Tag: young professionals

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Up To Speed

MOTR ownership team to renovate Woodward Theater into 600-person music venue

MOTR ownership team to renovate Woodward Theater into 600-person music venue.

MOTR Pub has become an Over-the-Rhine destination with seven days a week of live music. The success at the small music venue has encouraged the owners to embark on a new venture, and they will acquire the vacant Woodward Theater building across the street and open a second venue. More from the Cincinnati Business Courier:

The new renovations will be extensive. McCabe plans to eliminate a staircase in the center, add a new staircase to one side, install bathrooms and bars, and build a stage that juts out into the crowd.

For bands, the Woodward would provide the bridge between smaller bars like MOTR and larger area venues such as the Taft Theatre and Bogart’s. It would also give Cincinnati a leg up in attracting musicians, McCabe said. When a band is making its way from Chicago to Nashville, it doesn’t make stops at Indianapolis, Columbus and then Cincinnati; it just picks one.

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Arts & Entertainment News

Join author of book on Cincinnati’s incomplete subway at March’s URBANexchange

Jake MecklenborgHopefully everyone thoroughly enjoyed their February and the introductory weekend to March known as Bockfest around these parts.

We will be back in the biergarten of the Moerlein Lager House tomorrow for our monthly URBANexchange event.

Last month’s giveaway was a big hit, so we’re going to do it again this month. This time we will be giving away two signed copies of Jake Mecklenborg’s book about Cincinnati’s abandoned subway. Jake will even be in attendance to talk about the book and his findings.

If you did not have a chance to participate in the Bockfest activities over the weekend, then this will be a great opportunity for you to try out the Lager House’s selection of bock beers.

As always, the event will take place from 5:30pm to 8:30pm, and we will gather in the northwestern most corner of the biergarten. If you are nervous about picking us out from the crowd, simply inform the employees at the front desk that you are there for URBANexchange, and they will direct you to the correct location.

The event is a casual atmosphere and is free and open to the public, so feel free to bring a friend. Those who decide to attend can come and go anytime during the scheduled event hours, but we do encourage you to come hungry and thirsty to support our kind hosts at the Moerlein Lager House (map) and Smale Riverfront Park.

It should be a great time to talk about city issues with all sorts of big news happening over the past month. The city’s proposed parking modernization and lease plan, Wasson Corridor, city budget, proposed 30-story residential tower, Bartlett Building hotel conversion, MLK Interchange, casino opening, and the efforts to accelerate both the Cincinnati Streetcar and Oasis Line rail projects.

If you are on Facebook, then you can connect with others attending the event by RSVPing for the March URBANexchange. See you there!

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Arts & Entertainment News Opinion

PHOTOS: Kansas City’s Surprisingly Gritty Urban Core

I visited Kansas City February 6-10 for the New Partners for Smart Growth Conference, where the people behind Streetsblog were kind enough to invite a number of urbanist bloggers out to the event.

The intent was to conduct a training session about how advocacy journalists and bloggers can better reach and influence policymakers, and how those websites can better reach non-white and lower income individuals – two demographics bloggers traditionally struggle to reach. To that end, I was asked to present on the things that UrbanCincy has been doing in Cincinnati, and how younger bloggers might be able to learn from our experiences in the Queen City.

Kansas City

It was a great opportunity, and we’ll be doing more of these gatherings in the future…hopefully hosting one in Cincinnati in the not-so-distant future.

When not collaborating with these writers and new media types, or attending the conference, I spent my time wandering about Kansas City’s urban core. I stayed in the central business district, but also checked out the Crossroads Arts District, Westside North, Central Industrial District, West Bottoms, River District, Crown Center, Hospital Hill, Westwood, Paseo West, and the 18th & Vine Jazz District.

Perhaps the largest takeaway for me was the surprising amount of industrial architecture and infrastructure in the city. I guess I should have known better since Kansas City was always a prominent industrial center and transfer point for much of the Midwest, but it was an impressive surprise nevertheless.

I think I walked 11 miles on Sunday alone, in overpowering wind at that. But the discomfort was worth it for all I was able to see, but I hope to return to check out Midtown and Country Club Plaza at the very least, and to get some more of that amazing barbecue at Oklahoma Joe’s.

If Photobucket wasn’t so lousy, you could have just viewed them in slideshow form within this post. Instead, please view all 82 of my photographs from Kansas City here.

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Up To Speed

City neighborhoods with the most single men, women

City neighborhoods with the most single men, women.

Single men and women are often in a quest to find other single men and women. The quest leads people to debate which cities are best for singles, but what is the truth behind the rhetoric, and how do you think Cincinnati stacks up? More from Atlantic Cities:

To figure out where the gender ratio is most skewed in each direction, we went right to the data and looked at the ratio of men living alone to women living alone in order to assess the dating scene. We also subtracted estimates of the gay and lesbian population in order to focus on men and women interested in dating someone of the opposite sex. Finally, we excluded people older than 65 since differences in life expectancy skew the gender ratio in the later years.

In most metros, the neighborhood with the highest ratio of men to women is in or near downtown, as well as in recently redeveloped neighborhoods like Boston’s Waterfront or Long Island City. The neighborhoods with the highest ratio of women to men tend to be more residential, like San Francisco’s Marina and Seattle’s Queen Anne, and more upscale (and safe), like the Upper East Side and Upper Connecticut Avenue. Some are near major retail centers, like Chicago’s Near North Side, the Beverly Center in LA, and Atlanta’s Perimeter Mall.

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Business News

URBANexchange returns this Wednesday to Moerlein Lager House

After a nearly two-month break, the UrbanCincy team is proud to kick-off the 2013 season of URBANexchange events.

Following a successful pilot run last year, URBANexchange will return this Wednesday for a full year of events at the Moerlein Lager House.

“Dozens of people excited about cities and Cincinnati’s urban core showed up at last year’s events, and we’re really excited about the possibilities for a full year’s worth of URBANexchanges in 2013,” said Randy Simes, Owner & Managing Editor of UrbanCincy.

2013 URBANexchange Events

UrbanCincy will be giving away prizes at each of the events in 2013, with a custom tile of Carew Tower (image) from Rookwood Pottery being given away at February’s URBANexchange courtesy of Downtown Cincinnati Incorporated.

The collection of events in 2013 will take place on the first Wednesday of each month to avoid conflict with weekly bike rides that occur in warmer weather, and when there are no home Reds baseball games. The group will always meet in the northwest corner of the Moerlein Lager House’s biergarten – closest to the ‘Moer to Go’ window and outdoor bike racks.

“We are really excited to continue to offer a monthly event where fellow urbanists can get together, share ideas, and expand their social networks,” stated Simes. “The goal with our URBANexchange events is to not create a platform for one-way presentations, but rather create an opportunity for city supporters in the region to get together and meet one another.”

URBANexchange events are always free and open to the public, and take place from 5:30pm to 8:30pm at the Moerlein Lager House (map) within Cincinnati’s Smale Riverfront Park. Those interested in attending are welcome to come and go anytime during the event, and friends are always encouraged.