LO_10_21 Trends? On the Street & Online
Posted: Tue Oct 14, 2014 5:41 pm
PDF here:
http://media.lakewoodobserver.com/issue_pdfs/Observer_Vol_10_Issue_21.pdf
You know it is funny, seriously funny most of the time, as a full time observer of life for nearly 60 years you have the pleasures of watching trends develop and fall to the wayside. You are actually old enough to watch the cycle of fashion as things you wore as a kid come back into style. Sometimes again and again. Where in the other arts you see progress that sometimes pays homage to the past but generally just builds and builds, and while the comment stays the same, the back beat differs wildly.
The same is true for other trends, it has come to my attention that trends like “new ways to eat” tacos instead of sandwiches, Paninis instead of just grilled. Kale instead of spinach, and on and on and on and on. Fueled by a desperate need to make money, a desperate need to be cool among friends, and an even more desperate need for old people to stay relevant and be as hip as possible if nothing else in the eyes of their children and people they work with.
One trend that never really seems to change, except through fear, is housing. We now know a good house in 1900 with proper care is a good house in 2014. We know for a fact that a house that sold for say, $69,000 goes for $300,000 today. That is if it was taken care of, if it was updated for new power needs, and the funny thing is really not much else, EXCEPT - LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION.
CLEAN AND SAFE, two of the three keys to a city, and more importantly the community it hopefully supports.
WE really need little else in the Cleveland area, and that has been proven time and time again. We have watched communities fall into terrible neglect, Flats (2 times), Tremont, Warehouse District, Ohio City, Detroit Shoreway, Collinwood, etc., and we have seen them “discovered” as Columbus discovered America, and saved them from the indigenous people that were calling them home. Through it all Lakewood has remained a top tier city in the county for decades, possibly since we were formed. A perfect mix of the middle class, from mid-level upper middle class along the lake, to hard working 2 jobs lower middle class of Birdtown, and everything in between. Truly a magical mix, that has made this city as strong as it is, for as long as it has been.
But now fads, the perceived need of a new and different beer every night, if not every gulp, has run headlong into the need for CLEAN AND SAFE housing. Lakewood, much like Olde Town in Chicago, really had nothing to worry about when it came to overdoing it. The perfect mix had 2.5 canals of commerce, Madison, Detroit, and Berea Road to fill our needs. These three roads were able to sustain not just the city of 71,000+ people, but also feed and entertain all that came to our door. The Blue Fox, Miller’s, Highland Party Center, were the entertainment spots that rival the largest venues in Lakewood now. Tasse’s (now a parking lot), Telestar (now Riverwood) and 4 other infamous places catered to bikers, I I do not mean the Yuppie Bikers of today, I mean kick your ass bikers. Yet we were able to keep our streets clean, safe and keep Lakewood a place where people wanted to live, buy a home, and raise a family.
But today for some ungodly reason, City Hall has decided that our residential neighborhoods are no longer worth keeping sacrosanct. Instead of protecting the neighborhoods from the inevitable attempts to encroach in these areas, to actually expediting the assault on the very SAFETY and CLEANLINESS of our community. City Hall, and the so called Planning Department, have decided that residents are just not worth the effort, and we will work with business fads to get residents out, while devaluing their neighborhoods so that more business can flood in. The City Hall Administration has grown tired “of the whining” from the residents, and prefers to deal with businesses, that do not demand cleanliness, or safety, just a place to sell their wares.
It is this line of thinking that gave birth to this project. When City Hall can no longer be trusted to keep you SAFE and CLEAN, it is time to rethink City Hall. We have a chance. I do not believe that City Hall is filled with bad people, just terribly misguided ones. They do not really hate the residents, they have just brought commercial thinking to a residential project. In the old days, when the City came up with an idea that was born to fail, and that would have displaced 1,500 Lakewoodites, when asked why. City Hall’s answers came down to, “We don’t want to drive for Cheeesecake” and “to keep our taxes low.” One was a complete fabrication of bad thought, the other was a desperate need that old people had to feel cool, and seem relevant. Now when these ideas come up, they say nothing, when asked, they tend to misinform, or even in some cases take the sides of the businesses in court against the residents! The very people that trusted them enough to elect them.
As we throw another neighborhood away for a new beer, albeit only brewed in 5 gallon batches once or twice a year, we once again clearly see where residents stand in the eyes of City Hall. Nothing more than a bump in the road, as they desperately look for a way to get around the traffic problems and parking, and tell residents that their street will now be one-way— for their own good.
Although I’m sure they would probably just refer to it as “resident calming.”
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