Author: Randy A. Simes

Randy is an award-winning urban planner who founded UrbanCincy in May 2007. He grew up on Cincinnati’s west side in Covedale, and graduated from the University of Cincinnati’s nationally acclaimed School of Planning in June 2009. In addition to maintaining ownership and serving as the managing editor for UrbanCincy, Randy has worked professionally as a planning consultant throughout the United States, Korea and the Middle East. After brief stints in Atlanta and Chicago, he currently lives in the Daechi neighborhood of Seoul’s Gangnam district.

Categories
Development News Politics Transportation

TIGER II grants to target projects that make impact, create jobs

Photo by Jake Mecklenborg

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) will distribute $600 million in Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) II grants for capital investment in surface transportation projects later this year. Pre-applications are due on Friday, July 16, and formal applications are due on Monday, August 23 from state and local governments. The City of Cincinnati is expected to apply for the TIGER II grants to help fill the remaining $41.5 million needed for its modern streetcar system.

Over the past month, Cincinnati officials have secured $86.5 million for the project, but local politicians have vowed to seek out federal funds to help fill the financing gap. Project officials are hopeful that the project will fare better in this round of TIGER grants because of the recent approval of $64 million in local money to the effort – something federal officials noted as a critical missing element for Cincinnati’s proposal in TIGER I.

Another critical item federal officials docked Cincinnati for was the lack of zoning policies along the proposed route that would encourage mixed-use development, transit ridership and walkability. Since that time, Cincinnati has introduced an amendment that would reduce parking requirements for residential buildings located within 800 feet of a streetcar stop by 50%, and complete eliminate parking requirements for those buildings needing fewer than five spaces after the initial 50% reduction is calculated.

The $600 million available in the latest round of TIGER funding is less than half the $1.5 billion available in its first round that was distributed February. DOT officials state that the money for TIGER II will be awarded on a competitive basis to projects that have a significant impact on the nation, a region or metropolitan area and can create jobs.

“The enormous number of applications we received for the first round of TIGER grants shows that we have a backlog of worthwhile transportation projects waiting for funding,” said Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood. “This money will go to the kinds of projects that will help spur lasting economic growth, reduce gridlock, provide safe, affordable and environmentally sustainable transportation choices and create jobs.”

Selection criteria for applications will include those that contribute to the long-term economic competitiveness of the nation, improving the condition of existing transportation facilities and systems, improving energy efficiency and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, improving the safety of U.S. transportation facilities and improving the quality of living and working environments of communities through increased transportation choices and connections. The DOT will also give priority to projects that are expected to quickly create and preserve jobs and stimulate rapid increases in economic activity.

Categories
News Politics Transportation

Cincinnati City Council celebrates Bike to Work Week

Last week several Cincinnati City Council members took to the streets, on their bicycles, for a ceremonial ride from City Hall to Fountain Square for National Bike to Work Week.  The Bike Month celebration encouraged individuals to commute to work by bike instead of by car.  In Cincinnati, Queen City Bike established bicycle commuter stations all over the city to help motivate even more to ditch their automobiles.

Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls, Laure Quinlivan, Laketa Cole and Jeff Berding were those participating last week from Cincinnati’s City Council.  After arriving at Fountain Square, the four council members addressed the crowd on-hand, and took part in the festivities taking place.

The following photographs were taken by Thadd Fiala.

Categories
Development News

Clifton Plaza an early success, improvements needed

Clifton Plaza took the place of the former Bender Optical building along Ludlow Avenue in the heart of Clifton’s vibrant neighborhood business district.  Early on in its concept people were concerned whether more open space was needed, or whether more businesses and people were needed in that central location.  After seeing the results of a recently completed streetscaping project in combination with the new Clifton Plaza, it now appears that additional public space was very much in demand.

The new public space created along Telford Avenue added simple, yet functional, park benches along with a new community board for event postings and other random information.  It took slightly longer to complete the new Clifton Plaza across the street, but the impact appears to be equally strong if early use is any indication.

The problem is not the creation of the new public space, but rather the design of it.  The primary design flaw of Clifton Plaza is the fixed seating.  Seating is extraordinarily important when it comes to public space design, and this type of seating design is straight out of the urban design playbook of two to three decades ago.  Since that time several studies have indicated that users prefer movable seating options where they can assert their control over the space.  This might mean the slight adjustment of a chair as one prepares to sit, or it might mean wholesale change to avoid or seek out sunlight.

“The possibility of choice is as important as the exercise of it.  If you know you can move if you want to, you feel more comfortable staying put,” explained William H. Whyte in The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces.  “This is why, perhaps, people so often move a chair a few inches this way and that before sitting in it, with the chair ending up about where it was in the first place.  The moves are functional, however.  They are a declaration of autonomy, to oneself, and rather satisfying.”

Whyte goes on to discuss how fixed seating is often awkward in public spaces as there is often much space around them as is the case at the new Clifton Plaza.

“The designer is saying, now you sit right here and you sit there.  People balk.  In some instances, the wrench the seats from their moorings,” Whyte continued.  “Where there is a choice between fixed seats and other kinds of sitting, it is the other that people choose.”

