The Observation Deck

Jim O'Bryan wrote:But would love to drag this back to if local politicians need vision....


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Vision or just common sense? I’d rather our local elected officials have more on the common sense side than the visionary side. Reason being that you can always take other peoples visionary ideas and implement them (or not) with your own common sense. Some recent common sense ideas put into action are outdoor dining, bringing back basketball hoops and allowing leashed dogs in the parks. I wouldn’t call any of these visionary, it’s just common sense.

Safe, clean and fun are basic common sense things. As I said earlier, back to the fundamentals

Charlie

! court, 1 park to walk dogs in, and outdoor dining which is barely 1 table wide.

Hardly common sense or visionary.

FWIW


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Jim O'Bryan wrote:Charlie

! court, 1 park to walk dogs in, and outdoor dining which is barely 1 table wide.

Hardly common sense or visionary.

FWIW


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You’re right Jim. Letting people enjoy their City is not common sense. I don’t know what I was thinking.

Maybe we need another push for an arts district. Better yet, the whole City is an arts district....now that’s visionary

Charlie Page wrote:You’re right Jim. Letting people enjoy their City is not common sense. I don’t know what I was thinking.

Maybe we need another push for an arts district. Better yet, the whole City is an arts district....now that’s visionary

Charlie

Wow, a tad testy today, ok I can work with that.

My point is, all parks should be pet friendly not 1. The city should put the hoops back, not 1,
You are absolutely right, allowing people to enjoy their city is common sense, something
lacking severely. It was not that you have zero common sense, I am pointing the finger at
an underwhelming amount of common sense at work on those subjects.

Charlie, I suppose you are saying "The Beck Center" and "1 block in Birdtown" as an "Art
District" is visionary? Do a search for "Art District" hardly visionary. Do a search for
"Start-Up" Programs, ours with Zero Funding is hardly visionary when compared to other
cities with millions funding theirs. Our way finding is not visionary, the term visionary has
truly left this town, and all we see is a rehash of old ideas, that are painfully underfunded
and lacking any serious direction.

Don't even get me started on rain barrels! Perhaps as we have no access to the Lake
we forget we are the Kuwait of Freshwater. Hmmmmmmmm maybe something like a
Freshwater University, where people could come from all over the world... Maybe
marketing ourselves to the blind, and handicapped in an city that is easy to get around,
maybe Business Groups that work together without gouging the businesses, maybe
Community Currency, Maybe Food Security...

FWIW

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Jim O'Bryan wrote:Charlie

Wow, a tad testy today, ok I can work with that.

My point is, all parks should be pet friendly not 1. The city should put the hoops back, not 1,
You are absolutely right, allowing people to enjoy their city is common sense, something
lacking severely. It was not that you have zero common sense, I am pointing the finger at
an underwhelming amount of common sense at work on those subjects.

Charlie, I suppose you are saying "The Beck Center" and "1 block in Birdtown" as an "Art
District" is visionary? Do a search for "Art District" hardly visionary. Do a search for
"Start-Up" Programs, ours with Zero Funding is hardly visionary when compared to other
cities with millions funding theirs. Our way finding is not visionary, the term visionary has
truly left this town, and all we see is a rehash of old ideas, that are painfully underfunded
and lacking any serious direction.

Don't even get me started on rain barrels! Perhaps as we have no access to the Lake
we forget we are the Kuwait of Freshwater. Hmmmmmmmm maybe something like a
Freshwater University, where people could come from all over the world... Maybe
marketing ourselves to the blind, and handicapped in an city that is easy to get around,
maybe Business Groups that work together without gouging the businesses, maybe
Community Currency, Maybe Food Security...

FWIW

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Me testy? I could say the same to your initial response but now I can see it’s sarcasm. I guess I should label my sarcasm so as not to appear testy.

Why does a city have to officially label a specific section of road as an ‘Arts District’? Doing so is kind of like someone giving themselves a nickname because everyone else has a nickname and they don’t want to feel left out. Arts Districts are like Post Offices nowadays, it seems every city has one.

Is there a reason (other than lack of funding) that an arts district can’t happen organically? BTW, who is supposed to provide this funding, how much are you talking about and who are the beneficiaries?

Freshwater U? Where people come from all over the world? To do what? You lost me on this.

Marketing ourselves to the blind and handicapped? How about just marketing ourselves to people in general? Why do labels have to be put on people? Safe, clean and fun are attractive to all.

Business groups gouging businesses? I don’t follow you. I’d like to see business groups that help get businesses out of their house/garage and into a store front. Groups that provide help to businesses like free seminars on Quickbooks, tax planning, forming a business plan, basic accounting, marketing, etc. Things that are life and death for businesses, not fluff.

