Downtown Cleveland Inc. makes a move

Starting next year, the new home of Downtown Cleveland Inc., formerly
the Downtown Cleveland Alliance, will be 668 Euclid Ave., just a short
walk from its current home at 1010 Euclid Ave. The move is touted by
the nonprofit development corporation as putting it more in the center
of the action downtown  and will help it reduce operating costs (Yelp).
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In written statement to the media and others, Downtown Cleveland, Inc. today announced board approval of its move to a new office location next year. The decision comes after careful consideration of the organization’s operational needs and strategic goals, with the aim of bolstering visibility, enhancing accessibility for stakeholders and the community, and reinforcing its refreshed brand identity.

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Midtown developments accelerate

Funding procurement for the Warner & Swasey redevelopment has advanced
far enough to where the project is up for conceptual approval by the city this
week. Plans show the long-abandoned site will be reborn with 112 afford-
able apartments for seniors and families with a future phase offering 28
market-rate apartments. The project is considered by many to be a
catalyst for further development in Midtown (Geis).
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Long considered as the affordable and accessible place to live between downtown and University Circle, the Midtown neighborhood of Cleveland is starting to take off. Multiple development projects are under way or planned in this area, midway between two of Ohio’s largest employment hubs — the city’s central business district and its eds-and-meds hub. And a project that many consider to be the key to unlocking further development in Midtown is finally moving forward.

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Shoving ye spades into the leitir

Local, regional, state and federal officials assembled today near Merwin’s
Wharf in the Flats, across the Cuyahoga River from the unstable hillside
that will host Irishtown Bend Park to celebrate the start of construction
of hillside stabilization work. That will precede construction work on
the park itself, due to get under way in 2025.Ward 3 Councilman
Kerry McCormack kicked off the ceremonies (KJP).
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Today was a hooley 175 years in the making. Hundreds of people celebrated today on the banks of the Cuyahoga River, across the waters from the lietir, or hillside where work is already starting to stabilize a slope on which Irish immigrants settled under difficult circumstances long ago. Today, their struggle is about to be memorialized with the $100-plus million Irishtown Bend Park.

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The fate of East Cleveland

Sixty years ago, my mother and two older brothers lived in the Superior
Glen Apartments at left, at the corner of Superior and Glenmont Avenues
in East Cleveland. Across Superior, at right, a small portion of Forest Hill
Park is visible. The city has fallen far in the six decades since and isn’t
done falling. Multiple apartment buildings at left were demolished. The
apartments at right were vacated in the late 2010s. The fate of Forest
Hill Park and East Cleveland is not hopeful (Google).
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In the 1950s, after my mother Edith March Prendergast divorced her first husband, she moved herself and her two boys to Greater Cleveland to be near family. After a brief stay at the Alcazar Hotel, she settled at the south end of Glenmont Avenue in Cleveland Heights. Then she moved to the north end of Glenmont which is in East Cleveland. There, she, Dale and Dean stayed until the early 1960s when she married my father James and moved into his home in Lyndhurst.

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For sale: The Justice Center

Cuyahoga County is offering for sale its 2-million-square-foot, 7-acre
Justice Center complex in downtown Cleveland to the highest bidder
and the county would continue to use and lease much of the complex
for at least several more years until new, renovated and/or expanded
facilities costing upwards of $1.2 billion can replace them (Cuyahoga
County). CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM.

All five above-ground buildings in downtown’s Justice Center complex, plus a below-ground parking garage, are being offered for sale by Cuyahoga County as a result of other efforts that could partially or completely vacate the entire 2-million-square-foot facility. The sale includes a three-year leaseback with four additional one-year renewal options so the county and city of Cleveland will have time to carry out those vacating efforts. No sale price was listed for the property but if you have to ask, you probably can’t afford it anyway.

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City Club Apartments tops out

At today’s topping-off ceremony, construction workers signed the final beam
to be placed atop the new City Club Apartments tower on Euclid Avenue
near East 9th Street in downtown (Cleveland Construction Inc.).
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Cleveland Construction, Inc., the contractor behind the City Club Apartments project in downtown Cleveland, celebrated a significant construction milestone as the project reached its full height. The “Topping Out” event was held today and highlighted by a team lunch provided by Fahrenheit’s food truck and a ceremonial steel beam signing by all the craft professionals building the project.

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McNair tapped as new development director

Tom McNair has served leadership positions at Ohio City Inc. since 2010.
At the end of September, his workplace will move across the Cuyahoga
River to downtown, seen behind the West Side Market in the back-
ground (NAIOP). CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM.

For the past 14 years, Tom McNair rode the Rapid from Shaker Square to Ohio City where he led its community development corporation in different roles. At the end of September, his train will have a new destination — Cleveland City Hall. Mayor Justin Bibb announced yesterday that McNair will be the city’s new director of economic development.

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Would Cliffs + USS = a new tower?

Cleveland-Cliffs is continuing to build its empire with US Steel the next item
on its shopping list. Will that result in a new headquarters tower going on the
list as well? There is a multi-year-long path where that could be the desti-
ation (Cleveland-Cliffs). CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM.

Three years ago, when Cleveland-Cliffs made some big moves, NEOtrans asked the question. Three years later, we’re asking it again. If Cliffs is able to acquire rival United States Steel (USS), as recently proposed, what impact might this have on the combined company’s headquarters situation?

