Category: Development

Categories
Development Opinion

Horseshoe Casino Cincinnati requesting 80-foot sign

On Wednesday, the City of Cincinnati’s Zoning Hearings Examiner will hear a request from the owners of the new Horseshoe Casino asking for the city to grant several variances to the city’s sign ordinance for signage at the casino site. Casino representatives are asking for more signage and larger signs than the current ordinance allows.

A variety of signs are included in the package including three signs that will display a real-time count of available parking spaces in the casino garage, and a monument sign that will located along Gilbert Avenue and rise 80 feet in height.

The sign, which is 943 square feet in size, exceeds the maximum allowed signage by 678 square feet in total area and 64 feet in height. According to the plans, the sign will be illuminated and visible along I-71 and up Gilbert Avenue into Walnut Hills, as well as parts of Mount Auburn and Mount Adams. For reference, the sign will be taller than the six-story building currently housing casino construction offices at Broadway Street and Eggleston Avenue, and will dominate the skyline view looking south from I-71 like a peculiar star above the Greyhound bus terminal.

In requesting for the sign variance, casino officials argued that they need the site to be visible to drivers along I-71. Once erected, the sign will tower above the casino complex and adjacent highway as a beacon of hope and good fortune to gamblers, and serve as a landmark to those traveling through downtown Cincinnati.

Residents living along Reading Road and in Mount Adams will also be able to bask in the comforting warm neon glow emanating from the sign at night. In fact, some may never need a night light again!

Some neighborhood leaders have raised concerns that the meeting is being held without enough notice for neighborhood councils; however, it seems to be in the city’s interest to get this sign up as soon as possible so suburbanites have plenty of lead time to know exactly where the casino is and how many parking spaces are free in its breathtakingly massive parking garage.

Already, out-of-towners are looking to flock to the casino but are unsure of its exact location.

“I was approached by a woman at the airport the other day and she asked me where the casino was being built,” disclosed UrbanCincy Chief Technologist Travis Estell. Thankfully, the woman will now know where the casino is with this gargantuan sign!

Springboro resident Chris Cousins also shared his enthusiasm for the proposed sign saying, “I’m really looking forward to dining at the casino’s buffet and this sign will point me in the right direction.”

The meeting will take place Wednesday, October 24 at 9am in the Permit Center located at 3300 Central Parkway (map). This facility is served by Metro’s #20 bus route.

Categories
Arts & Entertainment Development Transportation

New time-lapse video captures movement of people and machines in Cincinnati

Friend of UrbanCincy and regular URBANexchange attendee, Andrew Stahlke, has produced a new time-lapse video of Cincinnati.

The video showcases construction work at the $400 million Horseshoe Casino, Little Miami Scenic Trail, Eden Park Overlook, boats on the Ohio River, circus training at Burnett Woods, freight activity at the Queensgate Railyards, construction of the new $66.5 million Waldvogel Viaduct, fans at Great American Ball Park, and many other scenes from around Cincinnati.

Stahlke is currently enrolled in the Masters of Community Planning program at the University of Cincinnati, and originally studied civil engineering at Case Western University.

The video, entitled Paths and Nodes: Cincinnati, attempts to capture the life of the city as people and machines move about, and was shot in early fall 2012. It is a nearly three minutes in length, and features music from Little People.

Categories
Business Development Transportation

Cincinnati City Leaders to Move Forward with Ohio’s First Bike Sharing System

A new study, prepared by Alta Planning + Design, has determined how and where a bicycle sharing system could be implemented in Cincinnati in a way that will compliment its expanding Bicycle Transportation Program.

The recently released report was called for by city leaders in May 2012, and identifies a 35-station, 350-bike system that would be built over two phases in Downtown, Over-the-Rhine, Pendleton, Clifton Heights, Corryville, Clifton, Avondale and the West End.

“We went into this study wanting the public to be a big part of the process. They contributed more than 300 suggestions for stations and cast nearly 2,000 votes,” said Michael Moore, Director of the Department of Transportation & Engineering (DOTE). “Thanks to all their input, this study helps ensure bike share is relevant and useful to the residents and commuters in the downtown neighborhoods.”


Several neighborhoods throughout the city were determined as potential areas to be included in a future Cincinnati bike share system. Map provided by Alta Planning + Design.

City officials also say that locations throughout northern Kentucky’s river cities were also popular, and would make for a logical expansion in the future should system arrangements be achieved.

According to the report, the 35 station locations were identified through public input and through a variety of suitability factors that include population density, percentage of residents between the ages of 20 and 40, employment density, mixture of uses and entertainment destinations, connectivity with existing and planned transit networks, and the terrain in the immediate area.

