Submitted by Norm Roulet on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 12:06.
I was analyzing the lay of the land around the Cleveland Cultural Gardens Sunday and thought I'd visit the region's most valuable real estate, along the blue shores of Lake Erie. Driving down MLK, I went through one of the few ugly mouseholes under the Freeway and traintracks thal block almost all reasonable public access to the lakefront, and chose to not go right, to where millionaires live, in Bratenahl, but left, where lunatic leaders have failed to extract a red cent of real value from our greatest natural resource... to where our leaders are tearing down a private owner's building, with no good explanation.
Tear down the ugly one.
Give the land to the usual suspects.
Four more years!
Or, let's make this an international hostel and farms.
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But they have $billions worth of absurd new plans
Cleveland.com posts today more poor planning from our high and mighty Port Authority and their well paid consultants from a-far... the one run by that guy from England... hired a consultant from NYNY to tell us to build NYNY on our lake and riverfront.
Doesn't mention bringing NYNY's economy to pay for it, but what's with details... even the big picture for this sounds absurd.
If we hired and developed good, independent-thinking local planners, perhaps we could build Cleveland in Cleveland... or even be neo in NEO
Instead, get ready to swallow hard and waste the next few decades debating smoke and mirrors... our highest priced foundation-hired, taxpayer-paid carpetbaggers have really been at the drawing boards spending our next $ billions in eroding tax revenues.
And where is the analysis about future need for container traffic in Cleveland justifying moving the port, much less proof we need any really significant port in the future here at all.
Shut down Mittal for real, forever, and scale the port DOWN to the minimum possible footprint here, forever, and stick it back in some corner of the Flats. Grow food on the land no longer needed for filthy industry.
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back in 2005 we got ideas contrary to this
Back in 2005 we got ideas contrary to this port vision. Listen to this - Dutch architects in Cleveland in 2005
That's right. Hire a planner to say what you want to hear.
We throw away what we hear. We forgot about free wifi citywide. ODOT pulls down history instead of slowing traffic on the innerbelt. We pooh, pooh wind on the land and dream of wind on the lake. Sheesh!
Norm, a brilliant idea
Norm,
What can I say, that's a brilliant idea...turning the HoJo into a hostel with ajacent urban farm!!! What an efficient, low-cost way to stimulate the economy. Perhaps Cleveland has something there like Atlanta has here--The Atlanta Development Authority--which has as affordable, mixed-use, urban revitalization at the core of its mission.
I would encourage you, the owner of the site and all the rest at RealNeo to seriously investigate the possiblities, and if a program(s) like Atlanta's ADA doesn't yet exist, find out who you might talk to to make it come to life. You'll need a team of people to put together a compelling case for you hostel and farm idea, but it might be more feasible that you think.
ADA versus CDCs
Thanks for your vote of support Eternity. I'll post some more pictures of the site - it is amazing, and the semi-demo'd building is the bomb.
You bring up an interesting matter. You say you have a good development authority in Atlanta, and Atlanta is doing well - most REALNEO members seem to feel we have problems with development authority here in general, and Cleveland and Northeast Ohio are a mess!
In addition to the ADA, do you have like 30 community development corporations and a dozen or so non-governmental organizations all controled by industry and a few Foundation leaders that largely control local government, the media and so all public funding, and divert that to a small party of close interests, because that is what we have in Northeast Ohio, and it doesn't work at all.
I'd love to see a model of something that works... perhaps it is time for a trip to Atlanta.
What is happening with local foods there? Any urban farming activity? Is the Atlanat economy planning its future around "green" jobs?
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Empowerment and Renewal
Norm,
I don't want to give the false impression that Atlanta is some utopia, because it's definitely not. However Atlanta, like much of the South, has had much experience with rebuilding and restoration; just think of all the destruction that the Civil War wrought. But I think too, one of the legacies that Atlanta has that should be observed, is that Georgia is the state of great individuals like the Carters and the Kings. Two families guided by two great humanitarians and civil rights activists; President Jimmy Carter and Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Carter and King really educated the people about economic equality and the rights of the citizenry. But we've also had the good fortune of having some really terrific mayors like Hartsfield, Jackson, Young and our current mayor Shirley Franklin.
