Year: 2013

Categories
News Opinion

GUEST EDITORIAL: Absence of Language Programs Will Be Felt Across Cincinnati

On November 5, constituents in the Oak Hills Local School District will make a very significant choice: To pass or kill an emergency levy (Issue 20). This decision will impact the well-being of not only the school, but of the future of Cincinnati’s economy.

I make this claim due to the threat to the district’s German program. The Lakota School district has already quietly killed their language program, and now Oak Hills’ is under fire.

Oak Hills’ German program is the second largest in the region and strong in college placement. Students routinely advance to 200-level courses upon entering college and shine amongst other German programs in the city, achieving first place three years running at UC’s German Day language competition. Should Issue 20 fail, Oak Hills will remove German from Delhi and Rapid Run Middle Schools and one of the three remaining German instructors at Oak Hills High School.

Oak Hills High School
Oak Hills High School is one of the largest in Ohio, but the district’s German language program, the second largest in the region, may be at risk. Image courtesy of Google Maps.

Why does German matter? As you probably know, Cincinnati has a strong German heritage. What you may not know is that Germany’s influence remains not only in our last names, our festivals, and the foods we eat, but is strongly represented in our business sector with over 100 German-owned companies in Cincinnati.

This translates to local jobs in industries like engineering, banking, chemistry, and medicine. Many of our leading local businesses, including P&G and General Electric, have global offices in German-speaking regions because they are some of the strongest centers of innovation and economic power in Europe.

By removing German from our middle schools and high schools, we deprive our future business leaders of exposure to a key foreign language when they are developmentally most inclined to learn a second language. We deprive them of the ability to navigate through cultural differences when dealing with their future colleagues. We deprive our city of the ability to maintain ties to the strongest economies in the European market, losing our ability to compete in regional and global market places.

Programs like Oak Hills’ are being cut all over the city. Remember that curricula are determined at the local level by voters like you. Whether you live in the Oak Hills School District or not, consider the significant impact of your vote when going to the ballots on November 5. Support your local language programs to provide our middle and high school students the tools they need to succeed and to foster the growth of Cincinnati.

Issue 20 by the Numbers:
Oak Hills School District has the third lowest total costs per pupil and administrative rates in Hamilton County at $9,166. This is $1,341 lower than the state average and $2,367 lower than the Hamilton County average.

It is the first time in 16 years that the school district has requested that voters decide on an increase in revenue for operations.

This $4.82 million operating levy translates into a $168.72 per year increase to homeowners on $100,000 of assessed property valuation.

Lisa Bambach is a graduate of the University of Cincinnati’s College of Design, Architecture, Art & Planning where she studied graphic design. She currently works as the Marketing and Creative Director of Cincideutsch, a local German language and culture organization. If you would like to submit a guest editorial of your own, please contact UrbanCincy at editors@urbancincy.com.

Categories
News Politics

UrbanCincy Partners With Niehoff Studio to Host Urbanist Candidates Forum

Yesterday we highlighted the important planning efforts that will be affected by this year’s mayoral race. However the real legislative efforts will be carried out by the nine city council members elected on November 5th. Even though the newly elected mayor may have his or her own agenda starting December 1, often times council members are eager to begin working on their own priorities.

With a field of 21 candidates this year, we feel it is important for urban-minded people to hear what city council candidates have to say on some of the issues important to you, which is why tomorrow we are co-hosting the Urbanist Candidates Forum with the Niehoff Urban Design Studio.

Earlier this year we worked with the studio to host the successful Metropolis & Mobility event and are continuing that partnership this fall with the council candidates forum.

Forum Invite
In addition to the eight confirmed candidates listed on the banner, we have also received confirmations from Kevin Johnson, Shawn Butler and P.G. Sittenfeld.

This forum is an excellent opportunity voters interested in transportation, land use, sustainability and architecture to learn more about the Cincinnati city council candidates. We also hope this will help encourage your involvement in the public process going forward.

The forum will focus on issues important to urbanists. Some of those issues will include topics we typically cover on this site including transportation, economic development, sustainability and other planning topics.

The event is free and will run from 6:30pm to 8pm. Food and drink will be provided by neighborhood establishments.

The Niehoff Studio can be reached via the #24 and #78 Metro bus lines.

Categories
News Opinion Politics

Mayoral Election Will Impact Cincinnati’s Planning Future

Cincinnati is in the midst of revitalization. There have been several significant accomplishments achieved since 2007 when the city’s Planning Department was reconstituted. Initiatives such as Plan Cincinnati and the development of Form-based code have united regional leaders and communities to help build a shared vision of the city’s future.

These efforts could be affected drastically with the election of a new mayor on November 5th.

