Yes. I do believe this to be an accurate statement over the long run. Frankly, any major American city that solely relies on streets and highways for its transportation network will fail to remain competitive and will falter economically over time. That includes cities with bus transit systems that rely on the same streets and highways.
By rail, I am including subways, commuter rail, or light rail (tram, trolley, and modern streetcar). I am not including BRT (bus rapid transit), because they use the same thoroughfares as traditional buses and automobiles. …

It’s branding season again in Cleveland, so says the Cleveland Plain Dealer. In its 2012 editorial agenda, a main goal for the upcoming year is “[rebranding Cleveland] to change not only the look and feel of our region’s “capital city,”… but also the way the world and Clevelanders themselves look at it.”

But the branding of a Rust Belt city is tricky business, as you’re dealing with the prospect of putting lipstick on a poorhouse, or at least that’s how it can be perceived. For example, Atlantic Cities recently did a study examining perceptions of the country’s big cities, and the Rust Belt claimed six of the top ten spots in highest percentage of negative reactions, with Detroit and Cleveland claiming first and third place, respectively.

Those immortal song lyrics come from Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame inductee and fellow Hoosier John Mellencamp’s classic rock tune entitled “Pink Houses.” On my return trip to Michigan from Indianapolis on Sunday afternoon, I decided to follow the road less traveled and was fortunate enough to visit one very proud small town for an hour or so and take in some of the local history and culture.
Most small towns cannot claim a legendary icon as their native son or daughter. Charming Fairmount, Indiana, set amid a patchwork quilt of rural farms and with an population of approximately …

We write about transit on this blog a lot because we think it is essential to turning around our cities. The city of Detroit, more than others, has been undergoing a transit crisis. There are calls to finally develop a decent, sustainable system. We are hoping that they do.
In the meantime, here’s a taste of what Detroit’s transit dependent deal with on a day to day basis:

Faces of Transportation 11-30-11 from Project S.N.A.P. on Vimeo.
-A.S.

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Pretty cool video about Cincinnati’s 1970s-era “Urban Walls Movement,” when more than half a dozen large murals were painted on downtown buildings. Murals really dress up a city and give it life.

Urban Walls Cincinnati from Jacob Fox on Vimeo.
I would love to see something like this in downtown Cleveland.
H/t Urban Cincy

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I could have continued living in Erie, maybe; I quickly became used to assuming I’d be among the minority. But I couldn’t live there with a different brain. I don’t mean to imply that Erie is full of stupid people; quite the contrary. It’s home to smart business people and attorneys and nurses. I am awake to the difficulties of making a life in the Rust Belt, and awake to the wonderful lives smart, funny people do make there. But while the businesspeople may stay, the poets, by and large, leave. I eat differently, love differently, worship differently…most most importantly, I tend to value differently. I left twelve years ago not because I didn’t think I could get a job; I left because I didn’t feel welcome. That still saddens me: Gertrude Stein said famously that America was her country and Paris her hometown, which is the way it is for me with Erie and Ithaca.

My hometown of Indianapolis has been a logically designed community based on traditional geometric shapes ever since it’s designer Alexander Ralston first put pen to paper. Monument Circle (source of the ‘Circle City’ nickname) sits at the heart of the original mile square, with a radiating street pattern extending outward from there, though it becomes more grid-oriented in the midtown areas. Later, an outer loop (not circle) was created by Interstate 465 and a near perfect oval was constructed for high-speed excitement and adventure in the suburb of Speedway. Because of Monument Circle and …

Many people are not shy in expressing disdain for the kind of photography that has been branded as “ruin porn.” Though I have to say—as a Clevelander inundated with vacancy to the point one becomes forced to create a new perception of decay else shrink into a corner — I don’t get too moved by the critiques.

Why?

Well, let’s get the name thing out of the way first, because if the practice of photographing industrial and urban ruins was simply Ruin Photography as opposed to Ruin Porn then much of the debate wouldn’t exist. But it does. And we have the word “porn” to thank for it.

Check out this video tribute to Cleveland’s Randall Park Mall, recently listed on the Huffington Post’s America’s Most Abandoned Places.

I especially dig the Edward DeBartolo intro, where he claims prophetically that downtown will decline and the suburbs will rise. What is the next frontier for Cleveland? Will it continue to be farther out into farmlands? Will a return to the city really take hold in greater Cleveland like it has in more prosperous metros? Who is the Edward DeBartolo (Youngstown) of today? What would he say? Would he even bother …

This story originally appeared in HiVelocity and was reprinted with permission of the author, Rust Wire contributor Lee Chilcote.
In the heyday of Youngstown’s steel industry, wealthy families settled in the city’s Idora neighborhood, building solid, brick homes near Mill Creek Park. Trolley cars whistled down Glenwood Avenue, the neighborhood’s main thoroughfare, and shot-and-a-beer bars like the Empire Club Tavern served steel workers coming off their shifts.
Yet today, Idora’s decline is like an oft-repeated refrain from a Springsteen song. The community is packed with empty …