Atlanta too, has had its fair share of corruption, our last mayor, Bill Campbell (who helped bring the 1996 Olympics to our towh) ended up being sent to prison for tax evasion. It really wasn't alot of money, and my opinion is that he should have been fined and not imprisoned, but ultimately what I think what I'm attempting to say is that it takes a lot of people with a singular vision to make their town the best town it can be. There are destined to be bumps in the road. However, it's not about getting everything right the first time, instead being about an ongoing commitment to improvement.
35 years ago Atlanta was a virtual wasteland, today its vibrant and very much alive. It happened because people got involved. We believed in ourselves, and used our collective power to those ends.
The RealNeo community is a superb example of people power, so I think you're definitely on the right track. Moving forward, I suspect, just like the late Ed, your vision(s) will continue to grow and manifest, so that Cleveland and NEO can be fully reimagined.
The time-line is
The time-line is disheartening , when do they begin to build it?
It’s done in 2026 that’s seventeen years! Hey I will be eligible for retirement that year….I wish! I think retirement for me is death.
http://www.portofcleveland.com/pdf/2009%2003%2020%20Planning%20Commission%20Final.pdf
This is construction, sort of like the pyramids that kept people working but really did not serve a purpose…shhh… we liked the pyramids.
One leader comes and makes a plan and then another leader with another plan….
As the field levels off that being as the global economies become more similar then it is very possible to see more activity at the ports. There is also other ports that are not that far away, competitive in the future is all about efficiency. Getting or transporting by ships is not that expensive, but unfortunately are goods are.
The port has to be multifaceted and able to handle all traffic, unfortunately the size of the ships are limited in the great lakes. They know that, try to have some faith in people.
What other cities have the balls to rebuild their ports? In order to reclaim land, it is what they are doing.
In twenty years, something for the next generation, will the river be much cleaner? The banks at the mouth will be dramatically greener. I wonder how many boaters left? The Flats are gone, no reason to go there no rows of rafted boaters. The once booming Commodore club is closed.
Move the port, they all say and in that process they said lets make it viable for the potential for changing markets. Let make it state of the art and multifunctional. If you want an analysis of the future, do it yourself, it would be as valid as any. They chose an option based on that site having the ability to handle it all.
It also leverages space for other development, it keeps it rolling. The mouth of the river and the lake front.
If you want to manage Urban agriculture then get a piece of that land bank. I'll make it simple if it is not based on cooperatives and collectively managed it will fail. Can I come to the market and watch twenty different people attempt to sell all the same thing? I will tell you I told you so. Your up against 100 year of progressive agricultural technology and to the point they pay people not to grow. The few people doing it now is fine they can cut into markets but eventually they will cut into each others. The smart farmer does not sell his best seeds. Your collectively promoting your competition, that very American J of you.
It is based on a cooperative...
And you are a member.
Real Coop!
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I really got my wheels
I really got my wheels turning from the website that detailed the consumption, it made me think about the managing and retailing.
A urban farm market, that buys what it can sell and then works with the cooperative growing what to sell.
Oh that gets me real close to wanting to approach Rokakis, but then it get very much like work and requires compensation, then is that like becoming one of them?
If they build a land bank then sections or parts of it, that being the land in pieces can be collectively managed and the produce collectively marketed.
It's allot of work, getting the information about consumption, it has to be accurate…my first job was as a produce clerk in grocery store. You have to know what you can sell, you order it and then if you mess up it rots. Managing multiple parcels to feed a viable market is if anything extremely challenging.
I talked to my mother about it, she said they want to go back and do it all over again. She was raised on a farm…then there is my father he sold produce for 40 years. Every morning the people from the west-side market go were? Were do they get there produce from?
http://www.clover.okstate.edu/fourh/aitc/lessons/upper/transport.pdf