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Part of it might also be because other people actually read the OP’s post that explicitly stated having already gone to NYC and Miami and was scouting other options. Did you also notice the lack of NYC mentions which would be the obvious common answer?
It should be pointed out that Miami's dt isn't that great. The action is more in SoBe which is a separate city. I've been to what they call dt Miami and was very underwhelmed. Brickell is better but Brickell is not large and I feel many more cities have more stuff to do in their dt.
Cleveland, of all places, believe it or not, definitely does not rank with the big boys -- NYC, Chicago, Philly, SF, Boston (by day, anyway), etc.-- This is largely because downtown Cleveland is physically small and the shopping aspect basically stinks (though improving slightly) -- the main core is less than 1 mile out Euclid through Playhouse Sq. with some spillover onto Prospect out to around 13th street then west into the Warehouse District, which is only a couple blocks, then down into the Flats... but it's underrated and punches well above its weight.
The fact downtown Cleveland is small, and compact is to its advantage, making it highly walkable supplemented by free RTA trolleys (really small buses made to look like old-time trolleys, but cool nonetheless) which run every 5-10 minutes until 11p. But few cities have as much concentrated weekend energy in its hot areas, like E. 4th (a truly electric block of restaurants with no cars allowed), E. 9th Prospect/Euclid, Playhouse Square and, now, especially the Flats East Bank, which is totally off the hook crazy; and the fact it is along the riverfront will all sorts of freighters, pleasure boats, paddle boats, and even jet skis, adds to the Flats uniqueness.
Another aspect to downtown is Ohio City, which is 1 mile or so away over the Cuyahoga River/Flats; the core areas easily reachable by a ton of bus routes and a stop on the Red Line rapid transit near the OC's Market Square core -- an area where bars are hopping until 2:30a, even on Sundays and weekday nights. Cleveland, like Chicago (but on a lesser scale, of course) is a big neighborhood/bar/restaurant/club city, with many buzzing old-line commercial districts in the city and some close-in suburbs like Lakewood and Cleveland Heights.
Cleveland’s a great city, but I think its massive downtown parking lots, especially as close to mass transit stations as they are. really detract from it. It’s a shame because there’s a lot of great stuff in downtown Cleveland and a rather large legacy transit network that can be made great use of, but so much of what would be in a nice half mile walking radius of those stations is just surface parking lot.
It should be pointed out that Miami's dt isn't that great. The action is more in SoBe which is a separate city. I've been to what they call dt Miami and was very underwhelmed. Brickell is better but Brickell is not large and I feel many more cities have more stuff to do in their dt.
South Beach is definitely the most bustling part of Miami, though it’s not part of Miami city limits.
That being said, downtown Miami and its neighboring area has a lot of built density that can probably be shifted into a much better walkable area in a pretty short amount of time and it’s moving in that direction. I think a year or two after Tri-Rail services downtown Miami, we’ll probably see a definitively great urban downtown for Miami because by then there will have been a lot of new completed developments downtown that have a larger street level focus.
South Beach is definitely the most bustling part of Miami, though it’s not part of Miami city limits.
That being said, downtown Miami and its neighboring area has a lot of built density that can probably be shifted into a much better walkable area in a pretty short amount of time and it’s moving in that direction. I think a year or two after Tri-Rail services downtown Miami, we’ll probably see a definitively great urban downtown for Miami because by then there will have been a lot of new completed developments downtown that have a larger street level focus.
CBD needs to be focused instead of 3 or 4 towers being built downtown. It needs an all out boom, not talking about Brickell, bay, and Overfelt areas, just downtown core. That's where the attention is needed, but the boom is winding down due to poorer economy in Brazil/other latin America, higher interest rates and higher U.S. currency. Downtown Miami core is lucky to get some building underway but not enough to change the downtown environment to warrant a busting and exciting downtown.
Cleveland’s a great city, but I think its massive downtown parking lots, especially as close to mass transit stations as they are. really detract from it. It’s a shame because there’s a lot of great stuff in downtown Cleveland and a rather large legacy transit network that can be made great use of, but so much of what would be in a nice half mile walking radius of those stations is just surface parking lot.
I agree. There are some really ugly surface parking holes downtown, esp that northwestern corner of Public Square stretching deep into the Warehouse District.
Unfortunately there is just too much incentive for lot owners to simply hang onto these lots for the cash cow of daytime parking fees and its tough to induce them to sell... But I'm understanding towards Cleveland given that the City is really trying: it's come back from a devastating population and economic collapse (which partly led to the PS hole when the bank that proposed building there collapsed financially... just after it had torn down the older buildings to make way for the project!!), and much of what the City is focusing on is re-purposing abandoned office buildings into residences and trying to lure small-to-medium firms back into downtown. This approach, esp the apartment conversions, has been very successful, even though there is still high inventory of empty, deteriorating office buildings -- many rehabs are dependent on landing precious, tough-to-get State historic tax credits.
The large new buildings buildings that are going up/have recently gone up (Flats East Bank, the Hilton, along with the Beacon and Lumen (Playhouse Square) Apt towers), are very hard to come by because, despite all the good going on downtown, bank pre-sales requirements for are quite high and difficult for developers to achieve. These lending requirements are tough enough for simply the rehabs; for new builds, they are off the hook. For every new hotel or apartment tower rising in Cleveland, esp downtown, the packages of tax credits and subsidies and loans are so complex they'd make MIT or Wharton profs sweat. The amazing, $500M Flats East Bank development, for example, took years to piece together and barely made to the finish line to allow shovels to go into the ground nearly a decade after FEB's plans were sets. It's that difficult.
Frustratingly RTA/mass transit has been a tough sell to Cleveland pols and developers, which is a total head-scratcher given the obviously that several American Cities are killing themselves, and would give their eye-teeth, to have the rail-BRT-downtown trolley network Cleveland already has. (Hello Nashville, where voters just deep 6ed a multi-billion dollar rail/BRT proposal that would have given the Music City a network similar in size to Cleveland's)... At least there is some positive rail TOD development going on: University Circle and Little Italy are exploding with TOD apt/retail and the new Van Aken end-of-the-Rapid project is about to come on line... Also Flats East Bank is about to embark on Phase 3 which I seriously hope gets some butts on the Waterfront Line LRT so RTA can start running it more normal hours...
Last edited by TheProf; 06-03-2018 at 05:22 PM..
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