Streetcars & Pecha Kucha

Some short notes on a couple items in Soapbox this week. First, an excellent opinion on the streetcar.

It should be noted that the proposed Mill Creek Expressway/I-75 project will essentially add one single lane of freeway in both directions of I-75 between the Western Hills Viaduct and Paddock Road, while also revamping on/off ramps, and will cost an estimated $642.5 million. That's an extra lane of freeway for 7.9 miles, plus revamping interchanges.  ...In addition to the $642.5 million Mill Creek Expressway project, the Through the Valley project will engage in an additional widening exercise from Paddock to I-275 at the cost of an additional $149 million (at least).

...Coincidentally enough, if the full stretch [of the streetcar] to the zoo and back were implemented, it would be a route of roughly 7.9 miles, the same stretch of widening on I-75.

So we have critics carping on the profligacy of spending $185 million versus a whopping $800 million for freeway widening.

 

The second item I noticed was about the apparent success of the first Pecha Kucha night in Cincinnati.

"PK Vol. 1 was such a huge success," says official organizer, Greg Lewis. "It demonstrated that the same desire that got PK started in Tokyo six years ago is present here in Cincinnati today."

Uh, I don't mean anything negative, but I know that technology groups around the region have been doing these presentations for last two years.  They may not have been as flashy, and certainly none were in as cool a venue as the CAC, but they have been around.  You may have heard them mistakenly referred to as Machu Pichu talks, or Pikachu presentations, but PK has been present in Cincinnati for a while now.  So thanks for participating.  :) 

Storm's A-Comin'

Tornado sirens sounded on and off as a high wind advisory lasted throughout the day and into the night.  But the afternoon was actually pretty calm, except for a few isolated torrential rainstorms that stopped as soon as they started.  Here's the end of one of those rainstorms, looking at Bellevue and Dayton.

And those two pictures stitched together...

A Word On Consumption

One thing I love about CityKin is that I get all this great information from urban/green media, but don't have to track any of it. In a post about efficiency vs. sustainability is this quoted quote:

Driving a car that is 10% more efficient uses the same amount of gas as driving 10% less.

It's a sentiment I've dwelled on before. Sure, it's great if that new pair of shoes is made locally by workers paid a living wage with sustainable materials, but do you really need a new pair of shoes? (Forgive me if my example offends those of you who love your shoes.)

I don't consider myself particularly green with the stuff I have, but I have a compulsion to own as little as possible. (Or maybe I'm just cheap.) I have a coat that used to be my dad's. All my shoes are at least 6 years old. I pretty much own things until they are run into the ground. Then I try to sell them on eBay or give them to Goodwill. Unfortunately, the more I look around, the more it feels like we live in a disposable world.

I don't know if it's my training, or if I'm just lazy, but I am also very anal about energy and time trade-offs. I hate sitting in traffic. I hate braking on hills. I love walking because even though it takes more time, I benefit from the activity and from saving gas. I meticulously load every corner of the dishwasher, and usually hand-wash pots and pans. I break down every box I throw away or recycle, not only to save landfill or bin space, but also because it means I'll have to take out the garbage less.

I like this quote from CityKin's post a lot too.

Living in a place where you can get to all the daily necessities of life by walking, biking or driving gives you much more freedom than living in a place where your only choice is driving.

I don't get to drive much, so sometimes I just like drive around at night aimlessly. Especially in the summer. At first, I felt guilty about it, like I was wasting gas, but eventually I realized the same thing in that quote. Being green is about freedom just as much as it is about anything else.

Third Least Popular? Sure.

The Enquirer points out a Pew Research Study on Social & Demographic Trends that place Cincinnati third from the bottom of a list of cities people would most like to live.

I started this post by trying to point out the flawed methodology in the study, as I usually do for negative reports.  But the methodology was pretty solid.  So I looked at the part of the phone survey that gathered data for this list of cities.  The question went like this:

As I read through the following places, just tell me your first reaction: Would you want to live in this city or its surrounding metropolitan area or NOT want to live there?

First, …[INSERT ITEM; RANDOMIZE]

READ IF NECESSARY: What’s your first reaction? Would you want to live in [INSERT ITEM] or not want to live there?
IF RESPONDENT SAYS THEY CURRENTLY LIVE IN THIS AREA, PROBE ONCE: “If you had a choice, would you want to live there, or not want to live there?”