Qualls: Focus on vision and and consensus building:
In her time as Mayor in the 1990’s and when she returned to City Council in 2007 Roxanne Qualls (C) has been the leader in implementing a bold vision for Cincinnati through planning policies. In the 1990’s, Qualls lead the effort to narrow Fort Washington Way which allowed for the expansion of downtown and the conversion of the riverfront into a showcase for the city.

The award winning Banks Master Plan owes its existence and implementation to Qualls’s dedicated leadership in establishing the Riverfront Steering Committee which developed the plan. By the time Qualls returned to council the plan had advanced through Mayor Mark Mallory (D) who formed The Banks Working Group and began implementing the plan in 2008.

Qualls has also been active in developing Plan Cincinnati, the city’s recently adopted comprehensive plan. But since her return on council she has been more closely associated with bringing form-based codes to Cincinnati.

Since 2007 she has led several groups on tours to Nashville, TN and Columbus, OH to learn more about form-based codes and how they benefit cities. Last month, that vision became reality when Madisonville became the first city neighborhood to adopt the form-based code regulating plan.

The Cincinnati form-based code is a comprehensive land use regulation that was developed by the city through years of community participation. It is a code that emphasizes that new development be constructed in a form that integrates into the traditional character of the neighborhood.

Cranley: Focus on removing barriers for developers:
Running against Qualls is former council-member John Cranley (D) who served on council from 2001 to 2009. He resigned from council in 2009 to pursue building a private development in East Price Hill.

The Incline Square project, located next to the Queens Tower apartment building, was envisioned to have a 22,500 square-foot office building be constructed along with a 58-unit four-story apartment building and restaurant space. Only the residential and restaurant portions of that development were built.

A review of Cranley’s track record on council had shown that early in his council career, he had been an advocate for making the city more “developer friendly.” In 2002, he was instrumental as chairman on the Budget & Finance Committee in dissolving the city’s long standing Planning Department, the oldest continuously running planning division in the country at the time.

The dissolution came over disagreements between the Planning Department and a developer in Oakley for the Center City of Cincinnati development. The unprecedented move generated a good amount of public outcry.

In 2002 Cranley told the Cincinnati Enquirer, “”The Planning Department was almost given the mission of causing problems, because it was completely divorced from economic incentives and any kind of market reality.”

However; Cranley did not oppose Mallory’s effort in 2007 to reestablish the department. He also signed a motion with Qualls on advancing form-based codes in 2008, but at a recent mayoral debate sponsored by the Urban Land Institute, Cranley strongly opposed them. He has also stated his opposition to planning and zoning, stating that the solution to neighborhood problems is money.

The outcome of this election will determine the future vision and progress of Cincinnati. That vision of progress is either one forged on grand visions and community outreach or one that favors minimizing regulations and oversight to increase development in the city.

Categories
Arts & Entertainment News

The Ridges to Perform Live Film Score of Nosferatu at CAM

Nosferatu at CAMTonight, the Cincinnati Art Museum’s (CAM) free Art After Dark series will collaborate with orchestral folk rock group The Ridges to bring a classic horror film to life.

As part of October’s “Immortal Spirits” theme, The Ridges will perform an original string-based score to an abridged version of the 1922 silent film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror inside the Museum’s Great Hall.

Art After Dark is one of the CAM’s many recurring events aimed at young professionals. The museum is open until 9pm, past its usual closing time of 5pm, so it is an opportunity to explore one of the country’s oldest art museums after hours, check out some world-class art, enjoy a drink, and this Friday, watch a vampire flick accompanied by a folk rock band in the Great Hall.

Based out of Athens, Ohio, The Ridges is led by Victor Rasgaitis (guitar, vocals) and Talor Smith (cello, vocals) but feature any number of musicians from a rotating collective of players on cello, violin, banjo, horns, percussion, mandolin and accordion. CAM’s screening of Nosferatu will be scored for guitar, cello, violin, upright bass, and banjo.

The Ridges are known for presenting each show as a unique and different experience, and their performance of Nosferatu is no exception. “It’s our own reimagining of the film,” said Ridges frontman Victor Rasgaitis.

While the band composed some new, original music for the film, they also reworked parts from some of their existing songs. For example, the film plays heavily on the use of Nosferatu’s shadow, so it only made sense to Rasgaitis to use their song “Shadows” as Nosferatu’s theme.

“Whenever he’s on screen, we’re doing variations of the chord progression of our song,” Rasgaitis explained.

The band is a perfect fit to revisit the adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula; The Ridges took their name from the allegedly haunted asylum in their hometown, and even recorded their 2011 EP inside the Victorian-era asylum in the dead of winter. (If you listen closely, it’s rumored you can hear mysterious, unexplained noises and whispers in the background of some of the songs).