Community currency? Sounds like a short-lived gimmick. I’m no marketing genius but I would suspect that people would buy Lakewood because stores sell the things people want at a decent price with good service AND people know about them. For example, if more people knew about the Hobby Shop on Detroit (in and outside of Lakewood), that place would be packed.

Food security? Not sure I follow you on this. Is this the hoarding of canned food incase of a natural or man-made disaster?

BTW, you seem a little more cryptic than usual.

Charlie Page wrote:Me testy? I could say the same to your initial response but now I can see it’s sarcasm. I guess I should label my sarcasm so as not to appear testy.

Why does a city have to officially label a specific section of road as an ‘Arts District’? Doing so is kind of like someone giving themselves a nickname because everyone else has a nickname and they don’t want to feel left out. Arts Districts are like Post Offices nowadays, it seems every city has one.

Charlie

I could not agree more, so instead of arguing which block, say the city and move on. Infact
this is a community loaded with artists. It is no longer a defining point, especially when
other cities have much more funding. However in this town it was more about inviting
"cool artists in" and then forcing them out with cool economic development. I actually
believe the correct way to go was what DL was talking about, sustainable districts.

Charlie Page wrote:Freshwater U? Where people come from all over the world? To do what? You lost me on this.

I believe Mel has all my notes on this. There are saltwater universities, but we had never
seen a freshwater one. So why not?

Charlie Page wrote:Marketing ourselves to the blind and handicapped? How about just marketing ourselves to people in general? Why do labels have to be put on people? Safe, clean and fun are attractive to all.

While I agree marketing this city could be huge, and could help. What exactly do we market
and to who? How much do we pay for this marketing? What market. I still send papers to
the Ferries of Manhattan, San Francisco, and San Diego. Do we place an ad in USA Today?
Do we show the clean streets, the pristine Downtown area? The single park you can walk
your dog in? The basketball hoop? While marketing is good we have a lot to go to live up
to the hype already surrounding this town.

Charlie Page wrote:Business groups gouging businesses? I don’t follow you. I’d like to see business groups that help get businesses out of their house/garage and into a store front. Groups that provide help to businesses like free seminars on Quickbooks, tax planning, forming a business plan, basic accounting, marketing, etc. Things that are life and death for businesses, not fluff.

Charlie
We already have one group taking credit for that, though the business did not see it that
way, and while I would say it bares some thought. Why not just open up some regulations
that allow businesses to work out of their homes better? I think that your other comments
make sense, now should a small business be forced to pay big dollars to another business
group that has very little actual business experience for that?

Charlie Page wrote:Community currency? Sounds like a short-lived gimmick. I’m no marketing genius but I would suspect that people would buy Lakewood because stores sell the things people want at a decent price with good service AND people know about them. For example, if more people knew about the Hobby Shop on Detroit (in and outside of Lakewood), that place would be packed.

Maybe, maybe not. The Hobby Shop makes their $$$$$ on very high priced trains, and
parts for those. Community Currency is not a gimmick, buyer's cards, are a gimmick.
Where is Lakewood's Buyer's card today? Meanwhile Community currency in Toronto,
Ithaca and other communities where it was rolled out properly is thriving and helping
those communities keep dollars and buying power in those communities. The one was
nothing more than a slick news release, while many got left holding bad cards. Real
Community Currency is the start, or ending of a whole new way to think about a city and
do business within that community.

Which will take us to food security. No while food security certainly includes canning it also
is another way of life for a community, that many here just do not understand. It is
building long term working relationships with farms nearby, so that as markets fail there
are other ways to keep food coming in. It is about teaching people how to grow in their
yards and in community gardens. Not for the cool factor but so people have healthy
alternatives. It is not about "owning" the faux farmer markets, but creating real CSA's
that serve both the people and the farmers equally. It is about rain barrels, and why
collected rainwater makes more sense for a garden than hose water. It is a lifestyle not
something cool to add to your repertoire. In this city many thought it was something to
conquer and own. Not grow and let flourish.

Cryptic, yeah, was getting ready for an interview about starting civic journalism here in
Lakewood. Wanted to practice feeding thoughts without actually attacking the big
businesses that are now trying to own a community's words, that are having serious times
even staying afloat. And those that embrace "Builders Square" over "Lakewood Hardware."

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Jim O'Bryan wrote: Don't even get me started on rain barrels!

Jim,
At the potential risk of causing serious thread drift, what exactly is your issue with rain barrels?

Yea Jim---- rain barrels-----you fer 'em or agin 'em

Matt Jones wrote:

Jim O'Bryan wrote: Don't even get me started on rain barrels!

Jim,
At the potential risk of causing serious thread drift, what exactly is your issue with rain barrels?

Matt / Stan

Have no real opinion on them. And Charlie built a hell of a nice one.

Me, I believe many of the "water issues" we are forced to swallow or groove on, are mostly
because of California, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, etc. I certainly understand why it is
oh so precious to them. They live in an area with none. Here, I think it is more just another
part of the religious/spiritual movement called GREEN.

