From a former member of the old North East Ohio Sierra Club Urban Sprawl Committee who now lives elsewhere:

Based on my memories of the Plain Dealer-

To dream the ...

Hi Lee -

I write about real estate and development for the Plain Dealer, and I wrote one of the stories that you referenced in your letter. I have written several other stories about development in Midtown, in general, and the hospital project, in particular.

Just for reference, here is the first story that the Plain Dealer published regarding discussions about several projects, including the hospital, in the Midtown neighborhood: http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2009/06/competing_developmen...

I received your e-mail yesterday and thought I should hop on here to let you know that the hospital project has not fallen off our radar. It's one of many projects in Midtown that I'm keeping tabs on, and the questions you raise about how parking will fit into the development, how the project will relate to the Euclid transit line and how the hospital will fit into Midtown's zoning are important ones. Those are issues that we have asked about before, and they're issues we will continue to examine as more information about the project becomes available.

At this point, the state has not publicly revealed site plans or designs for the project. So we don't know how the regional psychiatric facility will occupy the property, or what it will look like. I'm anxiously waiting to see those plans, which I'm sure we will write about.

I have been told by planning and development officials that the state's plans for the project will go through a public review process. Typically, such a process involves design review and review by the city's planning commission. Additional approvals might be necessary if the hospital does not mesh with Midtown's zoning code, which is designed to encourage dense, mixed-use development.

Feel free to call me anytime if you want to talk more about the project. You can reach me directly at 216-999-4830.

Michelle

Thank you for posting Lee and thank you to Michelle Jarboe for responding--your article was pointed and informative.  Predictably, the plain facts are being ignored.  This is a colossal waste of our tax dollar.  We used federal dollars to encourage public transportation, not more cars and parking lots.

The siting of the mental health facility along the route is institutional insanity--feeding a one-time windfall for an architect/construction firm, capitalizing on the only game in town these days--which is to chase federal and state dollars for projects.  This project will not result in job creation--it will pull existing employees and their dollars spent from the Metrohealth facility and the Sagamore Hills facility. It will also destroy any hopes the technology center originally intended for the site.

If the hospital takes the Midtown site, the community will need to cobble together a comparable property elsewhere, Haviland said. Though the Euclid corridor is peppered with vacant land and dilapidated buildings, there are few areas where enough property could be assembled and cleaned up for a technology park or other, large-scale development.

Always the SOS in NEO--use other people's money to make money and then run like hell.

The apparent lack of transit oriented design and land use is a relatively minor problem of the psychiatric hospital proposal.

The reason I brought it up now is because many transit experts are in town for a conference through May 5th (today). What do transit experts think of even prospectivly considering land right next to a Bus Rapid Transit stop for parking, not for passengers to access the BRT, but for the hospital across the street? I'm advocating the Plain Dealer find out what members of the national transit community think of such an approach to "Transit Oriented Design." At this point I have little hope that the Plain Dealer will take such a comprehensive approach to covering this urban design situation.

A much bigger issue is the destruction of potential property values that this proposal will have, if build in Midtown. A state regional psychiatric hospital pays no property taxes. Such a facilities is not likely to attract commercial tax paying uses to the area nearby. (If the hospital is built, the largest shovel-ready property along Euclid Avenue will be removed from commercial development.)

About $200 million in tax dollars was invested to make Euclid Avenue a transit cooridor offering realtively high speed public transit through Midtown making the area a prime commercial development area.

After this investment and poised that area for commercial development, the state of Ohio, with Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson doing their bidding, plans to pump $87 million in tax dollars into a proposal that will squander the potential this area has for commercial land use made possible by the $200 transit investment.

Here is a case of tax dollars invested to destroy the value of tax dollars previously invested. If this facilities is built at E. 56th Street and Euclid Avenue, the prospect that property values increasing and property taxes collected from this land to increase will be destroyed.

  The Euclid Corridor project was also slated to be a wi-fi and digital corridor, when originally proposed.  Lev Gonick with One Cleveland (now One Community) heavily promoted the digital corridor. 

That promise died quickly when it became obvious that other interests wanted state and federal dollars to develop the Opportunity Corridor, instead.

Please see above comments--this post shows the Plain Dealer is aware of this site and aware that the site raises issues that determine our community.

Will the Plain Dealer ask and answer the right questions??

  From a Facebook discussion topic posed by City of Cleveland Planner Robert Brown:

The State of Ohio announced that it is dropping plans to build a large-scale mental health facility on a 14-acre site that the City of Cleveland had assembled and cleared for that purpose. The land is on the north side of Euclid Avenue, generally between East 59th & 61st.

If the State does not reverse its decision, this nearly "ready-to-build" 14-acre site presents an significant development opportunity for Midtown Cleveland -- complementing other new development and adaptive re-use projects that are underway and proposed along the new Euclid Corridor.

What do you think would be the best use of this 14-acre site, particularly with respect to advancing the vision of a mixed-use, vibrant Midtown district?

Really, really?! Wow-that's pretty big news.

Cleveland has spent more than $4.1 million on land assembly and environmental cleanup, only $398,000 of which was state money, Warren said. The city also budgeted nearly $1.4 million more for the project at the state's request.

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2011/02/state_abandons_plans_for_menta.html

(Sarcasm: Hey--I could use street repairs and basic services in my neighborhood--that 1.4 million would help us out...too bad we used 4.1 million on land assembly and environmental cleanup at TAXPAYER expense....but we're all good...we'll have that skate park in the flats and we can use our skateboards to get around !  Skateboarder capital of the world!!! Cowabunga! Dude!  And, ride our bikes through the snow on the new Carnegie Bridge bike lanes!!!...)

  That's a good one, Norm.  I will post that to the planning site on FB and it will undoubtably gain traction--sheesh.