Enough with the Cleveland bashing! (Lakewood, Beavercreek: transplants, foreclose, neighborhood)

[Zooropa]

Average of 2 inches of snow in april and 5.9 inches in november. It doesn't snow every april, only here and there, but most novembers have measurable snow.

[andrew61]

Originally Posted by Cle440

Yes, I mentioned that in my post. But I was saying is thats kind of rare and we hardly ever get snow in April. And May, I dont remember ever getting snow. We might get a very small amount of snow like once every 25 years or something. I even looked it up, the city of Cleveland gets 0.1 inches of snow in May, and most years we dont get any. There is also no snow at all from May-September.

Over all the 34 years I lived in Cleveland, I only recall seeing measurable snow in May once... and I mean real snow that stuck to the ground, not just a few wet flakes mixed in with the rain.

It was in 1989... May 9, IIRC. And even then I had to drive to the south suburbs to see it. In Lakewood where I lived at the time, it was only raining, but down in the Strongsville/North Royalton area, big clumpy flakes of snow were falling... and covering the ground.

I do recall seeing some very serious snow in April... In 1982 it snowed some twelve inches overnight (April 5-6, IIRC). And I hear you guys got a pretty good April snowstorm either last year or the year before, I forget which.

Most years when I lived there, the first measurable snowfall came around the second week of November... although I've seen it as early as October some years, and other years not until well after Christmas. It often seemed like the worst snowstorms of the season frequently fell in November or March, but that's just my recollection.

[BelieveInCleve]

Ive lived in the Westside of the Cleveland area almost all of my life so far. This is what I noticed in Elyria/Lorain as far as snow: Nearly all (85%+) the snowfall occurs from January-March. It usually ends by mid-late march. It hardly ever snows in April, November, and December usually doesnt get much, half the years there was none until after christmas. Theres no snow at all from April-October, but once in a long while it will snow in October and very rarely April. May-September I dont think it has ever snowed at all. I think they said we get around 40 or so inches a year over here.

The city of Cleveland and the Eastside areas get more than that but its basically the same times. The winters can very a lot though, last year we got well above average in Cleveland and the westside areas.

[jh1347s]

Originally Posted by Cle440

I understand what you are saying, but Cleveland has a lot of differences in feel from midwestern cities like Indianapolis, Omaha, Kansas City, Des Moines, St. Louis, Columbus. Cleveland is a lot more similar to cities like Detroit, Chicago and Milwaukee, I guess you could call them lake cities. They tend to be more progressive and more dense and have a more diverse population. A lot of people refer to Cleveland as "Lil Chicago" because Cleveland really is just a smaller version of Chicago, we have all the same things they do just on a smaller (except our lake shore is nowhere near Chicago's yet).

Also, a lot of people still refer to Cleveland as "The North Coast". And sometimes that term is used broader for the whole area near the Great Lakes that is near a lake. The North Coast has been one of the nicknames of the area for as long as I can remember and people I know are still using it as much as ever.

I am very aware (and its obvious) that Cleveland is technically in the midwest, I never said it was in the Northeast region. But if you look at a map without knowing the regions, Cleveland is undoubtedly in the Northeast (of the US). Also, I meant that as a compliment I dont understand how you could get offended by that?. I am from Cleveland and love the area, its a great place.

How old are you? I'm almost 52 (will turn 52 on July 9) and have lived in northeast Ohio all my life, all but three of those years in Wickliffe and the last eight years in Fairport Harbor.

I apologize for my remark "...don't let all that 'North Coast' jazz from Cleveland bother you..." in my last post. I really should follow my own advice and refuse to let the phrase bother me. (I have since taken that attitude, and as a result it doesn't bother me in the least now--I simply ignore it these days, as I feel I know this area much better, by virtue of having lived here my entire life, than whomever started that expression 30+ years ago.) I don't hear it being used much to describe the Cleveland area (note I said "not much" because I do hear it now and then on the TV news and occasionally over the radio, especially on Ashtabula-area radio stations which come in very well where I live, a mile or so from the south shore of the lake), but I do hear the expression used very extensively to describe the Ashtabula area, which is almost literally on Lake Erie.

I agree with you that Cleveland is much more like Detroit, Milwaukee, Chicago and other lakeshore cities, so it is probably more accurate to describe the area in which these cities are located as the Great Lakes region. The term "Midwest" is more suited to states such as Nebraska, Iowa, etc. that are located some distance from the Great Lakes and, by virtue of geography, are closer to the center of the country.

