Pop City Posts on Lack of Flights, Cleveland & Columbus Hope For European Service, Why Can't the Greater Region Support A Major International Airport?

Another year and the same old story as individual airports around the greater region bemoan the inability to attract better national and international air service. More plans for tax subsidies to bribe carriers into providing service.

From Pop City

Want to turn Pittsburgh into a power player? Make flying to and from easier

"In 2013, Pittsburgh International had air service to just 36 destinations; many were connecting airports where passengers get on another plane to get where they really want to go. And that’s what drives Spitz Cohan crazy. She said her guests might not have the best experience when visiting Pittsburgh if they’ve missed a connection or suffer jet lag from trips prolonged by layovers."

New service is planned to Toronto but there is a decent chance it may not last.

An official for the Allegheny Conference, Ken Zapinsky answers with a sad, bunch of excuses and rationalizations.

“If there was a direct correlation between level of air service and economic success, Newark would be doing a heck of a lot better,” 

Newark International Airport is right across the Hudson from NYC, which doing pretty well.

An official from Vist Pittsburgh says"

“We compete with Louisville, Cleveland, Columbus, all of which are two stops away,” Davis said. “Of similar cities, only Charlotte and Baltimore have better air service than Pittsburgh.”

Isn't that the problem? We are competing with other similar sized regional metros instead of combining to compete against coastal mega-metros. 

Zapinsky at least admits the negative impact the lack of better service likely has.

"At issue is the potential for things to happen, according to Zapinski. Maybe a local company decides against expansion because it’s too difficult to get to the West Coast. Maybe a German company looking to grow never considers Pittsburgh because there are no direct flights. “What you can’t measure is how much better Pittsburgh would be if we had more air service,” Zapinksi said. “The real impact is in the lost opportunity for a Pittsburgh company that could have had a client fly nonstop from San Francisco or Los Angeles and cut a big deal that leads to revenue of $5 million.”

Pittsburgh isn't alone. One can find countless stories about the same need in Cleveland, Akron, Columbus, Cincinnati, Indianapolis and Louisville.

From Cleveland.Com

Cleveland to Europe: Airport director says push is on for transatlantic flight

The hope is they can land a non-stop to London.
But it's too early to rush out and apply for a passport.
Any effort to land international service will likely take at least two years – perhaps longer – from now until takeoff.

And many important questions remain unanswered:

* What airline and what European destination?

* Will the community pony up the cash necessary to convince an airline to take a risk on Cleveland?

Others see beefing up domestic flights as a higher priority:

 Joe Roman, president of the group, (Greater Cleveland Partnership) said members are telling him their No. 1 travel-related priority remains restoring domestic service eliminated by the closure of United Airlines' Cleveland hub last year.

Cleveland Hopkins Airport director, Ricky Smith says:

Smith said he is convinced Cleveland can support a nonstop flight to Europe, despite Continental's assertion that the routes weren't profitable in 2008 and 2009.

"There was a perception that the local market couldn't support those routes," said Smith. 

"That simply wasn't true."

The flights were unsuccessful, in part, Smith believes, because the schedules were inconvenient for some business travelers and the planes were smaller and less comfortable than larger jets flying out of bigger cities.

Meaning that the current Cleveland airport market can't fill larger, more comfortable planes and frequent flights.

Of course if you bribe airlines with cash or a guarantee, you can get service

"Communities the size of Cleveland aren't getting international service without that kind of financial assistance in place," said Smith. 

It's too early to say what those economic packages might include, said Smith. "The offers would differ based upon the destination, frequency of service and even the type of aircraft," he said. Ideally, they would include a mix of private and public money. 

Thomas, with the Greater Cleveland Partnership, said he didn't know whether the business community would be willing to subsidize a flight. "We haven't asked," he said."

Same issues in Columbus.

Nonstop Port Columbus flight to London? It may happen

"Whitaker believes Columbus has a chance because “We are the fastest-growing city in the Midwest," and the support of Columbus 2020 and the business community it represents adds “a lot of value to our presentation.” 

