. It is not possible to divert water from the Ohio River to Central Parkway without pumping.

Cool, let the pumping begin.  And when people get tired of the river again, they can convert it pack into a coffee shop.  That's what happened in Milwaukee.

 

Here's the old pump house that used to pump water from Lake Michigan to the Milwaukee River (to "flush" it.)  Now it's the coolest coffee shop in town:

 

 

They could schtick one of these down there at the Cincinnati Riverfront Park and put the reservoir needed at the other end in Broadway Commons.  It's a plan!

 

  Ok folks, before this gets out of hand...

 

  The original Miami and Erie Canal was fed by feeder dams on the Great Miami River.

 

The level of the water was about 80 feet higher than the level in the Ohio River. Water flowed from the canal to the Ohio River, not the other way around.

 

Central Parkway is about 80 feet higher than the Ohio River. It is not possible to divert water from the Ohio River to Central Parkway without pumping.

On that note i don't think anyone wants Millcreek going through the middle of downtown..lol

 

  This is the old moat in Chiang Mai, Thailand. It has a pair of one-way streets on either side. This would be approximately the same scale as a canal in Central Parkway. This moat in Thailand, however, is fed by a natural stream to keep from becoming stagnant.

I was looking at the SCPA website, and it looks like they may have thought of this before us. Here's their current rendering:

 

<a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/beachkbk/TheAdventuresOfCincinnatiFinn/photo?authkey=v-wv_QIE-xQ#5236061668342511842"><img src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/beachkbk/SKo6WHOYOOI/AAAAAAAAB4k/6dSrrmn0H_k/s288/kayak.jpg" /></a>

LOL!!!  Holy crap that's hilarious.  Nice work beachkbk.

I was looking at the SCPA website, and it looks like they may have thought of this before us. Here's their current rendering:

 

<a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/beachkbk/TheAdventuresOfCincinnatiFinn/photo?authkey=v-wv_QIE-xQ#5236061668342511842"><img src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/beachkbk/SKo6WHOYOOI/AAAAAAAAB4k/6dSrrmn0H_k/s288/kayak.jpg" /></a>

 

LOL ... You need a cutlass in there now sittin on dubs parked by the rocks, because he just came down Ravine St.

OMG!  That rendering is great!  Wow.  In all seriousness though, if we did bring the canal back, would that introduce a flooding hazard?  It seems like when the Ohio River floods, the Licking River does too, so would the canal present a problem?

^I Don't know. I know where the canal used to be. It's higher in elevation than the Ohio river. I'm sure they could control the amount of water that backflows into the canal.

This is nostalgia at its absolute worst.  Should excommunicate this topic to the Urbanbar.

As for enlivening a city waterway, more realistic would be the Millcreek.  Take out the concrete lining and reconnect the city to the Millcreek with buildings, streets, bikepaths etc..  I have seen birds, fish and turtles in it.  It has more possibility than people think.

I don't know how deep the roof of the subway is beneath the street surface.  I'd guess it's about five feet.  This would mean water only 1 foot deep or so.  I do think a reconstruction of the center medians with 1-foot deep pools could be interesting, if it were done very well.  But the thing is ideally I think you'd want the canal to be set deep enough so that people could walk on a sidewalk next to the water and underneath bridges at cross-streets, and I don't think that's possible without removing the subway tunnel, at least not west of Vine St.  I think you'd want a consistent character to the rebuilt canal, even if it's just one foot deep, from Plum St. all the way over to Broadway. 

 

    Cincinnati missed an opportunity with Central Parkway. If the buildings had all been rebuilt with a consistent height and elevation one either side of Central Parkway, it would have resembled a Parisian boulevard. Imagine if the Alms and Doepke building was reproduced all the way down Central Parkway.

 

    What happened in fact was even worse. Some of the existing buildings were torn down for parking lots. Old phots from 1940 show a Central Parkway that is more attractive than what we have today.

 

    Like Jake said, a shallow pool down the center might look good if done well. A deep canal is probably out of the question.

 

    The Mill Creek is problematic due to flood issues and sewers. The 1920 Cincinnati Plan recommended improving the Mill Creek to look like a European river.

 

    Water features are important to cities. We have some pools at Eden Park, Winton Lake, Sharon Lake, and others. Right on Vine Street in Inwood Park is a really nice pond that can be used for ice skating in winter but hardly anyone knows about it, and it is practically abandoned. Maybe if the streetcar was built on Vine Street, Inwood Park would be more popular. 

The elevation of the M&E Canal was above the Ohio River and with a series of locks along Eggleston Avenue south of a turning basin which was located near Court Street.  The roof of the subway is 1-3 feet below the pavement along Central Parkway.  I don't think you can restore any type of water feature without removal of the subway tubes.

 

I do think there is some hope for the restoration of Mill Creek to a more natural state but it will never serve as a "water feature".

 

 

 

  Don't forget about the Ohio River, Winton Lake, Sharon Lake, the ponds at Eden Park, and Swan Lake at the zoo. Cincinnati has lots of water to be thankful for.

 

    There used to be a Lagoon at Ludlow, Kentucky. That would have been neat to see. You can see the site from Mt. Echo park. 

 

I thought of this a few weeks ago but forgot to post until now.

 

The Race St. subway station cannot be used as-is.  It will need to be completely rebuilt in order to lower the platforms for use with today's low-floor light rail vehicles. 

 

Therefore there are two options for a canal and subway scenario:

 

#1, build a new subway route one block further south from the Plum St. turn, then east under Court St. to Walnut or Main. This would allow the canal to be extended all the way to the Plum St. turn and allow complete freedom in the design of the canal. The downside is that it would force any new subway route from the Broadway Commons area to snake into downtown instead of meeting the existing subway and turning south under Walnut. 

 

#2, rebuild the subway on the southern third of Central Parkway from the Plum St. turn to Walnut St., between the new canal and the basements of existing buildings along the Parkway. This would be a tighter design that would prevent construction of a station along this stretch.  No matter -- I've always thought a station under Walnut between 9th and Court St. made more sense than the Race St. station anyway.         

 

Is this one of the renderings of the Cinci canal reconstruction proposal?  I think this is such a fantastic idea, and with the current resurgence of canal projects along the M&E Canal, it might actually be possible. Federal Transportation Enhancements funds and other such grants are being used to rebuild old canal locks already. Why not to recreate a functioning canal down Central Parkway?

^ That looks like a scheme to replace Ft. Washington Way with a canal.  A pretty idiotic idea considering how close that is to the Ohio River.  Why create "competition" for the river just two blocks away? 

 

The whole canal idea at Central Parkway is pretty silly considering the subway tunnels underneath and the amount of work it would require for little benefit.  However, replacing the boring grassy medians with shallow pools and fountains would be a nice gesture to the road's history that right now is completely ignored.  That would also be much easier to implement and maintain, and it's far enough from the Ohio River that it's a nice bookend to the north side of downtown.   

Is this one of the renderings of the Cinci canal reconstruction proposal?  I think this is such a fantastic idea, and with the current resurgence of canal projects along the M&E Canal, it might actually be possible. Federal Transportation Enhancements funds and other such grants are being used to rebuild old canal locks already. Why not to recreate a functioning canal down Central Parkway?

 

Yes, this is one of the renderings of the design/idea the guy floated in the early 90s.  If I remember correctly, it went up Eggleston to a marina with condos and other development at Broadway Commons, then west down Central Parkway, South on Central Ave., then west back down again to where it came up Eggleston.