I never meant to "knock" Cleveland, even though I never lived in the city proper in my life; in fact, I am very glad to have found out that some folks in the area refer to Cleveland as "little Chicago". I will probably never live in Chicago (I like the small town where I've lived the last eight years too doggone much, after having lived in the suburbs 43 years), but it's nice to know some folks around here consider Cleveland a smaller version of Chicago. As I said in my last post, that is one of the best things I have read about Cleveland in years; it puts the city in a much better light, I think, than it has been in for decades. Certainly Cleveland and northeastern Ohio have problems, but then again so does every other city in the United States. The people who insist on giving this area a black eye by hurling insults such as "the mistake on the lake", et al. (don't forget 1978, when Cleveland went into default under Dennis Kucinich as mayor, and the burning of the Cuyahoga River over four decades ago--these events are really what started the Cleveland bashing), do not realize what a great area this actually is. Cleveland has been referred to as "the best location in the nation" (this phrase was used for years, and may still be used today, on CEI bills), the "Great American City," and so on, which should put the area in a much better light than many out-of-towners and even area residents have been led to believe for years or decades.

In my humble opinion, it is time (past time) for the so-called Cleveland bashing to come to an end; the city doesn't deserve it. Cleveland has problems, but many of them are being resolved. The lakefront developments are coming along nicely from what I've seen on TV (I don't get The Plain Dealer so don't know what it says about this; the Lake County paper doesn't say much about downtown Cleveland or the rest of the city either), albeit slowly, so in a few years we may well see changes that, hopefully, will draw more people to the city as well as create more jobs. The latter is one reason many people are leaving Cleveland and even the state of Ohio in search of employment; it goes without saying this trend must be reversed, soon, or else the city may well go downhill faster than some its neighborhoods have in recent years.

Cleveland, again in my opinion, needs much more than just the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame if it wants to boost tourism. As it is, there is little else to see in the city except the so-called "Rock Hall"; this may be an attraction for people such as myself who grew up with rock and roll music, but for older folks there is little or nothing to see in the city. I live too far from Cleveland to see much of the downtown area (I do not drive), but from what I have seen on TV and in the papers, Cleveland has a long way to go before it will be any kind of tourist attraction for anyone other than baby boomers. Heaven help us if anything bad happens to the Rock Hall. If it were gone, tourism in Cleveland would surely drop like a stone.

[BelieveInCleve]

I am currently 27 years old and have lived in Northeast Ohio all of my life so far. I have visited a lot of other places but I never officially lived outside of NE Ohio. I have lived in Elyria, Lorain, North Ridgeville, and the city of Cleveland for a short time. Even though the whole area has high unemployment and more than its share of problems (some places more than others), Im from here I grew up here and I will always love it because its my home.

The Cleveland bashing does need to stop though, the least that should happen is stop the bashing by the people who live here (which just happens to be where the bulk of the bashing is coming from), but we do have good reason to bash the city. The state of the city, sports, river, weather, all of this is good reason to bash. I feel that once we get a championship things will really start to change though, or at least the attitude in the city. We have a lot of great things near by: Cedar point (#1 amusement park in America for like 8 years in a row), Rock n Roll hall of fame, Indians, Cavs, Browns, Cleveland Clinic, other great hospitals, University Circle and all the museums, beaches, the lake, a lot of concerts, decent colleges, unique neighborhoods and suburbs, and so much more. We have a lot going for us and its a shame the area is in the position that its in right now.

[Traveler87]

I agree, Cle440.

Cleveland has a lot to offer.

Yes, we do have our problems. We our a major city, last time I checked most major cities have their problems. I just got back from vacation, and even the so-called booming areas of the country are facing so many problems. Down in Florida, my one friend's development had so many houses with the orange papers on the front doors telling you that it is foreclosed.

Its nice to hear people say how much Cleveland has changed since the 80s or even the 90s. Cleveland is on the rebound, but we will not hide our problems. The first step to making the city better is facing these problems and tackling them.

[jh1347s]

Originally Posted by Cle440

I understand what you are saying, but Cleveland has a lot of differences in feel from midwestern cities like Indianapolis, Omaha, Kansas City, Des Moines, St. Louis, Columbus. Cleveland is a lot more similar to cities like Detroit, Chicago and Milwaukee, I guess you could call them lake cities. They tend to be more progressive and more dense and have a more diverse population. A lot of people refer to Cleveland as "Lil Chicago" because Cleveland really is just a smaller version of Chicago, we have all the same things they do just on a smaller (except our lake shore is nowhere near Chicago's yet).