Beyond user preferance, fixed seating allows for a less functional space.  When planners redesigned Fountain Square, non-fixed seating in part helped to create a more open and flexible space better suited for the many events that attract thousands of people to the public space every week.

What works for Clifton Plaza is its large open area towards the back that will allow for flexible programming.  A simple fix could be made by removing these fixed seating options and replacing them with non-fixed alternatives.  This would create a more welcoming public space that encourages users to stay longer and take ownership of the space in a truly dynamic way.

Categories
News Transportation

Metro to award free bus passes to best transit story submissions

On Thursday, May 27 Metro will kick off their “Tell Us Your Story” contest on Fountain Square from 11:30am to 1:30pm. Organizers say that the event will include table displays, entertainment, prizes, giveaways and tours will be available on one of Metro’s new articulated buses to be parked on Walnut Street.

The contest asks for video or written entries that tell a story about how transit benefits you or your community in terms of the economy and jobs, the environment, energy independence, and quality of life. Those submitting entries can submit videos or written entries Metro’s website, or by submitting your written entry via email on a form provided on the transit agency’s website.

Entries will be accepted from Thursday, May 27 through Saturday, July 31 of this year. The top four video and top four written entries will be selected and awarded a one-month Metro bus pass. Two grand prize winners will be selected by the public between August 3rd and August 31st with the two grand prize winners receiving a year of free rides on Metro.

Categories
Business News Politics Transportation

Cincinnati Enquirer abandoning city interests

Today the Virginia-based Cincinnati Enquirer has published yet another hit piece on the proposed Cincinnati Streetcar project.  The Gannett-owned newspaper sponsored a telephone survey of 600 adults in Cincinnati between Tuesday, May 18 and Wednesday, May 19.  The survey concluded that those who plan on riding the modern streetcar system were in support of the project, while 61% said that they were opposed to borrowing $64 million to build the initial system.

Now I could go on and on about the survey itself and about how telephone surveys are historically unreliable and undercount certain demographics, or about how borrowing money is par for the course in any local-level expenditure even though the survey presented it differently, or about how the Enquirer decided to use one of their patented misleading and sensationalist headlines for the story on their sponsored survey, but I won’t.

Instead I want to look at the disturbing trend that the Enquirer has of putting down the city to appeal to their suburban audiences.  Through the middle of May, the Enquirer has ran 56 negative letters to the editor and just three positive letters on the Cincinnati Streetcar.  Tom Callinan, Editor and Vice President of Content for the Cincinnati Enquirer, stated that these letters are simply representative of what is sent in, and that the Enquirer simply “takes what you send.”  Interesting, because I find it hard to believe that the disparity is that great, but I digress.

The coverage goes much farther than the outlandish publishing of anti-streetcar letters to the editor and includes editorials from Mr. Callinan himself that either directly bemoan the project or passively attack it.  The daily beat coverage of the topic has also been fairly skewed to appeal to these anti-streetcar readers in the suburbs.  Why is this the case though?  Why does the Enquirer feel the need to criticize and attack the city while boosting the suburbs in the region?

Recent letter to the editor in the Enquirer

The answer to that may lie in the conversation I had with a content editor at the Enquirer three years ago where he said, “We tell the stories our readership wants to hear.”  Encouraging right?  The Enquirer does not care about providing fair/balanced news coverage, they care only about their bottom line and telling the story they feel their readers want to hear.

At that time when I spoke with the content editor, not Mr. Callinan, the Enquirer had made a focused moved towards Cincinnati’s northern suburbs where the population growth was/is occurring, and where they felt they might be able to pick up new readers in the increasingly merging Cincinnati-Dayton metroplex.  And by no coincidence, it was around this time that I started UrbanCincy to start sharing the good stories happening in the city that the Enquirer cared not to share with its audience.

Since that time UrbanCincy has flourished beyond what I ever thought it would become.  Thousands of readers come to the site weekly to stay plugged in with what’s happening in Cincinnati’s urban core, and get news on things that quite frankly are not either covered in the Enquirer, or barely at all.  I do not take joy in this, nor do I make any kind of profit from this website, but I do find it telling that the readership continues to grow as more and more people get fed up with the Enquirer’s anti-city bias.  It does not have to be this way, but the Enquirer has chosen their side, and that is the side of the suburbs.  I truly wish there was not a need for a site like UrbanCincy as I would much prefer the daily print newspaper to cover these issues.

Going forward, UrbanCincy will no longer link to the Enquirer and I would like to encourage you to no longer buy the print edition, cancel your subscription if you have one, and even quit visiting their website.  If Mr. Callinan and the content managers want to position themselves against the city, and only exploit it to their suburban audience’s delight, then they should go right ahead, but those of us that love this city should make them aware we do not approve by hitting them where it counts – their pocket book.

If you feel so motivated to write the Enquirer so that they can simply “take what you send them” and have it published, you can do so by emailing letters@enquirer.com, sending your letters to “Letters, Enquirer Editorial Page, 312 Elm Street, Cincinnati, OH 45202,” or by fax at (513) 768-8569.  You must include your name, address (including community) and daytime phone number.  Also please limit your letters to 100 words or less.