So it really becomes a gut answer.  I say a name, you give me your first reaction.  And when I think about what my answers would be, all the superficial reputations I have for cities, good or bad, bubble to the top.

When I hear...	I immediately think of...
New York City	Way cool, way hard to live there.
Cleveland	Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame. River caught on fire.
Dallas	Hot, flat, crowded. Um, Texas.
Minneapolis	Quite nice. Lakes and forests.
Orlando	Hot, flat. Disneyworld. Lots of young people.
Portland	Hippies wearing hemp and riding streetcars.
Sacramento	Hot, flat, desert. Near Tahoe.
St. Louis	Uh, they got that big arch.
Pittsburgh	Very scenic. Hills and rivers.
San Diego	Beach, beach, beach. First line of defense from Mexico.
Detroit	Robocop.
Houston	Even hotter than Dallas.
Las Vegas	Desert. Water shortages. The Strip of course.
Los Angeles	Way cool. Sprawling. Traffic.
San Antonio	The Alamo. The Riverwalk. Um, Texas.
Philadelphia	East coast, but not too east coast. Still expensive.
Phoenix	Desert. Retirees.
Seattle	Beautiful scenery. Lots of childless couples with dogs.
Tampa	Beach. Retirees?
Washington, D.C.	Lots of interesting things going on. Expensive.
Atlanta	Big city. Southern hospitality.
Baltimore	Inner harbor. Armpit of Washington, D.C.
Boston	Scenic waterways. Lots of young people and colleges.
Chicago	Scenic lakefront. Big city. Midwestern sensibilities.
Denver	Mountains, mountains, mountains.
Kansas City	Funny that Kansas City is not in Kansas.
Miami	Expensive and pretentious. Pro athletes. Celebrities. Nice weather though.
Riverside	Riverside? California? Isn't this just part of L.A.?
San Francisco	Gay people. Liberal bastion. Technology.

 

I put those up very quickly. Now what about Cincinnati?  Obviously, I'm biased, but if really tried to pretend I was an outsider, what are the first things that spring to mind?  WKRP.  Rain man. Conservative.

And that's the problem we, and the likes of Detroit and Cleveland, face.  Of course, Cincinnati is a great place to live for all sorts of people.  But how would you know?   That's the work that's never finished. 

So I believe that Cincinnati might finish third from the bottom in a survey like that, even if I know it's not true. 

State-Of-The-Art Simulation Center... On Short Vine

Soapbox writes about the University of Cincinnati's Simulation Center (UCSC) in collaboration with Procter & Gamble.  The UCSC is a high-performance computing center for simulating products, systems, and processes that are related to P&G product lines.

For some reason, I think it's interesting that it's in the middle of Short Vine, an area I never took for advanced anything, despite its proximity to UC.  Ever since I've been able to drive, Short Vine has conjured up images of tattoo parlors, punk clothing and beauty product stores, Bogart's, and Top Cats.  Now, the only reason I walk the street is when I go to Martino's.

But I guess with all the new Uptown Consortium development on MLK, the area is changing.  I always thought that the Short Vine area would be one of the best neighborhoods to live in a parallel universe.  There is a library, post office, drug store, and grocery store - all the ingredients of a walkable neighborhood.  But of course, it's not one of the best neighborhoods to live in, yet.

In any case, here is the building.  I remember seeing the UCSC building being renovated a few years ago.  I remember thinking to myself, "that's interesting. Somebody's rehabbing that building. I wonder what for?"

 

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Cincinnati Is Cool

I can't remember where I saw this link, but I always enjoy reading about others' travels to our Queen City. In this edition, Chicago Carless goes into very specific detail about his weekend visit to Cincinnati, and why Cincinnati is cool. There's the usual praise for Skyline and Graeter's. There is also now what has been noticed for a third time by these visiting bloggers: an inexplicable schizophrenic quality to the fabric of the city and its people and almost palpable feeling of potential.

How to parse a city of aesthetic beauty, civic pride, high cultural amenities, and, at the most unexpected times, low social graces?

Again, Cincinnati and its identity crisis. Are we the North or the South? The East or the Midwest? Are we internet or manufacturing? Are we a small town with big city amenities? Or a big city with small town charms? What message does Cincinnati send?

There was no artifice here. Nothing was prettified. Just basic communication passing among familiar faces. Unexpected, a bit shocking in its primal quality. But not out of place. It did make me wonder whether inside the average Queen Citizen beat the heart of a conformer. We may be down, but we’re down together, and as long as we lie low, things can’t get much worse, so let’s just leave well enough alone.