The Ridges’ romantic Old World sound has been compared to Beirut, Arcade Fire, and Fleet Foxes, while Daytrotter described their music as “hidden with turn of the century and Dust Bowl-era themes.”

The free event will also feature guided ghost tours ending at the newest exhibit, Realm of the Immortals: Daoist Art in the Cincinnati Art Museum, as well as a cash bar (featuring Great Lakes’ Nosferatu Ale, of course) and appetizers for purchase. Parking is free for Art Museum members; $4 for non-members. The CAM is also served by multiple Metro bus routes.

“Art After Dark: Immortal Souls” will take place from 5pm to 9pm. The Ridges Present: Nosferatu, Symphony of Horror will go from 6pm to 8pm. Ghost tours, meanwhile, are scheduled to take place at 6:30pm and 7:30pm.

Categories
Business News Transportation

Ridership, Revenue Continue to Grow for Resurgent Amtrak

The growth of intercity passenger rail and bus continues. According to newly released data, the National Railroad Passenger Corporation (Amtrak) recorded a record breaking year in terms of both ridership and revenue.

The data is for FY13, and showed that the oft-criticized passenger rail agency carried 31.6 million passengers and collected $2.1 billion in ticket revenue. Amtrak officials say that the ridership figure represented a 1% increase while revenue was 4.2% higher than the previous year.

In addition to the ridership and revenue growth, Amtrak also broke several records over the past year including total ridership in one month (March; July), ridership records on 20 of the agency’s 45 routes and the number of passengers using state-supported routes (15.4 million) in a single year.

When compared with other modes of transportation, Amtrak now has more than double the ridership of Greyhound, and if it were a commercial airline it would be the fifth largest domestic carrier.

Queensgate Railyard
Cincinnati has largely been on the outside looking in when it comes to Amtrak ridership growth, but unclogging the Midwest’s second busiest railyard will need to come first. Photograph by Jake Mecklenborg for UrbanCincy.

“In ten of the last 11years, we have marked new ridership records, and since ridership has risen by 50% since FY2000,” Amtrak’s President and CEO, Joe Boardman, told employees through an internal memo. “This great accomplishment is not solely ours, but was made possible through strong, collaborative relationships with our state partners and the federal government.”

Boardman went on to say that through these relationships, Amtrak will pursue the resources needed to rebuild and enhance passenger rail service throughout the country, and work toward building infrastructure to support high-speed rail.

As a result of these partnerships and ridership growth, Amtrak now recovers approximately 85% of its annual operating expenses from user fees.

“I believe that all of these records point to our success in creating and marketing a product desired by the traveling public,” Boardman explained. “In growing metropolitan areas, passenger rail is clearly a viable alternative to crowded roads and skies, while in many rural areas, Amtrak often is the only means of regularly scheduled, public intercity transportation.”

While Amtrak’s success has been felt nationwide, very little has been felt here at home in Ohio due to limited service in the nation’s seventh most populated state. The reason, passenger rail advocates say, is because of a lack of support from the State of Ohio.

“We are on the outside looking in. Ohio isn’t on the outside due to a lack of travel, as USDOT says travel on Ohio’s stretch of I-71 (Cleveland-Cincinnati) ranked 22nd in the country with nearly 5.5 billion vehicle-miles traveled in 2011,” noted Ken Prendergast, Executive Director, All Aboard Ohio. “In the Midwest, only I-94 through Michigan (Detroit-Chicago) saw more traffic in 2011.”

Prendergast went on to note that the stretch of I-94 through Michigan is currently being upgraded to 110mph service by the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT), with some stretches operating at that speed already.

The situation in Ohio has been bad for a long time, but got significantly worse following the election of Governor John Kasich (R) in 2010. Almost immediately after taking office, Kasich gave away $400 million from the federal government that was intended to establish passenger rail along the 3C Corridor. The stretch between Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland is seen as the most densely populated corridor in North America without any passenger rail service.

Not all hope for Ohio, however, is lost. On National Train Day this past May, Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory (D) commended the work being done by Amtrak and called for enhanced service and operations out of Cincinnati’s Union Terminal.

“Passenger rail has to be part of a balanced multi-modal transportation system that I believe the federal government needs to play a huge role in in addition to states and local governments,” Mallory stated at Cincinnati’s National Train Day event on May 11. “Indiana has made a lot of progress as it relates to Amtrak…wouldn’t it be great to be able to jump on a train in Cincinnati, run to Indianapolis and then on to Chicago? I want Cincinnati to be a part of that line.”