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Cleveland Thermal target of acquisition

The 129-year-old coal-fired Cleveland Thermal steam heating plant on Canal
Road, at right, in downtown was shut down nearly seven years ago and is next
to the big Bedrock riverfront development site. It’s worth watching to see what
happens next to this and a couple of other sites around town (Google).
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As Dan Gilbert’s real estate firm gets ready to roll out the details of phase one of its riverfront development, a neighboring fixture on the banks of the Cuyahoga River since 1894 may not be around much longer. The long-closed Cleveland Thermal steam heating plant, 2274 Canal Rd., along with possibly other properties of Cleveland Thermal Generation LLC are in the process of being acquired, according to a real estate source.

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Old Brooklyn Lofts gets early OK

Old Brooklyn Lofts is a proposed redevelopment in the heart of the project’s
namesake neighborhood of Cleveland  to convert a vacant mixed-use building
with high ceilings into apartments, most with bedroom lofts. A 12-space park-
ing lot will be constructed behind the building on the right (Google).
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A Parma real estate investor and his development team won conceptual approval yesterday from a local design review panel to convert the vacant, century-old Independent Order of Odd Fellows Temple at 3409 Broadview Rd. in the heart of Cleveland’s Old Brooklyn neighborhood into loft-style apartments. The team will then refine their plans into more detail schematic designs for review by the Planning Commission’s citywide design-review committee prior to construction.

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Ohio City buildings to be razed for Bridgeworks

An axiometric view of the proposed demolition plan for the Bridgeworks
site, at the west end of the Detroit-Superior Bridge in Cleveland’s Ohio
City neighborhood. But the pending demolition of buildings on the site
doesn’t mean construction is about to begin. Instead, the demolition
is sought because the developers could lose a state grant to aid in
the demolition if they don’t use it soon (LDA/Mass).
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Two historic buildings are proposed to be torn down for a 16-story, mixed-use development in Cleveland’s Ohio City neighborhood, despite information that financing, including the use of air rights, for the high-rise is still being finalized. A demolition permit application was filed Aug. 4 by LDA Architects of Cleveland for Bridgeworks LLC with the city’s Building Department following recent approvals of the demolitions by the city’s Landmarks Commission and a design review committee. But the approvals by those two panels in the City Planning Commission were made with the presumption that the overall Bridgeworks development would be carried out.

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Bedrock to start riverfront work

This view shows the location of the first phase of planned rehabilitation of
steel bulkheads along the edge of the Cuyahoga River. The work would
be the first evidence on the landscape for Bedrock’s huge riverfront de-
velopment (Osborn Engineering). CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM

A company owned by billionaire Dan Gilbert has secured a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for the reconstruction of bulkheads along the edge of the Cuyahoga River, a federal navigation channel. The approved work will be one of the first tangible pieces of Detroit-based Bedrock Real Estate’s huge Cleveland Riverfront Development Project.

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Erieview, Galleria redo: steps forward, back

 Proposed uses and activities for the Erieview Tower and associated Galleria
were updated this week in a presentation shared by a development team

led by James Kassouf as part of a request for tax abatement from the

city (Berardi). CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM.

A $193 million redevelopment of half-empty Erieview Tower and its associated and similarly vacated Galleria shopping mall, 1301 E. 9th St.,  is the first big project to request a scaled-down tax abatement from the city under Mayor Justin Bibb’s new abatement policy. That policy reduces the amount of tax abatement for new construction or renovation in stable, wealthier neighborhoods in Cleveland, including downtown.

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GCRTA stations: lots of opportunity

Here are just four of the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority’s 21 rail
stations that have park-n-ride lots. All station parking lots are largely devoid of
cars since the pandemic. Even before that, most station lots weren’t as full as
they used to be. With downtown employment and commuting way down and
interest in transit-oriented development up, these large parking lots can be
developed with new uses to support regional goals like adding affordable
housing, improving access to jobs and reduced emissions (Google).
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A COMMENTARY

In recent months, the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (GCRTA) has served notice that its rail system isn’t going anywhere. That could be interpreted in one of two ways. In one way, GCRTA plans to invest $540 million by the end of this decade to rebuild its 34-mile rail system including a new, standardized light-rail fleet plus rebuilt tracks and stations on the Red, Blue and Green lines. Greater Cleveland’s “Rapid” is sticking around for decades to come. But taking it another way, there are no expansion plans while ridership on GCRTA buses and trains fell nearly 60 percent from 2013 to 2021 “led” by its rail system which fell even farther, from 9.3 million boardings in 2013 to 2.9 million in 2021.

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Seeds & Sprouts 31 – Oliva Steakhouse on downtown’s menu; Starting Point center opening at Link59; Lido Lounge stripped by George, BofA

 Proposed signage on the façade of a new restaurant, Oliva Steakhouse,
on West St. Clair Ave., in downtown Cleveland’s Warehouse District (Richardson).
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Oliva Steakhouse is on downtown’s Cleveland's menu, Starting Point center to train child educators and caregivers is opening at Link59 in the Midtown neighborhood, and Lido Lounge on West 117th Street is getting stripped from the landscape by Bobby George and Bank of America.

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