Also, a lot of people still refer to Cleveland as "The North Coast". And sometimes that term is used broader for the whole area near the Great Lakes that is near a lake. The North Coast has been one of the nicknames of the area for as long as I can remember and people I know are still using it as much as ever.

I just looked at the website for a radio station (WMJK-FM 100.9) in Port Clinton, near Toledo, that calls itself "The Coast", and in fact its logo has the phrase "Northcoast Classic Rock" directly below the frequency. Therefore, I guess "the North Coast" can and probably does refer to the entire lakeshore area from Ashtabula to Toledo. I did not realize, until I saw the Port Clinton radio station's website, that the phrase was used anywhere else in Ohio except Cleveland and along the south Lake Erie shore east to Ashtabula.

There is an area of California, however, that has an actual North Coast (the phrase is not a nickname as it is in the Cleveland area). The city is Eureka, which is located, yup, you guessed it, on the north shore (coast) of the Pacific Ocean. I remember seeing ads for Eureka, California in National Geographic magazines as far back as the early 1960s, which referred to the Eureka area as "The North Coast" (of the Pacific Ocean). At least one of Eureka's TV stations (I forget which one) refers to itself to this day as "the spirit of the North Coast" as well, so the use of that phrase is by no means restricted to the lakeshore area of northeastern Ohio.

How about that! You learn something new every day.



Jeff Strieble
Fairport Harbor, Ohio USA

[MsVFAB]

Originally Posted by SoCalClevelander

One thing good about Cleveland is that you can live in say Westlake, yet go to dinner in Cleveland Heights without much trouble. LA has all the greatest restaurants in the world, but I cant get to them on weeknights. Meeting friends after work is out unless you just happen to live nearby. Everything here is planned by traffic--and avoiding it.

Cleveland has many cool neighborhoods--as does LA--but again, if you can't get to them, it only leaves the weekends (and traffic is bad then, too--just not AS bad).

I left in 1999, and I am sorry to hear some of the awesome things about the town are gone (the Flats, how could the Flats be gone?) but it looks like new things are coming along as well.

To the original poster: it's not fair to compare Cleveland to NYC--NYC is a place of its own, with more to do than probably anywhere in the world. Yeah, Cleveland wont hold up to that. But if you really look for cool things to do, they are there!

And you should already be used to the crappy weather

Having lived in the NYC area, I have to say the crappy weather there isn't as bad as the crappy weather here... The Atlantic ocean actually keeps the east coast a bit warmer, and there isn't all that blowing cold, like we get off Lake Erie...

Having said that, I have lived in LA, SF, Tampa, Houston, and an hour and a half away from NYC, and no place compares to Cleveland...

With my job, I could literally live anywhere in the world... I chose to move back to Cleveland and buy a house, instead of buying in Savannah (which was at the top of my list of places to move and own property)...

I love Cleveland... There is always something to do, and you can find peace and quiet here, which is something that is non-existent in so many places (unless you have loads of money)...

[jh1347s]

I just finished reading several articles on the Cuyahoga River fire of 40 years ago (found them in a Google search), and am still wondering why (or if) Cleveland still has a reputation as "the mistake on the lake." I am 52 years old, was born in East Cleveland, was raised in Wickliffe (with a short stay in Cleveland Heights in the early '70s) and now live in Fairport Harbor, so was a suburbanite a good part of my life (40 years, until I moved to Fairport nine years ago); however, I remember all too well the news coverage given the Cuyahoga River fire in 1969. Does Cleveland still carry the stigma of being "the mistake on the lake", or has the passage of time pushed that aside to the point where most folks don't think much of it anymore?

I think we should look to Cleveland's future, rather than dwelling on a fire that put the city in a very unfavorable light for decades--causing the rest of the U.S. to laugh their heads off at us, as the event made national news and was the subject of jokes on late-night TV talk shows of the time. The Cuyahoga is much cleaner now than it was four decades ago; goodness knows Cleveland did not then (and certainly does not now) deserve or need that kind of negative publicity--especially at this time, when the city's population is dwindling.

[mommamia b]

^ i was raised in Wickliffe, too! little bit younger though