Other cities in the mix are Indianapolis, Nashville, St. Louis and Cleveland, Whitaker said, adding, “I’d be surprised if they selected more than one.”

Indianapolis? Seriously, an airport located around Dayton would serve the total Indianapolis, Columbus, Cincinnati urban triangle.

My comments on Pop City:

"Sad and ironic that Cleveland and Columbus have the same issue. 

Poor air service, reflects the insular mentality of regional cities, each trying to have their own "international airport".Logically Cleveland and Pittsburgh should share a major airport located around Youngstown. Likewise, Columbus, Cincinnati and Indianapolis would be better served by a major airport around Dayton." 

My following comment looking at some of the numbers.

 "A search shows that all the regional cities have marginal international and national service and almost all are subsidizing what they have. Detroit, is the only significant "Rust Belt" airport outside of Chicago. How is a huge, densely populated area not able to support more service? 

The Cleveland/Akron/Pittsburgh metros have a combined 5,863,000 residents. Adding the Youngstown/Warren/Boardman/Sharon CSA brings one close to 6.8 million people. Add Erie and it goes up again. Even if I added wrong, the numbers should be more than adequate to support much better air service.  

Columbus, Dayton and Indy's greater metros combined create an even stronger case for sharing a major airport."

 Smaller local airports can pick up some the shorter distance flights but in the long run most transit between cities under 500 miles would be best served by a strong rail system.

I may be back with follow up posts on the hope that someone is listening.

A Look at Last Week's Lawn-Con Outdoor Comics Festival in Youngstown

From The  Youngstown State Student Newspaper, The Jambar

"Yambar’s Lawn-Con began in the artist’s own yard years ago. Now, for its fifth year anniversary, the convention resided at the B&O Station in Youngstown.

Yambar is a painter, writer, cartoonist, publisher, designer and recorder. He is best known for his comic, “Mr. Beat,” and his involvement in “The Simpsons.”

The convention offered national and indie comic creators a place to showcase their work and their talents — as well as live music, stand up comedy, portfolio reviews, local wrestling acts and a cosplay contest for all attendees."

........

"Yambar believes that Lawn-Con will continue to grow as long as the population as a whole harbors a love for creativity and, deep down, hopes to see the Bat Signal in the night sky or the USS Renegade spotted next to Hubble Space Station. "

If you attended, please share your thoughts in the comments.

Call for Submissions: Essays, Nonfiction for Youngstown Anthology

Belt Magazine is gaining a reputation for putting out great writing and reporting about the "Rust Belt".

Next Anthology: Youngstown!

A call for submissions and proposals

Proposal deadline: October 1, 2014

Submission deadline: November 1, 2014

Publication date: Fall 2015

"We are accepting nonfiction contributions, including essays, profiles and reported works between 500 and 2,000 words that fit with the vision expressed above. Proposals of no more than 300 words are also welcome. We will work with writers on pieces that show promise.Payment will be $100* upon publication.

Contributions are needed for the following sections:

• Family (culture, neighborhoods, attachments)
• Loss (violence, steel, racial and ethnic conflict)
• Transcendence (arts, sports, religion)
• Work (new business, new politics, redevelopment)

We are also looking for work from documentary photographers and graphic artists with a Youngstown connection. Work will be published in black and white. Poetry will be considered, but the bar is extremely high. Please do not submit works of fiction."

All details here: http://beltmag.com/car-bombs-cookie-tables-youngstown-anthology/

The Idora Park Carousel Barely Escapes Hurricane Sandy

The already bittersweet story of the last remaining gem from Youngstown's Idora Park came close to epic tragedy. After decades of decline, the park burned to the ground in 1984, with the last major remanant, an amazing carousel bought by the wife a wealthy NYC developer. Finally, fully restored and placed a few feet from the water's edge in a small park under The Brooklyn Bridge. From The Daily Beast

The 48 horses and four chariots that make up what’s now called Jane’s Carousel—after Walentas—brought delight to children at Idora Park in Youngstown, Ohio—then a prospering steel town—in 1922. After the city declined along with the steel industry in the 1970s, a fire consumed the park, but spared the historic carousel—in 1974, it became the first one ever listed on the National Register of Historic Places—which went up for auction in 1984.