But really, I have very little real feelings or issues with them.

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I think we should do whatever Toronto is doing. Our houses would be worth 1.5 million in Toronto. And I'm talking about the small ones. Maybe we should build high speed rail under the lake and become a suburb of Toronto.

Seriously though someone needs to buy a bus ticket for frank Jackson and Fitzgerald and all their council members to toronto so they can figure out what to do with the greater Cleveland area.

I'm glad someone else mentioned Ithaca. Ithaca is awesome. Can we lure a college to open up a branch here? What happened to Akron university having having some kind of extension here? Can we start some interesting small college on a patch of land in Lakewood

Minimally we need new population to the region. With a decent size house going for 20k more or less in parts of Cleveland, we've got to be able to lure people here. It could be west coasters who have underwater mortgages who are walking away from their houses, it could be immigrants from anywhere, people from Toronto who don't want to pay so much for the city life. How about a work from home lifestyle and draw all the freelancers and what not that want ammenities but can't afford NYC and such?

The region has hung on to a lot of amenities but we are going to loose them at a rapid pace with Cleveland at the 400k mark. I don't think we should kid ourselves that we can just dismantle large parts of the city and just turn it into green space until we can think of what to do.

Ellen Cormier wrote:I'm glad someone else mentioned Ithaca. Ithaca is awesome. Can we lure a college to open up a branch here? What happened to Akron university having having some kind of extension here? Can we start some interesting small college on a patch of land in Lakewood

Four or five years ago Akron University was considering a Lakewood campus. Cleveland State University and Cuyahoga Community College worked behind the scenes to kill the project. They publically promised to build something in Lakewood while privately they already had plans to build in Medina County and Westlake. I'm sure you have noticed that nothing was built in Lakewood.

Tri-C trustees speak publically about supporting the City and supporting public transportation while locating their new campuses far from students and far from public transportation.

Cleveland State is embarking on a $125 million program to build a new housing, shopping and life style campus on vacant lots on Payne Avenue. If they spend $20 million here in Lakewood they could build a series of school buildings on Detroit Avenue. They wouldn't have to spend anything on housing, shopping or "life style" development because those things are already here. There are 75,000 people within a 10 minute bike ride of Detroit and Bunts and they choose to build where nobody lives. Urban planning at its best.

I think that illustrates the problem. Our taxpayer supported institutions are spending a lot of taxpayer (Cuyahoga) money to build further South, East and West and spending hundreds of millions to subsidize downtown.

The SEW strategy pulls people farther and farther from the central core,

The downtown development strategy spends hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies to enrich downtown property owners.

I know why they do it but I don't know why our leadership isn't screaming bloody murder, waving the bloody shirt, sitting on the mountaintop screaming "What the hell do you think you are doing!"

Does that count as vision?

Bill Call wrote:

Ellen Cormier wrote:I
Cleveland State is embarking on a $125 million program to build a new housing, shopping and life style campus on vacant lots on Payne Avenue. If they spend $20 million here in Lakewood they could build a series of school buildings on Detroit Avenue. They wouldn't have to spend anything on housing, shopping or "life style" development because those things are already here. There are 75,000 people within a 10 minute bike ride of Detroit and Bunts and they choose to build where nobody lives. Urban planning at its best.

But you don't seem to realize why they're spending what they're spending. First, the money is being spent on their main campus to improve the campus and build more housing. CSU is quietly and quickly turning itself into a residential school from a primarily commuter school with great results.

How does taking money they're spending to improve residential life on their main campus and putting a $20 million dollar facility in Lakewood helping them towards that goal?

You like to cry about the money they spend in the outer burbs on their satellite campuses, but honestly, why build a campus here when you're just 10 mins from downtown already, other than for the people who are afraid to go downtown?

If I'm a steward of CSU funds, it would be negligent to build a campus here quite honestly. You'd get the best return and highest reach by building farther away from your main campus which is exactly what they've done.

Also, one more key fact to clear up about you post. CSU is funded primarily by state funds just like other state colleges. It is not funded directly by any Cuyahoga County taxes. You must be confusing CSU with Tri-C.

FYI the quote you have with my name in it is wholly attributable to mr. Call.

In general I'm glad to see csu become a more residential college. I've been upset with them since they got rid of first college. Having spent two years in that program, it was a best kept secret of the campus.

I still think we could draw a nice small school or extension to Lakewood. Build it over near the 117th rapid station. I kinda thought Berea rd would have been a good location for the medical mart though I know they wanted something closer to the hospitals. With all those neat old industrial buildings over there has anyone come up with a plan for all that? I know it's not within Lakewood boundaries but that section is in dire need of a plan.

Downtown, Saturday 9am

Wayfinding?


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