Much like the Public Square redesign, the pedestrian bridge has long been hailed as a sort of red carpet infrastructure project for the big Republican party in 2016. Neither — and this really does need to be stressed in January 2015 — neither project has visibly begun in earnest.
County leaders publicly confirmed that, were Cleveland not to approve their funding by the first week of December (and they didn’t), the project timeline would need to be crunched to get the work done in time for the RNC. That race against time — what one local bookie is now terming “Big Money” — should be fun to watch this year.
(Meantime, Hotel Cuyahoga is rising at a pretty good clip [one skeletal floor per week, according to project leaders]. That flagship Hilton hotel, built to literally become one with the Cleveland Convention Center and Global Center for Medical Mart Innovation, is the centerpiece of RNC regalia. You’re paying for it, county peeps, so do take some time to enjoy the rooftop bar at the very least.)
ANYWAY. The Land Bridge o’er the Amtrak Line, by all accounts, is happening. Calls for the county to undertake a one-week pedestrian study have gone unheeded. Critical questions posed to the architect and to county legislators in November went unanswered. “What rationale was used?” one local activist asked at the time. He ended up just walking back to his seat amid silence.
Nevertheless, through funding hiccups and wryly ineffective public meetings, the pedestrian bridge is touted as a harbinger of Change, of the New Cleveland.
This article appears in Jan 7-13, 2015.
Which of the three proposals did they decide on?
*Armond Budish, the new Cuyahoga County Executive, has not responded to an e-mail (January 5) asking how building a new $25 million Lakefront Pedestrian and Bicycle Bridge when we already have two existing crossings (East 9th and West 3rd) is consistent with his statement made at the January 4, 2015 Inauguration, a ceremony which I attended:
“WE must work to save money and eliminate wasteful duplication, both with both county government and our 59 local communities”.
*The proposed bridge using the cable-stayed option — is a jointly funded project: $10 million each from the City of Cleveland and Cuyahoga County, and the balance of $5 million from the State of Ohio.
*Bonnie Tuwen (Director of Public Works, Cuyahoga County) never responded to my question raised at the 11-13-14 public meeting:
“What rationale was used to justify a new bridge when we already have three existing crossings – of which two are operational?”
I added that Norman Krumholz (former member, Cleveland City Planning Commission, and former Prof. in the Levin College of Urban Affairs) – an opponent of the project had also raised a similar concern – that there was no justification for the new bridge.
*Public projects should be justified based on needs. A justification would include a traffic study that would show that the two existing bridges (East 9th and West 3rd) cannot handle the volume of pedestrians and bicyclists in the area and thus a new bridge would be needed.
Because a justification, based on a traffic study, does not exist – neither the US Department of Transportation, nor the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) are contributing any funds for the project. This was confirmed to me in e-mail correspondence with ODOT.
The $10 million share from the City of Cleveland will be coming from a $100 million bond issue. Cuyahoga County has not yet decided where their $10 million contribution will be coming from. The $5 million share from the State of Ohio will be coming from the General Fund for capital projects.
We will be building an unnecessary bridge when we already have two fully operational existing crossings in a city with a 37% poverty rate.
Way to go Cleveland, Ohio – no shortage of stupidity in this city.