News & Updates: Newsroom

RTA News

 

Oct. 17, 2006

 

Complete Euclid Avenue project will be validated

Joseph A. Marinucci & Joseph A. Calabrese

Originally published in Crain's Cleveland Business, 10/16/06

 

Sometimes it is hard to envision a future that is so entirely different from the present. For people walking or driving downtown along Euclid Avenue — our time-honored Main Street — that challenge seems to ring true every day.

 

The current flurry of construction on the $200 million Euclid Corridor Transportation Project may seem a bit confusing. In fact, it may be challenging now, but the results will be extraordinary and well worth the temporary inconvenience.

 

Downtown property owners, employers and merchants chose downtown for all the right reasons, and their decisions will be further validated once this major facelift is finished.

 

The benefits of the Euclid Corridor project — the first of its kind in the United States — will lead to a city reborn. This unique urban transportation system will feature clean, quiet and futuristic-looking rapid transit vehicles transporting riders from Public Square to University Circle every five minutes during peak hours.

 

Riders will board the Silver Line vehicles at spacious, weather-protected stations along a beautifully landscaped median. Real-time vehicle status will be posted on electronic signage. Fare collection will be fast and simple: riders will pay at meters before boarding. In addition, touch-screen kiosks at high traffic and pedestrian areas will feature historical audio profiles of Cleveland neighborhoods.

 

The project is determined to create a more livable community through dramatic design elements. Landscape architects studied the grand boulevards of other American and European cities before adopting their innovative concepts for Euclid Avenue. For a glimpse into the future, one only has to visit Playhouse Square, where the decorative brick sidewalk installation has begun.

 

The new streetscape will include a median, as well as new sidewalks, lighting and more than 1,500 trees. Also under construction are distinctive crosswalks and exclusive bicycle lanes on both sides of Euclid between Cleveland State University and Case Western Reserve University.

 

The pièce de résistance is some $1 million in spectacular public art. This beautification effort will complement the $150,000 that the Cuyahoga County commissioners awarded earlier this year to the Downtown Cleveland Alliance to refurbish three of the quadrants on Public Square to make it more inviting and safe.

 

Yet, these amenities are the just tip of the iceberg. The RTA estimates public and private capital investment along the corridor will be more than $1.3 billion.

 

This investment is spurring a remarkable growth in office rentals and residences. And, at East Ninth and Euclid, a large, new county administration building will rise on the old Ameritrust property.

 

As one considers the short-term inconvenience, remember that thousands of well-paid construction workers are busy on the Euclid Corridor project and at spinoff projects, such as at Cleveland State University, where a $200 million master plan promises several new buildings, including an impressive new student union by 2009.

 

Another vital Cleveland State project will be a joint effort with the RTA: the East Side Transit Center at East 22nd and Prospect Avenue. This airport-like environment and related retail shops will provide a safe and convenient environment for RTA riders waiting for buses near the campus.

 

Cleveland State intends to someday build a field house atop the transit center and connect it into the Wolstein Convocation Center. This will complement a modernized Innerbelt, which will bring another $1 billion in construction work here over the next decade.

 

Still, the Euclid Avenue renaissance is more that just bricks, mortar and motors. Property owners last year voted to form the Downtown Cleveland Improvement District and the Downtown Cleveland Improvement Corp. In turn, they are allocating some $3 million annually to the Downtown Cleveland Alliance to market and enhance downtown.

 

The alliance’s most visible effort has been the Clean and Safe Program, whose cleaning ambassadors in bright blue and gold uniforms help keep our downtown streets free of trash and graffiti.

 

Safety ambassadors patrol streets on foot or bicycle while maintaining contact with the Cleveland police and dispensing information and directions to visitors.

 

In the end, it is important for all Greater Clevelanders to plug into the community spirit that has made Cleveland such a successful city over the generations: the ability to look to the future and see what great things will come from hard work, patience and tireless perseverance.

 

FOR MEDIA INQUIRIES ONLY:

Jerry Masek, 216-566-5211