The Walentases scooped up the bruised and battered carousel for $385,000, and it was shipped in parts to New York City in 1984, and the horses were stored for much of the next few years in individual stalls in the basement of David’s building at 45 Main Street.

Told by experts, the Carousel would be safe from a 100 year storm, Sandy a mere category 1 Hurricane almost washed it away.

There, in Brooklyn Bridge Park, on a three-foot high pavilion that usually stood 30 feet from the river’s edge, the waters whipped up by Hurricane Sandy were engulfing the carousel she had cared for over decades.

Check out the scary images.

Cool Cleveland Seeking Northeast Ohio Musicians For Videos

No, this is not exactly gonna be a high paying gig, but they do mention a small stipend and "big exposure". You know how this works, if your music stikes the right cord, you could be a viral star.

Wanted: Northeast Ohio Area Musicians

Cool Cleveland is putting together short videos on each of the cool neighborhoods in the region, from C-Town to Y-town, from the Football Hall of Fame to the Rock Hall, from Oberlin College to Lake Erie Wine Country, from Highland Square to the Erie Islands.

If you’re a musician or a band from Northeast Ohio and would like to have your music featured in one of our cool videos, we’re looking for you to help make these mini-movies relevant, energetic and enjoyable. All styles will be considered, especially uptempo. We’re not sure there’s a “Cleveland sound,” but we’re looking for it.

More details here.

See the Sweet New Locally Made Bike Racks In Youngstown

I Will Shout Youngstown, has a few images up of the new bike racks in Youngstown. IMHO, this design is way above average-very beautiful. In spite of a pretty subtle YO reference, these look to me to be exportable.

Anybody seen these in person or used them? Who made them?

Rebuilding the Cities That Built America : Pittsburgh, Youngstown, Cleveland Regional Conference : May 21st

Actually registration for this free event is now closed but at least I can say I gave you a heads up about it a week or two ago. I will be attending. They have done things like this before, usually in Youngstown, but this seems to be somehow bigger and more "serious".

■ Advancing an Older Industrial Cities National Policy Agenda
■ Land Acquisition Strategies
■ Regional Rail, Local Transit: A panel discussion on the benefits of transit for all
■ The University/City Connection
■ Strategies for Creating Greener, Sustainable Cities
■ Changing Times for CDCs
■ Making the Case, Taking it Home: What you can do to bring rail to the region
■ Community Organizing: Going Wide and Going Deep
■ Restoring Prosperity: Transforming Ohio’s communities for the next economy

A long list of speakers.

Co-ordination of regional arts assets not on the official agenda. Also, no mention of regional media either. (even though, small scale grass root things like The Sprout Fund and The Penn Avenue Arts Initiative and alternative media like POP City and Cool Cleveland have been so productive.)

Found a website for Rebuilding The Cities That Built America ,where they drop this bomb. I mean, straight up honesty like that is pretty rare. IMHO--Federal Government Policy and The Root Shock it caused is by far the single biggest factor in the destruction of America's cities, neigborhoods and entire civil society.

"As early as the 1940s, the Federal Government, led by agencies such as the Federal Housing Administration and the Department of Transportation, established policies that spawned suburban flight. As people continued to flee older industrial cities, they left behind cities ill equipped to adequately deal with the plethora of abandoned and vacant property. Since then, cities have resorted to dealing with vacant properties as best as their miniscule resources allow as they do not have sufficient funding to implement policies that will lead to sustainable development and community regeneration. Residential streets plagued with large, unsightly gaps between houses stand as silent witnesses to the cities whose budgets do not permit them to rebuild after they demolish properties, while properties that cannot be demolished decay and often become safety threats that they city has no means of repairing. Such unavoidable neglect has resulted in declining property values for the entire city, which has made businesses hesitant to invest in the area, and eventually has led to rampant unemployment, crime, and poverty.