To put it another way, perhaps: in Cincinnati, it is important to work hard, shut up, and do what you're supposed to do. It's why fancy nightclubs get so much guff. It's why people take comfort in things that have been the same and familiar for so long, and why people get upset when the Fountain gets moved 30 ft. to the north. It's why the most successful businesses here are still in manufacturing, consumer goods, and insurance, despite the best efforts of the biotech and internet sectors. It's why change happens so slowly, and it's why people segregate themselves with people who are alike.

However, in Cincinnati, it's also relatively easy to make a difference. If you want to be an up-and-comer, I don't think you have to compete with as many people like you might in other places.

These traits, positive and negative, make Cincinnati what it is: an easy place to live. Cincinnati gives quite a lot and does not ask for much in return. Friendly, inexpensive, and, despite the bellyaching, without lot of big city issues. You have world-class arts and professional sports. You can decide at 4 pm to take in a major-league baseball game at 7 pm that same day. (That may say more about our baseball team than it does our town.) People who move here tend to get stuck here. People who move away tend to come back. At least, that's been my experience.

Like his friend Dan at Park + Vine:

When he told me in 2006 he was ditching his Windy City communications career to open what I figured would be a glorified hemp shop in a marginal nabe of a secondary rust-belt town, I thought he had already begun smoking his product. As I purchased my recycled bicycle-tire wallet with the writing still on it from the happiest man on Vine Street, I knew Dan had made the right decision.

Here is a full list of recent visits to Cincinnati by bloggers.

• From Minneapolis: Other City Sidewalks: Cincinnati, Ohio (my take)
• From Indianapolis: Cincinnati: A Midwest Conundrum (my take)
• From Toronto: Cincinnati Photo Diary
• And quite recently: New Year's In Cinci

Streetcars Hit Major Bump In The Road

So a diverse coalition of groups led by the NAACP want to put the streetcar on the ballot.

The NAACP recently launched a petition drive to place an issue on the November ballot that would amend the city’s charter to prevent Cincinnati officials from spending money on the streetcar project without first getting approval from city voters.

I definitely appreciate the sentiment. When the same group of people wanted to put the jail tax on the ballot, to let the people decide, I wholeheartedly agreed because I did not support the jail tax. I voted to put it on the ballot, and when it was, I voted against it (both times). But this time, I find myself on the other side of the coin.

I have quoted lots of evidence in support of streetcars on this blog already. The NAACP's main objection seems to be that there are better uses for the money.

Smitherman believes the money could be better spent elsewhere, such as in neighborhood business districts. Streetcar systems are a risky gamble that have failed in some cities, he says, and Cincinnati’s mostly would benefit people who own property along the proposed route and developers like Towne Properties, which is owned by Bortz’s family.

To be sure, it's a risk, and there are many other ways to spend the money. But let's say we take the $100 million required to build the first phase of the streetcar. The city has 52 neighborhood councils. We could give each neighborhood nearly $2 million dollars - a vast increase in their current dole - and it would certainly be put to good use. But the streetcar is projected to return $1.4 billion dollars in investment, investment that means new residents, new businesses, and higher payroll tax. Big picture here.

Also, the fact that the issue is for support of a charter amendment is a bit weird. To me - and I'm no lawyer - it's as if Congress passes an amendment to the constitution outlawing Amtrak.

In any case, let me clearly state my opinion: if this issue gets on the ballot, the streetcar proposal will fail.

Because while I believe that people are good-intentioned, the masses are dumb. The majority of people who even bother to vote will not even know about all the issues they will vote on until they are in the voting booth. Which means we will have a repeat of the kind of vote that put two stadiums on the riverfront, and of course a repeat of the vote that doomed the light rail initiative in 2002. (BTW, had the light rail initiative passed in 2002, we would have had running streetcars for the past two years already.) If it goes to the ballot, streetcars will not become a reality for at least another decade. And the NAACP has a very good record with getting issues on the ballot.

The streetcar is not a transportation plan. It is a development plan. The point of the streetcar is not to get people where they need to go. It's to get people to stay. It's to get people to live, work, and stay where we want them to stay, namely, in the city. I believe it's a distinction easily lost.

Also see UrbanCincy's strong reaction to the NAACP petition.