Thursday, August 04, 2005

 

Millworks Gets Boost


The Mixed-Use project, Cincinnati Millorks near 'Center of Cincinnati Shopping Center' got a boost from council today, as they voted to allow the developer to request Tax Increment Financing (allows developers to use money generated by increased property value tax receipts to repay public improvement on projects - things like roads, sewers, etc). This is needed to allow the project to go forward. The next step is to define the TIF agreements and get council's approval on the specifics when they return in September.

Hopefully this project will break ground before the end of the year. It is to include a new movie theater, a jungle jim's and several hundred thousand sq. ft. of retail.

Comments:
It looks half-way decent for a fake urban development. I like that it's an adaptive re-use of existing buildings, but they still have acres upon acres of parking and no residential mixed in to actually create a continuous urban vibrancy. It's really no different from a typical big box, strip mall development except that it's internally-focused and they'll *shock* have natural light coming in through the skylights of the old buildings. (Because people used to know how to light spaces in the middle of the day without wasting energy.)

It's still far better than the crap that Vandercar threw up.
 
We need something like in the north of downtown...something like Newport on the Levee, but actually in Cincinnati. That would really help revitalize our poor image...don't we havea few blocks of condemned buildings we could raze to build something like this? Perhaps where the ball stadium was going to go?
 
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