Until recently older industrial cities largely have been neglected by the very government that created the conditions that led to their dilapidated state. However, vacant property has now become a national issue that the Federal Government cannot afford to ignore any longer, and a new piece of legislation introduced by Congressmen Time Ryan (OH17) and Brian Higgins (NY27) and Senators Sherrod Brown (OH) and Charles Schumer (NY) gives these cities reason to hope for restoration. The legislation, entitled The Community Regeneration, Sustainability and Innovation Act of 2009 (CRSI), would provide distressed communities with the resources necessary to implement large scale changes that will approach the issue holistically, thus restoring these cities to their former thriving condition.

CRSI encourages cities to adopt a holistic regeneration model that is used by communities worldwide. It will strongly encourage multi-jurisdictional or regional approaches to transforming vacant and abandoned property. This approach supports policy innovation, experimentation, and environmentally sustainable practices through collaborative efforts to reuse vacant properties in ways that will provide long-term benefits to the public, whether it is through the creation of green infrastructure, economic development, or other strategies. Implementation of such strategies will help reverse the over thirty year trend of depopulation, skyrocketing unemployment rates, and urban sprawl."

Anyway, I gotta go and have some hope this is a good networking opportunity and a chance to see a little bit of Youngstown. Not every city and small town has is gonna have major Research University or a pipe of federal or state cash. Doing more with what you have is the real deal wave of the future and Youngstown is doing that.

Hunter Morrison: Who Defines Northeast Ohio?

The truth is I don't know enough about this subject to wade in here but what he says rings very true. What we have here is neither Pittsburgh+ or Cleveland+ but a series of very significant communities often holding priceless assets we need to figure out how to use better and build on.

Don't let some ex New Yorker, and a few other Pittsburgh residents talk about what's going on in your town.

If you have thoughts, events, insight or images you want to share about art, music, film, urban design, architecture, transit or history in the Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Youngstown, Erie, Morgantown, Akron, Canton region--Cleveburgh, email me diggingpitt@gmail.com. We can hook you up to post.

This is not Hyper Local media, but regional media seeking local viewpoints.

Yinz Cleveburgh And Random Art Links Late April- Early May

A truely random assortment of stuff I came across in the last few weeks. Many very important conferences in which people in Cleveland can hear about all the great things the political class has cooked up for them now.

Also, a very serious Cleveburgh Pow Wow in Youngstown that could lead to some great networking.

Cleveland



CNN visits the nation's biggest indoor mountain bike park--In Cleveland, a great and so far very successful example of creative reuse in just the kind of properties Cleveland seems to have a lot of. Please, please don't tear too many of these babies down if you can help it.

Terry Schwartz, of the Kent State Urban Design Collaborative and founder of Pop Up City Cleveland, participated in a long open forum chat about urban prospects, TOD and other stuff at Pheonix Coffee. A report on Extraordinary Observations.

"Schwarz thinks struggling neighborhoods should be deregulated to the point where property owners can essentially do whatever they think would turn the neighborhood around. There's definitely some compelling arguments in the case that outdated zoning laws and other regulations don't allow for the types of recovery in neighborhoods that they need."

Cleveburgh Talk

Burgh Diaspora, has a post loaded with Cleveburgh thoughts. Hmmmm, too much to digest and respond to yet.

My general feeling "Cleveburgh", however you describe it or define it, has a number of cities and assets in too close a proximity for us to be ignoring each other. There sure seems to be a lot of comparative advantage and synergy. One place has coal or gas, another water and rail links, a cluster of technical knowledge, in nuclear power, medicine, robotics, fuel cells, steel, materials science, urban planning or product design. Also, the plain bottom line is that Ohio's massive supply of good flat land is just a better sight to build a lot of stuff which sooner or later we are going to get back to. People like Carnegie and Henry Ford, figured that out long ago.