“In general, there are enough positive indicators to suggest that bike sharing is feasible in Cincinnati,” Alta Planning + Design wrote in the 49-page report. “There are no fatal flaws, although a smaller dependency on visitors and ordinances restricting advertising would need to be overcome to make the system financially viable.”

The financial viability of the project is particularly important in Cincinnati’s case as city officials have determined that a privately owned and operated system would be the best business model for Cincinnati.

Alta Planning + Design estimates that the potential 35-station system, spread throughout Downtown and Uptown, would cost approximately $2 million to construct and nearly $200,000 to operate annually. While user fees are expected to sustain a portion of the annual operating costs, system operators will most likely need a variance to city law to allow for advertising on the stations, as is commonplace for bike sharing systems throughout the world.

     
More than 2,000 responses helped determine public support for potential station locations [LEFT]. The initial system would be built out over two phases in Downtown and Uptown [RIGHT]. Maps provided by Alta Planning + Design.

“As of now we do not intend to invest any public funds in the system, other than in-kind assistance with marketing and station siting,” explained DOTE Senior City Planner Melissa McVay, who recently sat down to discuss Cincinnati’s bike culture on Episode #8 of The UrbanCincy Podcast.

Annual membership fees and hourly rates would be determined by the eventual company selected to operate the system, and would be contingent upon how much money could be raised through advertising and local sponsorships.

In addition to drilling into local details and demographics pertinent to a potential Cincinnati bike sharing system, the feasibility study also compared Cincinnati to other cities throughout North America that have operational bike sharing systems.

Through that analysis it was found that Cincinnati’s system would be smaller than those in Miami, Boston, Washington D.C., Montreal and Toronto, but that it would be larger than systems in San Antonio, Des Moines and Chattanooga. Cincinnati’s system is also anticipated to have a more favorable trip comparison, for the first year of operation, than both Minneapolis and Denver.

The report also estimates that Cincinnati’s system would attract 105,000 trips in its first year of operations, with that growing to 305,000 in year five once both Downtown and Uptown regions are operating, with approximately 25 percent of trips replacing a vehicle trip.

“We want Cincinnatians to be able to incorporate cycling into their daily routine, and a bike share program will help with that,” Moore explained. “Bike share helps introduce citizens to active transportation, it reduces the number of short auto trips in the urban core, and it promotes sustainable transportation options.”

The City of Cincinnati is expected to issue a request for proposals, within the next month, that will call for bids from an operator of the planned system. If all goes according to plan the Midwest’s sixth, and Ohio’s first, bike share system could become functional as early as the operator’s ability to acquire funding.

Categories
Business Development News

Phase two of The Banks set to begin construction in early 2013

[This story was originally published in the October 5, 2012 print edition of the Cincinnati Business Courier. You can read that story online for additional comments and discussion about the forthcoming phase of work at The Banks – Randy.]

Developers of The Banks hope to break ground in early 2013 on the next major phase of construction work at the $600 million development.

Following the success of the $91 million Phase 1, newly revealed designs for the riverfront development call for an additional 300 apartment units, more than 60,000 square feet of street-level retail and more than 400 parking spaces at the block southeast of Race and Second streets, said Libby Korosec, spokeswoman for The Banks development team. The structure is one building, but appears to be two, sitting on a three-story foundation.


The next major phase of construction at The Banks is planned to get started in early 2013. Rendering provided.

The Banks development team has until now been quiet about the design for the second major phase. According to principals at the Preston Design Partnership, an Atlanta firm selected by Carter for Phase 2 design work, the designs have received approval from Cincinnati’s Urban Design Review Board after two “productive” meetings over the course of the summer.

“The review board liked the concept, but they thought we had watered down the idea across all of the elevations in terms of its 3D massing,” said Edsel Arnold, senior design principal with Preston Design. “They also wanted us to look at how the structure appeared within the city skyline view, and were worried that some of the original color on the building would look too cold in front of the city skyline.”

Taking the board’s comments into consideration, Arnold said that the team went back to the drawing board to better match color schemes with the surrounding cityscape and build upon their design concept.

Building reflects city’s grid, riverfront
The end results include more gray and light blue colors to match existing buildings in the Central Business District. With a strong emphasis placed by the UDRB on integrating the designs of Phase 2 with the city skyline in mind, the colors were considered a critical element.

Arnold said the three-story base of the building will include brick to match that of other nearby structures and also offer some variation in the building’s use of materials. The two structures that will rise from the base will largely be made up of grayish-blue glass and vertical white columns.

Preston’s concept was influenced by the unique convergence of Cincinnati’s orthogonal grid street system with the organic curves of the central waterfront, Arnold said. It was this design concept that led to an eye-catching curved glass façade on the north side of the 10-story structure.

“Being from Atlanta, we were struck by the way that the city comes out of the plain and comes out to the water’s edge,” Arnold explained. “We decided it would be fun to play a strong curve along one of the walls, and let the other three sides play up more of the grid system of the city.”

To that end, the remaining three walls will be flat, as is true with most buildings in downtown Cincinnati. And a popular design element carried over from Phase One, balconies, will be incorporated onto the building’s western and southern façades to take advantage of city and river views.

From here, the design team will return to the design review board for final approval later this fall.

“We don’t have a schedule set for Phase 2 yet, but we are pleased with the progress being made on the development overall,” Korosec said.

Developer still seeking hotel, office deals
Project officials also say that they continue to work on negotiations for a potential operator for a hotel tower and tenants for an office tower planned to be built within the footprint of Phase 1 work. Townhouses planned to front along the Schmidlapp Event Lawn are also pending financing.

Once complete, the $2.5 billion public-private development partnership will transform Cincinnati’s central riverfront with 3,000 new residents, 1 million square feet of commercial space and 300,000 square feet of hotel space. The first major phase of construction work was completed in 2011 and has been considered a major success by city officials and the development team, with 100 percent of its apartments leased and about 92 percent of its 96,000 square feet of retail space occupied.

Those who would like to access more premium content from the Cincinnati Business Courier can take advantage of UrbanCincy‘s exclusive subscriber discount. The discount allows readers to get full access to all of the Business Courier‘s premium content for 52 weeks at the cost of just $49.

Categories
Development News Transportation

Cincinnati officials are looking for design ideas as they work to cap urban highway

Billions of dollars of public and private investment has transformed Cincinnati’s central riverfront over the past decade. What was once a flood-prone industrial center turned unusable waterfront property, is now home to a new park, neighborhood, museums, and professional sports venues.

The investments made to date have been so successful, in fact, that they are creating spinoff investment in the Central Business District. A remaining hurdle, however, is the crossing of Third Street, Fort Washington Way (FWW), and Second Street.

The nearly 300-foot span of roadways was significantly reduced in width when Fort Washington Way was reconstructed in 2001, but the span remains a visual barrier for many of those in the Central Business District or at The Banks.

Cincinnati officials are looking to build off of recent success by capping Fort Washington Way. Photograph by Randy A. Simes for UrbanCincy.

The problem was expected by city officials, in the 1990s, during original planning efforts for the central riverfront’s transformation. As a result, city leaders worked to raise $10 million to construct pile foundations that could one day support a cap over the interstate highway running beneath street level on FWW.

The pile foundations are capable of extending 600 feet over the highway roughly between Elm Street and Main Street. According to engineers who worked on FWW’s reconstruction, the caps could support the weight required for a park, or built structures depending on height and building materials.

No specific development plan for the caps has been developed however, and now the city is launching a design competition called Connect the Blocks to establish a vision for space.

“The Banks is well underway, downtown is growing, and now we must begin thinking about what we as a community want to see over Fort Washington Way to connect downtown and the riverfront,” City Manager Milton Dohoney stated in a prepared release. “We must first have a common vision of what we want, then we can establish the roadmap to get there.”

The national competition is calling on architectural, engineering and design professionals to create and submit concepts and cost estimates for the caps that are to be built over FWW. According to city officials, three to five finalists will be selected and awarded stipends to further refine their designs.

St. Louis has dealt with similar issues as it has tried to bridge the divide created by I-70 between downtown and the Gateway Arch grounds. While I-70 will not be capped entirely, a one block portion is envisioned to connect Jefferson National Expansion Memorial with Kiener Plaza in the CityArchRiver 2015 plan.

In Ohio, the only similar example of such a project exists in Columbus where a $7.8 million cap was constructed over I-670 along N. High Street. It includes approximately 25,000 square feet of street-level retail and connects Columbus’ downtown with its Short North district.

The City of Cincinnati held the first of two public meetings, on the design competition, last Wednesday in Madisonville. The second meeting is scheduled to take place on Tuesday, October 9 at 6pm at the Main Public Library (map). The public is also invited to weigh in on the process by participating in an online survey going on now, and officials also say that the public will be invited back to view the finalists’ designs once they are selected.

Full details about how to participate in the eight-month design competition can be found on the project’s website. The implementation of any winning design, officials say, will be dependent upon the availability of funding.