Brewed Fresh Daily wonders about Cleveland's hyper negative major media and if perhaps the regional narative is now shifting towards Youngstown/ Akron and Pittsburgh. (If Cleveland at least for now has dropped the ball, it's likely better that it's picked up by Akron or Pittsburgh than NY, Mumbai and Hong Kong.

"The region’s new narrative will emerge elsewhere…from places like Crain’s, Med City News, NEOTropolis, Youngstown Business Journal, Pop City, CoolCleveland, and blogs like Defend Youngstown (Phil Kidd), I Will Shout Youngstown (John Slanina), Burgh Diaspora (Jim Russell), and Pittsburgh, Youngstown, Akron, Cleveland Arts and Livable Cities Blog.

Cleveland’s traditional leadership has been lost for some years now. That’s why the regional conversation about Northeast Ohio’s future is shifting to Akron, Youngstown, Lorain and Pittsburgh. As brother Hunter points out, people are drawing new mental maps of the region, and Cleveland, while still important, is no longer at the center."

Youngstown

The city celebrates the opening of a new arts "incubator" in a very sweet old school building--The Calvin Center Idea Incubator which will house a number of perforiming arts groups. (So far, I can't find a website for it yet)



May 21st Rebuilding The Cities That Built America:

A major conference and workshops with activists, business people and regional leaders from across Cleveburgh. Totally free but you must register.

Some Pittsburgh and Cleveburgh Artist Links Up

You might have noticed the evolving sidebar, now includes a somewhat more rational breakdown of my link list. Media, and blog links are separated from other arts institutions and now there are links to a sampling of local artists which will get a bit longer.

I will not be linking to every artist in Pittsburgh. This list is an attempt to show some of the richness around here but it's also a bit tilted towards artists that have achieved some level of "success" beyond the local area. They do exist and more are coming. Artists are rarely considered to be a significant economic asset in the region.

Also, one may have noticed that I included a lot of people who's work blurs the line between art and technology. It's entirely possible that the next big job creating tech startup will emerge from one of these artist's efforts. Obviously, a lot of these people have "day jobs" in those fields and are feeding off a growing community here.

Corruption And The Rust Belt

Rust Wire asks what role corruption plays in depressing local economies. It refers to this 2007 piece by Transparency International.

"According to economist Sanjeev Gupta, national corruption lowers economic growth and per-capital income, despite the argument that a certain amount of corruption can “grease the wheels” of the economy by circumventing bureaucratic regulations.

“Corruption increases the cost of investment for entrepreneurs who need to devote their scarce time and resources to fulfilling government regulations and bribing officials,” Gupta writes. “This cost can be high for small and medium-sized enterprises.”

“Second, corruption acts as a barrier to foreign investment and results in the flight of capital out of a country. The use of public funds to acquire assets abroad shrinks the economy’s savings pool that could otherwise be used for investment. This has repercussions for future generations, particularly in resource-based economies.”"

While, the role of corruption, the lack of clear rules and transparent institutions is almost universally considered a big drag on developing countries, Few have the guts to say it might be one of the biggest factors depressing the "rust belt" and even fewer try to do much about it.

Yet another big public scandal in Cleveland repeats a common theme in places like Ohio and Michigan.

"Damiani, a close ally of County Auditor Frank Russo, orchestrated the arrangement in which his law firm had near-total control over V.A.S. Enterprises, the commercial real estate appraisal firm that got more than $21 million in contracts with the auditor's office over a decade, according to federal prosecutors. V.A.S. did only $9 million in work, according to an audit released last week.

One of Russo's top aides has admitted taking $154,000 in bribes and helping to funnel $1.2 million in kickbacks to Russo from the Damiani-connected firms. In return V.A.S was awarded contracts to perform commercial audits, according to charges and plea agreements."

The Transparency International story suggests that the costs of opaque and corrupt government may fall hardest on small business people who lack inside connections, or political power. Small business job loss is much harder to guess at than big business, but it's very, very bad.

Clearly, at least by what's currently known we are not in Cleveland's league, but let's just say that transparency isn't big here.